Benjamin Franks

Postanarchism: A critical assessment1

Post-modernism has had a significant influence on anarchism, notably in the interrelation between the theoretical positions of libertarianism and post-structuralism (a set of theories and philosophies strongly identified with, but not identical to, post-modernism). This has generated a subset of anarchist thinking referred to as postanarchism. Postanarchism, like anarchism, is a fluid assemblage of political concepts that alters according to geographic and historical context. Within this paper, some of its key theorists, principal terms, and some of the structures that coordinate its central principles, are identified and assessed. The paper then concentrates on the apparent differences between postanarchism and more traditional anarchisms, arguing that rather than regarding postanarchism as a transcendence of anarchism, as some of its proponents maintain, it is more appropriate to regard postanarchism as representing a particular, historically specific constellation of practices, which consequently prioritizes particular discourses, agencies and tactics that are peculiar to these locations.

Anarchism and Moral Philosophy

This chapter looks at the pervasiveness of ethical discourses and analyses within anarchism, and how the priority given to moral evaluation distinguished it from rival revolutionary movements, such as orthodox Marxism. It traces the different meta-ethical positions and normative formulations found within anarchist traditions. It argues that a practice-based anti-hierarchical virtue ethics is most consistent with anarchist core (but not fixed) commitments to materialism, anti-universalism and social solidarity.

Between Anarchism and Marxism: the beginnings and ends of the schism …

This paper analyses the development of the schism between Marxism and anarchism and explores two distinct methodological approaches to investigating these apparently discrete ideologies: one is derived from analytic political philosophy; the other is an adaptation of Michael Freedens conceptual approach. The former views the division between Marxism and anarchism as the result of a clear distinction in universal principles, an account that is found to be flawed. Using the alternative conceptual approach, this paper argues that the schism that marked the relationship between anarchism and Marxism during the ‘short twentieth century’ was primarily the result of the primacy Marxism gave to the Leninist centralized structure following the Bolshevik revolution. The revolutionary party was able to impose a more tightly controlled interpretation of socialist principles, which marginalized and excluded rival socialist constructions. With the decline of Leninist structures, constellations of Marxism have arisen that, once again, actively engage with anarchism.

Anarchism and the virtues

This chapter has a number of aims: the first is to briefly sketch out standard philosophical approaches to anarchism (‘philosophical anarchism’) drawn from the arguments of Robert Paul Wolff (1976) and more recent critical synopses by Dudley Knowles (2007) and Jonathan Wolff (2006). This outline of philosophical anarchism concentrates on identifying the main ethical principles and the classification of the moral agent. The second feature of this chapter is that it explains and illustrates a distinctive alternative anarchist ethic (‘practical anarchism’), which is consistent with the main features of contemporary activism and scholarship on anarchism, but which also draws on the historical canon, such as Emma Goldman, Peter Kropotkin and Errico Malatesta.

Anti-Social behaviour in Britain: Victorian and Contemporary Perspectives

Sarah Pickard’s edited volume of well-researched, informative essays compares contemporary and Victorian concerns with anti-social behaviour and the corresponding legislative, penal and cultural re...

Spanish anarchist engagements in electoralism: from street to party politics

Abstract The eruption of the Spanish 15M movement in 2011 was marked by a high degree of political participation and creative experimentation. The political repertoire has constantly been re-evaluated, with methods revised and evolving, from the occupation of public spaces to the recent creation of new constitutional parties. One of the key aspects of these tactical revisions has been the involvement of anarchist actors in an experimental process of engagement in electoral processes, a method of political engagement anarchists standardly oppose. Our study identifies the motivations and theoretical justifications that have recently led libertarian activists to take the electoral path. This paper stands in the small but growing tradition of works that examine the recent phenomenon of new parties built by ‘street’ activists, but uniquely concentrates on a detailed case study of the anarchist actors linked to the platform Castelló en Moviment (CsM). It thus describes the anarchist influence in recent electoral developments, identifies proponents’ justifications for engaging in these previously rejected methods and highlights some of the doubts raised about the electoral experiment.

Introduction: Anarchism and Moral Philosophy

Alongside the growth of avowedly anarchist and anarchically influenced contemporary movements, such as anti-capitalist networks, radical environmentalist groups and grassroots community campaigns, there has been renewed academic interest in anarchist thought and practice. Significant volumes have appeared discussing anarchism from a range of anthropological, sociological, historical and political theoretical perspectives. However, instances of interest by philosophers have been much rarer and occur more intermittently, despite the scholarly studies by George Crowder (1991), Paul McLaughlin (2002, 2007) and Samuel Clark (2007).

Anarchism and Ethics

This chapter defends the centrality of ethics to anarchist theory and practice. It starts by describing some of the main meta-ethical and normative positions associated with different constellations of anarchism and postanarchism. It then explains and argues for an anti-hierarchical virtue approach as being the most productive and consistent with the main anarchist ideological constellations (socialist anarchisms), its key classical proponents and contemporary practitioners. It demonstrates that this practice-based virtue approach is consistent with anarchism’s wider materialist philosophical commitments—including its critiques of universal values—and micropolitical orientation. This chapter explores and critically evaluates post-left and postanarchist critical rejections of ethical analysis, which uses Max Stirner’s radical egoism as a basis. It goes on to argue that as these critics increasingly engage with material problems significant areas of convergence develop between them and social anarchisms. The chapter further illustrates the pertinence of the revolutionary Aristotelian virtue approach by providing examples of anarchist practices that are rich in virtues and showing that anarchist virtue theory provides a strong basis for dealing with some standardly contentious questions, such as defending freedom of speech or supporting anti-fascist interventions against discriminatory and oppressive speech acts.

Anarchism: A Conceptual Approach

Utilising Michael Freedens morphological (or conceptual) approach to the study of ideologies, this book applies this approach too the study of anarchist ideology. The volume comprising 15 (chapters) and an introduction – authored by a handpicked group of established and rising scholars – investigates how anarchists often seek to sharpen their message and struggle to determine what ideas and actions are central to their identity. This book examines the meanings of its key concepts, which have been divided into three categories: Core, Adjacent, and Peripheral concepts. Each chapter focuses on one important concept, shows how anarchists have understood the concept, and highlights its relationships to other concepts.

Ideological hybrids: the contrary case of Tory anarchism

Abstract This article provides an account of ideological hybridity. It describes and categorizes four main types of ideological hybrid in order to examine a range of sub-ideologies and cross-breeds but concentrates on identifying and assessing the particular phenomena described as conservative (or ‘Tory’) anarchisms. The article demonstrates how an ideological hybrid’s morphological relationship to its parent ideologies can alter in different geographical or historical contexts. Using this model, it argues that some differences between conservatism and anarchism are overstressed (such as those over the role of the state and individual rights), whilst some important similarities are often overlooked, namely those surrounding their political epistemologies. However, because apparently shared concepts are structured next to radically different core principles (defence/rejection of hierarchies and prioritizing/negation of dominant economic institutions), these shared principles are interpreted in radically different ways. As a result, conservative anarchism is a deeply unstable hybrid rather than an innovative new ideological form. It is one which, in most contexts, stabilizes into a form of conservatism rather than a form of anarchism.