A message of support for striking casino workers in Aotearoa/New Zealand. ... read full story / add a comment

The objective of this article is to present a summary of research carried out for some years, which culminated in the publication of the book Bandeira Negra: rediscutindo o anarquismo [Black Flag: Rediscussing Anarchism].[1] As part of a collective process of global research on anarchism, developed by researchers from different parts of the world within the Institute for Anarchist Theory and History (IATH), this book has a general objective: to answer the following question in depth, what is anarchism? ... read full story / add a comment

Alasbarricadas - We echo this historical review on the various positions that the CNT-FAI took along the Spanish Revolution. It is not usually easy to understand the complexity of a historical moment in which so many things were happening at the same time. We consider basic to understand the tactical ups and downs of any revolutionary movement in a historical moment in order to be able to learn something for our future struggles.

The article is not an academic one, but it sheds light on some little-known facts about how the CNT navigated 1938, in terms of tactics and strategy. This period has usually been completely erased, automatically branded as obscure, shameful, claudicating or bureaucratic without any attempt to understand what the libertarian organisations were actually doing. It is assumed that the drift of the war and, as the article says, the pessimism that surrounded the organisation from mid-1937 onwards, resulted in a shift in the strategic line of the libertarian movement to approaches as different from libertarian communism as could be the "trade union state" or corporate socialism.

We know that this article is the tip of the iceberg of a world that cannot be explained in a struggle of the good guys against the bad guys. Everything is full of nuances. We miss an explanation on the opposition to this shift. But to have treated that opposition as it deserves would have diverted the article from conveniently (and at a manageable length) presenting us the official line of the Movimiento Libertario Español (MLE) of '37 and '38.

And by the way, even if this history presents us with an unclear evolution towards bureaucratism and centralism, we are still amazed at with the enormous capacity of those people who built up our organisations and managed the daily lives of millions of people. Because, it must be said, when there was supposedly no social revolution any more, there were still hundreds of thousands of people living in collectivisations and a large part of industry was still under workers' control.

In order to give you an insight into the debates and to be able to elaborate further in-depth studies, https://mega.nz/folder/FwRXkQBS#xk2IN6lpYZmEJYP-IaTW3g.

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Review of Jacques Lesage de La Haye, The Abolition of Prison

Anthony J. Nocella II, Mark Seis, & Jeff Shantz (Eds.), Classic Writings in Anarchist Criminology; A Historical Dismantling of Punishment and Domination.
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KSL: Bulletin of the Kate Sharpley Library No. 104, November 2021 has just been posted on our site. ... read full story / add a comment

Mèo Mun is an anarchist collective working to make anarchist materials and ideas more accessible to a Vietnamese audience, together with providing an analysis of social struggles from a Vietnamese anarchist lens. Over the next hour you’ll hear three collective members, Mai, Will and tùng share their critiques of leftist misrepresentations of the Vietnamese State as Socialist, lasting impacts of imperialism and war on populations of Vietnam, the centering US imaginaries of Vietnam, the struggles of working class people in general (and queer folks and sex workers in particular) in Vietnam, nationalism promoted by the government and other topics. ... read full story / add a comment

On Trans Day of Remembrance (20th November 2021), we remember and honour the lives of trans and gender-diverse people reported murdered in the last 12 months. Trans people around the world face structural, institutional, societal, and direct violence. The violence that trans people face has roots in the policies, laws, and institutional practices of capitalist society.
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A review of the fight against the rise of fascism in Italy and Germany and its lessons for revolutionary anarchists today. ... read full story / add a comment

What is especifismo? Is it anarchism? What is an especifist organization? What does it do? Is it a political party? These questions, which may seem basic to some, are not uncommon. Using the Anarchist Federation of Rio de Janeiro’s (FARJ) Social Anarchism and Organisation, we can arrive at a more concrete understanding of the ideology, theory, strategy, and final objectives of especifismo. This is not a definitive study of especifismo. It is a close analysis of a single text. If this theory is to have an influence on the revolutionary strategies of social anarchists around the world, we must continue to expand our research on the subject. Today, this usually requires working in multiple languages or with translations. For this reason, anglophone anarchists quickly arrive at the end of the available literature on the subject. This text is intended to add to an amassing canon of English-language writings on the subject. ... read full story / add a comment

In the wake of the pandemic, the outbreak of domestic violence has led the government to set up and increase victim support lines operating inside police stations. What this practically means is just another hotline in the policy directory. But women’s emancipation in the Greek context cannot come via a posteriori calls to the police. It requires systemic responses that will empower women, the same being true for any vulnerable individual, so that their decision to quit the sphere of violence will not involve the risk of poverty and social exclusion. ... read full story / add a comment

What is necessary is to create workplace climate groups that link up with the School Strike for Climate. These groups will discuss the way the climate crisis affects their industries, the responsibility of their bosses for aggravating climate change and what possible solutions could be. They would develop the School Strike for Climate into a Workers’ Strike for Climate. In the process, workers would need to become capable of acting independently of the union officials and of defeating them when these officials try to dampen down action. ... read full story / add a comment

This article looks at the phenomenon of the Great Resignation and what it means now and for the future. ... read full story / add a comment

It should go without saying that Anarchist Communists defend the CFMEU against bosses and the State, even when its officials haven’t done the right thing. It’s up to the labour movement to clean its own house, so neither the CFMEU’s failure over COVID19 nor the personal misbehaviour of the Victorian Secretary justify State intervention against the union. Instead, the Melbourne Anarchist Communist Group calls on construction workers to learn the correct lessons from the COVID19 debacle, clean out the ranks of the officials and bring the union under the direct control of the members. The CFMEU is in danger. Only class struggle will save it. ... read full story / add a comment

We recognise the FAU's contributions to the libertarian movement and the sacrifice of comrades past and present. We send our congratulations on the 65th anniversary of the FAU. In solidarity with the struggle for freedom and socialism, the undersigned Anarchist-Communist groups of Oceania. ... read full story / add a comment

Call for Papers

Burning the Ballot: Feminism Meets Anarchy

A Special Issue of Coils of the Serpent: Journal for the Study of Contemporary Power ... read full story / add a comment

This booklet is a tool to introduce activists to what capitalism is, how it functions and in whose interests, how society is divided into different classes with differences in power and interests, what role the state plays, and how the state functions in the interests of capitalism and the ruling class. Part 1: Capitalism and anti-capitalism aims to help activists deepen their understanding of the system we live under, how a majority of people are exploited, and how and why a majority of people face forms of oppression. It can also be used as a basis for activists to analyse why they face the problems they do, and the deeper reasons for these problems. Part 2: Popular Organisation looks specifically at building a movement. Both new and seasoned activists can use this booklet to think more deeply about the elements, values, principles and practices of movement building. [Português] ... read full story / add a comment

This is a companion to Social Anarchism and Organisation by the Anarchist Federation of Rio de Janeiro. All of the references are to only that text which has become essential reading for social anarchists today. This article summarizes, paraphrases and interprets the original. It is meant to be an addition to the English language discourse on especifismo and social anarchism generally, as well as the FARJ text in particular. There is a link to an audio version with a slideshow presentation at the end. ... read full story / add a comment

The article argues that especifismo, and social anarchism more generally, addresses problems that are fundamental to interpersonal relations and group praxis, while not resorting to coercive or vanguardist methods. ... read full story / add a comment

More stable and slowly changing structures condition the camp of social relations proper. They are a totality where each sphere has a specific and differentiated form of relationship. The separation for analysis always suggests two things: that they belong to a common whole and that they have their particularities. ... read full story / add a comment

The Greek state has a long tradition in the racist management of refugees and migrants within it. The on going war and poverty in the Middle East and Africa (to which the Greek state actively contributes), the exclusion and exploitation policies, as well as ecological disaster, are forcing hundreds of thousands of people to seek a better future in Europe.
The planning of the European Union, however, holds a nightmarish future for them, with the Greek state being behind the expansive military interventions and at the forefront of the war against migrants on the European territories. ... read full story / add a comment