Anomalous Wave

These two videos are from the university of Rome, La Sapienza, where hundreds of students stopped the inauguration of the academic year by occupying Aula Magna in the administration building. “Barons out of the university!”

There’s an interesting article titled "How to generalize the Wave?". It takes up the urgent questions of the Wave, which is preparing for the general strike of 12 Decembre: how to generalize the strike? Or: would it be better to talk about generalizing the Wave, instead? The article is written by Gigi Roggero and published on the Uniriot website 30 November 2008. This is a brief summary of the arguments of the article:

There was an assembly at the university of Bologna in preparation for the the national demonstration of 14 November 2008. There was a student from Torino who was asked to tell about their experience of giving out flyers at the gates of Mirafiori, the legendary car factory of Torino. His reply surprised everyone: "Look, the extraordinary element is exactly the opposite: the workers are the ones who are coming to the gates of the university, looking for ways to organize themselves like the wave".

The classical slogan "unity of students and workers" has been overcome. This does not mean to trace a linearity between the factory and the university. This means that today, this unity does not constitute itself in the solidarity from outside, but it lives inside the new composition of labor. Not only: often it goes through singular biographies, because the worker is also student, and vice versa.

The student between the education market and the labor market is immediately a worker. The point is to become a class of students through a movement. The wave is a class movement.

However, the problem how to relate to workers (or rather: other subjects of the composition of labor in which students are included completely) being posed in the assemblies continuously.

The question is, how to generalize the slogan "we won’t pay for the crisis". This slogan has immediately been capable to speak a general language.

We should not forget that it was the power of the anomalous wave that obliged the reluctant CGIL to declare the general strike.

In the last years the movements of the precariat have asked themselves: how to generalize the strikes of trade unions? Now, the strike of 12 December must be a step forwards. On this level of subjectivity, we turn the question upside down: how does the union help the workers, of which the student from Torino was talking, to generalize the anomalous wave, in other words: to become anomalous wave?

If replying to this question, no union can keep its representative function: unrepresentability and autonomy are common features of the entire class composition.

Instead, the union can put its structures in the service of self-organization and political expression of labor. There is no other way: the other alternative is to become an actor subordinate to Partito Democratico, or for some, to become appendixes to the dead Left.

Here we’ll see who are allies of the Wave, who are subjects capable to generalize the slogan ("we won’t pay for the crisis") which is immediately a political program, or rather: a program of the class.

Friday 28 November 2008. This was another day of mobilization of the Wave in Italy. Here’s some info what happened in Rome (source: Uniriot website).

Hundreds of Sapienza students went to Aula Magna (in the administration building) and blocked the inauguration ceremony of the academic year. "There’s nothing to inaugurate!" The only thing worth inaugurating is the self-reform of university which the students and precarians are already constructing with the conflict, with self-managed seminars, with campaigns on welfare and income, with self-reductions (autoriduzioni) and many more.

"Today the students occupied the administration building, the barons only had the rain." There was an internal demonstration and after it went through the campus the students managed to enter in Aula Magna shouting "Frati barone sei solo un buffone". It’s an insult towards rector Frati: "You’re just a clown".  

The students later took to the streets outside the campus, expressing their anger about the incident of Torino (a student died in school) accusing the politicians who are cutting down school funding. Deadly cuts. During the day there were parades and blockades in various parts of Rome. "After the self-reductions of theatre and cafeteria, the campaign for self-reform continues… towards the generalized strike of 12 December!"

Self-reductions (autoriduzioni) means disobedience, fighting for cheaper services etc. For example, people go together in the university cafeteria and refuse to pay the full price.

The Wave has been going on for many weeks. It started when the semester started (October) and it is heading towards the general strike (12 December). Here’s a timeline of some of the important moments of mobilization:

17/10/08 - Generalized general strike by "base unions" (Cub, Cobas ecc.)

30/10/08 - School strike of mainstream unions + autonomous student mobilization

07/11/08 - University protests in cities all over Italy

14/11/08 - Huge national demonstration of the Wave in Rome

15-16/11/08 - National assembly of the Wave at Sapienza, Rome

28/11/08 - University protests in cities all over Italy

12/12/08 - General strike declared by Cgil + autonomous mobilization of the Wave

Padua, Thursday 27 November 2008. In the morning the university of Padua hosted a meeting titled "University in transformation" with a guest speaker from Confindustria (Confederation of Italian industry). The Paduan anomalous wave, however, considered it unacceptable that the university not only ignores the protests by students and researchers (that have been going on for many weeks) but in fact gives support to Confindustria which wants to privatize the world of education. What makes this even unacceptable is the fact that students were excluded from the meeting about the transformations of university. The students stopped the meeting and protested the fact that the university administration excludes them from decision-making. Students and precarious researchers are the ones who make the university live every day by producing and sharing critical knowledge and self-education (autoformazione).