Some Thoughts on Democratic Revolution

(This blog post is a pre-write for/forerunner to something else I've been working on) 

I recently read an article on Infoshop called "Do 'Leaderless Revolts' Contain the Seeds of Our Own Failure?." The article cites Anti-Austerity protests in Greece, as well as the revolutionary movements of Egypt and Spain. The strengths and weaknesses of these revolutions, which are addressed by the article, have mostly to do with the unique, technological nature of today's revolutions, but are also indicative of problems revolutionists have pondered for centuries.

In any revolution, dozens of fundamental questions need to be asked: What is the structure of the new society? Is this structure stable, and how do we maintain stability while maintaining the most possible liberty and equality for citizens? How do we deal with reactionary counter revolution? How do we prevent power hungry demagogues from taking advantage of the power vacuum? We can narrow all of these questions down to "how do we make sure a democratic revolution stays democratic?" 

There are countless ways a revolution can go wrong and ultimately put power into the hands of someone just as bad as, if not worse than, the previous ruler. A group might use coercion claiming to be acting in the name of the people, as with the Jacobins. A group might promise to ensure a smooth transition by fighting off counter-revolution, as with the Bolsheviks; or a group might simply have some other form of power with which to fill the power vacuum, as it is looking like it might be in Egypt.

Any sociology textbook will tell you that dissent is maximized and more likely to lead to action when people are able to communicate their grievances to one another, and when some kind of leader can articulate those grievances into some kind of plan. Social media, in these revolutions, has allowed for communication of grievances between individuals the likes of which have not been seen since the advent of the printing press (which is extremely important, though the media has played up social media's role in order to downplay the revolutionary fervor that had to have existed to begin with).  The result has been exacerbated dissent and efficient organization on a massive level that is mostly leaderless.

When any power structure is being removed, it is done so through at least one of two kinds of power: Counter-Power, the belief in specific goals or a specific structure as a replacement for the old, and Anti-Power, the basic desire and capacity to remove the current structure (I did not come up with counter/anti power, however the blogs I read about it on didn't cite anyone).  Organization through social media makes it possible to amass a great deal of anti-power; however, being leaderless the exacerbated dissent is without a sense of direction and without long term goals. After the removal of the old structure, confusion and lack of structure are left. This power vacuum can then be easily exploited by the private power of corporations or the violent power of a military. 

Clearly, of course, both anti-power and counter-power are necessary. A revolution by counter-power alone will never take off the ground except through military coup (which ultimately leads to more tyranny), and a revolution by anti-power leaves behind confusion to be exploited by demagogues (which ultimately leads to more tyranny). 

The anti-power we see in the Middle East and other countries in the 21st century, however, is very unique and may very well hold a solution to its own problem. We saw in these revolutions (particularly in Egypt) an enormous capacity for organization: means of passing information, committees and councils all came into fruition almost organically. Driven by simple common goals, people were capable of creating temporary structures through which to organize the revolt. Is it at all unreasonable, then to hope that counter-power and anti-power do not have to be separate? If these organizational structures can emerge organically among dissenters in the streets, they can be an example, or the beginnings, of a post-revolutionary structure.

Counter-power can grow organically from anti-power, creating goals and structures custom made for, and by, the people. It would be purely democratic.