A new rupture in Spanish anarcho-syndicalism

[Translator note: in the following article the International Workers Association is “IWA”, but also “AIT”, which stands for Asociación Internacional de Trabajadores in Spanish. Therefore in Spain, the IWA affiliate is called CNT-AIT ]

Spanish anarcho-syndicalism has experienced a new rupture. The crisis had been brewing for a long time. It came to an end between 2015 and 2017. The CNT-AIT and CNT-CIT (or CNT©¹) are now two distinct organizations. In the international libertarian movement, this conflict is little known, or it is observed with irony and condescension: a ridiculous battle over the CNT acronyms, when there are many other more urgent battles to be fought…

It’s not that simple. CNT-CIT, which registered the CNT acronym as a trademark (hence the ©), is engaged in a legal battle of rare violence against CNT-AIT. At the time of writing, the CNT© is taking eighteen CNT-AIT unions to court, claiming damages of 50,000 euros each for the use of the CNT acronym; the premises and other resources of these unions could be seized (even if they change their name) as « property » of the CNT; several CNT-AIT members could be imprisoned as a result of these lawsuits.

The venture to capture the CNT-AIT’s heritage is the result of long-standing maneuvers, to which we’ll have occasion to return. What we need to know at the outset is that the operation has taken on an international dimension with the process that led to the creation of the International Confederation of Labor (ICL) [TN: or Confederación Internacional del Trabajo, “CIT”, in Spanish. Hence “CNT-CIT”] founded in Parma (Italy) in May 2018.

Let’s go back a bit. In December 2015, in Zaragoza, at the CNT Congress (known as the Congress of Empty Chairs, because many delegates didn’t attend), the men and women who were to head the future CNT© put forward the idea that the IWA should be overhauled. What they didn’t like about the IWA was the excessive number of small sections, particularly those from the former Eastern bloc.

Because of the International’s federalism: one organization = one vote, they felt that the Spanish section was at a disadvantage. In their eyes, the CNT, which paid a membership fee for several thousand members, should have had more weight and power than sections with only a few dozen members. Without a mandate from its unions, the Confederal Committee of the Spanish CNT stopped paying its dues to the IWA (even though every member, by paying his or her dues to the organization, pays a share to the International) and took the initiative of creating another international on its own terms with sections sympathetic to it, such as the German FAU and the Italian USI, as well as a few other organizations.

At the time, the Spanish promoters of the future CIT were convinced that they could wipe out the IWA simply by ceasing to contribute financially to it. Their calculation was as follows: in photocopies alone, the IWA secretariat spent at least €1,000 a year; the Spanish CNT would deprive it of some €30,000; if to this were added the withdrawal of the FAU and USI, the International would be deprived of 90% of its contributors. Thus, with no sources of funding for its propaganda and activities “will turn the IWA into a purely testimonial and completely inoperative organization”². By the way, that was already what they were accusing him of.

This tyranny of numbers is a constant among CNT-CIT promoters. In Spain, they had already excluded unions from their own organization that didn’t “commune” with them. One of the criteria for these purges was group size. For example, two Andalusian unions were expelled for organizing joint actions with other CNT unions that had previously been excluded. In fact, four unions had committed this “fault”, but only the two smallest were expelled. Getting rid of malcontents: yes, but without losing too many contributors.

From December 2nd to 4th 2016, the twenty-sixth congress of the IWA was held in Warsaw. On this occasion, the congressmen decided to disaffiliate the Spanish, German and Italian sections (CNT, FAU and USI) due to non-compliance with the statutes and refusal to pay their dues. In its final declaration, the IWA congress also noted that it had received declarations of support from Spain from some forty local unions (members or former members of the CNT), and that several members of these unions had attended the congress as observers.

At that time, two meetings took place in Spain. The first in November 2016 and the second in April 2017. This was a “CNT-AIT restructuring congress” carried out in two stages, bringing together unions that had left the CNT, others that had been expelled from it and still others that were still part of it, albeit with a critical point of view.

Participants in these sessions denounced scandalous situations: a breakdown in federalism; a lack of solidarity; a absence of transparency – in connection with a theft of 20,000 euros committed by a national secretary – but also authoritarianism on the part of committees and even assaults. The delegates noted that this drift had weakened the organization. The absence of militants justified the remuneration of permanent staff. In their sights was a law firm (also called technico-confederal) set up by the leaders – in place of the occasional recourse to lawyers – which was absorbing the bulk of resources: not only the sums that should have been paid to the IWA, but also the share of “pro-presos” dues due to imprisoned comrades paid by the CNT.

The delegates drew up new statutes, deleting articles that allowed authoritarian practices, and decided to rejoin the IWA, with an internationalist perspective rather than the “colonialist” one (in the service of the Spanish CNT) favored by those who had provoked the split.

A repeat of the process that gave birth to the CGT?

For their part, CNT-CIT craftsmen claimed at the same time (end of 2016) that their split had nothing to do with the one that took place between 1979 and 1983 and gave birth to the Spanish CGT. Here’s their explanation: “CGT was betting on a model that renounced anarcho-syndicalism, while now it is a situation of paralysis that prevents the practical development at the international level of a model of implementation and growth truly anarcho-syndicalist. The problem is not one of ideological differences, but of attitude and mood.” ³

Should we believe them? Unlike the CGT, the CNT©, like the CNT-AIT, does not take part in union elections. However, it’s easy to imagine that the CNT© has embarked on a path towards reformism and integration. Why else would there be talk of unity and probable unification of the CNT© with the CGT and the Solidaridad Obrera (SO)⁴ union? In the communiqué announcing this convergence, released at a press conference on April 10, 2023, the CNT©, CGT and SO present themselves as “three organizations that recognize ourselves as heirs of the workers’ tradition of anarcho-syndicalism.”⁵

So the CGT, which was not anarcho-syndicalist in 2016, would become (again) so in 2023! Now that’s surprising…

An element that goes in the same direction is the current media interest in the CNT-CIT, obviously presented as “CNT” for short, and the invisibilization of the CNT-AIT in the media. In a January 2022 article published by the newspaper Publico on trade unionism in Spain⁶, the space devoted to the CNT© is as large as that devoted to the majority unions CCOO and UGT, each of which claims nearly a million members, or that allocated to the CGT, which claims to have over 100,000 members. Why give so much space to an organization that claims… 8,000 members? Why give it so much publicity? As for the expert consulted by Publico: Beltrán Roca (professor at the University of Cadiz) is a member or ex-member of the CNT©. One is never so well served…

Here’s another clue: the arguments used by CNT-CIT spokespersons to denigrate CNT-AIT and IWA activists bear a striking resemblance to those used at the time of the birth of the CGT. They are accused of being “ideological purists”, with no “union realization of their own”, their existence “virtual” due to their rejection of the “new strategic approach to union action [of the CNT-CIT]”⁷. On the one hand, there would be the “immobilists”: the CNT-AIT, and on the other, the promoters of a “new syndicalism” ⁸: the CNT-CIT. Let’s not forget that, before becoming the CGT, this organization was called “CNT-renewed” – what a coincidence! A comparison with what happened forty years ago is worth making.

At the time, to defend the CNT-AIT, we were called “ayatollahs” and “inquisitors”!⁹ But despite all the anathemas, uncompromising anarcho-syndicalism refuses to disappear, and even seems to be rising from the ashes on several continents!

Ariane Miéville et José Luis García González
Summer, 2023

1. The acronyms CNT-CIT and CNT© will be used interchangeably to refer to this organization.

  2. Amor y Rabia, “ Más allá de la AIT ”, 1ª parte, December 25th, 2016.

https://noticiasayr.blogspot.com/2016/12/mas-alla-de-la-ait-1-parte.html (visited on July 31st 2023)

3.  Ibid.

4.   Union born of a split from the CGT, mainly active in the Madrid metro.

5.  https://www.cnt.es/noticias/a-la-clase-trabajadora-por-la-movilizacion-y-la-confluencia/

In French, an article by Christian Mahieux entitled “Accord entre les organisations anarcho-syndicalistes de l’Etat espagnol, CGT, CNT, Solidaridad Obrera : historique?” which presents the press release and press conference appeared in La Révolution prolétarienne, June 2023.

6.  https://www.publico.es/economia/paradoja-sindicalismo-espanol-siglo-xxi-fuerte-fracturado.html#analytics-fecha:listado (visited on August 6th 2023)

 7. In the words of the members of the CNT© secretariat in the interview by Amor y Rabia, “ Más allá de la AIT ”, 1ª part, already cited, and 2ª part https://noticiasayr.blogspot.com/2016/12/mas-alla-de-la-ait-2-parte.html (both visited on 06.08.2023)

8.   “ Building the new unionism” was the motto of the CNT© Congress in Canovelles in December 2022. https://www.cnt.es/noticias/construyendo-el-nuevo-sindicalismo/ (visited on August 6th 2023)

9.  Frank Mintz, “ Contre la théologie anarchiste ”, IRL n°82, summer 1989.