I’m digging anarchists’ more hands on, pragmatic approach to politics. I finished The Conquest of Bread a couple of weeks ago and I’m currently working my way through Bullshit Jobs. Any suggestions about theory, praxis, mutual aid, etc. would be appreciated
It’s really simple… the whole idea behind anarchism (and all libertarian socialist thought, for that matter) is to put the power of decision and action back into the hands of communities and not a bunch of far-removed and unaccountable political racketeers (which is essentially how anarchists view “formal” political establishments - and they are entirely correct in this view)
No. Nothing new about it… the meaning behind the term “socialism” (for instance) has always referred to a condition where the workers own the means of production. The big split in the left happened because Marxists believed the state could represent the workers - the Bakuninist anarchists believed the state would simply form a new “political elite” and simply become the new elite repressing the working class. This happened long before the Russian revolution… and subsequent events proved the anarchist side correct beyond a shadow of a doubt.
I never took socialism seriously as it is seriously economic and non-political, then I read Gustav Landauer write about socialism, starting off very metaphysically, and I thought it would have been a waste of time, but the further I read the more interesting it became.
So right wing circles in the US in the 50s, in defense of capital and in their infatuation with anti-communism, propelled and financed this pseudo doctrine and ideology called libertarianism, that is nearly the exact opposite of libertarianism. Passively libertarians in the US adopted the term libertarian socialist to deviate from this near fascist pseudo-ideology.
Why I dislike the term socialist for being economic, because I think there are political (decision making processes on matters of common interest) attributes to class and not just economic. The same way Marx very well explains exploitation mechanisms in producing profit, oppression is used to build power within a class system. Whether parent, life partner, teacher, boss, supervisor, … the most oppressed and the most exploited form the bottom class, no matter what you would call it. And that class, based on both exploitation and oppression needs to organize and liberate itself.
But will the liberators and the liberated end up in the same class of a classless society? Just because “means of production” change ownership, titles, and jurisdiction, will the abused, tortured, oppressed, be free?
We have tons of “theoretical writing” that doesn’t necesseraly constitute a theory on the one side, and a hard “theory” on the other that is too busy defending its orthodoxy and universal value, let alone allow space for criticism, re-evalutation, and re-examination on whether it can still interpret current social, economic, and political conditions.
Welcome to anti-capitalism at a loss and stagnation