The global poor, all around the world and no matter what country in which they live, currently live in a system of dictatorship. They live under a dictatorship known as no alternative, shackled by capital that’s been unjustly acquired, constrained by landed gentry who have no incentive but to pursue they own interests, and chained by the fact they can’t do anything but to look at the question of their own subsistence, they are unable to reach out the right to liberty and the self-determination that we think inheres in the human condition.

How are we going to define a Marxist revolution in this debate?

We say that in all its forms it shares the feature of wanting to break down the system of private property, that’s what a Marxist revolution means. It can take place in one of two ways. 

One, it can happen through internal systems that exist presently. That is to say you vote in Marxist governments who support things like mass redistribution and the abolishment of private property, or it can exist externally in the instance of forcibly bringing down governments that for far too long have tread on these people’s rights. 

The first thing that I am going to note just on account of the model is just a picture of what we think this world looks like. That is to say that we accept that this attempt to revolution won’t succeed in all instances, that in many just lead to the rise of Marxist parties, but in the world succeed we encourage you to use your imagination. That is to say, just notice how chrono centric our vision of civilization is, that is a system of private property emerged out of the enlightenment that is the last 300 hundred years of human existence. Prior to that people lived in sharing economies where they defined themselves as something greater than their labor and their productive force, that is the kind of world that we support.

Two things then I’m going to begin with this speech with:

First, private property constitutes a fundamental assault in human dignity in three key respects. First, it is found and in has been acquired unjustly. In the vast majority of instances, the reason why wealthy countries are wealthy is through processes like colonialism, through slavery, through patriarchy. It represents plunder when you refuse to give any representation or resources to whom and from whom you took money, but even if it wasn´t in those direct instances of theft, in many instances it was negligence, that’s to say the creation of vastly constrictive intellectual property rights that means that individuals don´t, in the poor, have proper access to things like medication, its refusal to tax properly. We think negligence is morally culpable. The fact that it is unjustly acquired in and of itself gives the poor a claim to that property and to an institution that itself has been harmful. 

The second thing it enables the poor in terms of a principle is that it allows them to get redress in opposition to centuries of disenfranchisement. That is to say theft and negligence represent the stripping of the individual right to assert themselves. We are going to give you systematic reasons why you don’t get reforms on their side, but notice that this as a principle argument is independent from a consideration of practices, that’s to say compensation or giving more money is unlike categorically what these people require in principle which is a redress from the fact that they´ve been taken out of the system of moral equality by theft and negligence.  

The last thing to say is let’s take them at their best, that is, let’s wipe the slate clean and accept that everybody has equal access to resources. 

Why then is property still oppressive and why does it represent an assault on human dignity? 

The first reason is that competition and the premise on which it is based is artificial. That’s to say it trades on morally insignificant or arbitrary factors. The fact of scarcity which allows many corporations to succeed, the fact that I was born with certain talents or certain skills that other individuals weren’t. We think that those are morally arbitrary from the consideration of desert and we don’t think that’s just ground. 

The second thing is a question of actors so capital continues to decide what begets it so you get to decide as the head of a corporation who you hire and what kind of skills you have. Principally private property assaults dignity. Notice what´s on the other side, the reason why they need to defend the SQ is that they don´t get the structural reforms that you require.  

There are three reasons for this:

The first is the democratic system that through processes of gerrymandering which are almost irrevocable in many parts of the world the poor are systematically disenfranchised. They don´t control hegemonic media that control media narratives about what a good policy is. They usually kept apart by racist rhetoric that accentuates other ascriptive descriptions preventing them from coming forward. The fact of historical disenfranchise furthermore means that they're less likely to turn out the vote in a way that other people are. 

The second reason why you don’t get structural reform Is because it´s internationally imbalanced on the consideration of nations. so the Bretton Woods institutions largely built by the west, the institution of human rights, which favors civil and political rights of a socio-economic human rights. We say that those things mean that the alternative they need to defend is continued and systematic in action. 

What do you get on our side? 

So, let’s say the world in which they succeed, we think that those communities will succeed for three reasons.

First, it encompasses the vast majority of the global population and given that capital is dependent on labor to get any return from it, we think that’s beneficial.

Second is the location of resources in many parts of the developing world mean that they have access to those things. 

The third thing to say is that you get cross-pollination and you get global solidarity across racial lines where currently capital have the incentive to get them divided. Those deals with the best case scenario for their side where you get complete revolution, Fanele will also talk about why you get structural reforms along the way that are beneficial. 

What we need from an opposition is a comprehensive account of property, why it’s just, and why it doesn’t, as it continually done throughout history, assault human dignity.