The Bourgeois — And you believe in the revolution?
Me — I believe in it. Like you, by the way.
Bourgeois — Me? You must be kidding! Is a revolution possible in our time? The armed forces; the wisdom of the proletarians — resolved to legally obtain the improvement of their lot; the will of the republicans — who have already done so much for the workers — to resolutely march on the path of social reforms: isn’t all of this guarantee enough for you?
Me — No more for me than for you. I know your reasoning, and I know how much you’d like to believe in it. You’re like the sick men who calculate their chances to escape an illness and calm their fears by maintaining ho... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
A split between the rational and irrational is constructed by every rational system; each rationality creates a corresponding irrationality, that which does not fit inside of it. Therefore each rational system has inherent limits. To break out of a dominant rationality one must also be capable of conceiving of that which lies beyond the limits of that system. Rational systems can be useful tools but they can also become mental prisons.
Some wish to reject all rational systems because they detest specific types of rationality, such as capitalist rationality. We live in a highly mechanized society where nearly everything has been ascribed a monetary value, where urban and rural spaces are ravaged by the needs of capital while human bei... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
The Campaign for a General Strike to Stop Tony Abbott is developing, but needs to go a lot further and a lot faster. Each day that goes by without an organized working class response is a day that Liberals harm working class people and democratic rights in Australia further, a day to destroy the environment, torture refugees, wage imperialist war in West Asia, stoke reactionary social forces and stack public offices with Right wing zealots. To wait till the next election is to concede Tony Abbott the right to commit any crimes, no matter how appalling.
The Senate Won’t Save Us
Firstly, many of the atrocious measures contained in last May’s Budget were waved through because they were part of the appropriation bills which give... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
One year has passed since the death of Francisco Ferrer. His martyrdom has called forth almost universal indignation against the cabal of priest and ruler that doomed a noble man to death. The thinking, progressive elements throughout the world have voiced their protest in no ambiguous manner. Everywhere sympathy has been manifested for Ferrer, the modern victim of the Spanish Inquisition, and deep appreciation expressed for his work and aims. In short, the death of Ferrer has succeeded - as probably no other martyrdom of recent history - in rousing the social conscience of man. It has clarified the eternally unchanging attitude of the church as the enemy of progress; it has convincingly exposed the State as the crafty foe of popular advanc... (From: Kate Sharpley Library, http://www.katesharpleylibr....)
I think it’s insufficiently analyzed how the banner of “negative liberty” often replicates the “hardness” of masculinity and gets wrapped in it. Interdependence & contingency of feelings is often ridiculed alongside means of interdependence & contingency in social & economic relations.
I’ve long been skeptical of the ways “autonomy” – instead of “freedom” – gets thrown around in the left because of how often it is used as something like “sovereignty” and how quickly I’ve seen said negative approach to freedom collapse to nativism, isolationism, and self-reliance as the true goal. And it always tends to be coded masculine or appeal to... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Anarchism is notoriously pluralistic in the sense that there are many philosophers and many schools with no obvious common ground except the rejection of political sovereignty implicit in an-archia. Not unreasonably, anarchism is frequently taken to be a family of minimally related ideas that deny the legitimacy of the state and (usually) propose its abolition. This view, although texts in support of it could be cited, is narrow; for anarchism is not merely anti-state, somehow it is an idea or theory of freedom. But this not merely, this freedom, are indefinite and much in need of elucidation.
I offer here a view of anarchism, a way of understanding it in terms of a common basis, that I hope will make evident its importance and its m... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Who has stood upon the seashore and watched the weird dash of the ceaseless waves and has not become tired of their monotonous sameness? Still there was occasionally a wave which could attract and fix our attention for the time being by rearing its cap above the rest and thus become conspicuous.
Who but a devoted soul in this labor movement does not at times become tired—a weary tiredness, verging on a disgust at the apparent sameness and dreary monotony of the wage system as depicted by those engaged in the noble work of exposing the hideous inequalities of the present economic system? Yet, like the waves, there arises amid all this monotony a wrong sometimes as much or more glaring in all its details that not only is our atte... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Theoretically ‘democracy’ means popular government; government by all for everybody by the efforts of all. In a democracy the people must be able to say what they want, to nominate the executors of their wishes, to monitor their performance and remove them when they see fit.
Naturally this presumes that all the individuals that make up a people are able to form an opinion and express it on all the subjects that interest them. It implies that everyone is politically and economically independent and therefore no-one, to live, would be obliged to submit to the will of others.
If classes and individuals exist that are deprived of the means of production and therefore dependent on others with a monopoly over those means... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
“It seems more satisfactory, for me, seeing that it is about men who have been distinguished for their actions, than to honor them only with actions.”
Thucydides, History of the Peloponesian War, 411 BC
It is dangerous to declare war against the State and this world, because the State only knows how to do two things: progress, and combat everyone who would destroy it, weaken it, or impede its progress. As such, anarchists, by which we mean revolutionaries, are conscious of our decisions and of the responsibilities that derive from them. When we say revolutionaries, we are not speaking of any belief in a perfect and peaceful world, nor in the chimeric belief in the possibility of seeing the arrival of some total... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
The libertarian communist of today conceives the Anarchy as a democratic a-statal regime, based on the municipality in which the majority will decide the general rule of conduct… The theorists of libertarian socialism, Bakunin, Kropotkin, Rèclus, Malatesta were instead more tolerant. They thought that in the future municipality, the economical system to follow, the ethical and moral rules to respect, the collective decisions to take will not be imposed by the majority, but they must be voluntary accepted by the totality of the associated. They believed in the agreement of all, in an idyllic life, but they admitted also a dissident minority to whom the majority will recognize the right to try their experiences. Only if the mino... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Revolt Library 
Anarchism 
