Imagine the impossible
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A history of the 1968 revolution
By Teresa Coppola
Who are the youth of 1968? What similarities exist between that moment and the times we are living in today? How can we re-imagine a different world, even when it seems impossible? If we look at youth throughout history, this is certainly a part of society that drives action across the long term1. Within this current which still flows today we want to uncover the mechanisms of history that were crucial and that traced a different direction. In order to find a way out of the chaos, our goal is to find and shape the keys capable of unlocking the gears of our own time.
The year 1968 takes place at a conjuncture in world history. After emerging devastated from two world wars and unrestrained colonialism, the nation states of the world decide to open a period of peace. Yet this peace did not extend to the global south. The freedom promised by neoliberalism clouded one side of the world like opium and transformed the other side into a living hell. The Congo, Vietnam, and South Africa became the ghettos of an affluent imperialist society.
The rebellion of the periphery
With the connection between the «First” and the “Third” world, a new model of internationalist solidarity develops along two different strategic fronts. On one side there is the development of anti-colonial guerrilla warfare in an era in which the technology of war is rapidly accelerating. On the other side there is the internal weakening of capitalism at its very core through the development of consciousness and the construction of a different way of living.
In this context it becomes necessary for revolutionary vanguards to push society as a whole to imagine a world different from the one offered by capitalist modernity. The priority is seen in building the will to free oneself from self-imposed servitude and in becoming aware of living under the effect of liberalism’s elixir of false freedom.
Vietnam is certainly the most important example of this double front. On one side there is the resistance of young Americans facing mass conscription. On the other side there is a popular guerrilla movement defending itself against the greatest military power in the world. The Palestinian struggle for national liberation becomes a beacon of hope and reaches a turning point in 1967 with the creation of the PFLP and the beginning of armed operations.
The vocabulary of decolonization is also transferred within Western states themselves. Michel Rocard, leader of the Parti Socialiste Unifié in France, speaks in 1966 about the decolonization of the provinces, denouncing the imbalance between Paris and the rest of the country2.
In the United States the struggle of the African American movement becomes crucial, particularly that of the Black Panther Party, which from its foundation in 1966 quickly assumes a transnational character. Oppressed Dalits in India emulate the rhetoric of the Black Panthers. Representatives of the Vietnamese National Liberation Front also use the organization as a model, calling themselves the Yellow Panthers.
The youth movement
The activism that existed in Palestine, Algeria, Vietnam and Latin America suddenly spreads throughout the world. Young people, necessary to the system for their physical strength in the military field and for their intellectual contribution in the field of knowledge, rebel and become the revolutionary subject of the era. The year 1968 represents the culmination of a period of protests without precedent that begins ideologically on Californian campuses. It then spreads to Italy, Germany and Mexico before finding its strongest and most symbolic expression in France during the months of May and June 1968.
Che Guevara’s warning «Be realistic, demand the impossible» echoes everywhere. It is as if thousands of bridges were being built across the world. The brotherhood of a society resisting modernity links all these struggles in a visceral way.
1968 becomes possible thanks to the struggles of decolonization, thanks to young people from working class families entering universities, and thanks to the alliances between students and workers. For the first time in history youth openly affirm their own identity within a revolution, with the collective consciousness of being its vanguard.
A change of paradigm
A transition takes place from an approach centered on class to one centered on political autonomy and on the moral characteristics of society. The new sensibility of 1968 is linked to a more utopian vision of socialism in all aspects of life. It means taking a stand against power and against authorities that repress imagination and freedom.
From the Chinese revolution emerges the concept of cultural revolution. In this sense 1968 represents a cognitive turning point, a change of paradigm for an entire generation.
For these reasons the wave of change begins in universities, which had opened their doors to young people from less privileged social classes. Throughout 1968 we see the birth of committees and general assemblies within faculties that are open to anyone willing to participate.
The following year in 1969 students across Europe leave the universities in order to encounter the workers movement, opening the path for the development of the political parties and organizations of the 1970s.
During occupations and mobilizations students experience forms of communal life among equals. Here the seed of the idea that the personal is political3 begins to emerge. This happens through the attempt to politicize new areas of life and new contradictions that arise from the deep bonds created during occupations, strikes and demonstrations.
Against the moral corruption of capitalism, the goal becomes the development of a new way of living that is coherent with one’s ideals and that can already be practiced along the path itself.
The Feminist movement
When society is in motion the elements that jam the gears become easier to see. Women who participate in the social movement of 1968 realize that the greatest obstacle to liberation is the gender oppression they themselves experience. It is the patriarchal mentality that exists at every level of society. They understand that the contradiction between men and women is a fracture that crosses all other social divisions. The renewed awareness of being subjects capable of shaping history connects personal liberation with collective liberation. The personal experiences of women become political.
The participation of women in social movements becomes a disruptive phenomenon. It represents both rupture and reconciliation. It is capable of interpreting historical necessity and leaving a lasting mark, offering important contributions in terms of political tools and practices that help overcome the impasse of left-wing militancy after the decline of the protest waves of that year.
Black feminisms also contribute to the evolution of feminist theory because they arise from the awareness of Black women that racism, sexism and class oppression are inseparable.
In this sense women’s movements emerge victorious from the legacy of 1968, unlike most of the extra parliamentary left. They promote a political culture of unity in diversity and develop the capacity to unite different struggles and identities without simplifying reality. In doing so they succeed in influencing global society and provoking a deep awakening of consciousness.
Destructive turns
The feeling of despair and impotence created by a world divided into two blocs, together with the risk of becoming only a cog in the capitalist machine, pushes many people toward new searches.
The creation of subcultures and artificial paradises separated from the rest of society becomes one of the more liberal turns of the youth movement. Remaining at the margins of the system and its lifestyle is often perceived as something radical, but the consequence is frequently isolation from society.
Partly because of the distance from the political traditions of the nineteenth century and the openness to ideological experimentation, the youth movement of 1968 does not always succeed in recognizing what is a product of capitalism and what is not. In organizational structures that are often fluid and without strategic objectives, the possibility remains open for attacks and marginalization carried out by the system itself.
It is not by chance that large quantities of drugs arrive in Western metropolises following the waves of protest. Heroin spreads like an epidemic and kills thousands of young people who might otherwise have had the potential to overthrow that system.
Our inheritance
Though we have grown up experiencing systemic violence we are still are able to imagine the impossible, to unite, to uncover contradictions, and to expose the hidden connections and the false myths of capitalist system that presents itself as invincible but has always been fragile. This is what 1968 teaches us. If we do not become aware of our past, of young people who like us broke their heads against the walls of the world, wore out their voices shouting and threw themselves into a society that wanted them silent and obedient, how can we overcome the attacks against our hearts and our minds today?
We are not alone, neither today nor in history. There are thousands of young people who sacrificed themselves so that we could be one step closer to understanding and realizing our objectives.
«All revolutionary Youth resistances that have occurred throughout history are treated as a legacy. In particular, the Youth movement of 1968 is defined as a fundamental legacy for one’s own existence, as the most up-to-date central pillar, and as a Youth revolution in whose tradition the Youth movement of today stands. The intention is to develop the spirit, the resistance, and the rebellion of the Youth revolution of 1968 in one’s own struggle. The strategic goal is to push forward a second wave of the Youth movement of 1968»
The Principles of Democratic Youth Confederalism – Manifesto of the Youth
1. The historian Fernand Braudel views history through three dimensions: a “micro history”, the surface level of the here and now; a conjunctural history, composed of intermediate material cycles; and a structural history, or longue durée, which is the continuous flow that moves and shapes what exists.
2. For further discussion of the regionalist demands of 1968, we recommend the article “Le réveil des revendications régionalistes et nationalitaires au tournant des années 1968 : analyse d’une « vague » nationale” by Tudi Kernalegenn (2013)
3. The expression spread thanks to the essay “The Personal Is Political” by Carol Hanisch (1970)