This talk was given in February 2018 at the Five Leaves bookshop in Nottingham. As the name suggests, it discusses what anarchism is via the ideas and lives of twelve libertarians. The first part covered six male anarchists and the second six female ones.
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The Meaning of Anarchism, via twelve libertarians (Part 1)
This talk was given in January 2018 at the Five Leaves bookshop in Nottingham. As the name suggests, it discusses what anarchism is via the ideas and lives of twelve libertarians. The first part covered six male anarchists and the second six female ones.
Introduction to “The Unknown Revolution”
This is my introduction to the 2019 PM Press edition of The Unknown Revolution by Voline. It is a classic anarchist analysis of why the Russian Revolution failed by an active participant, seeking to ensure future revolutions do not make the same mistakes. The book is available, so please consider buying it from the publisher.
Anarchy and Covid-19
A standard reproach against anarchism is that it would not be able to withstand crises as well as hierarchies. This is often the underlying assumption of Marxist diatribes against Anarchism – although these usually invoke euphemisms to avoid admitting that what is really being suggested is that they and their party should be in power.
“Anti-government ideologues” and Coronavirus
For an anarchist, it is annoying to see the right – whether Trump or Johnson, the Tories or the Republicans – proclaimed “libertarians” or “anti-government”. They are neither, not least because they are members of governments and so repeatedly and regularly use State power to further their own and their backers’ interests.
Introduction to “Modern Science and Anarchy”
This is my introduction to Modern Science and Anarchy by Peter Kropotkin (AK Press, 2018). This was the last book published by Kropotkin during his lifetime (La Science Moderne et L’Anarchie, 1913) and he explores themes he had been raising since his first joined the anarchist movement in the 1870s. It shows that he did […]
Now and After
This is a write up of a talk I gave in Glasgow in 2018 entitled Now and After: What would Anarchy be like and how we create the new world by fighting the current one. It summarises anarchist ideas of what a free society would be like and how we get there. As with my […]
The Spanish Revolution: Anarchy in Action
This is a write-up of a talk I gave in Nottingham in March 2019. It is an introduction to the 1936 Spanish Revolution as well as a general introduction to the anarchist theory which inspired it. After all, you cannot see how 1936 was anarchy in action if you do not know what anarchy is. […]
Introduction to “Direct Struggle Against Capital”
This is the introduction to Direct Struggle Against Capital: A Peter Kropotkin Anthology (AK Press, 2014). It is a comprehensive selection of texts, many of which are translated or reprinted for the first time. As the introduction shows, Kropotkin was not some kind of anarcho-Santa but rather a revolutionary anarchist with a clear idea of […]
The Trotskyist School of Falsification
Most anarchists come across Victor Serge (1889-1947) at some stage, the elitist-individualist anarchist turned elitist-Bolshevik whom Leninists to this day like to invoke as “the best of the anarchists” to get libertarians to join their party (“Victor Serge: The Worst of the Anarchists,” ASR no. 61). This work by him and Natalia Sedova Trotsky, The […]