Anarcho-syndicalism

Historia de la Columna Tierra y Libertad de la CNT y de su sucesora la 153 Brigada Mixta durante la Guerra Civil española. Historia de los Comités de Defensa en la Catalunya central.

History of the anarchist column called Tierra y Libertad and the militarized unit it derived to during the Spanish Civil War. This is also a resum of the revolutionary activities of the Defence Committees in the central Catalonia areas during the spanish Second Republic.

This chapter addresses the life and works of Italian transnational anarchist and anti-fascist Camillo Berneri (1897-1937) drawing upon Berneri’s archives and original papers, never translated into English with only few exceptions. For the first time, I analyse Berneri’s work through spatial lenses, investigating the contributions that this can bring to the contemporary fields of critical, radical and subaltern geopolitics. My argument is twofold. First, I argue that the analysis of spaces of exile and transnational solidarity networks are paramount for understanding the trajectories of anarchist anti-fascism between the two world wars. Berneri is an outstanding representative of an entire generation of Italian anarchists and antifascists. He was eventually defined ‘the most expelled anarchist of Europe’ due to his innumerable travels and tribulations across the borders of Italy, France, Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and Spain. Second, I argue that Berneri’s writings on the geopolitical problems that the Spanish revolution had to face from 1936, such as the question of the armed defence from Franco’s troops and the Italian imperialism in the Balearic Islands, can nourish present-day perspectives in radical internationalism and stateless geopolitics. The prickliness of Berneri’s analyses, published in the journals of Italian anarchists fighting in Spain with the CNT-FAI, can also explain why he was murdered by Stalinist agents during the Bloody Week of Barcelona in May 1937, just few days after delivering a radio speech where Berneri pronounced a moved tribute to another Italian anti-fascist, Antonio Gramsci, just died in a fascist prison in Italy.

In this article we will analyse, from a transnational history point of view, the presence of American anarchism in the Galician libertarian press until 1936. In the 19th and 20h centuries, the transatlantic migrations contributed to develop a dense network of contacts and relationships between Galicia and American countries. This network involves anarchist militants on both sides of the Ocean. The Galician anarchists have a close collaboration with her Americans libertarian comrades; and many Galician militants are actively committed in the labour movement of their host countries. The Galician libertarian press shows this relationship and this participation in different ways (articles, contributions, news, solidarity initiatives, etc.). That proves the existence of an intense circulation of ideas and persons, as well as a transnational militancy in the Atlantic area.

Keywords: Anarchism; transnational history; press; Galicia; America.

Este dossiê foi realizado a partir de uma pesquisa de praticamente dois anos, que teve por objetivo analisar o ressurgimento do anarquismo, do anarcossindicalismo e do sindicalismo revolucionário, que ocorreu no mundo todo entre 1990 e 2019.

Through the translation from Swedish to Italian of an excerpt of Ormen (“The Snake”) by Stig Dagerman, the paper aims at analysing the author’s point of view under two aspects: the existential one and the political one, which were two essential scopes in the life and the career of the Swedish writer, who in his debut novel managed to paint the anxiety and the concern of Sweden during the Second World War years, while maintaining a resolute opinion towards the period’s politics, society and art. After a brief overview of the entire novel, the Italian translation of the last chapter of the novel will scrutinize the style, the linguistic and stylistic distinctive traits and the results of social commentary which Dagerman expresses.

The Polish anarchist movement suffers from a uniquely distorted and occluded history. Although it honourably defended by force of arms the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943, with two Anarchist Federation of Poland militants later being hailed as "Righteous Among the Nations" for their sacrifice by Yad Vashem, Israel's official Holocaust memorial, and though it fought alongside the Polish Home Army in the Warsaw Uprising of 1944, it has either been mischaracterised by historians as tainted by nationalism and/or bolshevism, or even completely erased from the history of the defence of the Jews and of Polish resistance to the Nazis. The imposed historical bias of more than 40 years of Soviet rule naturally accounts for much of the gap in the record, explaining why works such as George Bruce's The Warsaw Uprising, published in 1972 during the Soviet era, have no anarchist or syndicalist references in their narratives. But it is far harder to excuse recent studies such as the otherwise exhaustive 752-page Norman Davies work Rising '44: The Battle for Warsaw (2003) for demonstrating rank ignorance of this minority yet key aspect of the capital's dramatic resistance. This sketch, extracted from my forthcoming work In the Shadow of a Hurricane: Global Anarchist Ideological and Organisational Lineages, hopes to rectify these errors of commission and omission.

This dissertation investigates the internal struggles within the labour movement in Dalarna at the beginning of the twentieth century. I investigate Social Democracy, Anarcho-Syndicalism and Communism, the three major factions of the working class. I study the relationship between these organisations and their supporters in the complex socio-economic area of Dalarna.

I have based my study on the three party programs and their answer to two central questions of the time: Will the conflicts of society lead to revolution? and How should politics and production be organised in the non capitalist society to come? Generally, anarcho-syndicalists argue that state power must be transformed to local government, social democrats hope to make different social interests compromise into political consensus. Communists want a proletarian state through social revolution. How were those ideologies received in Dalarna? In the beginning, anarchists fought social democrats: The opposition excluded from social democracy 1917 was also more influenced by anarchism than by communism. The opposition founded a party, witch towards the 1920´s turned from anarchism into communism, and the small farmers, that erlier had been attracted by the anarchist influenced rural propaganda, left and more industrial workers joined. Simultaneously, anarchists reorganised from a political party to a syndicalistic trade union, gradually mowing from the industrialised south to northern Dalarna. Communists, mainly left in the industrialised south, were shaken by two splits in the 1920´s and they lost their ability to compete with the social democrats in democratic elections. In Dalarna, social democrats, confronting anti-parliamentary anarchy and totalitarian communism alike, won the contest within the labour movement: At the end of the period, they dominated the area.

A building worker since he was 12 and later a leader of his trade union federation, Raymond Péricat was a typical representative of the most radical wing of the revolutionary syndicalism in the Cgt before 1914. Then, he was one of a very few trade union leaders faithful to anti-patriotism, thus opposed to the war and the Union sacrée. To have an insight on labor activists’ attitude towards the Russian Revolution, one may study the archives he had constituted in order to write his memoirs. Thanks to it, it is possible to follow his reaction step by step: at first, he felt enthusiasm for the soviets in early 1917 and then solidarity with the persecuted Bolsheviks since July. His attempt to imitate them by radicalizing social unrest in France in 1918 encountered harsh repression. This explains why the Communist party he founded in 1919, a year and a half before the official one, remained a tiny leftist group.

One of the most important debates in contemporary social and political movements concerns the importance and value of “prefigurative politics”. Its meaning, along with its origins, is often misconstrued, and it has come under intense criticism. This article defends a strategic sense of prefigurative politics on the basis of a Marxist theory of practice. Thus it reconstructs Marx's theory of practice, clarifies the relevant meaning of "prefigurative politics", and presents three arguments for why prefigurative politics is essential to bring about a free and democratic socialist society. Prefigurative politics is important for (1) developing revolutionary subjects with the powers or real possibilities needed to organise deliberation and decision-making in free and democratic socialist ways. Secondly (2), it is important for developing revolutionary subjects with the needs or drives motivating them to institute such forms of deliberation and decision-making when able to do so. Thirdly (3), it is important for developing revolutionary subjects with the consciousness – i.e. the right knowledge, outlook, values, etc. – required to understand and implement such free and democratic modes of deliberation and decision-making. Finally, I defend this strategic commitment from three common criticisms.

Forthcoming in Constellations.

Taking issue against an established view which reduces the interactions between Bergson and Sorel to a shared ‘irrationalism’, the article reconstructs successive phases of engagement between the two, focussing on the question of the effective impact of Bergsonian ideas on
Sorel’s Reflections on Violence. It identifies two complementary dynamics of engagement: a first one dictated by a philosophical affinity on the conceptualization of human agency and a second, more instrumental one, determined by Sorel’s need to find an established and popular philosophical support to his syndicalism. This latter issue was particularly urgent for Sorel, since his previous attempt to implant in France Labriola’s and Croce’s non-deterministic "materialismo storico" – the original theoretical foundation of Sorelian revisionism – had ended in failure.

Visando compreender o processo global de disseminação do anarquismo na  questão específica no Brasil, tanto este como uma corrente do  socialismo de tendência libertária quanto sua principal estratégia e um  dos principais meios de luta histórica da classe trabalhadora – o  sindicalismo de intenção revolucionária – propomos, através da Coleção  de Estudos do Anarquismo da Editora Prismas, o presente livro.

Os capítulos encontrados aqui partem de recentes e emergentes  pesquisas, que abordam a história do anarquismo e do sindicalismo  revolucionário no país e suas conexões com outra regiões, uma vez que  tal ideologia e estratégia se pretendem internacionalistas. A escolha  dos autores condiz com estudos que tentaram descaracterizar e enfrentar  equívocos anteriores e ainda apresentar novos parâmetros e visões para  entendermos tais fenômenos no Brasil, tanto referente às teorias e  procedimentos metodológicos, mas também no tocante aos recortes  temporais e geográficos bem como na atenção nas ações dos personagens  anarquistas.

Nancy, éditions Arbre Bleu, 2022  ------- Célèbre pour avoir écrit les Réflexions sur la violence qui furent diversement interprétées, Georges Sorel (1847-1922) a pourtant produit une œuvre qui ne prête pas à ambiguïté sur le fond. Se voulant « serviteur désintéressé du prolétariat », il n’a cessé de questionner ce qui pourrait amener les groupes ouvriers organisés à préparer le chemin vers une société libérée des entraves asservissantes du capitalisme.
Se plaçant dans les pas de Karl Marx qu’il a contribué à acclimater en France, Georges Sorel s’est employé à ruiner le prestige de la culture bourgeoise et les stratégies politiques de séduction mises en œuvre par l’État républicain. La résistance qu’il concevait était à la mesure de l’enjeu : elle commandait d’opérer la « scission » par l’action directe et la construction de l’autonomie prolétarienne selon des principes qu’il partageait avec les syndicalistes révolutionnaires.
Ce livre apporte un regard neuf sur l’imaginaire politique de Sorel. Aux études que Willy Gianinazzi consacre à des facettes insoupçonnées de sa pensée s’ajoutent des écrits engagés du philosophe dont la plupart, publiés en Italie, l’autre « patrie » de Sorel, sont restés inconnus en France.
Plus que jamais, Sorel vaut d’être redécouvert et lu : son enthousiasme à repérer et élucider les allants populaires qui nous meuvent vers la liberté est communicatif.

Taking the view that all true spirituality is inherently Anarchist at it's core, this pdf book is a comprehensive examination of the many links between Anarchism, the Occult and Mysticism. It is presented within the broad framework of a modern myth and poetry and tells the story of a young punk Anarchist writer, who discovers the magickal nature of reality and so decides to write a book to spread awareness and spiritual anarchism. However it also heavily researched and like so many spiritualities, it uses this mythology as a vehicle for transmitting the mysteries, with the majority of the book being the prosaic teachings of the protagonist. It assumes no knowledge on the part of the reader and provides introductions to the topics discussed, before going on to more original and in depth ideas. While a history of spiritual anarchists and the theocratic black magicians that oppose them is given to provide context, this book focuses more on integrating mystical and magickal teachings from around the world and creating a detailed and modern Anarchist spirituality that suits the individual. It also provides a variety of practical ritual meditative techniques for creating an Anarchist consciousness, as well as using magick for activist and Anarchist purposes. If you were ever looking for an Anarchist grimoire, this is it! One of the main themes of the book is the global use of psychedelics or “entheogens” for spiritual purposes and how they can be utilized for overcoming the counter-revolutionary aspects of the mind. The book also explains how Occult techniques can be used to help direct the trips for expanding consciousness and performing magick. (especially DMT and Salvia Divinorum) Another primary theme is how language and “memes” apply to fractals, how Noam Chomsky's notion of “universal grammar” was actually discovered by Occultists along with the scientific method, but also how language shapes human consciousness, politics and the world around us. Other topics include an Occult interpretation of the historical origins of the monetary and legal systems, as well as the origins of Judaism, Christianity and governments through theocracy. Inside you will find explanations for how art and “memes” can be used for Anarchist propaganda, how ritual and magick apply to “neuroplasticity” and how all these things can literally shape our brains either to create free will, or as a form of brainwashing. This book explains theocracy as the root of all hierarchy which is itself the result of a kind of Obsessive compulsive memetic brain virus created by "black magicians." All this and much more is found within, while the epilogue explains groundbreaking political interpretations of “The Cube of Space,” Solomonic magick, Enoch and the Watchers, Gnosticism and world mythology in general. Here the author shows how this mythology relates to a meteorite death cult and ancient astronomical events, atomic theory, numerology and sacred geometry. It also gives advanced ideas on reconstructing an old world form of Alchemical Tantric Shamanism and how magick squares can be utilized with set theory to create the philosopher's stone in your brain!
A chapter by chapter synopsis is given in the table of contents

I am still on the first stretch of this nomadic exploration, but I think I can begin to answer the question that is guiding this exploration—'how can the Natural-Indigenous Worldview support our understandings of the potential for an anarchist society (i.e. for social order without hierarchical domination)?' The key of Natural-Indigenous Worldview that opens the lock of an anarchist society, of a society without hierarchical domination, comes in the Natural-Indigenous Worldview's spiritual ecology. When we develop the four R's (responsibility, reciprocity, respect, relationships [Young 2015]) through relating to the world in a manner that is facilitated by the spiritual ecology that rises from the Natural-Indigenous Worldview and thus ascribes spirit to all things without regard for the Colonial Modernist Worldview's distinction between 'animate' and 'inanimate', we come to see the world as a single, living, conscious being. The illusion of a discrete distinction between self and other breaks down and we come to see the self (and other selves) as strands in the unified, conscious web of creation. We come to care for all of creation as we would care for our children, for our partners, for our parents and for our self. Transcending the illusion of discrete individuality we develop a lovingly reciprocal, responsible, respectful and relational orientation to the world that begets virtuous thought, feeling, behavior and being without recourse to hierarchical authority (to punishment and fear of punishment). Engaging with the world through the spiritual ecology that rises from the Natural-Indigenous Worldview allows the sprouts of human nature to grow to fruition without recourse to hierarchical domination (i.e. without recourse to attempts to 'help sprouts grow' by pulling on them and the death of the sprouts of human nature portended by such hierarchical folly [Meng Zi 2016, 2A2]).

In transnational historical labour movement studies, the African anarchist / syndicalist movement is as under-studied as those of Central or South-East Asia and the Caribbean. This is despite the fact that the movement arose in Egypt in the same phase, the late 1860s, as it did in locations as disparate as Uruguay, Spain, and Mexico. This monograph - the first ever continental historical analysis of African anarchist movements - starts by providing a comparative analysis of the rise of the phenomenon in late 19th / early 20th Century Egypt versus South Africa, then sketches its traces in other African countries, examines its role in the post-WWII national liberation struggles of Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia, then concludes by asking whether there is a distinctly "African anarchism" by drawing on organisational positions from South African libertarian socialists of the 1970s, to self-described anarchists in Senegal in the 1980s, from Nigeria and South Africa in the 1990s, from Morocco and South Africa in the 2000s,  then Egypt in the Arab Spring of the 2010s.

Responding to David Harvey’s critique of my paper ‘Why a radical geography must be anarchist’, I once again reiterate the importance of anarchist perspectives in contemporary politics and geographical praxis. In challenging Harvey on the limits to Marx, I urge him to think again about the hidden vanguardism, implied statism, and veiled hierarchy that continue to lurk within the Marxist project, and importantly how these specters constrain both our collective political imagination and the possibilities of radical geography. I am admittedly very critical of Harvey, but I nonetheless refuse to close the door on dialogue between the Black and Red, even in the face of ongoing Marxist ridicule of anarchist politics. Accordingly, I propose an agonistic embrace of a ‘postfraternal’ or ‘postsororal’ politics on the left, where we come to appreciate ongoing conflict as a sign of a healthy leftist milieu. In doing so we can move beyond the misguided idea that all disagreements over strategies, tactics, and organizing methods will ever be resolved. Ultimately, what I have dubbed ‘the condition of postfraternity’ keeps us alert to the continually unfolding possibilities of a thoroughly politicized and forever protean space. By embracing this shifting horizon, not as a static limit to our politics, but as a beautiful enabler of visionary possibilities, the rhizomes of emancipation grow stronger.

Esta investigación se centra en el análisis y reconstrucción de los episodios violentos ligados al sindicalismo en Catalunya durante las dos primeras décadas del siglo XX, prestando particular atención a las relaciones entre los distintos actores involucrados en la conflictividad laboral, es decir, sindicatos, empresarios, esquiroles y el Estado. El marco cronológico toma como referencia dos grandes hitos de la conflictividad social: la huelga general de febrero de 1902 y el conflicto de la Canadenca en 1919. La huelga general de 1902 marcó una transformación importante con respecto a las políticas de orden público en Barcelona, pasando de una lógica reactiva a una preventiva. Durante los años siguientes, esta nueva política, facilitada por un importante descenso de la movilización sindical, logró controlar e inhibir la acción colectiva de los trabajadores en las calles, aunque esto significó en ocasiones la aparición de un tipo de violencia sindical ligada a pequeños grupos. Por otra parte, el fracaso del régimen de la Restauración en canalizar institucionalmente la conflictividad contribuyó a generar un sistema de relaciones laborales informal basado en la figura del Gobernador civil. De este modo, la violencia sindical se convirtió también en un importante mecanismo de presión política para obligar a las autoridades a intervenir en las huelgas. Tras la Semana Trágica, la violencia sindical sufrió transformaciones importantes, surgiendo algunas huelgas particularmente violentas, aunque éstas fueron la excepción en el panorama laboral barcelonés. En particular, se desarrolló una forma nueva de violencia, los “atentados sociales”, que asumieron un carácter altamente organizado, especialmente en el sector metalúrgico y del ramo del agua. La situación creada por la Primera Guerra Mundial impulsó una importante movilización de los trabajadores, que permitió la recuperación de formas tradicionales de acción colectiva; sin embargo, la huelga general de 1917 y sus repercusiones contribuyeron a frenar momentáneamente el auge sindical. En este contexto, se desarrolló un ciclo de atentados en el sector textil contra empresarios y contramaestres, que culminó con el asesinato del industrial Josep Albert Barret a comienzos de 1918. La creación de los Sindicatos Únicos durante ese año contribuyó a polarizar aún más el ambiente social a través de una alta conflictividad en que la violencia expresaba el poder que había alcanzado el sindicalismo en Barcelona, en vez de representar un signo de debilidad como tradicionalmente había sucedido. Esta dinámica confrontacional alcanzó su culmine durante la huelga general y el lockout patronal de 1919, iniciando un período de extremada violencia y enfrentamientos conocido como pistolerismo. Además de Barcelona, la investigación se centra en seis ciudades catalanas (Palafrugell, Sant Feliu de Guíxols, Terrassa, Sabadell, Reus y Tarragona), analizando los principales momentos de conflictividad de cada una de ellas y determinando las principales diferencias y similitudes con Barcelona. En este sentido, en otras zonas de Catalunya las agresiones físicas fueron un fenómeno más bien excepcional, privilegiándose alternativas como algunos mecanismos de presión comunitarios. Por último, el trabajo incluye una apartado dedicado a situar la situación barcelonesa en una perspectiva comparada, tomando como casos de estudio la violencia sindical en Sevilla, Vizcaya y Milán, destacándose cómo en estas localidades las formas colectivas de violencia fueron preeminentes durante el período estudiado.

Il libro ambisce tracciare il profilo a più facce dell'intellettuale sovversivo del primo novecento imbattutosi nel sindacalismo rivoluzionario italiano.
Svelato il condizionante sostrato sociologico, traspare l'inquieta e peculiare vicenda di intellettuali "engagé" serrati nel contempo da una generosa passione civile e da un vorticoso bisogno d'introspezione. Antintellettuali, fautori dell'autoemancipazione e dell'autogoverno operaio, eppure loro stessi intellettuali puri, non si esentarono dal dibattere l'incongruenza. Con esiti sofferti e clamorosi.
L'indagine non si limita a riesumare una rivista modello di politica ed arte, edita a Lugano : stabilisce genesi e contorni di quella generazione, ne esamina le aspirazioni sotto il profilo esistenziale, s'interessa di psicologia sociale e di interpretazione delle masse, presenta l'originalità del pensiero sindacalista intorno alle istituzioni italiane e svizzere messe a confronto, passa in rassegna i tanti "ismi" che lo nutrirono (marxismo e poi marginalismo, sorelismo, vitalismo), esplora su terre ignote l'incontro con il liberty e il futurismo, ipotizza il ritorno del rimosso dietro le roboanti sirene patriottarde preannunciatrici per alcuni dei protagonisti di altre sbandate.
Sullo sfondo permane come problema il nesso fra intellettualità filoproletaria e successiva, ma parziale, adesione o addirittura fomentazione dell'eversione fascista.

The essay (ostensibly a book review) is a critique.  It relates Noam Chomsky's Cartesian philosophy of language to his affirmation of an objective, universally binding morality and to his derivative affirmation of the objective moral reality of human rights.  It is also a critique of Chomsky's version of anarchism, which is found to have only a minimal basis in classical anarchist theory, and which is in an antagonistic relation to most contemporary anarchism, especially post-left anarchism.  Also criticized are Chomsky's views on political and industrial democracy.

This thesis resolves the dualism of a scientistic-deterministic Marxism and a critical-emancipatory Marxism by reinstating Marx's dialectical materialist (social-natural) ontology. Marx is shown to reconcile the two great wings of the philosophical tradition, subjectivity (will and artifice) and objectivity (reason and nature) via a praxis conception that accents the mediation of human social practice. The reinstatement of Marx's materialist dialectics establishes Marx within the tradition of socialism from below, affirming a principle of self-emancipation that is of general significance with respect to human beings as co-agents participating in a ceaselessly creative universe. Applying this dialectical integral viewpoint to specific social relations, Marx is shown to have developed a powerful practical critique of the capital system. I shall demonstrate that the point of Marx's emancipatory project was to facilitate the recovery of human subjectivity from the alienated forms within which it has come to be expressed, thus affirming conscious, creative human agency in a self-made social world. The genuine sociability of the socio-historical subject in the process of completing itself is thus affirmed against the unsocial and even anti-social external sociality associated with the atomised subject of capitalist society. I shall further argue that Marx could only go so far conceptually and theoretically in order to leave space for the reality-changing constitutive power of praxis, grounded in and bounded by a materialist (social-natural) ontology. I shall argue that Marx belongs to the tradition of ‘socialism from below’, a tradition which emphasises democratisation as a process based upon the principle of self-emancipation. This tradition is defined against the tradition of ‘socialism from above' premised on theoretico-elitist models of theory and practice. I argue that the abandonment of the principle and the practice of self-emancipation lies behind the distortions and deviations of Marxism in the twentieth century. To demonstrate this clearly it is necessary but not sufficient to expose the failures of party political and state socialism. The thesis, therefore, also identifies some deep-rooted conceptual problems in the Marxist tradition, highlighting those principles which remain pertinent to emancipatory struggles in the modern world. Marx is shown to have made the move from theory to practical struggles in order to transform the world from within its own material sphere.  Marxism can, in this sense, reclaim its relevance as a viable critical emancipatory-revolutionary project capable of being a factor in the transformation of society. And it is as such that Marxism remains the most intellectually and politically cogent hope we have in the struggle for liberation against alienative and exploitative power relations.

The thesis divides into five parts, each of which could serve as a stand-alone book in its own right. It is possible to read each of these different parts (or books) according to one's interests and concerns. At the same time, there is a unifying thread and consistency of purpose which advances a coherent view of Marx's conception as an active and integral materialism.

Part 1 Marx on the Postmodern Terrain
Part 1 sets the ‘crisis of Marxism’ in the context of the ‘crisis of Modernity’. Here I distinguish between the different views that have historically been discernible within Marxism in its dominant twentieth century formulations, emphasising Marx’s emancipatory commitment and making the case for Marx’s class analysis in light of the postmodern and post-marxist reaction against Marxism. I argue for an open Marxism based on critique, praxis, and materialist dialectics as against a closed Marxism that emphasises economic determinism, structure over agency, fetishism and alienation. I show that for Marx the world is objectified subjectivity, a field of materialist immanence. I argue that, rather than writing theory, Marx developed a critique of capital’s social metabolic order of alien control. As against the fetishisation of structures and categories and the theorisation and naturalisation of complexity, Marx shows how we may see through and break through the fetish systems of politics, power and production and recover our subjectivity. The ‘philosophy of praxis’ is thus defined against the contemplative-passive approach to knowledge.

Part 2 Active Materialism
This part can be considered central and foundational in the sense that it defines the materialist dialectic and ontology of Marx and Engels, avoiding the tendency to divide the philosophical-humanist Marx from a scientistic-naturalist Engels in order to explain the divide that opened up between a Western Marxism accenting freedom, culture, and creative agency on the one hand and the reductive, mechanical, and economist conceptions associated with the Second and Third Internationals. That division will itself be treated as a reproduction of the dualisms which express the inner contradictions of bourgeois thought and society – rationalism and moralism, naturalism and culturalism, scientism and emotivism. A marxist dialectics deriving from Marx's reconciliation and transcendence of philosophical idealism and materialism is show to reconcile the two great wings of the philosophical tradition – objectivity and subjectivity. A crucial part of the argument involves a positive evaluation of Engels' attempt to extend the dialectic to nature, showing how this extension is perfectly in keeping with the integral conception of Marx's social-natural ontology. The loss of the natural dialectic is shown to skew the character of the social dialectic, losing the anchoring of praxis in reality and inviting a reversion to idealism on the one side and relapse into mechanical materialism on the other.

Part 3 Revolutionary-Critical Praxis
This part argues for Marx’s critical and transformatory ‘philosophy of praxis’ as against the contemplative-passive approach to knowledge. I show how Marx’s praxis entails the democratisation of politics, philosophy, and power, subverting alienation, fetishism and determinism. I argue for a dialectic of structure and struggle, showing how values are central to Marx’s dialectic. I show how Marx incorporated the active side of idealism into his materialist conception.

Part 4 Agency and Structure
Part 4 employs Marx’s active and affirmative materialism against naturalism and positivism. The argument examines capitalist crisis as a crisis transformative potential, demonstrating socialism as an immanent potentiality for Marx, whose realisation required the self-development of proletarian autonomy and subjectivity.

Part 5 Alienation and Rationalisation
Part 5 develops Marx’s teleology of labour to make the case against the alienating separations and dualism of the capital system . This part compares and contrasts Marx’s critique of alienation with the rationalisation thesis of Max Weber, showing how the substantive irrationality and unnatural spirit of capital's fetish relations expresses a class rationality that can only be overcome by locating the problems not in an ahistorical reason – the rationalism of bourgeois thought, inviting an impotent moralism in respose - but in an alienated system of production. I show how Marx affirms the everyday social world of reciprocity and solidary exchange against the violence and tyranny of abstraction. In the process, I develop a concept of social self-determination as against capital's objective determinism, overcoming the monopolisation of power/alienation of control under the capital system through an emphasis on practical-sensuous experience embodied in the conscious, collective control of social relations.

«Una vita proletaria» fu scritta nel 1921 dall’emigrante anarchico Bartolomeo Vanzetti in un carcere degli Stati Uniti d’America prima di essere ucciso - innocente - sulla sedia elettrica nel penitenziario di Charlestown la notte tra il 22 e il 23 agosto del 1927. L’opera ebbe un grande successo e venne pubblicata immediatamente su venti giornali americani. In Italia fu edita, per la prima volta, dal quotidiano anarchico «Umanità Nova» del 9 ottobre 1921.
È la vita di un grande Uomo, onore e vanto dell’umanità che lotta - con abnegazione e disinteresse personale - per la libertà, per la giustizia, la verità e la tolleranza. È uno straordinario e toccante documento umano e politico, nel quale un uomo, con la prospettiva di una morte per condanna, ripercorre le tappe della propria vita senza trovarvi nulla che giustifichi l’ingiustizia che, insieme a Nicola Sacco, sta patendo: non ha mai rubato, non ha mai ucciso, anzi, ha speso la propria esistenza lottando per condizioni migliori di vita per tutta l’umanità.
Ma Sacco e Vanzetti erano due emigranti, per di più anarchici e italiani.
Solo per questa «colpa» furono condannati a morte e la «civile» America restò sorda a tutti gli appelli che arrivavano da ogni parte del mondo (tranne dall’Italia fascista) per chiedere la revisione del processo e per provare l’estraneità al delitto del quale erano stati accusati e il riconoscimento dell’innocenza dei due lavoratori italiani.
Con cinquant’anni di ritardo, nel 1977, gli Stati Uniti d’America hanno riconosciuto ufficialmente l’errore giudiziario, riabilitando i due anarchici, ritenuti innocenti già all’indomani del processo dai lavoratori di tutto il mondo, che si batterono con passione, rabbia e invincibile speranza per strapparli alle mani assassine del boia.
Una vita proletaria è la vita di un onesto lavoratore che sfida gli Stati Uniti d’America e li mette in ginocchio, anche se alla fine, dopo lunghi anni di lotta e di resistenza, viene ucciso.
Con la loro vicenda, Sacco e Vanzetti hanno segnato una pagina indelebile nella storia degli uomini liberi e - ancora oggi - sono, in tutto il mondo, simboli imperituri della libertà e della giustizia calpestata e negata.
Con l’autobiografia di Vanzetti viene pubblicato anche un raro, inedito e appassionante resoconto dello stesso Vanzetti sui retroscena del processo di Plymouth, tradotto dall’inglese in italiano per la prima volta, insieme alla coraggiosa e avvincente arringa difensiva che lo trasforma da accusato in accusatore.  Sono dei documenti di cultura politica, proletaria e rivoluzionaria, della quale Vanzetti non si pente, ma accusa il potere e la giustizia dell’infame persecuzione che lui e il suo compagno di sventura hanno patito solo perché anarchici e italiani. Queste, le loro uniche colpe!
Nel libro, oltre all’arringa difensiva di Nicola Sacco, sono presenti alcune delle ultime e struggenti lettere che i due martiri scrissero dal carcere ai loro compagni e ai loro familiari, nelle quali - come in tutte le azioni della loro vita - continuano a parlare il linguaggio dell’amore, della speranza, dell’anarchia e della libertà.
Volume a cura di Luigi Botta, con la prefazione di Giuseppe Galzerano. La copertina è di Antonio Zuccarello.

Biography and analysis of the political thought of Salvador Seguí (1887-1923), one of the founders of the CNT, unionist and European theorist of anarcho-syndicalism.

Biografia i anàlisi del pensament polític de Salvador Seguí (1887-1923), un dels principals fundadors del sindicat CNT, sindicalista i teòric europeu de l'anarcosindicalisme.

Ce travail préparatoire essaie de donner un aperçu global sur les rapports entre mouvement social et immigration, en établissant une comparaison entre les principaux pays d'immigration du tournant du XXe siècle (États-Unis, Australie, France, Argentine).

Este trabajo analiza la relación entre el anarcosindicalismo y la violencia desatada contra los representantes de la Iglesia católica en la retaguardia republicana de la provincia de Guadalajara durante la Guerra Civil española (1936-1939). Primero, establece un cálculo provisional del número de miembros del clero secular y regular que murieron violentamente en la provincia. A continuación, rastrea la participación de los anarcosindicalistas en el entramado de poderes alternativos, comités revolucionarios y columnas milicianas principalmente, que ejercieron la autoridad sobre el territorio. Por último, relaciona la distribución en el espacio y en el tiempo de las víctimas del anticlericalismo con la acción política y militar de los anarcosindicalistas. Las conclusiones de esta comunicación rebaten ciertas visiones del anticlericalismo que atribuyen directa o indirectamente a los anarquistas la amplitud e intensidad de la violencia revolucionaria contra el clero.

Die Arbeit beruht auf dem von der GZM im Oktober 2016 veranstalteten In Front Festival, das anlässlich der 100 Jahre DADA Feiern im Ludwig Forum Aachen stattfand. Es sollte in einer 3-tägigen Performance und einer Ausstellung ganz besonders an das vergessene Ereignis des Aachener Dada-Abends 1920 erinnern. Dabei war von Anfang an keine eins-zu-eins Rekonstruktion dieses Dada-Abends geplant, sondern eine Art Assemblage und Zeitreise im Sinne eines Gesamtkunstwerkes, zusammen-gestellt aus ausgesuchten Elementen der Geschichte Aachens, sei es historischen, politischen, sozialen, künstlerischen, musischen, literarischen, theatralischen oder architektonischen. Bausteine waren u. a. unsere Recherchen zu den (weitgehend vergessenen) Umständen des von Künstlern und politischen Gruppierungen gestalteten und aufgeführten Aachener Dada-Abends 1920. Dabei geriet u. a. auch das Hotel Grosser Monarch mit der zugehörigen Quelle, das Reiff-Museum und sein damaliger Direktor, die regionale Anarchisten-Bewegung und die Belgische Besatzung Aachens in unseren Fokus. In anderen Teilen des Festivals nahm unsere Thematik weiter Bezug auf Aachen, z.B. mit Werken des großen expressionistischen Dichters August Stramm (der am Einhard Gymnasium Abitur machte), oder mit der Uraufführung einer Gemeinschaftskomposition von sieben Aachener Komponisten/Komponistinnen. Die hier präsentierte Arbeit, Dada Aachen gewidmet, stellt unsere Recherchen zu eher ungewöhnlichen Aspekten der Aachener Geschichte und deren Bewertungen dar und schildert, wie wir diese unserem Publikum vermittelten. N.B. Wir bitten unsere Leser zu beachten, dass die GZM nicht als Geschichtsverein agiert. Es ist uns deshalb äußerst wichtig, dass diese Mappe nicht als akademische oder wissenschafltliche Arbeit verstanden werden soll, sondern eher als informeller Exkurs in die Geschichte Aachens, den wir mit viel Neugier und großer Freude, wenn auch mit Ernsthaftigkeit, betrieben haben. Aus Gründen der Übersichtlichkeit haben wir deshalb nicht alle Quellenangaben zu den Abbildungen und Texten genannt; auf Befragung stehen diese selbstverständlich zur Verfügung.

Study about attitudes in Spanish Socialist people in relation to Primo de Rivera's rightist dIctatorship (1923-1930), about Primo de Rivera's social politics, his syndicalist conception -founded on the principle "Free Syndicalism in Compulsory Corporation"-, his preference for UGT ("Unión General de Trabajadores" = Workers General Union) in the detriment of any other trade-unionism, included the rightist ones; the effective collaborationism of UGT, and the final result.

This is a preview of my 2019/2020 book on Argentina's worker-recovered companies, also known as worker-recuperated/recovered companies/factories/businesses, or worker-recuperated enterprises as I prefer to call them, a more accurate translation of the Spanish term empresas recuperadas por sus trabajadores.

2022 Joyce Rothschild Book Prize - Honourable Mention (adjudication organized by the Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing at Rutgers University)

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In Workers’ Self-Management in Argentina, Marcelo Vieta homes in on the emergence and consolidation of Argentina’s empresas recuperadas por sus trabajadores (worker-recuperated enterprises or ERTs, also known as worker-recovered companies or WRCs in English), a workers’ occupy and recuperation movement that surged at the turn-of-the-millennium in the thick of the country’s neo-liberal crisis. Since then, around 400 companies have been taken over and converted to cooperatives by almost 16,000 workers. Grounded in class-struggle Marxism and a critical sociology of work, the book situates the ERT/WRC movement in Argentina’s long tradition of working-class activism and the broader history of workers’ responses to capitalist crisis. Beginning with the voices of the movement’s protagonists, Vieta ultimately develops a compelling social theory of autogestión – a politically prefigurative and ethically infused notion of workers’ self-management that unleashes radical social change for work organisations, surrounding communities, and beyond.

Leiden and Chicago: Brill Academic Publishers and Haymarket Books
Historical Materialism Book Series, Volume 199. Available October 24, 2019 with a 2020 publication date via, softcover available January 5, 2021 with Haymarket Books.

Brill: ISSN 1570-1522 | ISBN 978-90-04-26896-8 (hardback) | ISBN 978-90-04-26895-1 (e-book)

Haymarket: ISBN 978-1-64259-339-6

Endorsements

David McNally
Cooperative enterprises, workers’ self-management and new forms of industrial democracy— these are the stirring themes animating Marcelo Vieta’s original and exciting book. Using a stunning set of interviews, buttressed by historical investigation and deep theoretical inquiry, Workers’ Self-Management in Argentina illuminates movements of occupation, recuperation and autogestión in Argentina in recent years. There is virtually nothing like this book when it comes to the study of lived practices of workers’ control today. Everyone searching for alternatives to neoliberalism and the domination of labor will relish this powerful and important work.
~ David McNally is Cullen Distinguished Professor of History and Business, University of Houston. He is the author of Against the Market: Political Economy, Market Socialism, and the Marxist Critique (Verso, 1992) and Global Slump: The Economics and Politics of Crisis and Resistance (PM Press, 2010).

George Cheney
Marcelo Vieta’s Workers' Self-Management in Argentina is one of the most important books on contemporary labour and democracy. The volume masterfully revisits and extends theory on autogestión (loosely translated as self-management in English) and places it in richly detailed historical, economic, and social contexts. The book employs three in-depth case studies of “worker recuperated” firms in today's Argentina and at the same time beautifully integrates those with an analysis of work and economy in Argentina especially over the past two decades. The comparisons of lessons from the experiences of workers in those firms for other national contexts gives the analysis an expansiveness seldom found in case-based studies of worklife and labour arrangements. Vieta’s longitudinal study and insightful commentary provide must reading for anyone interested in the intricacies of and possibilities for democratic revival from the shop floor and board rooms to communities and the global economy.
~ George Cheney is Professor of Communication, University of Colorado at Colorado Springs. He is the author of Values at Work:Employee Participation Meets Market Pressure at Mondragon (Cornell University Press, 2002) and co-editor of The Routledge Companion to Alternative Organization (Routledge, 2014).
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Peter Ranis
Marcelo Vieta’s book ranges far beyond the bounds of its Argentine analysis.  It is thoroughly researched and grounded in “class-struggle Marxist” theory and reflects a prolonged and deep understanding of and commitment to global working-class enterprise autonomy struggles.  In this Vieta provides a powerful and meaningful critique and alternative to neo-liberal capitalism.
~ Peter Ranis is Professor Emeritus in Political Science, Graduate Center, City University of New York. He is the author of Cooperatives Confronting Capitalism: Challenging the Neo-liberal Economy (Zed Books, 2016) and Argentine Workers: Peronism and Contemporary Class Consciousness (University of Pittsburgh Press, 1992).

Nick Dyer-Witheford
I was consistently impressed by Vieta’s impeccable scholarship and deeply-thought argumentation. Theoretically, it this work is oriented around the perspective of class-struggle Marxism, but is also informed by a deep knowledge of the history and practices of trades unionism, cooperativism, and social and solidarity economics in Argentina, Latin America and internationally. The work situates empresas recuperadas (ERTs) within the history of the Argentine class-composition and workers movements. It shows how the ERT practice of “occupy, resist, produce” generated a series of “radical social innovations” affecting economic activities, political formations and trans-individual subject formation. From this study Vieta draws important conclusions about the circumstances in which the potential for self-directed worker activities is actualized in ways that point beyond the existing system of production relations. I want to reiterate how impressed I am by this work. It is a major contribution to scholarship on the global worker of the twenty first century.
~ Nick Dyer-Witheford is Associate Professor in the Faculty of Information and Media Studies at University of Western Ontario. He is the author of Cyber-Marx: Cycles and Circuits of Struggle in High Technology Capitalism (University of Illinois, 1999) and Cyber-Proletariat: Global Labour in the Digital Vortex (Pluto Press, 2015).

Marina Sitrin
This book is a tremendous gift. A must read for scholars, activists and all who want to learn how to retake our lives and create something new. Within these pages Vieta has detailed the history of class struggle in Argentina, bringing us to this historical moment, grounded in a new conceptualization of autogestión. Workers taking back – recuperating – their sense of worth and dignity though directly democratic workplace recuperations. Distinct from occupations, making demands on bosses and states, in recuperations workers re-claim what is theirs/ours. Vieta’s lens offers a unique insider/outsider perspective, as an Argentine scholar based in Canada. His methodological approach, also innovative, combines global ethnography, history, political science, economics and sociology. Most of all, in Workers’ Self-Management in Argentina, Vieta shows, by way of extended examples, that people can self-organize their work and life, in ways that are horizontal, effective and affective.
~ Marina Sitrin is Assistant Professor of Sociology at the State University of New York at Binghamton. She is the author of Everyday Revolutions: Horizontalism and Autonomy in Argentina (Zed Books, 2012) and They Can’t Represent Us! Reinventing Democracy from Greece to Occupy, co-authored with Dario Azzellini (Verso Press, 2014).

From 1870 to 1920 the internationalist ideas in multi-ethnic countries of the Americas were strongly influenced by revolutionary syndicalism. The distinctively international
and trans-cultural working class identity of multi-ethnic subaltern classes in South America developed in the context of European mass immigration, urbanisation, and industrialisation. Many thousands of immigrants contributed to social struggles for better living and working conditions fighting against political exclusion. The examples of Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay illustrate that the subjectification of the international proletariat can be seen as collective identity construction of a libertarian subculture which developed in response to global capitalism. The revolutionary movements
in South America and Europe formed the Libertarian Atlantic as one international movement.

Este texto tem como objetivo expor as posições do clássico anarquista russo Piotr Kropotkin (1842-1921) acerca das estratégias anarquistas e suas posições frente a tal debate. Ele contesta que Kropotkin tenha sido um educacionista/culturalista e que seu "anarcocomunismo" tenha implicado uma ruptura completa com o "bakuninismo" da Internacional. Depois de uma contextualização histórica, que mapeia os grandes debates e dilemas estratégicos do campo operário-socialista e anarquista entre os anos 1880 e 1910, o texto expõe e analisa o pensamento político de Kropotkin. Argumenta que, quando situadas em relação aos grandes debates anarquistas, as posições kropotkinianas são ambíguas, de diálogo ou mesmo adesão a distintas perspectivas. E que elas podem ser associadas ao anarquismo insurrecionalista, mas, principalmente, ao anarquismo de massasem particular ao sindicalismo revolucionário. Enfim, o texto avança para uma exposição analítica das ideias de Kropotkin sobre o sindicalismo revolucionário e sobre o papel dos anarquistas frente a essa forma revolucionária de sindicalismo.

I review the book The Accumulation of Freedom: Writings on Anarchist Economics (2012) by Deric Shannon, Anthony J. Nocella II and John Asimakopoulos. This book is a collection of essays written by various authors who fall within the Libertarian Socialist tradition. This is the short version of the review which appeared in print, a lengthy version has been posted online through our website, see here :

https://syndicalist.us/2020/10/20/accumulation-of-freedom-writings-on-anarchist-economics/

This is a translation of Rudolf Rocker's 'Prinzipienerklärung des Syndikalismus' (1919), an influential document in the history of anarchist syndicalism. It is part of a larger effort to make accessible neglected strands of anarchist thought to an English-speaking readership. I am grateful for any suggestions of anarchist ephemera or neglected authors that might fit the bill.

CO-AUTHORED WITH PETER LIMB, MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY (USA) WHO ISN'T ON ACADEMIA.EDU: Our research compares and contrasts the transnational activism of maritime unions in Australia and the United States in what became the first and longest example of global solidarity in the post-World War II era – the anti-apartheid movement. Dockworkers, with a deep history of solidarity, occupied a strategic position to exert real influence on the South African state by refusing to unload South African cargo. We analyze the actions of the Waterside Workers’ Federation (WWF) in Australia and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) in the US, namely by exploring notions of solidarity and political unionism among marine transport workers, ideological motivations for solidarity activism, ethnic and race relations among workers, and labor connections these maritime unions made beyond the waterfront. We find and account for similarities and differences in Australian and US labor activism that often is underrepresented and incompletely explained in the literature.

Born from within the socialist party, Italian revolutionary syndicalism, with at its head various rootless intellectuals and activists, advanced an argument for working class autonomy against governmental liberalism and parliamentary socialism: this they attempted to do by leaving the party in 1907, in separating themselves from its intellectuals and through the creation of their own trade union base. Divided in their response to the First World War, after the war one strand formed a syndicalism receptive to the idea of the homeland, whilst another remained faithful to unconditional class struggle. Its bastions were situated in the countryside (Emilia, Puglia) rather than the industrial centres of the north.
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Apparu au sein du parti socialiste, le syndicalisme révolutionnaire italien, avec à sa tête des intellectuels et des militants itinérants, prôna, contre le gouvernement et le parlementarisme socialiste, l’autonomie ouvrière qu’il tenta de réaliser en quittant le parti, en 1907, en se séparant de ses intellectuels et en créant sa propre base syndicale. En 1912-1913, il parvint à concurrencer la CGT réformiste et majoritaire. Divisé sur l’attitude face à la Grande Guerre, une aile constitua un syndicalisme réceptif à l’idée de patrie, alors que l’autre resta fidèle à la lutte de classe sans condition. Ses bastions furent aussi bien situés dans les campagnes (Émilie, Pouilles) que dans les centres industriels du Nord.

Indice Bollettino 44



cose nostre

• Riflessioni sparse di un dopo-convegno

di Varden Riddani

• L’autobiografia di Rudolf Rocker finalmente tradotta in lingua italiana

di David Bernardini

• Novità dell’Archivio Pinelli



Memoria storica

• Il fuoco e la brace o i rischi del mestiere

di Michele Abbiati e David Bernardini

• Alfons Thomasz Pilarski (1902-1977)

di David Bernardini

biografie

• Antonia Fontanillas (1917-2014)

di Felip Équy

• Carlos Torres (1938-2014)

• Virgilio Galassi (1919-2014)

di Gaia Raimondi



Informazioni editoriali

• Volterra, storie d’alabastro e d’anarchia

di Pietro Masiello

• Le schede segnaletiche

di Lorenzo Pezzica

• La resistenza antinazista degli anarcosindacalisti tedeschi

di Varden Riddani



Storia per immagini

• Santi e martiri anarchici: la ritrattistica in “Cronaca Sovversiva” (1903-1919)

di Andrew Hoyt



Incontri

• A casa dai Bakunin

di Franco Bunčuga



Anarchivi

• Verona: nuova sede per la Biblioteca Domaschi

• Fonti online per la storia dell’anarchismo tedesco



Cover story

• Anarchica, attivista, egoista

di Elisa Iscandri