by B.S.Ph. and الحوت, May 7, 2025, 15:00 ///
We are at a crucial nodal period in history. The imperialist system that has dominated the world for centuries has reached its most dangerous, but also fragile, state.
On the one hand, there is not a single place on Earth that has not been invaded or influenced by imperialist countries. The two wings of imperialism: its politico-military apparatuses and the economic/financial system, have sustained this barbaric, racist, and exploitative system all over the world. On the other hand, this expansion makes the imperialist system fragile because it can be fought anywhere, on any soil. Whether on university campuses in the US, in the streets of Ouagadougou, or on the Red Sea coast, the imperialist system has nowhere to hide. Oppressed and conscious people of the world have no excuse not to resist. As Ghassan Kanafani put it: “Imperialism has laid its body over the world…wherever you strike it, you damage it, and you serve the world revolution”; Frantz Fanon elaborated: “any bystander will be a coward or a traitor”.
Before detailing what this means for student organizing on U.S. campuses, it is necessary to outline some points about the nature of the struggle people around the world have to wage to defeat this imperialist system.
First, although the imperialist system can be fought anywhere on earth, we must be clear that not all struggles will have the same quantitative or qualitative effects. The interests of the imperialist system are not spread out homogeneously across the globe. Some victories will give a blow to the imperialist economy, others will barely catch the attention of the imperialists. The October 7 attacks by the Palestinian resistance were impossible for the Zionist settler colony and its Western backers to ignore, as the operations broke the deterrence of this militarized outpost and raised the possibility of regional liberation. As Basel al-Araj emphasizes, the resistance in Gaza had developed the ability to carry out this operation under an extremely tight siege after decades of painful experience gained through successive intifadas. Meanwhile, to take an example from Chicago, the resurgence of coordinated rent strikes as an offensive tactic by tenant unions struggling against landlords is an emerging form of resistance dating to the past few months, and is yet to inflict damage on the imperialist system that would attract broad police attention.
Secondly, part of having a clear political analysis in our movement and organizing is to properly locate the vital points of the system, see if they correspond to where we are, and direct our actions and effort accordingly. All the vital points are tightly connected and interrelated so there is no room for hierarchization of struggles. Even if each struggle varies in impact, highlighting how they interconnect will strengthen them all.
Finally, we must not neglect or minimize the effort people are putting into any struggle, and we must ensure that all people understand their responsibility in the struggle. For example, it is undeniable that the people living in the imperialist core hold a key responsibility to crush the imperialist system. Just like the Carnation Revolution gave the final blow to Portuguese Imperialism after being defeated by PAIGC revolutionaries, the people in the US must understand their position and role in the struggle. Liberal “saviorist” mentalities tend to confuse movements and render them ineffective. Instead of dictating terms to people in Third World countries on how to properly struggle, the people in the metropole should understand that they are at a vital point of the system and must direct their energy towards their own struggle there. The lack of clear and precise political analysis gives excuses to the people in the belly of the beast to evade their responsibility to humanity by seriously engaging in the struggle to destroy the imperialist system.
Consequently, the responsibilities of students organizing at universities in the U.S. cannot be emphasized enough. Universities are not only dominated by billionaire imperialist “trustees”, they are an active arm of the imperialist system, both at an ideological level, and materially, such as in producing weapons technologies. The new “Quantum Campus” that the U.S. Department of Defense is working with the University of Chicago to build on the South Side is just one example. Thus, students are well-positioned to have a significant impact on the imperialist system. However, there are many challenges that student organizers will face, ranging from interpersonal, tactical challenges to conflicting political ideologies. The rest of this essay will identify these challenges and make small suggestions on how they can be overcome, in the hopes of sparking further debate.
The UChicago United for Palestine coalition, as it existed in the encampment season of May 2024, has broken apart, and relationships between organizations have taken on a new form. There were many different reasons for this, but the intensified repression that the movement has been subjected to in its different phases, as well as disagreements over tactics, strategy, ideology, and overall vision, are important factors. Some saw anarchist and horizontal organizing as the right way to proceed, not only strategically but as a matter of principle. Others emphasized the need for clear, accountable leadership with explicitly defined organizational structure to make rapid decisions and hold a political line. Some saw attentiveness to care and debrief spaces that focus on emotional and embodied processing as a top priority, while others called for theoretical and political development through reading groups. Some opposed what they saw as symbolic actions in favor of material resistance, while others saw the media as one of the most powerful tools to apply pressure on administrators’ interests. This is an oversimplification of the debates that took place, but one meant to spark conversation.
Within any political movement, there will be people with different ideological tendencies, interests, and perspectives working together, often in complex and contradictory ways. The movement for Palestine in the shape that it took since October 2023, and in particular the student-led movement at the University of Chicago, is no exception. The UCUP coalition not only included Students for Justice in Palestine at UChicago; organizers from Care not Cops, the Environmental Justice Task Force, UChicago Against Displacement, UChicago Jews for a Free Palestine, and many other groups were vital and necessary to the coalition. The participation of various organizations and individuals in the UCUP coalition was reflected in the scope of the demands of the encampment of May 2024, which included abolition of University of Chicago Police Department, reparations to residents of the South Side of Chicago, and divestment from fossil fuel companies in addition to Palestine-centric demands such as divestment from weapons contractors that arm Israel, cutting ties with the Israel Institute, etc.
But, what were the immediate demands of the encampment? How did the encampment, as a necessarily temporary project or tactic, relate to the overall strategy and goals of the movement for Palestine locally, nationally, and internationally? These questions were all subject to intense debate before, during, and after the encampment, and questions that could not be answered over the course of a few in-person meetings.
Debates and struggles internal to a movement are a potential source of strength, not just fragmentation. However, for this potential to be actualized, we need to collectively develop skills that productively channel our diversity of tendencies towards shared visions and objectives. Two skills we need to develop as a collective are:
- Writing for an internal movement audience
- Articulating political analyses that connect local developments to an international context in a specific and coherent way.
Why do we need to write? Couldn’t talking things out in meetings and within our immediate social circles be enough?
Writing is a way of clarifying political positions and proposed courses of action. When opposing perspectives are put out in writing, there will be a drive to sharpen both (or all) sides of the issue, which can ultimately help the movement as a whole develop and mature. Writing can be shared not only with comrades who are geographically distant from us, but also with future generations of organizers, aiding in the accumulation of revolutionary experience. When published publicly, it can also help combat the problem of political differences devolving into interpersonal ones, as there is more accountability for providing evidence, being specific, and speaking in a way that is relevant to the movement as a whole. It is a tool that oppressors have tried to deny the oppressed access to throughout history, which should tell us how important it is. The first demand of Palestinian prisoners who would go on to spark the first intifada from within their cells was for pens and paper.
As we write more often and better, we will also move closer to developing our own channels of messaging and propaganda. The reactionary nature of media outlets and newspapers ranging from the New York Times to the Chicago Maroon has become glaringly clear to us by this point. Social media platforms such as Instagram have their uses but also clear limitations, not the least being state surveillance and corporate censorship. The implication of all this is that, like all revolutionary movements, we need our own media outlets. The first step towards that is developing our skills as writers.
Moreover, we also need to learn to do political analysis. This is necessary for us if we wish for our international solidarity to develop beyond charity or sloganeering. To take an example, it has been common online to call for the liberation of Palestine, Sudan, and the Congo. We completely agree with the ambition and scope of these calls and agree that the struggles are necessarily interconnected. However, what is the practical meaning of these demands – what kinds of action and campaigns can contribute to the liberation of these 3 places? To answer this question, we need an analysis that links our position in the U.S. empire, and in Chicago particularly, to the situation of our international sisters and brothers. One way of thinking of this is, what and who are our common enemies? How are our oppressors linked, and what are the weak points we can target?
To end with a concrete example: The United Arab Emirates is a participant in the genocide of both Palestinians and Sudanese, the latter by way of its support to the RSF. In 2008, Mayor Daley of Chicago privatized all the parking meters, and an investment firm in the UAE ended up with a huge stake in them. So the millions of dollars that people pay into Chicago parking meters yearly are going to fatten the pockets of investors in Abu Dhabi. This is a material link you should think about next time you walk down the street or park your car – and a good reminder that the pen and the sword (or sledgehammer) are both stronger when working in coordination, towards global revolution.
Further reading:
https://allchicago.substack.com/p/rent-strike-forces-grow
https://thetriibe.com/2024/11/todays-chicago-city-council-regrets-the-infamous-2008-parking-meter-deal/
https://www.instagram.com/share/BAIGhvGxsl
https://basilmotaz.mataroa.blog/blog/on-the-claim-that-the-intifada-harmed-the-palestinians/
https://www.instagram.com/share/_2nymbKKP
https://deerwoman.press/?p=179
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