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Texts :: history |
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A Short History of Syndicalism |
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by Workers Solidarity Alliance (WSA) |
02 Sep 2005
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"The International Workers Association was founded in Berlin in 1922, but its origins trace back to the 1860's and the International Working Men's Association, better known as the First International. Most people associate the First International only with Karl Marx and the emerging Social Democratic movement, but the Anarchists and Marxists had actually about the same influence among the workers and in the International." |
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Texts :: history |
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An Overview of the Spanish Libertarian Movement |
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by Murray Bookchin |
02 Sep 2005
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"Although the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in July, 1936, was followed by a far-reaching social revolution in the anti-Franco camp - more profound in some respects than the Bolshevik Revolution in its early stages - millions of discerning people outside of Spain were kept in ignorance, not only of its depth and range, but even of its existence, by virtue of a policy of duplicity and dissimulation of which there is no parallel in history." |
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Texts :: history |
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Anarchist Activity in France during World War Two |
by C.I.R.A.
Previously published: C.I.R.A. Bulletin No. 21/22 (Summer, 1984 |
09 Oct 2005
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Summary of material from the C.I.R.A., Marseille, BULLETIN No. 21/22 (Summer, 1984), which had the theme Anarchists and the Resistance. |
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Texts :: history |
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Anarchists in the Spanish Revolution |
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by José Pierats |
02 Sep 2005
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"Anarchism is largely responsible for its own bad reputation in the world. It did not consider the thorny problem of means and ends. In their writings, many anarchists conceived of a miraculous solution to the problem of revolution. We fell easily into this trap in Spain. We believed that "once the dog is dead, the rabies is over." We proclaimed a full-blown revolution without worrying about the many complex problems that a revolution brings with it. Nettlau said that those who believe that a society can change itself overnight through a heroic struggle have not learned the lessons of history. As Bakunin was wont to say, "a people develops extraordinary capacities when it is able to defeat its worst enemy: the State." But we must not forget what we have learned from more recent history (which Bakunin did not experience) - that the state is a virus that can take hold in each of us, and that revolutions set free not only the enslaved masses, but also millions and millions of viruses." |
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Texts :: history |
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Anarcho-Syndicalism in Puerto Real |
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by Solidarity Federation - IWA |
02 Sep 2005
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"Today I would like to talk about the rationalisation of the shipyards in Puerto Real in the south-west of Spain and the kind of activities the CNT has been involved in . . . Every Thursday of every week, in the towns and villages in the area, we had all-village assemblies where anyone who was connected with the particular issue, whether they were actually workers in the shipyard itself, or women or children or grandparents, could go along to the village assembly and actually vote and take part in the decision-making process of what was going to take place. So we created a structure which was very different from the kind of structure of political parties, where the decisions are made at the top and they filter down. What we managed to do in Puerto Real was make decisions at the base and take them upwards, which is in complete contrast to the ways in which political parties operate." |
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Texts :: history |
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Anatomy of a Struggle |
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by Confederation Nationale du Travail (CNT-AIT) |
02 Sep 2005
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"The CNT-AIT section among the municipal workers in Blagnac (France) was formed in March 1998 with a small nucleus of militants and some openly sympathetic municipal employees. Starting from the need for freedom of expression and action the new section soon pinpointed two primary issues among the problems facing the wageworkers in the public service - the problems of discriminatory bonuses and casual labor." |
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Texts :: history |
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Chinese anarchists in the U.S |
by mitch
Previously published: Anarcho-Syndicalist Review, Summer 2006 |
02 Oct 2006
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Expanded and updated version of previous article on The Equality Society |
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Texts :: history |
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Collectives in the Spanish Revolution |
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by Gaston Leval |
02 Sep 2005
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"The ideals pursued by the Spanish anarchists are the same as those followed and propagated by the greatest minds from Plato and perhaps some of the Stoics, right up to our own times. The Spanish revolution achieved what the early Christians were asking, what in the XIVth Century the Jacquerie in France and the English peasants led by John Ball struggled for, and those in Germany whom Thomas Munzer was to lead two centuries later, as well as the English Levellers led by Everard and Winstanley, the Moraves brothers, disciples of Jean Huss. That which Thomas More foresaw in his Utopia, and Francis Bacon, and Campanella in La Citta del Sole and the priest Jean Meslier in his famous Testament (too often ignored) and Morelli in his Naufrage des lles Flottantes, and Mably who like Morelli inspired the noblest minds in the American Revolution, and the enrages of the French Revolution of whom Jacques Roux, the "red priest" was one. And the army of thinkers and reformers of the XIXth Century and of the first thirty years of the present. It is, in world history, the first attempt to apply the dream of all that was best in mankind. It succeeded in achieving, in many cases completely, the finest ideal conceived by the human mind and this will be its permanent glory. " |
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Texts :: history |
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Direct Action Movement |
by Mitch
Previously published: Kate Sharpley Library Bulletin #4 |
30 Dec 2005
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Brief history of the succesor to the British Syndicalist Workers Federation, the Direct Action Movement. |
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Texts :: theory : history |
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Founding of the Worker's International |
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by Mikhail Bakunin |
23 Sep 2005
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"Only individuals, and a small number of them at that, can be carried away by an abstract and "pure" idea. The millions, the masses, not only of the proletariat but also of the enlightened and privileged classes, are carried away only by the power and logic of "facts," apprehending and envisaging most of the time only their immediate interests or moved only by their monetary, more or less blind, passions. Therefore, in order to interest and draw the whole proletariat into the work of the International, it is necessary approach it not with general and abstract ideas, but with a living tangible comprehension of its own pressing problems, of which evils the workers are aware in a concrete manner." |
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