Manicheanism is like a vacuum, it is an either or situation that curtails or destroys the development of liberatory thought.

The colonial regime makes sure, often with the help of surrogates, that radical leaders and those honest principled intellectuals and activists who refuse to compromise their principles of independence are eliminated, so that the postcolonial regime (and especially its resources) remains accessible. The result has been a disaster for the (post)colonial world.

If you look at social movements in Latin America, there are spaces where alternative politics are thought about on the ground, at the grassroots level, but they are always under threat. The problem in North Africa and the Middle East is the politics of oil. It means that the spaces for truly grassroots politics, involving those masses of people excluded from high politics, are very quickly closed down. They are not really allowed any kind of autonomy to develop, and that seems to be the real problem, which gets us back to the neo-colonial relationship.

Political change does not really lead to any fundamental change for most of the people, indeed because politics (even if it calls itself democratic) is elitist and barred to most people, so it is necessary to look to new movements outside of "politics."

Counter-violence against the colonial regime is liberatory because it is an act, and by acting, the absolute power of colonialism, internalized by the colonized, is shaken.

What is interesting about the revolts is that they show that there is never anything purely spontaneous, and there is always some thinking and discussion, and thus some kind of organization involved in it.

Organization has to come from an agreement about principles, rather than just the need to coordinate: so as much as we must all act today in a concerted manner, that should not be the ground of an organization.