Economic Civil Disobedience

Economic Civil Disobedience

John Asimakopoulos, Ph.D.

Abstract
Working class strategies for greater equality have focused on co-opted incremental policies within
the existing capitalist institutional framework. The outcome has been increasing levels of
inequality and poverty. It is argued that militant direct action detached from current institutional
and legal frameworks would have a significant impact on inequality via a new strategy of
economic civil disobedience (ECD). Such actions include disobeying restrictive labor laws
(Taylor Laws; Taft-Hartley; the National Labor Relations Board), mass organized stormings of
corporate stores & warehouses, high stakes tax-resistance, financial actions, and electronic civil
disobedience. These strategies are suggested as a supplement to traditional work actions which
are also encouraged at higher levels of militancy i.e. mass & sympathy strikes, slowdowns,
sabotage, militant picket lines, plant occupations, etc.
Keywords:
Economic Civil Disobedience, Social Movements, Direct Action, Wealthfare
Introduction
Today there is no labor movement in America other than a disorganized motley crew of unions and
activist groups. The old radical labor movement (up to the 1940s) has been coalesced into the
institutional framework of the capitalist system. Now, instead of leading the militant rank and file, labor
leaders suppress them (Aronowitz 1992; Brecher 1997; Mills 1971); unions in order to obtain contracts
gave up the right to strike; more importantly, labor gave up on political action that would challenge the
ideological hegemony of capitalism (Brecher 1997). It opted instead for Samuel Gompers model of
business unionism while aligning itself with the Democratic Party. However, at the heart of any labor
movement is the organized resistance to private property rights (Perlman 1966). By accepting the
institutionalization of class conflict, workers have de facto submitted to capitalist principles, thus,
legitimizing an inherent ideology of control and inequality (London 1989/90).
Unfortunately, experience suggests that this is a failed strategy as many writers from the 1970s
onward have documented the steady decline in working class incomes, benefits, job security, and overall
living standards (Davis 1986; Harrison and Bluestone 1988; Mishel, Bernstein and Schmitt 1997). For
example, in 1969 the Gini Ratio for households was 0.391 compared to 0.466 in 2004 (U.S. Census
Bureau Gini Ratios for Households). The poverty rate for families in 1969 was 9.7% compared to 10.2%
in 2004 (U.S. Census Bureau Historical Poverty Tables). The unemployment rate in 1969 was 3.5%
compared to 6% in 2003 (U.S. Department of Labor). Unionization rates declined from around 36% in the

Transformative Studies Institute

Economic Civil Disobedience

1940s to under 12% currently. Globalization has accelerated these trends. Meanwhile, the share of
aggregate household income received by the top 5% jumped to 21.4% in 2003 compared to 16.6% in
1969. (U.S. Census Bureau Historical Income Tables). What, then, are workers to do in the face of an
unresponsive union leadership, globalization, and downsizings into service jobs? Is the future destined to
become one of a McDonaldized world with Wal-Mart wages?
Unions and activist groups need to engage the working-class and cultivate a movement from
below according to Anarcho-Syndicalist and Gramscian principles. The only people that can help workers
are themselves through class-consciousness and organized resistance to capitalism. Unions need to
capture workers imagination and awaken them from their slumber not through empty rhetoric but through
radical actions with real risks and real outcomes. The working-class needs to engage in a new radical
economic rights movement detached from the existing institutional and legal frameworks through workers
organizations which are not covered by the now anti-labor National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) (Lewis
2004). This new movement should be modeled on the U.S. civil rights and labor movements of the past.
These movements are an appropriate model because they were effective due to their radical nature.
Specifically, they challenged existing institutional frameworks through societal education, civil
disobedience, violent resistance, and militant ideology (Asimakopoulos 2005). Therefore, we need a new
militant working class strategy of direct economic civil disobedience with the determination to violently
resist reactionary state violence.
The concept of economic civil disobedience originates from Anarcho-Syndicalist principles which
historically advocated the use of militant direct action, including the use of strikes, sabotage, workplace
occupations, boycotts, etc. According to Rocker:
Political rights do not originate in parliaments, they are, rather, forced upon parliaments from
without. And even their enactment into law has for a long time been no guarantee of their
security. Just as the employers always try to nullify every concession they had made to labour as
soon as opportunity offered, as soon as any signs of weakness were observable in the workers'
organisations, so governments also are always inclined to restrict or to abrogate completely rights
and freedoms that have been achieved if they imagine that the people will put up no resistance.
Even in those countries where such things as freedom of the press, right of assembly, right of
combination, and the like have long existed, governments are constantly trying to restrict those
rights or to reinterpret them by juridical hair-splitting. Political rights do not exist because they
have been legally set down on a piece of paper, but only when they have become the ingrown
habit of a people, and when any attempt to impair them will meet with the violent resistance of the
populace [italics added]. Where this is not the case, there is no help in any parliamentary
Opposition or any Platonic appeals to the constitution. (1938:111-12)
Another early anarchist made one of the first links between direct action and civil rights (Voltairine 1912).

Economic Civil Disobedience

Much of the mass movement literature suggests that militant direct action does have an impact
on power holders. Fording (1997) reviews this literature starting with the work of Piven and Cloward
(1971), who argued welfare spending increases in response to civil unrest in order to pacify the poor.
They believed action would be more effective when the protest group has access to/yields electoral
power. Fording (1997), using a pooled time-series model, confirms that violence is more effective than
conventional means in obtaining concessions. He found that the effectiveness of violence, including
looting, rock throwing, beatings, vandalism, arson, etc. depends on four factors. These are the size of the
insurgent group, its relationship with broader society, the presence of democratic institutions, and the
insurgent groups access to these institutions.
Today, the conditions for successful use of militant civil disobedience with the determination to
violently resist state attacks given by Fording are present for labor. Thus, we need a new form of militant
direct economic civil disobedience capable of exacting significant financial blows to Capitalism. Direct
action must be at an increased level of actual and threatened use of violent resistance to increase the
effectiveness of achieving working class goals. However, most mainstream academics, activists, and
labor leaders oppose militant direct action that would seriously hurt, cripple, or even bankrupt
corporations. It is as if labor has become a parasitic organism that can only live off of corporations (Mills
1971). This is a fundamental mistake related to the general lack of class-consciousness in America. In
addition, when writers do suggest that labor engage in civil disobedience they propose non-violent actions
such as protest marches. For disobedience to be an effective tool of change the one being harmed
cannot be the protester but the protested. This is difficult to achieve with non-violence alone. Instead,
citizens must engage in actions that have a direct, immediate, significant, and quantifiable impact on the
power holders. Only when the power holders realize that their authority and financial interests are directly
threatened will labor be in a position of extracting significant gains.
Globalization unfortunately has privileged multinational corporations relative to a national
workforce making it difficult to financially impact such corporations with localized or even national level
strikes alone. The primary reason is that multinational corporations can easily shift production to a
number of their global plants (Adler 2000; Davis 1986). Therefore strikes have become an ineffective
means of inflicting financial costs upon corporations, not to mention Americas anti-labor laws. This is
why we need to find additional means through which to inflict a financial toll on anti-labor corporations
such as Wal-Mart. To achieve this labor must be re-radicalized and broaden direct action into new socioeconomic spheres and at higher levels of conflict.
Militant direct actions which are proposed as a basis of a new economic civil disobedience
movement include disobeying restrictive labor laws (Taylor Laws; Taft-Hartley; the NLRB); mass
organized stormings of corporate stores, distribution warehouses, and banks; high-stakes tax-resistance;
and financial actions. These strategies are suggested as a supplement to traditional work actions which
are also encouraged at a higher level of militancy such as mass and sympathy strikes, work slowdowns,
sabotage, militant picket lines, plant occupations, etc. All of these actions attack capitalism at its core:
private property.

Economic Civil Disobedience

Disobeying the Law
First, economic civil disobedience must include disobeying biased labor legislation. When trying
to subvert militant resistance to an ideology of inequality and domination political systems often quote the
rule of law. But what if the legal framework is part of the problem to begin with? Once it was illegal to
have a union, to strike, or for women and blacks to vote. Now we need to continue the civil rights and
labor movements by challenging anti-labor legislation. These laws have been mostly conceived, written,
promoted, and voted in by capitalist institutions and their representatives (Domhoff 2002). Malcolm X for
example made the following analogy regarding civil rights and law in America which can be applied to
labor currently:
When you go to Washington, D.C., . . . to pass some kind of civil-rights legislation to

correct

a very criminal situation, what you are doing is encouraging the black man, who is the victim, to
take his case into the court thats controlled by the criminal that made him the victim. (1965:53)
Specifically, labor law reflects anti-labor policies making many important working-class rights
illegal. For example, the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 forbids secondary or sympathy strikes and boycotts.
This greatly reduces the economic impact of strikes and working-class solidarity across firms and
industries. The re-organization of the NLRB has made it very cumbersome to legally establish a union,
therefore, limiting union growth. Also, NLRB v. Mackay Radio & Telegraph (1938) is used to permanently
replace striking workers with strike-breakers. Taylor Laws deny public employees the right to strike.
Finally, because labor contracts include a no-strike clause, workers are not allowed to strike for the
duration of the contract. Labor law in America is so restrictive that many have argued workers would be
better off without it (Flood 1989/90; Lerner 1996).
But, when a group is oppressed by law it has the right to actively resist (Thoreau 1969). For
example, the most significant organizing victories in recent years were won by hospital and farm workers
which are not covered by the NLRB and by public employees that engaged in illegal strikes resulting in
jailings of their leadership (Lerner 1996). Thus, workers and the poor need to reject such legal
frameworks whose compliance is actually based on only two factors: false class-consciousness and state
violence. When the first fails through education and vested interests of the elite are challenged, the state
is quick to use violence.
The following exemplify the bias labor laws and why they should be defied by the working-class.
For example, the law permits revolving doors between government and corporate office despite clear
conflicts of interest; use of bankruptcy law to break unions, cut wages, and lay-off thousands; the use of
prison labor; subsidies to wealthy corporations; the giving of multibillion dollar public resources to
corporations for free; corporate looting of pensions; massive corporate tax breaks, evasion, and
loopholes, just to name a few. What the law does not permit is secondary or sympathy strikes; a

Economic Civil Disobedience

simplified unionization process; the prohibition of strike-breakers; and the universal right to strike any time
to name a few.
Tax Resistance
Second, economic civil disobedience must target the state as the political power base of
capitalists. State violence is routinely used to protect elite interests when these are threatened. This
makes the state a legitimate target for direct action. Ideally, the working-class should try to take peaceful
control of the state which is possible given the basic democratic structure of the U.S. This, though, is
unlikely given Americas winner-take-all electoral system and the absence of a major working-class
political party. Therefore an immediate strategy should focus on depriving the state of its financial
resources to undermine its ability to engage in violence. This can be done by depriving the state of its tax
revenues through various kinds of tax resistance strategies. Iraq for example, has cost us over $455
billion as of September 2007not counting the cost of human lives (National Priorities Project). For
FY08, $193 billion has been requested for war expenses in Iraq and Afghanistan. Compare that to the
$6.8 billion spent on Head Start for FY 2005 (Head Start Bureau) or the fact that America is the only
industrialized nation without national health care. Tax resistance, though, must be at much higher levels
than that of groups which usually practice it. How can this be done and is it moral? To answer this lets
see what corporations and the wealthy do so that we may learn from them.
Where a corporation is based makes a difference on how it is taxed. Thus, many of Americas
largest companies have moved incorporating themselves in off-shore tax havens usually Antigua,
Bermuda, or the Cayman Islands. The company headquarters does not physically move. It is all done on
paper using a P.O. Box located in one of those nations. According to Zepezauer (2004) Tyco
International did it saving $400 million as well as companies like Pricewaterhouse Coopers and the
infamous Arthur Andersen. As a result, between 1983 and 1999 Americas top 10,000 corporations saw
a 735% increase in profits thanks to off-shore incorporation. Also, companies can open offshore bank
accounts again protecting funds from U.S. taxation. It is estimated that American companies have
upwards of $3 trillion dollars deposited in these accounts.
Transnationals also reduce their tax bills through transfer pricing. A company sells goods or
services to itself at very high prices in high-tax nations and very low prices in low tax nations, thus,
transferring profits to the low or no tax nations. For example one company bought from its Brazilian
subsidiary a bottle of salad dressing for $720 while another sold a missile launcher to its Israeli subsidiary
for $22 (Zepezauer 2004). As a result of these tax strategies, loopholes, tax breaks, special exemptions,
etc. corporations in America account for 15% of the federal governments general revenues down from
about 31% in the 1950s (Zepezauer 2004).
The richest 1% of Americans own about half of all stock while the bottom 80% own only 4.1%
(Zepezauer 2004). The rich, though, do not benefit from these tax strategies only through their stock
holdings. It is not enough that companies like Microsoft:

Economic Civil Disobedience

Paid no tax at all in 1999, but reported $12.3 billion in U.S. profits. General Electric paid just 11.5
percent of profits in taxes during the last five years WorldCom paid no taxes in two of the last
three years while reporting $15.5 billion in profits. (Public Citizen 2002,
http://www.citizen.org/documents/corporateabusetax.pdf)
Instead the rich avoid paying income taxes as well. For example, according to the IRS, 101 millionaires
paid nothing in income taxes in 1996 (Lewis and Allison 2002). In addition, there is the regressive nature
of many types of taxes such as the Social Security tax which is levied only on the first $87,000 of income.
Thus, billionaires pay Social Security tax only on their first $87,000 of income whereas a school teacher
earning less than $40,000 has all of that income taxed.
All this teaches us that working-class people should file the creative types of tax returns that
corporations do. We could all reduce our weekly tax withholdings by claiming two or three additional
dependants. For example, if you have no children think of your pet as a child and claim that additional
exemption. If done on a massive scale, it would be difficult to police and review which claimed
exemptions are legitimate and which are not. In addition, working-class people should file itemized tax
returns, expensing anything real or imaginary such as a childs Happy Meal (lets call it a business meal),
family vacations (business travel), and whatever else the imagination can conger up.
Organized Stormings
Third, economic civil disobedience must directly target the corporation as the productive power
base of capitalists. The elite use their ownership of the means of production to reap profits by exploiting
workers through low wages, temporary and part-time work, and little to no benefits. Today wages are not
even sufficient to cover the cost of necessary labor. Workers have no healthcare or other basic benefits
necessary for a healthy family life nor are poverty wages adequate for the working-class to raise children
and reproduce itself. In 1968, one person working full-time at the minimum wage would come pretty
close to the federal poverty level for a family of four. Today that same full-time, minimum-wage job takes
a worker up to just 56% of the poverty line (Zepezauer 2004:136-37).
The riots of 1992 in LA and the civil rights and old labor movement era were characterized by
massive looting and anger (Brecher 1997; Cole 1999; Rossi 1973). At their core these events were a
revolt against the unfairness of the system. People were angry and frustrated lashing out any way they
could against the perceived power holders attacking their private business property. What is needed
today is a well organized plan of mass lootings. People must organize to loot major retailers, such as
Wal-Mart, for as long as they refuse to become socially responsible employers. This should be done with
organized stormings of stores with designated guards and coordinators warning employees and
customers not to interfere. Also, this would bring direct action to the power holders doorsteps generating
broader news coverage. Lootings should also not target small businesses as in all honesty these are not
the power holders. What should be targeted though, in addition to corporate retailers, are the

Economic Civil Disobedience

corporations producing these products. For example, General Motors and other corporations have their
own warehouses from which they distribute products to retail outlets. The working-class needs to target
these distribution centers as well. Lastly, the strength of this tactic is that participants can conceal their
identity to avoid prosecution. Let the exploited expropriate the exploiters.
Brecher (1997) argues that the common threads among mass strikes like the Seattle General
Strike of 1919 are a challenge to existing authorities, workers tendency to direct themselves, and
development of worker solidarity, in other words, Anarcho-Syndicalism. Since workers do not own the
means of production, mass strikes aim toward the control of production. This means replacing societys
power holders, making mass strikes a revolutionary process. It is suggested that working-class people
and unions also focus on the other side of the production equation which is output. Thus, selfmanagement and expropriation of private productive property should be supplemented with efforts to
expropriate outputs as with organized lootings. Therefore, the common thread between mass strikes and
economic forms of resistance like looting is that both attack the economic power base of the elite
challenging the legitimacy of corporate private property. But, is this a new idea? No. Corporate looting
has been practiced for a very long time and at a much higher cost by corporations themselves.
To this day corporations routinely loot the poor through poverty level wages, no benefits, and
even through the use of prison labor. Corporations also loot the treasury via their tax strategies which
deprive government of recourses for social spending. In addition, corporations loot government funds via
wealthfare in the form of subsidies, handouts of public resources, military waste, and fraud. The only
difference with the type of looting proposed is that most of the corporate looting is legal.
According to Zepezauer (2004), corporations in America receive approximately $815 billion a
year in wealthfare from the Federal Government alone compared to $193 billion for welfare for the poor
(including food stamps, housing assistance, temporary aid to needy families, legal services corporation,
low-income energy assistance, head start, and WIC). Corporate wealthfare includes $224 billion in
military waste and fraud. From 1985 to 1995 the Pentagon does not know what happened to $28 billion
of its own money. Contractors routinely overcharge the Pentagon e.g. McDonnell Douglas sold metal
nuts worth less than a dollar to the navy for $2,043 each. Pentagon audits found Halliburton had over
$1.422 billion in questioned and unsupported costs (Pleming 2005). Appearing before a Congressional
panel in 2003, a 20 year veteran for military procurement, said it was "the most blatant and improper
contract abuse I have witnessed during the course of my professional career" (Eckholm 2005:A9). In
addition, the top 10 weapons contractors have all admitted or been convicted of fraud yet continue to do
business with the government. The only company ever suspended was GE which was the worst
offender. The suspension lasted five days (Zepezauer 2004).
In addition, there are the massive subsidies to logging, mining, nuclear, aviation, agribusiness,
and other companies e.g. 43% of Archer Daniels Midlands profits come from subsidized products. On
top of that we have a giving away of public resources to corporations for free or far below market value.
For example, media companies, including GE owner of NBC, are given public airwaves valued at over
$14 billion a year for free provided they serve the publics interests. The problem is The definition of

Economic Civil Disobedience

public interests has become so loose today that the chair of the FCC (Federal Communications
Commission) says that he has no idea what it is (Zepezauer 2004:98).
Compare all this to the annual cost of shoplifting by consumers estimated at $10 billion and
employee theft at $15.1 billion (National Retail Security Survey 2002). According to the same survey, bad
checks, cash shortages, and credit card charge backs all together amounted to about 1% of annual
retailer sales in 2002. Of course, if an individual is convicted of such offenses they could go to jail but not
corporations for their looting activities. So how do companies get away with their theft? The answer is
institutionalized corruption.
For one, these corporations make massive political contributions including bribes. What is more
disturbing, because it is legal, is the direct staffing of key government positions with corporate executives
despite clear conflicts of interest (Domhoff 1975; Domhoff 2002; Mariolis 1975; Mintz and Schwartz 1985;
Mizruchi 1992). In fact, corporate executives are often put in governmental positions responsible for the
policing of the very industries they came from. For example, Vice-President Dick Cheney, was
Halliburtons CEO. Halliburton received the largest Iraq military contract estimated at over $7 billion
without a bid process and then engaged in unsubstantiated charges and overcharging.
Of course, anyone would notice immediately that these corporate McPoliticians are not scholars
and thus policy would be drafted by experts in the publics interests. The problem is that the think-tanks
and various policy institutes from which these McPoliticians obtain legislation and advice are dominated
through staffing and financing by the same corporate elite. Domhoff (2002) documented how the
conservative right, representing capital, makes consistent efforts to influence public policy. This is
achieved by their de facto monopolization of major think-tanks, foundations, and advisory groups through
their deep financial funding and staffing. For example, The Council on Foreign Relations, The
Conference Board, etc., are all major policy formation groups with deep ties to government and mostly
dominated by corporate executives and members of the upper-class.
Financial Resistance
Fourth, economic civil disobedience must directly target financial institutions which are the
financial power base of capitalists. Major banks and corporations use their financial power to legally and
illegally defraud people and the government treasury alike. Under-funding or looting pension funds and
using chapter 11 bankruptcy to break unions are a good example of such legalized financial fraud.
Corporations and the wealthy, though, also engage in financial theft. The list of frauds, theft, conspiracy,
and financial collapse is staggering. The king of fraud is undoubtedly Enron, once the 19th largest U.S.
Corporation under CEO and long time Bush friend Ken Lay. According to McLean and Elkind (2003),
Enrons top management engaged in systemic company-wide fraud to hide losses. One strategy was to
move losses to off-shore paper companies. Another way the company made money was through
conspiring with power plants to limit power supplies effectively manufacturing the California energy crisis.
The crises drove up the cost of electricity for citizens and profits for Enron while costing the state of

Economic Civil Disobedience

California $6 billion in overcharges. When the Enron con game was about to implode the company
raided employees pension funds.
Enron, however, was assisted in its looting of employee pensions, the public, and government by
major financial institutions such as Citigroup, Merrill Lynch, and J.P. Morgan Chase and the accounting
firm Arthur Anderson which were fully aware of what was really going on. These companies conspired
with Enron out of greed for their very lucrative fees or what we would call bribes. J.P. Morgan Chase in a
series of lawsuits and investigations agreed to pay back $3.3 billion. Arthur Anderson was convicted of
obstruction of justice (later overturned by the Supreme Court) and is now virtually debunked. Two Merrill
Lynch executives were also convicted of fraud for their enabling role in the Enron scam (Creswell 2005).
Other major frauds that we know of include Tycos Dennis Kozlowski (CEO) and Mark Swartz
(CFO) who looted more than $600 million and were convicted of grand larceny, falsifying business
records, securities fraud, and conspiracy. WorldCom (later MCI) CEO Bernard Ebbers was convicted of
an $11 billion accounting fraud and agreed to divest personal looted assets worth more than $45 million.
Adelphia founder John Rigas and son Timothy (CFO) agreed to forfeit their looted personal assets valued
at over $1.5 billion and were convicted of conspiracy, bank fraud, securities fraud, and looting the
company and its investors. Global Crossings founder and Chairman Gary Winnick together with top
management falsified financial documents and agreed to repay $19.5 million while Citigroup agreed to
pay $75 million for its role in the collapse.
But why target with direct action financial institutions such as banks in addition to the corporations
that have engaged in financial abuses? It is well documented that these top financial institutions form
direct and indirect interlocks with the board of directors of Americas top corporations (Allen 1977;
Domhoff 2002; Mariolis 1975; Mintz and Schwartz 1985; Mizruchi 1992; U.S. Senate Committee on
Governmental Affairs 1978b). This allows banks to function as coordinators and facilitators of capitalist
interests (Domhoff 1975). For example, banks are the major stock voters in over 122 top U.S.
corporations (U.S. Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs 1978a). This reduces competition among
corporations and it creates common business agendas. Financial institutions also assist in formulating
unified political agendas for corporations and the wealthy (Domhoff 1975). Thus, financial institutions
function as ringleaders for forming a unified and highly conscious corporate-capitalist class (Domhoff
1975).
Second, these financial institutions usually issue the credit cards of major retailers and other
businesses. Thus, if there is a work action say at Wal-Mart why not target financially its credit card
issuer? This is another way of forcing capitalists to put pressure on other capitalists that are targeted by
worker action to settle the dispute as with a sympathy strike. Third, these financial institutions are also
responsible for scams and frauds against the credit card users themselves. There is ample data on
unreasonable late and other fees, usury interest rates, bate-and-switch offers, etc. which defraud
consumers and especially working-class minorities (Ross and Yinger 2002; Rummel 2004).
Obviously, working-class people have neither the skill nor access to commit frauds of such epic
proportions. Some suggested strategies, though, include deliberate worker organized credit card frauds

Economic Civil Disobedience

including claiming the card was stolen and refusing to pay for charges. Why target credit cards with direct
action? Who owns and issues credit cards: the same major financial institutions that enabled major
corporate fraud at Enron, WorldCom, etc. For example, over 72% of the credit card market is dominated
by the top five credit card companies including Citigroup Inc. and J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (Starkman
and Mayer 2005). In addition, banks as the representatives of financial capital should also be targeted
with organized lootings. The working class should storm the volts of bank branches distributing the cash
to the needy and charitable organizations.
The working-class should also take advantage of bankruptcy laws. Its time for workers to use
the same laws to their favor. For example, there are still many people that consider it a matter of honor to
avoid bankruptcy. Unions and other organizations should actively encourage and help people file for
bankruptcy. Of course bankruptcy laws for corporations differ from those for consumers with the latter
recently changed to be more restrictive. People should also refuse to make student loan, car, mortgage,
and other loan payments when downsized, on strike, or victims of poverty wages with no benefits. And if
the repo-man comes for the house or car let communities say no. Why not have a borrowers revolt as
the modern equivalent of Shays Rebellion and the 1830s land-rent revolts?
Finally, viral direct action/electronic civil disobedience should also be used by organized workers
against corporations. It was posed in the mid-1990s by the Critical Art Ensemble as a way to match the
de-centralized and de-territorialized nature of contemporary capitalism, particularly financial capital (Arditi
2004:13). Examples would include virus attacks, hijacking websites, shutting down corporate computer
systems, etc. Why not hijack Wal-Marts web site and advertise its labor abuses. This would deprive
these corporations of sales, inform the public, and probably get the attention of the mass media furthering
the spread of the message. For example The Electronic Disturbance Theatre, a pro-Zapatista group,
developed the FloodNet software to engage in acts of ECD: in 1998, they flooded the then President
Ernesto Zedillos webpage with the list of people killed in Acteal (Arditi 2004:13). Why not hack into
secret company files and learn what the companys financial books really look like? Gathering of
strategic information is done daily by the FBI and CIA against us and other governments. By corporations
themselves against each other (corporate espionage) and us (computer cookies which are legal practice).
Electronic civil disobedience would also offer the working-class the opportunity to share resources,
organize, and promote knowledge. It also provides a greater opportunity for political involvement to those
who are politically disenchanted by the available political options and structure (Arditi 2004).
Conclusion
In order to secure greater gains for the working-class a new radical economic civil disobedience
movement is needed to supplement strike action in ways that increase the corporate cost of refusing to
address workers demands. It is only by attacking the corporate bottom-line that workers today can have
any hope of obtaining living wages and benefits as a start.

10

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Given the globalization of the production process, the U.S. working-class needs to take the lead
and fuel a renewed effort to challenge capitalist ideology and global structures from within America as
was done by the civil rights and old labor movements. You cannot have islands of socialism in a capitalist
world. Such islands like Europe will ultimately be out-competed by the lowest cost production regions.
To stop the race to the bottom we must first change the power structure within the current global
hegemon and then push for global reforms of capitalist institutions like the WTO. For the American
working class to achieve true changes toward equality workers need to develop class-consciousness
which in turn can be transformed into class-solidarity. This implies moving from becoming aware of ones
class position to becoming willing to act on it in solidarity with others. Unions must stop expending limited
resources on strategies that are bankrupt such as political contributions. For example, the Republican
and Democratic parties from Clinton to Bush have passed free trade agreements with virtually no labor
protections despite labors intense lobbying. Instead, our funds must be used for organizing combined
with worker education to raise class-consciousness.
Workers have more power than they realize other than the ability to withhold their labor power
which is what the old labor movement did through general strikes. As a class, workers can also withhold
their political participation in an inherently biased political system denying it the illusion of legitimacy. This
is what the civil rights leaders did when they refused to conform to segregationist laws through civil
disobedience. Workers also have a third power: to withhold their economic participation in biased
economic structures. This can be done through the new radical forms of resistance outlined here. To be
successful the working class needs to realize that all of these tools of resistance such as secondary
strikes have been legislated out of existence by the elite because of their effectiveness. Wal-Mart will not
provide living-wages unless it sees a fundamental threat to its private property and the bottom line.
Historically power holders have violently suppressed actions which fundamentally challenged
their interests (Brecher 1997). Worker actions that had an impact on the bottom line have been
addressed with armed forces. Racial protests that evolved into meaningful challenges of existing power
relations have also been suppressed through reactionary violence. Thus, when and if the working class
engages in new radical action it can expect violent reactions by the power holders. It is this violence that
we must resist with violence of our own to bring about fundamental change. Finally, even if such action
does not result in the immediate attainment of our goals it at the very least stops the deterioration of our
condition. This is a neglected point in the debates over the effectiveness of radical resistance: what
would be done had workers not shown their willingness to fight back? How much worse would things be
when power holders do not expect resistance to their policies?
What should we fight for? A guaranteed minimum living standard for all (including housing and
income); universal healthcare; fair trade legislation; full-employment policies; industrial democracy as
through works councils; eliminating wealthfare; repealing the fiction of corporations as legal persons for
accountability; prohibiting corporate involvement in the political process; legislating independence of news
media from corporate control/governance. These demands alone would revolutionize the labor
movement in the United States first and the world later.

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Economic Civil Disobedience

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