The Revolutionaries From Boulevard Saint-Germain

This chapter begins with Marshall Tito's reminiscences on his anti-faction campaign that ensued when he came to the Communist Party of Yugoslavia (CPY) secretariat after Milan Gorkić's disappearance. It considers Tito's purging of various elements from the CPY as an attack on the strongest party organization in the country as most of the 200 communists served long-term prison terms in Sremska Mitrovica. It also recounts the twofold impact of the arrests of 1935 and 1936, which destroyed the CPY's field operatives and created an alternative organization behind bars. The chapter looks at the dispatch sent by Moscow in January 1938, which confirmed the replacement of Petko Miletić as the leader of the Mitrovica Prison Committee. It demonstrates how Tito capitalized on his investment in the network he had singlehandedly formed in accordance with Comintern's general instructions.

Shadow Committees: On “Drug User Voice,” Representation, and Mobilization in a Norwegian Drug Policy Reform

Until recently, Norway remained immovable on its conservative policy that illegal drug use is a crime. In 2018, the Health Minister appointed an inquiry commission to design a less restrictive drug policy, which included two “drug user representatives.” But the Minister’s choices for these posts met massive dissatisfaction from some drug users who contended that the representatives “are not real drug users” and do not “speak for” nor “act on the behalf” of their experiences and opinions. They mobilized to establish an alternative organization, the Shadow Committee, to propose a drug policy reform shaped by “the user voices” and “not polluted by political compromises.” Yet, while performing a labor of difference, this committee, too, became caught in conflicting landscapes of representation with some members contesting strategic solidarity. Based on this case, and an ethnographic fieldwork among the protesters, this article investigates the concept of representation as understood, contested and applied by “drug users.” Exploring how they relate to “user voices” and question the authenticity of some of “user representatives,” I highlight how changing political landscapes affect understandings of representation and shape political, individual and collective forms of involvement. I draw on Pitkin’s political philosophy and apply the classical categorization of political representation to suggest reconsidering the governing assumptions regarding “user representatives” that increasingly inform drug and treatment policies in Norway. I ask if the concept of representation itself may be a barrier to meaningful involvement.

PRACTICAL TRAINING FOR STUDENTS IN SOCIAL PEDAGOGY, CARRIED OUT DURING STATE OF EMERGENCY

The article presents the organization and implementation of the training practice and pre-graduation training for Social Pedagogy students at the Trakia University in Stara Zagora. The state of emergency declared due to the COVID-19 pandemic imposed the research, development and implementation of new forms of training that were never before employed for educating the future specialists. It also defines new problems in the organization, tracking, and assessment of the training and demonstrates solutions that include the active participation of all representatives – academic tutors, mentors from the institutions, students from both forms of education (full-time and part-time). The article presents the results from an on-line survey, carried out among the students and draws conclusions about the effectiveness of the alternative organization of the training. The author also shares ideas about the inclusion of new elements in the organization an implementation of the practical training of future students.

Contradiction, circumvention and instrumentalization of noble values: How competition undermines the potential of alternatives

Recent studies have shown that alternative organizations are particularly exposed to the risk of losing ‘their soul’ or their capacity to put into practice their original ends when they compete with capitalist companies. But what happens when an alternative organization competes exclusively with another alternative organization? This article addresses this question using a unique and ‘revealing’ case, in which two mutual insurance organizations compete structurally and directly with each other and propose the same products to the same target population, at the same time and same place. The case shows in concrete terms how competition can undermine the integrity of alternative organizations and expose them to a dissociation between ends and means by leading them to: (1) adopt ‘dirty’ practices that are incoherent with their founding purpose, (2) circumvent the coherent practices that have been specifically designed to reach their alternative ends, and (3) instrumentalize their alternative ends and turn them into means of coping with competition. Furthermore, the case shows how the dynamic of structural and direct competition, because of its ‘captivating’ nature, may prevent local actors from ‘denaturalizing’ or questioning these incoherent practices. This study suggests that any action aimed at promoting alternative organizations requires taking due account of the competitive environment in which local actors of alternatives are placed and which can seriously undermine their emancipatory potential.