From Byron onward the rebellious artist has appeared as a stock figure in the social drama, joined later by the revolutionary worker. The one character stands on no better ground than the other. Some artists have rebelled as some workers have taken part in revolutions, but artists as a group, like workers as a group,… read more »
Prominent among the more chewy nuggets of unorthodox political literature stands The Ego and his Own, the case of the individual against authority, [1] first published in 1845 and written by Johann Kaspar Schmidt under the pseudonym Max Stirner. Marx tackled it in The German Ideology, and the question whether Stirner ranks among the anarchists still… read more »
In two vigorous contributions to Freedom (December 1988 and January 1989) the Anarchist Communist Federation supported the National Health Service, a system under which the state imposes compulsory payments for medical services. The Editors of Freedom added their voice in the December issue, describing the present system, under which the coercive powers of the state… read more »
Writers in Freedom often traduce the state. They speak as if it were imposed on us by the rich, the rulers, the bosses, when in fact it is established and maintained mainly by the great body of citizens and subjects. Those who wield the power of the state, the prime ministers, generals and police chiefs,… read more »
Quentin Crisp wrote How to Become a Virgin. Whether he would call himself an anarchist I have no idea, but he has come up with a phrase that hits off, with grace and economy, the present relationship between government and anarchy: “The function of government is to create a walled garden in which anarchy can… read more »
Would anarchists find capitalism acceptable if it were more efficient? The article “Profit and Loss” (Freedom, February 1989) comes close to implying that they would. It lists the recent British disasters – the Zeebrugge ferry, Piper Alpha, Kings Cross, Clapham, Lockerbie, and the Boeing that crashed on M1, and ascribes them to “a profit system… read more »
Anarchism seeks recruits and an intake of six hundred would noticeably strengthen the British movement. Yet an organised group of this size remains detached and receives no encouragement to come closer. “The solution to repressive laws is not better government but no government.” Does that not sound like anarchism? It comes from the Socialist Standard,… read more »
In the phrase “Anarchist Research Group,” what does “research” mean? To judge from the Group’s meetings it means the accumulation of information about anarchism and anarchists. (The Bulletin also operates for the most part on this interpretation). At the last meeting, for example, John Moore delivered a highly informative talk on Perlman and the discussion… read more »
In “Reason as Enemy” [1] Frank Antosen says that as an anarchist he wants a way of thinking more flexible than logic or reason (he uses these terms interchangeably), and proposes to find it by a ‘marriage of opposites,’ joining reason and imagination. “We must not,” he says, “worship our ‘rational’ sides and scorn our… read more »
Thinkers fall into two groups: unifiers and dichotomizers, otherwise lumpers and splitters. Anarchists stand on both sides of this fence, lumping their opponents together as supporters of the state and splitting their own movement off as independent of them. This leaves anarchism rootless, with no sufficient explanation for its presence, and in any case it… read more »