Revolt Library : The Written Word to Help You Revolt!

Editor’s Corner “All this Boundless Multitude:” Rereading Mikahail Bakunin for EcoJustice Education Rebecca A. Martusewicz One hundred thirty years ago or so, my great-grandfather, an employee in this country’s booming logging industry, was helping to wipe out the great pines in the northern Midwest of the United States to re-build Chicago. To accomplish this feat in Northern Michigan, the government first had to dispossess the Ojibwe tribes of their relationship to the land and rivers that they had depended upon for centuries, sending them to live on reservations, never to provide for their families in the same way again. It took a mere thirty years to completely wipe out those ancient forests. Imagine what it must have been like for the native people to experience such massive destruction of the rich living world they had lived within. Today you can still see the effects of my grandfather’s work... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

ALTHOUGH workers have been getting a bad deal out of the PNR and now the PESP in terms of pay the same can hardly be said for Irish bosses. In 1989–90 many executives got increases of 20% according to a recent Irish Management Institute survey. Others got less, having to make do with 13%. At the same time workers were getting 2.5% under the terms of the PNR. In addition many of these executives were able to make use of various tax fiddles through being paid into overseas bank accounts or receiving company shares rather then cash. In addition 93% of executives have a company car. The biggest winners were probably banking executives who received pay increases of 65% from 1985 to 1989. The workers in the banks, needless to say, got a hell of a lot less. In addition in 1988 the major banks introduced “yellow-pack” staff so that school leavers had their starting wages dropped to £6,750. The IBOA, a non-ICTU union, which r... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Introduction The Russian Revolution is the most important historical event of the 20th century, and for some historians it is even accounted as one of the great events of human history. Its influence on international relations, political ideologies and word history from 1917 to 1991 is indisputable. Trotsky, in the preface of his History of the Russian Revolution, claimed that “[t]he most indubitable feature of a revolution is the direct interference of the masses in historical events” and the acceleration, over brief periods of time, of the pace of economic, social and political change, in addition to the emergence of radically opposed political poles, and the shift of the social support of the masses towards parties of an increasingly extremist type. The Russian Revolution must not be understood as a mere coup d’état, reduced to the storming of the Winter Palace, but as a historical process that began... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Once it became clear that Trump was going to become the president of the USA, my Facebook feed became cluttered with attempts to understand how that could possibly happen. How could a white supremacist, misogynist and utterly transparent snake oil salesman accumulate so many votes? Those on the left both inside and outside the borders of the USA struggled to understand what had happened. A common conclusion in too many of these pieces is that the left needs to reach out, and listen to the concerns of, those who voted for him as a priority. In a similar fashion to how sections of the left evaluated Brexit, they see a working class anti-establishment rebellion in the Trump vote from what they term the ‘white working class’. They believe that component was won by Trump because it has been neglected by the left — often, they will assert, because the rest of the left was distracted by what they call identity politics. This is a simple explanatory story... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

The Trump presidency has seen a boom of fascist organizing and anti-fascist resistance in North America. Strategies and tactics that originally developed in the European context have spread around the USA. Meanwhile, in Russia, both Nazi violence and anti-fascist activity have died down to a mere fraction of what they were at the peak of the years of confrontation, 2002–2011. In the following text, a participant in the Russian anti-fascist movement suggests some conclusions about how to train for anti-fascist confrontations. In publishing this perspective, we aim to facilitate dialogue between those fighting fascism in a variety of conditions all around the world. We believe it is crucial for anti-fascists to learn from history and from each other’s experience. If the Russian model for anti-fascist action reached its limits based on internal factors, as described below, we should take care not to reproduce those elements in our own organizing. Likewise, we... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

It should be said here that the author of these two pieces, N. Sukhogorskaya, was not an anarchist. Her assessment of Makhno and his movement is quite negative, even cynical, but she was a contemporary and an eyewitness of events in Gulyai-Polye and I think her colorful accounts can be enjoyed with caution. (From : TheyLieWeDie.org.)

Alexandros Schismenos is a researcher working on social-historical phenomena of the 21st century. He is coauthor of The end of National Politics with Nikos Ioannou. Writes: Continental Philosophy, Political Theory and Philosophy. Author of : Castoriadis and Autonomy in the Twenty-first Century. (From : Bloomsbury.com.)

First of all, mazal tov to April Rosenblum for being listed as one of The Forward’s “Forward 50,” of American Jews who made their mark in 2007. She is someone I’ve come to know slightly from our involvement in the Facing A Challenge Within conference in Newark in 2006, for left-wing activists concerned about anti-Semitism within the left. I have a copy of her 32-page pamphlet about antisemitism on my PC’s desktop and I may write something of a critique, particularly regarding her harsh, dogmatic opposition to Zionism. (From : ProgressiveIsrael.org.)

(1961 - )
Ruth Ellen Kinna (born March 1961) is a professor of political philosophy at Loughborough University, working in the Department of Politics, History and International Relations. Since 2007 she has been the editor of the journal Anarchist Studies. Kinna holds a BA in history and politics from Queen Mary University of London and a D.Phil in politics from the University of Oxford. She began working at Loughborough University in 1992. Her subsequent work focused on the socialist thought of William Morris (1834–1896). She is the author of the book Anarchism - A Beginners Guide, an in depth study into the political concept of anarchy (ISBN 1-85168-370-4, Oneworld Publication Ltd.). (Source: Wikipedia.org.) BA History and Politics Queen Mary University of London DPhil 1991 Nuffield College, Oxford (Source: lboro.ac.uk.) Ruth Kinna is a member of the Anarchism Research Network at Loughborough University UK (where she has worked since 1992)... (From : Wikipedia.org / lboro.ac.uk.)

FdCA Gender Commission Statement
We are witnessing the preparations for a clear and determined attack on the freedom and self-determination of the women who live in this country, an attack which is aimed at several fronts but which has the sole objective of reducing the public voice and presence of women. One of the prime areas where women’s freedom is worse threatened is in regard to sexuality, with the ongoing demonization of free and responsible sexuality with regard to contraceptives and to the use of Law 194 of 1978 concerning voluntary abortions. Always foremost in the minds of the Right and the Catholic church, this attack on women’s freedom to responsibly and autonomously manage their relationships and their sexuality is now at the center of a mad rush to gain control of public funds in order to ensure that the private clinics, financed by our money, are run according to the demands of the church and a certain political ideology, yet another attack on the public healthcare syst... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

A taste for rural scenes, in the present state of society, appears to be very often an artificial sentiment, rather inspired by poetry and romances, than a real perception of the beauties of nature. But, as it is reckoned a proof of refined taste to praise the calm pleasures which the country affords, the theme is never exhausted. Yet it may be made a question, whether this romantic kind of declamation, has much effect on the conduct of those, who leave, for a season, the crowded cities in which they were bred. I have been led to these reflections, by observing, when I have resided for any length of time in the country, how few people seem to contemplate nature with their own eyes. I have "brushed the dew away" in the morning; but, pacing over the printless grass, I have wondered that, in such delightful situations, the sun was allowed to rise in solitary majesty, whilst my eyes alone hailed its beautifying beams. The webs of the evening have sti... (From : Gutenberg.org.)

Why do you clothe me with scarlet of shame? Why do you point with your finger of scorn? What is the crime that you hissingly name When you sneer in my ears, "Thou bastard born?" Am I not as the rest of you, With a hope to reach, and a dream to live? With a soul to suffer, a heart to know The pangs that the thrusts of the heartless give?" I am no monster! Look at me -- Straight in my eyes, that they do not shrink! Is there aught in them you can see To merit this hemlock you make me drink? This poison that scorches my soul like fire, That burns and burns until love is dry, And I shrivel with hate, as hot as a pyre, A corpse, while its smoke curls up to the sky? Will you touch my hand? It is flesh like yours; Perhaps a little more brown and grimed, For it could not be white while the drawers' and hewers', My brothers, were calloused and darkened and slimed... (From : Anarchy Archives.)

Thursday Night. I have been wishing the time away, my kind love, unable to rest till I knew that my penitential letter had reached your hand—and this afternoon, when your tender epistle of Tuesday gave such exquisite pleasure to your poor sick girl, her heart smote her to think that you were still to receive another cold one.—Burn it also, my ——; yet do not forget that even those letters were full of love; and I shall ever recollect, that you did not wait to be mollified by my penitence, before you took me again to your heart. I have been unwell, and would not, now I am recovering, take a journey, because I have been seriously alarmed and angry with myself, dreading continually the fatal consequence of my folly.—But, should you think it right to remain at H—, I shall find some opportunity, in the course of a fortnight, or less perhaps, to come to you, and before then I shall be strong again.—Yet do not be uneasy! I am reall...

[Paris] October 1 . It is a heartless task to write letters, without knowing whether they will ever reach you.—I have given two to ——, who has been a-going, a-going, every day, for a week past; and three others, which were written in a low-spirited strain, a little querulous or so, I have not been able to forward by the opportunities that were mentioned to me. Tant mieux! you will say, and I will not say nay; for I should be sorry that the contents of a letter, when you are so far away, should damp the pleasure that the sight of it would afford—judging of your feelings by my own. I just now stumbled on one of the kind letters, which you wrote during your last absence. You are then a dear affectionate creature, and I will not plague you. The letter which you chance to receive, when the absence is so long, ought to bring only tears of tenderness, without any bitter alloy, into your eyes. After your return I hope inde...