EVENT: Annexation, Autonomy, or Independence? The Politics of Cuban Identity in the Émigré Communities of New York and Florida, 1840s-1890

Via 171 bus:

Evan Daniel, Queens College, City University of New York

“Annexation, Autonomy, or Independence? The Politics of Cuban Identity in the Émigré Communities of New York and Florida, 1840s-1890s”

Thursday 18^th April 2013, 2 pm – 3.30 pm

Seminar Room, Pauling Centre, 58a Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 6QS

Hosted by the ESRC Centre on Migration Policy and Society (COMPAS)

This seminar will explore the changing modalities of diasporic identities among émigré Cuban workers in the nineteenth century, including tensions between Creole and Peninsular orientations, and tensions between different conceptions of nationalism and internationalism in the anarchist and labour movements.

For information, please contact Ben Gidley, COMPAS ben.gidley@compas.ox.ac.uk

Directions and map at: http://www.compas.ox.ac.uk/about/how-to-find-us/

On this day

Via the Modern School blog:

January 7, 1919 – This date marked the beginning of Argentina’s “Bloody Week” (AKA Tragic Week) in Buenos Aires. Workers (led by Italian anarchists) were demonstrating for the 8-hour work day and were fired upon by the authorities, leaving four dead and nearly 30 wounded. Clashes with the authorities on the day of the funerals left another 50 dead. A General Strike was called and strikers were attacked by trade union reformists and paramilitary groups collaborating with the police. By January 16 the strike was crushed, with as many as 700 dead and 2000 wounded, many of whom were Jewish-Russian immigrants targeted by racists and anti-Bolshevik hysteria.(From the Daily Bleed and Wikipedia)

January 7, 1939 – Tom Mooney, a labor activist wrongly convicted of murder in the San Francisco Preparedness Day bombing in July 1916, was freed after 22 ½ years in jail, granted an unconditional pardon by Governor Culbert Olson.(From the Daily Bleed)

Related articles

Barcelona diary: Celebrating radical history

The Gonzo Kid:

Recently I was lucky enough to take part in a meeting of radical historians in Barcelona. The event was billed as “a meeting of colleagues and comrades, all active in interpreting and bringing out the radical history of the place where they live”.

As well as sharing experiences and having a good time, the gathering was aimed at establishing “a more or less formal network/platform for the future. An international network of independent tour guides, street storytellers and historical activists”.

Radical historians and tour guides from Dublin, Barcelona, Olso, Berlin and London were present, as well as members of the RaspouTeam who make innovative use of street art, QR codes and radio to celebrate the revolutionary history of Paris. For my own part, I delivered a presentation on Liverpool’s history from an anarcho-syndicalist viewpoint, including some general history of the Solidarity Federation (which goes back to the founding of the Syndicalist Workers’ Federation in 1950), of which I am a member. Also participating and helping to facilitate the meeting was a CNT member who has set up a bar off La Rambla called La Llibertària, which is run as a workers co-operative. The walls of the bar are covered in posters, photographs and original newspapers from the Spanish revolution and it is well worth a visit for anyone spending time in the city.

READ THE REST

Related articles

• Durruti in the Spanish Revolution [Paperback] (thefreeonline.wordpress.com)

Libertarian Anthology III: Trade Unionism, Councilism and Revolutionary Syndicalism

Via Andy:

Libertarian Anthology III: Trade Unionism, Councilism and Revolutionary Syndicalism is edited, published and produced by Acracia with the co-operation of Grupo Cultural de Estudios Sociales de Melbourne, November 2012. The anthology is comprised of five essays:

• ‘The basis of Trade Unionism’ by Emile Pouget;
• ‘The origins of anarcho-syndicalism’ by Rudolf Rocker;
• ‘Fernand Pelloutier and the dilemma of revolutionary syndicalism’ by Alan Spitzer;
• ‘Councilism and Syndicalism: a historical perspective’ by Andrew Giles-Peters and;
• ‘Anarchism and Trade Unionism’ by Gaston Gerard.

From the Foreword:

This third issue of Libertarian Anthology is devoted to the topic of trade unionism and the evolvement by one of the groupings within it to revolutionary ideals; whom ever has taken the patience to study both the economic and political development of society over the past two centuries will come to realise that the goals of anarcho-syndicalism did not evolve from unachievable utopic concepts conveyed by a few lunatic innovative goodhearted individuals, instead, these goals are the outcome of constant struggles within the maladjusted social conditions. As a result we have the pleasure in presenting the reader with a collection of articles which we hope will demystify the misunderstanding of anarcho-syndicalism…

Download here.

For more infos write to exiliolibertario[at]gmail[dot]com.

London Anarchist Bookfair 2013

It’s that time of year again.  It will be on Saturday  27th October  From 10am to 7pm at Queen Mary’s, University of London on the Mile End Road. Here are two Poumista recommendations.

The Path Not Taken - welfare history and the libertarian perspective 11am – 12 noon Room 3.22

To know where you’re going, you need to know where you came from.  One piece of hidden history is the way working class people, in face of the most ruthless capitalism ever, erected a system of welfare services, based on mutual aid “friendly societies”.  Health, education, housing, benefits, etc, were all included as the new book tells.  We can’t resurrect the friendly societies but we can work for modern collective libertarian welfare services, as well as defending the compromise welfare state.  Books available. Organised by:  Socialist Libertarian Group [Whoy are they?]

1839: The Chartist Insurrection 12 noon – 1pm Room 3.18

The Chartists were the original political movement of the working class, and 1839 was the year a National Convention assembled in London, and revolution seemed a real possibility. The year ended with an armed uprising in London, followed by the trial of its leaders for treason. Our speaker, David Black, is co-author (with Chris Ford) of a new book on the events of 1839. Organised by: Hobgoblin

From the archive of struggle no.69: Emma Goldman, anti-fascism, etc

Most important link today is an apparently previously unpublished text by Emma Goldman on “The political Soviet grinding machine“, written in Barcelona in 1936.

I’ve only recently noticed the newish website Anti-Fascist Archive, which mainly has material from the history of British militant anti-fascism. Here’s a recent weekly update to give you an idea of what’s there:

• The blanks have been filled in the fighting talk collection.
• The World in Action documentary on anti-fascism is final available for all to watch!
• Information about picture 6 in the Collection of Beatings post has been supplied by Pedro.
• TAL fanzine and Celtic anti-fascist information has been helpfully supplied
• An old picture of Joey Owens has been added
• A new various AFA literature post
• Pre-War articles on anti-fascism
• Some fascist stickers have been added too

Most relevant to this blog, I guess, is the pre-war stuff, so here’s a taster.

The Two-Gun Mutualist site has been updating its translations. Among the updated are: “Nihilism” by Voline (ca.1929); Joseph Déjacque,Authority—Dictatorship (Down with the Bosses!) and Exchange; Henri Rochefort, letter on Louise Michel; Han Ryner, from “The Congress of Poets” and ”The Revolt of the Machines“.

There’s lost more from the radical archive at Entdinglichung, mainly in French but also including Rare texts by the Situationist International 1966-1972 and Nestor Machno’s The Anarchist Revolution (192?).

Below the fold, what’s new at the Marxist Internet Archive:

Spanish Revolution and Civil War gallery

A wonderful gallery at Libcom. Here’s just a taste – go enjoy the real thing.

Theft at the Atenou

As I already reported (thanks to Kate Sharpley Library), there has been a terrible theft at one of the most important cultural spaces in Barcelona, l’Ateneu Enciclopèdic Popular, which will be celebrating its centenary this year. Here is a statement from the Ateneu, badly translated into English – please circulate.

Today, 1 February 2012 entered in force to steal important documents from the Library of the Athenaeum.

Among the items stolen were:

• Original posters of the Civil War era as well as various objects also the period of the Spanish Civil War.
• Postcards from the civil war, pamphlets of many organizations and groups of the 20s and 30s and of the Franco-era underground.
• A collection of currency notes of the collectivized villages
• A postcard collection of civil war and of personalities such as Bakunin and Kropotkin
• A collection of film programs for the period of civil war
• A collection of old tram tickets for ten cents a pts.
• A collection of medals, pins, badges and insignia of the Civil War
• A folder with pictures of the free women’s and libertarian cultural associations, as well as documentation of collectivised enterprises based on the road from Ribes de Barcelona and visit of experts from Mexico.

The website contains some images, as well as a zip folder, and people are urged to look out for these. Here are just a couple of items:

Occupy and the anarchists

Some interesting discussions of Occupy and anarchist history lately, as Roland has noted. In a guest post at Roland’s place, TNC writes:

Some including Paul Berman and Michael Kazin identify anarchist elements of OWS such as presenting a living, breathing, counter-modelto capitalism and the utilization of consensus decision-making.

 The notion that you can create a rival community, a new world “within the shell of the old”, a counter-culture, is intrinsic to anarchism. That this must be consensus-driven is much more recent. It is not evident among the various groups that considered themselves anarchist–anarcho-mutualists/collectivists/syndicalists/communists—from the mid-nineteenth century until the Spanish Revolution. All of them felt that voting within their own organizations and groups was just fine.

By the 1960s, elements within the New Left including Students for a Democratic Society and others were experimenting with styles of decision-making that were viewed as more inclusive, participatory and democratic. These themes were also taken up by the Radical Feminist Movement in the 1970s. Certainly by the 1990s consensus organizing was gaining steam primarily though the work of Food Not Bombs (FNB), Earth First! and a few other groups. FNB in particular was effective at distributing inexpensively reproduced literature, including their Handbook, promoting consensus as the only way to order a local chapter:

We make decisions by consensus rather than voting. Voting is a win or lose model in which people are more concerned about the numbers it takes to win a majority than they are in the issue itself. Consensus, on the other hand, is a process of synthesis, bringing together diverse elements and blending them into a decision which is acceptable to the entire group. In essence, it is a qualitative rather than quantitative method of decision-making.

From my experience on the radical left, the influence of consensus decision-making was incredibly negative. The long, drawn-out meetings with no discernable outcome eventually take their toll. People start to drop out.

While Michael Kazin, Paul Berman and others note the attempt by the OWS movement to create a counter society (some have termed the encampments “micro societies”) an important difference between OWS and the classical anarchists is an emphasis on what form the future society would take. All of the utopian socialists going back to St. Simon and Fourier had a model in mind. Never mind how wacky the model was, at least they had something to refer to. This is completely missing from OWS. They say this is “all part of the process”but it is not enough for most of us. We want to know what you want, especially if you claim to represent us (as part of the 99%).

There is an interesting interview with Kazin at The Browser.

As the Occupy Wall Street movement writes a new chapter in the history of American leftism, you’ve published a history of radical movements in the United States titled American Dreamers. Tell me about it.

It chronicles almost 200 years of the American left’s history, interpreting what the left did right and what it did wrong. What it did wrong is better known. The subtitle of the book is “How the Left Changed a Nation”. I emphasise the positive difference it made, focusing on a couple of themes.

One is that the left expanded the meaning of individual freedom. It made sure that people of all races, religions and sexual preferences are, at least in theory, able to enjoy the same opportunities and freedoms as everybody else. The book begins with the abolitionists and goes up until the gay and lesbian movement of the 1970s. The other theme is that the left succeeded in presenting a vision of a more egalitarian and socially responsible society. The left may have had less success in this respect but its success has been considerable nonetheless.

I highlight figures like Henry George and Edward Bellamy, both journalists. Henry George wrote a bestselling economics tract called Progress and Poverty in 1879. He was very popular among the labour unionists. Edward Bellamy was a Christian Socialist who wrote Looking Backward. Published in 1888, it ranks with Uncle Tom’s Cabin as one of the most influential political novels of the 19th century. Bellamy’s followers were important figures in the populist movement of the 1890s and the Socialist Party in the early 20th century. These figures articulated an anti-corporate platform which continues to be influential even in the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations.

Do you see the DNA of the abolitionists, suffragettes and other leftist forebears in today’s protest?

Yes, in many ways I do. There are different strands. Of course you have civil disobedience, which abolitionists were known for. You have nonviolence and a “beloved community”, which civil rights protesters were known for. And you have a very strong emphasis on the 99% being injured by the 1%, and a critique of American democracy as being corrupted by big money, that began in the late 19th century with people like George and Bellamy.

He goes on to talk about Marx and Engels, about Howard Zinn’s historical vision, and then Students for a Democratic Society, and finally Gene Sharp, who has also been cited as an important influence on the Arab Spring.

Related articles

Music Mondays: Anarchist fado

Via Sam Geall’s Twitter, here is some rare anarchist fado.

According to the info on YouTube, this is a clip from the documentary Mariza and the Story of Fado.

Here are the lyrics:

Today in 1943

From IISG: Antecedents of Ester Borras

Membership card FEDIP, 1945

Arch José Ester Borrás 5

As an anarchist, José Ester Borras (1913-1980) fled from Spain to France. There he was active in the underground during the Second World War. Arrested by the Gestapo on 30 October 1943, he was deported to Mauthausen. He survived and established the Federación Española de Deportados e Internados Políticos (FEDIP) in Toulouse shortly after liberation. The FEDIP offered relief to Spaniards like Ester Borras, who were politicial refugees and had been interned in concentration camps. Borras was one of the first members of his own organization. The IISH has the archives of both Ester Borras and the FEDIP.

See also:

•  FEDIP archive
•  José Ester Borrás papers

He’d turned 40 just days previously. Here’s his Daily Bleed page:

[October 26:] 1913 — José Ester Borrás (1913-1980) lives, Berga (province of Barcelona). Spanish anarchist, active in the resistance in France & in the Mauthausen concentration camp, & co-founder of the founder of the Federación Española de Deportados e Internados Políticos (Spanish Federation of Former Political prisoners & camp inmates [FEDIP]).

Ester fought in the famed Colonna Tierra y Libertad during the Spanish Revolution of 1936. He was arrested by the communists, fled to France, arrested & tortured by the Gestapo…

[Details / context]

Léandre Valero

I only just noticed that one of my favourite blogs has been back for a few weeks from an enviably long summer break. Thanks to him for this fascinating obituary.

Valero, Léandre (1923-2011)

A short biography of Léandre Valero an anarchist who “critically supported” the Algerian independence movement

The recent death of Léandre Valero on 21st August shines a light on the activities of the Fédération Communiste Libertaire in France in the 1950s and its attitudes towards the independence movement in Algeria.

The son of an anarchist from Andalucia,who had fought with the FAI during the Revolution and Civil War, Valero was born in Oran in Algeria on the 12th October 1923. This meant that he became fluent in Spanish, French and Arabic.

He joined the Forces Françaises Libres, the groups initiated by De Gaulle which refused to accept the capitulation of France, during the Second World War. He took part in several campaigns and was involved in the liberation of several concentration camps. Following this, and apparently against his will, he was then sent to fight in Indo-China in January 1946. Here he established contact with the Vietminh and supplied them with petrol from French bases. Reported as a “demoralising element”, he was sent back to France in August of the same year.

Here he went to Paris. He made the decision to join the Fédération Anarchiste. The first person he met from the FA was the full-timer at their offices, who was none other than Georges Brassens, later to become known as one of France’s greatest singer-songwriters. He then moved to Auxerre working as a toolmaker-fitter. At the Gardy factory – where he set up a large section of the CNT – Valero allied himself with Georges Fontenis within the FA, and stayed with the organisation when it was transformed into the Fédération Communiste Libertaire.

He accepted the decision of the FCL to send him to Algeria in 1954 to aid the Mouvement Libertaire Nord-Africain (MLNA) in close relation with the FCL. Its main activists were the docker Duteuil, Idir Amazit, Derbal Salah and the teachers Fernand Doukhan, Jean Decharriene and Guy Martin. He obtained employment in a factory at Alger.

The MNLA gave assistance to the independence movement of Messali Hadj (distinct from the FLN). The FCL gave critical support to the independentist groups and Valero was to say : “You suffer from double oppressions. We are going to help you to get rid of colonial oppression. After that, it’s up to you to get rid of the oppression of your own capitalists!”. After the 1954 insurrection the main activity of the MNLA was support for Hadj’s organisation. Valero served as a “letter box” and sometimes a driver for the independentist leaders. At the same time Valero carried out propaganda selling the FCL paper Le Libertaire in the streets. He always carried a revolver in his pocket on these occasions and had to fire off several shots during a street sale.

In August 1955 he got a job as a foreman on a farm in Constantine province. Here he made contact with the guerrilla groups of the FLN ( Front de Libération Nationale) and supplied them with arms. In summer 1956, to avoid a military call-up in Algeria, he decided to return to France and live underground. The MNLA , now more and more under threat, decided to dissolve itself and all its archives and arms were thrown in the Mediterranean.

Part of the FCL had decided to go underground in summer 1956. These included Fontenis, Pierre Morain, Paul Philippe and Valero himself. With the amnesty offered by de Gaulle in 1958 Valero returned to Auxerre where he again got work in a factory. He was active in the CGT and in 1960 served on the departmental union of the CGT in the Yonne department. The factory where he worked was the first to go out on strike in the Yonne in May 1968 and Valero was one of the chief activists in the movement in the department.

Valero retired in 1983. In 1991 he joined the libertarian organisation Alternative Libertaire at its foundation, remaining with it until 2000. He remained active in free thought agitation and a neighbourhood association until the end of his life.

Nick Heath

Sources: obituary in Alternative Libertaire no. 210, October 2011

Related articles

• 17 October 1961: Fifty years on (oup.com)
• France remembers Algerian massacre 50 years on (guardian.co.uk)

1911

Phil Dickens again:

As I noted on Thursday, yesterday I attended Near To Revolution? The 1911 Liverpool General Transport Strike Centenary Conference.

This was only the latest in a strong line-up of events to commemorate 1911. First, there was Steve Higginson, Tony Wailey and Ian Morris’s Rhythms That Carry, which has been put on now at a number of venues. Then, on the anniversary of Bloody Sunday, we had a commemoration on the steps of St George’s Hall. Liverpool Solidarity Federation hosted Liverpool in Revolt: 1911-2011, with local historian Frank Carlyle among the speakers.

At all of these meetings and events, we were reminded of the strong syndicalist and anarchist currents that underpinned the events of the Liverpool General Transport Strike. In the midst of the Great Unrest of 1910-1914, it was defined by a rank-and-file revolt against trade union officialdom and an upsurge in militant class struggle.

This, indeed, was the point made by Ralph Darlington, in the workshop on Syndicalism and Trade Union Officialdom. His talk focused on the British syndicalist movement, and its successes and failures in addressing the problems of officialdom. Though he appeared to have far more time for the idea that unions could be de-bureaucratised or “moved left” than I, his analysis of the “boring from within” strategy and its limitations was interesting – particularly in how Tom Mann’s Industrial Syndicalist Education League, despite a scathing analysis of union officialdom in general, tempered criticism of specific leaders in the name of “unity.”

Some of Darlington’s analysis is similar to what I’ve said myself, whilst some was radically different. Though he contrasted the establishment of syndicalist unions in Europe with the looser networks of activists in Britain, and mentioned the CNT, CGT, and USI as specific examples of this, he didn’t touch upon anarcho-syndicalism and how it developed syndicalist methods alongside a more explicitly revolutionary anarchist philosophy. He approached it from the point of view that a party was the best vehicle to address the problem of syndicalism being almost apolitical. Nonetheless, he hit the mark with reference to traditional syndicalism’s flaws, and I was able to pick up on this during the open floor to argue – as Durruti did – that the problem of bureaucracy in fact stems from unions taking on the representative function and removing decision-making power from the mass of the rank-and-file.

[READ THE REST]

Related articles

• From the archive of struggle: the Spanish Civil War at Warwick, the Marxist Internet Archive, and more (poumista.wordpress.com)
• Histories of the present: The riots etc (poumista.wordpress.com)

Organise!

Image via Wikipedia

New from Anarchist Federation – get your copy from yer local infoshop, from the Anarchist Bookfair, from Freedom, or on-line.

Organise! magazine Issue 77 Winter 2011: 

• Editorial – What’s in the latest Organise! – The Anniversary Issue
• 25 years of the AFED – reviewing the last 5 years of the Anarchist Federation.
• The Paris Commune of 1871 and its impact – 140th anniversary
  • The Paris Commune: A contested legacy
  • “Vive la Commune!”
  • Revolutionary Portrait: Eugene Varlin, Martyr of the Paris Commune
• The Anti-Cuts Movement and the Left: A local activist’s perspective
• The Great Unrest: prelude to the storm – industrial disorder and school strikes 1910-14
• The day will come: Chicago 1886 – 124th Anniversary of the Haymarket Massacre
• The Mexican Revolution of 1911 – Centenary year
  • The land belongs to those who work it – The Magon brothers & Zapata
  • Uprising in Baja – battles of the California border towns [related reading here]
  • A Grave Error – the Mexican Syndicalists
• The anarchist sculptor: Henri Gaudier Brzeska
• Review: Ghost Dancers: The Miners’ Last Generation, by David John Douglass
• Obituary: Bob Miller (1953-2011)

Related articles

The friends of Durruti

New at Libcom:

The Friends of Durruti Group: 1937-39 – Agustin Guilamòn

Guillamòn’s in-depth study of the hugely important anarcho-syndicalist CNT militants who opposed their union’s collaboration with the Republican government during the Spanish Civil War.

Occupy!

Image via Wikipedia

Phil Dickens’ quote of the day…

…comes from Martyn Everett’s introduction to the 1988 Phoenix Press edition of Anarcho-syndicalism by [Rudolf] Rocker;

Historically the oppressed and the disaffected have rallied to the standard of socialism because of its oppositional position within capitalism – an oppositional position which provides the appearance of a radicalism it did not possess. During periods of revolutionary potential, however, people see opportunities to go beyond attempts to ameliorate capitalism, and to instead abolish it altogether. It is important to realise, however, that this is not usually an apocalyptic conversion into revolutionary activity, but is an emerging process involving continual, but unsuccessful attempts to reconstruct a movement of socialist opposition, find new forms of organisation and activity as well as new forms of protest and expression. New movements appear, representing the interests of groups which have not previously confronted capital, and so lack the burden of tradition and the “password” phraseology of socialism, but which nonetheless possess greater potential for revolution. New ideas and new forms of organisation flourish.

Reading this today, I was struck at how readily – though Everett was referring to the movements of the late 80s – this analysis could apply to the anti-cuts struggles of now.

I’ve written before on how UK Uncut, alongside the student movement, had managed to mobilise a whole new generation of people and inject life into anti-cuts struggles. They pushed beyond the traditional leadership structures of the left, and their actions were far ahead of their politics. Adam Ford takes the analysis further in looking at the “Occupy” movement, set to explode globally tomorrow. In essence, what we have is ordinary people looking for new ways to resist and challenge the system, though not necessarily yet having adopted a revolutionary analysis to go alongside it.

This analysis is important because, as Adam says, it is the “no politics” mantra “which enables the formerly social democratic parties and their ‘left’ hangers on, against the building of a true revolutionary movement.” And the failure of such occupations to mirror the Egyptian experience by linking up with workers’ struggle is leaving it prey to a liberal vanguardism which takes ideas such as “direct action” and put a very different spin on them.

As Solidarity Federation argue;

Radical liberal activism talks about ‘direct action’, but it has a very different take on what that means compared to anarchists, based on a very different reading of history. For anarchists, Emile Pouget sums up the concept eloquently: “Direct Action is a notion of such clarity, of such self-evident transparency, that merely to speak the words defines and explains them. It means that the working class, in constant rebellion against the existing state of affairs, expects nothing from outside people, powers or forces, but rather creates its own conditions of struggle and looks to itself for its means of action.” This is the original idea of direct action as mass, collective, working class action carried out by workers themselves. For anarchists, it is mass struggles which change the course of history – winning things from the 8-hour day to universal suffrage.

However, the clarity and self-evident transparency that Pouget saw in the term ‘direct action’ has given way with the later emergence of a rival conception which in many ways is the opposite of the anarchist one. This radical liberal version is best summed up by an oft-quoted maxim by Margaret Mead: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” Here instead of mass, collective, working class action we have individual, exemplary action by ‘committed citizens’. A clearer example of the gulf between anarchism and liberalism would be hard to find.

READ THE REST

Related articles

• London Anarchist Bookfair 22 October (poumista.wordpress.com)
• The anarchist idea of order | David Goodway (guardian.co.uk)

London Anarchist Bookfair 22 October

It’s that time of year again. Events include:

Is Capitalism destroying itself? And can we replace it? 4.30pm to 6.00pm 
‘Karl Marx got it right, capitalism can destroy itself.’- Nouriel Roubini (IMF and US Treasury adviser). ‘The [economic] icebergs are the worst in the lifetime of anyone now living.’ - Kenneth Clarke. ’People have lost faith in the free-market, Western democratic order.’ - Charles Moore (Thatcher’s biographer and Telegraph editor). Our rulers are worried. Austerity is not reviving the economy. Instead, it has led to protests and riots that are likely to intensify. How did we get here and what are the prospects for anti-capitalist revolution? A debate with: Selma James (Wages for Housework Campaign; Chris Knight (Radical Anthropology Group); Hillel Ticktin (‘Critique, a Journal of Socialist Theory’)

Mistakes of the Spanish Revolution 4.00pm to 5.00pm
My main contention is simple; briefly, it is that between July-August 1936, the FAI-CNT regional, national and peninsular committees of the CNT-FAI abandoned all pretence of being popular revolutionary organs. Instead, within a matter of days, they constituted a vested interest structure that served, primarily, to apply the brakes to — and reverse — the spontaneous revolutionary activity of the barrio (ward/district) committees, defence cadres, the action groups and the defence committees, and repress the rank-and-file activists who were pressing for social revolution. ‘Anti-fascist unity’ and state power were promoted at the expense of anarchist principles and values while the hegemony of the notables of the CNT–FAI leadership was imposed over the local revolutionary district committees and the general assemblies. Speaker: Stuart Christie

From the Paris Commune to Saint-Imier 1.00pm to 2.00pm
The Paris Commune of 1871 inspired revolutionaries everywhere. When it was defeated, tens of thousands of communards were murdered, imprisoned or deported. The events of ‘Bloody Week’ (May 21st to 28th) traumatised anarchists and drove some to the despair of assassination and bomb-throwing. Others regrouped in August the following year at Saint-Imier, Switzerland, with comrades disaffected from the by-then authoritarian sham that was Marx’s International. They established structures and founding principles at the roots of modern class-struggle anarchist organisation. This meeting builds for what will be the 140th anniversary of that congress: 9th-12th August 2012, in Saint-Imier itself. Organised by: Anarchist Federation

Red Rosa and the Arab Spring 4.00pm to 5.00pm
Any revolutionary movement needs both spontaneity and organisation, the how can these apparent opposites be combined successfully? As the popular uprisings of 2011 bring this question to the fore once again, we will examine the ideas of Rosa Luxembury (1871 – 1919) and Raya Dunayevskaya (1910 – 1987). Organised by: Hobgoblin

Free University 1.00pm to 2.00pm
Until the twentieth century, the role of the University differed little from the times of Plato and Aristotle; to create an educated elite from amongst the ruling class. Then in the 1920s the IWW initiated a People’s College, under the auspices of Cornell University; while in the midst of the Spanish Civil War the CNT-AIT and FAI started La Universida Popular. Education became available to all. As University admissions shrink due to current neoliberal policies, the Anarchist university in Toronto and A-Bildungnetz in Hannover continue to propose a system of non-hierarchical concensus-driven learner networks, and here some of our German comrades will discuss these issues. Organised by: Industrial Workers of the World (IWW)

Related articles

The Iron Column

From SlackBastard:

I’m really looking forward to reading this…

The Story of the Iron Column: Militant Anarchism in the Spanish Civil War
Paul Sharkey (Translator) and Abel Paz
Edition: pb
ISBN: 9781849350648
Publisher: AK Press
Release Date: 2011-07-13

The members of the Iron Column were among the most notorious anarchists in the Spanish Civil War. They were intransigent in the face of the fascist revolt, but also in defence of the revolution’s gains.

We say to all workers, to all revolutionaries, to all anarchists: At the front or in the rearguard, wherever you may be, fight against the enemies of your liberty and demolish fascism. But also make sure that your exertions do not bring about the installation of a dictatorial regime that would represent the continuation, with all of its vices and defects, of the whole state of affairs that we are trying to obliterate. Now with weapons and later with the tools of labour, learn to live without tyrants and to develop for yourselves the only road to freedom. These are the feelings of the Iron Column, and they have been explained clearly and simply.

Comrades: Death to fascism! Long live the social revolution! Long live anarchy!

~ The Iron Column, 1 October 1936

Abel Paz (1921-2009) was a fifteen-year-old anarchist when the Spanish Revolution began. After the revolution’s defeat, he spent several years in exile, returning to Spain in 1942 as a guerrilla fighter against the Franco regime. He spent most of the subsequent eleven years in prison. Paz spent his later years authoring biographical and autobiographical works and delivering lectures celebrating the achievements of the Spanish anarchists. His book Durruti in the Spanish Revolution, was published by AK Press in 2006.

Paul Sharkey, an accomplished translator, has almost single-handedly made available a vast body of non-English language anarchist texts. His numerous translations include the works of Nestor Makhno, Osvaldo Bayer, Errico Malatesta, Daniel Guérin, José Peirats, and Antonio Téllez.

Iron Column Records

Iron Column Records is a distro and label spreading the anti-fascist message through no-nonsense music and merchandise. We are 100% non-profit – ALL proceeds from sales are given to antifa groups or anti-fascists in need.

We have a growing range of music from some of the finest anti-fascist bands and labels on the planet, and we plan to expand it as money allows. If you are in a band or involved with a label that is sympathetic to what we’re doing, please get in touch to see if we can work something out.

We’ve also produced a range of t-shirts with eye-catching anti-fascist designs and are planning to release our first album under our own imprint in the near future – watch this space!

We hope that you find something you like in our list and we look forwards to hearing from you.

Antifa always,

Iron Column Records.

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Today in 1957: fighting Franco

From Stuart Christie:

NOW AVAILABLE! FACERÍAS  — Urban Guerrilla Warfare (1939-1957). The Libertarian Movement’s Struggle against Francoism in Spain and in Exile by Antonio Téllez Solà (ISBN 978-1-873976-49-4), 413pp (indexed with 16 pp of photographs) £15.95 (+£3.50 p+p UK) (PDF) (ISSUU)
Anarchist urban guerrilla and member of the Iberian Federation of Libertarian Youth (FIJL) since 1936, José Lluis Facerías fought on the Aragón front during the Spanish Civil War, where he was taken prisoner and held until 1945. Following his release he rejoined the clandestine anarcho-syndicalist trade union, the CNT, and dedicated himself to the armed struggle against the Francoist dictatorship. From March 1946 until his death in a police ambush in 1957, Facerias was the driving force behind the anarchist defence groups operating in Barcelona.

BARCELONA, Friday, 30 August 1957, 10:45 am. In the deserted Sant Andreu district of Barcelona, a burst of automatic gunfire crackles and, as if pushed by some mighty hand, a man on the corner of the Paseo Verdún and the Calle del Doctor Pi i Molist slumps against a low wall. A pistol appears in his hand. His eyes scan the tree-lined boulevard leading off to his right towards the Santa Cruz mental clinic, but he sees no sign of life. Suddenly, he realises he has been betrayed. Unseen assailants are shooting at him from windows overlooking the junction of the Paseo Urrutia and Calle del Doctor Pi i Molist. The first burst of gunfire shatters the man’s ankle. Further rifle shots ring out and bullets ricochet around him . . .

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On this day in 1917: Frank Little lynched

From on this Deity: 

  Ninety-three years ago today on 1st August 1917, Frank Little – labour leader, militant activist, agitator, executive board member of the Industrial Workers of the World and anti-war dissident – was asleep in the room he was renting in … Continue reading →