The creation of a new type of political formation in the face of neocolonial structures is a challenging task that is fraught with difficulty. (Al Mayadeen English; Illustrated by Batoul Chamas)

The state could conceive of itself as the state of the only possible civic peace, but only at the price of a real ideological and theoretical mutilation based on the unstinting will to mask the class nature of power in order to maintain the fiction of the division of powers, or the illusion of the primacy of formal, individual liberty over the public freedoms

- Anouar Abdel Malek

Since October 7, after 9 months of the genocide in Gaza and the violence wrought upon protesters in Western capitals who dare to challenge Zionism and imperialism, we are still presented with the ‘ideological and theoretical mutilation’ of the concept of state power in NATO countries. We are told that we are living in Karl Popper’s "open society" where there is civic peace and that NATO countries are the most moral, the most peaceful, and the most advanced.

How did this come to be? One particularly strong answer comes from the work of Anouar Abdel Malek, and his classic work Nation and Revolution. This article will explore and analyze Abdel Malek’s work in relation to State power in NATO countries, the armed struggle against imperialism, and thus how the illusion of ‘civic peace’ in the West fuels violence in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, and then pathologizes it when the violence is turned against the West.

As mentioned before, Palestine is one particularly illuminating case study, while the newly formed Confederation of the Alliance of Sahel States is another.

In Palestine, there has been resistance against foreign colonialism since the early 20th century. Abu Jildeh and Al Armeet, along with Izz al-Din al-Qassam and the Black Hand are some of the earliest folk heroes of resistance. Today, the eponymous Al-Qassam Brigades and their leader Muhammad Deif, fight alongside communist, nationalist, and Islamic forces against Zionist colonialism and its imperial sponsors.

The United States—as the premier imperial regime—has a vested interest in maintaining the Zionist colony in order to secure the flow of wealth towards the centers of power in Washington, London, Brussels, and Paris vis-a-vis oil, weapons, and rare minerals. One key strategy of the imperialist powers is to maintain the illusion of civic peace—this is done in two ways. Firstly, by creating a scenario whereby the majority of kinetic wars and imperialist violence are conducted abroad. Secondly, any attempt at national liberation, decolonization, and socialist construction by means of armed struggle is demonized by the NATO stenographers in the mainstream media.

These two tactics of imperialism serve multiple functions; the citizens of the imperial core are able to access cheap commodities and finished goods, while the origin of these goods is obscured through the ideology of "just-in-time production". In a sense, this creates a weltanschauung among the people that the world has been created for them, blinding them to the violence necessary to maintain this status quo. The central function of these tactics is, as Abdel Malek said, to obscure class power in NATO countries.

In the case of Palestine, this is done by suppressing analyses by Palestinians and communists which point to Zionism as a class position. This then creates fertile ground for discussions of Zionism to be bogged down in culturalist and religious conversations about ‘anti-semitism in the left’ Further, by painting any anti-systemic movements as aberrant, excessively violent, and barbaric, the illusion of civic peace is maintained. This is exactly what happened in the aftermath of October 7, according to Dr. Susan Abulhawa:

"They said that they [Hamas] beheaded babies, that they eviscerated a pregnant woman, that they burned a baby in an oven, like really horrific violence that seemed just evil and gratuitous to kill Jews. That was the narrative."

In this scenario, Palestinians are cast as unusually violent and sadistic, and thus categorically opposed to the establishment of a civic peace along the lines of the NATO states. To the West of Palestine is another rising anti-systemic movement: the Confederation of the Alliance of Sahel States.

Since the coups led by patriotic forces in Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso have taken power, they have taken an increasingly anti-imperialist stance. As of July 6th, 2024, they have declared themselves as a confederation, which is one step towards erasing the colonially imposed borders. The same imperialist strategies are used to discredit this anti-colonial, patriotic movement, albeit within a different cultural context.

The creation of a new type of political formation in the face of neocolonial structures is a challenging task. From the beginning of their alliance, the leaders of Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso have emphasized that they are interested in creating a new geopolitical reality which reunites people who have been divided by colonial borders. According to Abdel Malek, this task is fraught with difficulty, "The effectiveness of the political project - its ability to attain the status of an authentic national project- is only as great as its capacity to mobilise the potential nation." This confederation has been able to mobilize the masses of their respective states, and meanwhile, the imperialists have used a similar toolbox as in Palestine.

The movement to shake off French influence in the Sahel has been characterized in most media outlets as full of ‘anti-French’ sentiment. That this is the focus point aims to conflate decades of racist, colonial rule with placards at protests which say ‘a bas la France’. The anti-colonial, patriotic movement to shake off French influence is then cast aside as one which is animated by a provincialist, anti-white racism. That this movement is being led by patriotic forces of the military has been pounced upon by the imperialist media, conjuring up bogeymen of the ‘African warlord’ to steer support away from a movement with very clear, liberatory aims. Not only are the aims liberatory, but the movement currently has the mandate of the majority of the peoples of these Sahelian states, and thus it poses even more of a threat to the imperialist order. Here again, the idea of the NATO countries as the only ones capable of bringing about civic peace is implicitly and explicitly put forward. Macron claims to be from a generation of French "that has never known a colonized Africa", and yet he aided in instability in the Sahel by urging ECOWAS sanctions and military intervention against Niger after the popularly supported coup.

By promoting myths of civic peace in the NATO states, the imperialist governments of these states create an ‘ideological mutilation’ of reality which facilitates the drain of value from the peripheries towards the center of the capitalist world-system. The truth is that the majority of kinetic warfare is conducted abroad, but is often used against colonized populations within their own states. Police brutality is well documented in the USA, while the French police routinely harass, arrest, and murder African migrants living in the ghettos of French cities.

Reality shows us that the violence of the oppressor and the violence of the oppressed are incommensurable, and that armed movements for national liberation will be demonized by the imperialists in order to maintain their grip on the system. The myth of civic peace is one instrument of this ideological warfare against the renascent states and peoples of the global south.