Which one are you counting as the last sentence? If it's this one: "Trump is doing this tenfold, as we’ll see in…" just put it together with the bit that follows.
Trump is actively undermining the basis of his own power, as we'll see in Part III.
Hello Mr.Gelderloos! I first got to know you through the book "The solutions are already here",then I read some of your other works on the anarchist library before I found this website.
A very informative and thoughtful article as usual,and what caught my eyes is the fact that the Soviet model didn't perform well in industry-mature countries like east Germany and Czechoslovakia. Are there any books that focus on this issue and/or offer some analysis on this? Also,I wonder if this phenomenon has something to do with the 53 East Germany,56 Hungary and 68 Czechoslovakia incidents.
I enjoy reading your definitions, I'm probably a word nerd but hey.
I'm old enough to remember the disputed election but I've got to say, from outside the US nothing changes terribly much. The empire rolls on and over anyone in its way.
I read a little heterodox economics, it helps to detect the lies of politicians or at least the distractions they use as of course lying is their stock in trade. Heterodox economists are on the outer in academic circles since Friedman sold his BS to Thatcher and Reagan destroying the welfare state and bringing in neoliberal austerity. I can just remember all the "free" stuff government used to supply, education, utilities, work for everyone (white males) public transport, medical, housing, even banking and insurance.
I thought I'd introduce you to it with this little cartoon, it might be enlightening.
The Germans have found a simple and imho elegant solution to your continued dilemma with anarchists and the left. Ever since the 60s in Germany they distinguish between a parliamentarian left and outer-parliamentarian left (Ausserparlamentarische Linke APO).
Done.
As long as the radical, outer-parliamentarian left stays pluralistic, intersectional, to find common cause in certain issues, without glazing over our important distinctions (say between vanguardism and grassroots democratic), i see absolutely no problem with placing anarchists on the radical left.
On the contrary, this is where we will find allies and hopefully interesting debates. All that is needed is a second axis, besides the left-right axis (for instance libertarian to authoritarian), to help pave the way for those much needed discourses.
These are not the times when we as anarchists can afford it to unnecessarily isolate ourselves further. Instead we need to create larger networks, with activists engaged in a spectrum of causes. But this cannot happen without establishing a healthier attitude towards conflict, a debating culture.
In these times, when so-called "anarchocapitalists" and even rightwing libertarians claim to be anarchists, we need the right-left axis as a distinctive descriptor. Quick side note: Even the term "libertarian" was also stolen from anarchists, who used it in the late 1800s when "anarchist" was made illegal.
Yes, the left-right axis stems from the French parliament way back when. But so what? Because the term has evolved ever since then.
I disagree and the analysis I present is also informed by the German experience, which isn't such a great example of avoiding isolation or not empowering vanguards and reformists-- it's not a movement that provides a whole lot, beyond a tactical level, that we might want to emulate.
What's important about the extra-parliamentary left is it's still oriented *towards the State.
You're also making a big assumption: that making an analytical distinction constitutes a wall or a separation. In my writing I pretty consistently emphasize the importance of working across differences. In this series, I'll be getting to the question of how to navigate that difference with the Left, either in Part IV or in a side piece specifically on the Left.
Good examples of how I'm using the term, which is not only historical but extremely useful, come from a number of Mediterranean countries like Catalunya and Greece. Here, the anarchist movement is *far less isolated and self-isolating than in Germany or the US, in recent decades. Maintaining the distinction isn't a call to purism and separation, it's a reminder that there's an important difference there, so we can choose when to work together and when to find separate paths.
In my experience in the anarchist left since the late 70s/early 80s (i missed the 60s and parts of the 70s because of age), it is incorrect that the extra-parliamentary left was still oriented towards the State. I wonder where you take this claim from? Have you looked into the so-called Spontis and other anarchist groups?
Plus you are not addressing the issue with the right wing "anarchists" (ancaps etc.), and yes, i also use scare quotes for them. But they do self-proclaim to be anarchists and, well, don't we all self-proclaim (and isn't that part and parcel of being an anarchist)!? In other words, who am i to simply claim that they are not anarchists?! It is more helpful to focus on their vicinity to right-wing convictions as opposed to the way the left-wing anarchists, that i can identify with, tend to see things.
In the current political climate, we need diversity of tactics just as much as we need flexible and discourse-friendly unity in a large tent left.
In the most pragmatic terms, it is in the large tent left where i can, not will, find friends and allies, it's where i can create networks and build grass-root movements. It is on the right where i find my enemies, enemies in every conceivable metric. So why would i need to place a wedge towards the left?
I seriously do not understand what we as anarchists are to gain, if we don't understand ourselves as belonging to the wide tent left. And reading your texts has not changed that one bit. On the contrary, it has fed my conviction that we need to widen our view and instead start to address taboo topics like ageism and ableism, instead of self-righteously narrowing our position.
I am well over 60 years old and in my experience, people who claim to be beyond left and right are either arrogant, often when they are younger, or they are on their slow move to the right, on their way to become renegades, when they are older.
P.S. Whenever i have used https://www.politicalcompass.org/test (for a laugh) my result is on the bottom left corner (libertarian-left), right next to Emma and Piotr, and i have to say, i am quite happy there (and of course i am aware that the test has serious limitations).
I found much of this helpful. I was confused by the last sentence.
Which one are you counting as the last sentence? If it's this one: "Trump is doing this tenfold, as we’ll see in…" just put it together with the bit that follows.
Trump is actively undermining the basis of his own power, as we'll see in Part III.
and here's the link to Part III https://petergelderloos.substack.com/p/the-rights-rollercoaster-to-hell-d3a/
Hello Mr.Gelderloos! I first got to know you through the book "The solutions are already here",then I read some of your other works on the anarchist library before I found this website.
A very informative and thoughtful article as usual,and what caught my eyes is the fact that the Soviet model didn't perform well in industry-mature countries like east Germany and Czechoslovakia. Are there any books that focus on this issue and/or offer some analysis on this? Also,I wonder if this phenomenon has something to do with the 53 East Germany,56 Hungary and 68 Czechoslovakia incidents.
I enjoy reading your definitions, I'm probably a word nerd but hey.
I'm old enough to remember the disputed election but I've got to say, from outside the US nothing changes terribly much. The empire rolls on and over anyone in its way.
I read a little heterodox economics, it helps to detect the lies of politicians or at least the distractions they use as of course lying is their stock in trade. Heterodox economists are on the outer in academic circles since Friedman sold his BS to Thatcher and Reagan destroying the welfare state and bringing in neoliberal austerity. I can just remember all the "free" stuff government used to supply, education, utilities, work for everyone (white males) public transport, medical, housing, even banking and insurance.
I thought I'd introduce you to it with this little cartoon, it might be enlightening.
https://youtu.be/TDL4c8fMODk?si=aAVcK3CVeMExOg-K
The Germans have found a simple and imho elegant solution to your continued dilemma with anarchists and the left. Ever since the 60s in Germany they distinguish between a parliamentarian left and outer-parliamentarian left (Ausserparlamentarische Linke APO).
Done.
As long as the radical, outer-parliamentarian left stays pluralistic, intersectional, to find common cause in certain issues, without glazing over our important distinctions (say between vanguardism and grassroots democratic), i see absolutely no problem with placing anarchists on the radical left.
On the contrary, this is where we will find allies and hopefully interesting debates. All that is needed is a second axis, besides the left-right axis (for instance libertarian to authoritarian), to help pave the way for those much needed discourses.
These are not the times when we as anarchists can afford it to unnecessarily isolate ourselves further. Instead we need to create larger networks, with activists engaged in a spectrum of causes. But this cannot happen without establishing a healthier attitude towards conflict, a debating culture.
In these times, when so-called "anarchocapitalists" and even rightwing libertarians claim to be anarchists, we need the right-left axis as a distinctive descriptor. Quick side note: Even the term "libertarian" was also stolen from anarchists, who used it in the late 1800s when "anarchist" was made illegal.
Yes, the left-right axis stems from the French parliament way back when. But so what? Because the term has evolved ever since then.
I disagree and the analysis I present is also informed by the German experience, which isn't such a great example of avoiding isolation or not empowering vanguards and reformists-- it's not a movement that provides a whole lot, beyond a tactical level, that we might want to emulate.
What's important about the extra-parliamentary left is it's still oriented *towards the State.
You're also making a big assumption: that making an analytical distinction constitutes a wall or a separation. In my writing I pretty consistently emphasize the importance of working across differences. In this series, I'll be getting to the question of how to navigate that difference with the Left, either in Part IV or in a side piece specifically on the Left.
Good examples of how I'm using the term, which is not only historical but extremely useful, come from a number of Mediterranean countries like Catalunya and Greece. Here, the anarchist movement is *far less isolated and self-isolating than in Germany or the US, in recent decades. Maintaining the distinction isn't a call to purism and separation, it's a reminder that there's an important difference there, so we can choose when to work together and when to find separate paths.
In my experience in the anarchist left since the late 70s/early 80s (i missed the 60s and parts of the 70s because of age), it is incorrect that the extra-parliamentary left was still oriented towards the State. I wonder where you take this claim from? Have you looked into the so-called Spontis and other anarchist groups?
Plus you are not addressing the issue with the right wing "anarchists" (ancaps etc.), and yes, i also use scare quotes for them. But they do self-proclaim to be anarchists and, well, don't we all self-proclaim (and isn't that part and parcel of being an anarchist)!? In other words, who am i to simply claim that they are not anarchists?! It is more helpful to focus on their vicinity to right-wing convictions as opposed to the way the left-wing anarchists, that i can identify with, tend to see things.
In the current political climate, we need diversity of tactics just as much as we need flexible and discourse-friendly unity in a large tent left.
In the most pragmatic terms, it is in the large tent left where i can, not will, find friends and allies, it's where i can create networks and build grass-root movements. It is on the right where i find my enemies, enemies in every conceivable metric. So why would i need to place a wedge towards the left?
I seriously do not understand what we as anarchists are to gain, if we don't understand ourselves as belonging to the wide tent left. And reading your texts has not changed that one bit. On the contrary, it has fed my conviction that we need to widen our view and instead start to address taboo topics like ageism and ableism, instead of self-righteously narrowing our position.
I am well over 60 years old and in my experience, people who claim to be beyond left and right are either arrogant, often when they are younger, or they are on their slow move to the right, on their way to become renegades, when they are older.
P.S. Whenever i have used https://www.politicalcompass.org/test (for a laugh) my result is on the bottom left corner (libertarian-left), right next to Emma and Piotr, and i have to say, i am quite happy there (and of course i am aware that the test has serious limitations).