Holloway - Crack Capitalism.pdf - Libcom

take their desks and chairs out on to th str ' 'l's :l lld IWl'ill 10
implement a different sort of education. In < 'h of (h 'H' '''HI' ,
the cracks, the spaces or moments in which W' I' 'j ,.( , ( (,I'II,d
authority and assert that 'here and now we rul ', :11" Oll( I'I'OW lh,
of more limited struggles. We come up aga in st th ' lillli(H of til('
system, and the anger that is inherent in any con/li '( t" 'iv I' II,
beyond those limits to assert a different logic, a I gi ' (or I t'l'hnp
anti-logic) of self-determination. The logic of demands givI'. W,\
to the simple assertion of our own rule.
The cracks are not always a direct spill-over from n ore lillllll'"
struggles. Sometimes they arise from a conscious d isiOIl or II
group of people to reject the constraints of capitalism. It nl:1y h'
a group of students who decide that they do not want to sill jt' .(
their lives to the requirements of capital and will find WHy oi'
living against and beyond the system in so far as they ':"Ill; (II'
various groups coming together to found a social centre, bOl'h ;1S
a centre for anti-capitalist activity and as a space for develol ing
other social relations; or a group of friends who decide that t'i1 .
best way to stop the destruction of nature is to live on the i:lnd
and produce their own food bio-intensively. Often such activiti s
are part-time:4 the people in the social centre, say, devote as
much time as possible to anti-capitalist struggle, but they al 0
take jobs at least occasionally in order to survive; or the friend
who decide to live by cultivating their own food create th ir
ideal community using the pensions they have already earn d
by working. There is no purity here, but there is a comm n
rejection of the cohesive logic of capitalism, and an attempt to
create something else.
The cracks may result, then, from a conscious opting- ul',
but they may also result from a forced expulsion from capit:llis(
social relations. More and more people are being push d Ollt
of employment or finding that they have no way of b 'Ol1lilill
employed, or, if at all, then only on a very casual and PI" 'orioll,
basis. They are obliged to make their lives in other wo ys, ' l'IIl'
state systems of unemployment benefits and social ::WSiS( 1I1l '('
(where they exist) are designed to extend th dis ' i l lill(' 01
employment even to the unemployed, to ma k Sill" (hili ill('
unemployed really function as an industria I I' 'S 'I'V(' \1' 111 ,
But most of the unemployed in the world fa II 011 (si dl' (II(',('
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