But I was alone, my mates were drifting to the right, more angry about immigration than wealth distribution. I left London, happy to get away and looking to get a better idea of the world through Essex University.

I tried the, socialists, communists, every type of Marxists but it was all theory, 1917 was more important than today. For them it wasn’t personal, and the more I spoke to them the more I found them to be the same middle class fucks I’d hated as a kid. No matter what meeting I went to I never found my own class just a load of dicks. I even tried Anarchists but got put off at the start of the meeting because everyone stank of vodka and Humus.

I passed my degree just as the recession kicked off. These bankers…I figured I’d try radical politics again an went to the Anarchist Bookfair, on the way out I was handed a glossy poster “an Invitation to Whitechapel”

A few days later I was at the first public meeting of the Whitechapel Anarchist Group. My class, My hate, these people got it – Within a few weeks we had a paper- it was clunky, a bit hard to read but full of spunk and class rage- all were handed out over the course of a few weekends on Brick Lane. Every handout led to fun conversations, I stopped being just a pissed off teen crying about someone with a few more quid then me, I was talking politics daily, reading about anarchism in the LARC library,  action after action. I was in Love, I found where my class was and where my politics were and it was with the Anarchists.

• Freedom welcomes articles from anarchists on how they got involved in the movement

This article originally appeared in the November edition of Freedom newspaper see here
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Up until the mid 1980s there were scores of radical bookshops in Britain – every major town had one. Many of these booksellers worked together under the mutual banner of the ‘Federation of Radical Booksellers’. The Federation acted as a support network for its members, helping with a variety of practical aspects of bookselling, as well as providing a sense of community. Sadly, as the book-trade hit hard times, the Federation collapsed.

The book trade has been in a slow decline for a long time now, particularly after the gradual collapse up of the Net Book Agreement throughout the early nineties. The NBA regulated book prices, meaning that booksellers large or small could sell at the same price, and on the same margins.

Today we are left with a fraction of the bookshops that once flourished, with both small independents and corporate chains struggling to stay afloat.  Radical booksellers have suffered the same fate as the mainstream shops, and many fine and wonderful shops have closed their doors.

However all is not lost, and there are still some wonderful bookshops out there, working hard to keep progressive books on our high streets. The Alliance of Radical Booksellers hopes to pick up where the Federation left of: as an organisation which allows its member booksellers to support each other, promote one anothers work, and sell books together. Plans are already in motion for the Alliance members to take part in bookfairs together, and to launch an ARB literary prize.

If you would like to find out more, get in touch with Nik via email: nik@housmans.com

Website: http://www.radicalbooksellers.co.uk/

This article originally appeared in the new monthly October edition of Freedom newspaper see here
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But privatisation introduced the profit motive into areas of the economy previously thought to be exempt from them. Neo-liberal theory believes that the state should do very little, with some radical exponents of it approaching an anarchist view of the state. The US has probably gone furthest of the major economies towards this model – its prisons have long been run by for-profit corporations, who lobby for harsher laws and longer sentences, and now even the military is opened up to competition from firms like Blackwater and Raytheon.

As the last few years have shown, there is no steady-state form of capitalism – it will grow or it will die. And once demand has dampened down because of recession, along come the ideological reasons to remove functions from the state. As an anarchist I know the state is not the best provider of services, but it does even out the awful outcomes we’d suffer under pure capitalism. If you disagree, just look at American healthcare, or British railways.

The privatisation recommended by the West once the Soviet Union collapsed paved the way for a small number of oligarchs to massively enrich themselves, while the general population watched their living standards plummet. It’s not a far-fetched prediction that the same will happen in Libya now that a western-friendly regime is in power. Gaddafi might have been a murderous dictator, but he was his own man. Libya could soon be heading the way of Nigeria, Angola or Equatorial Guinea.

Governments of all stripes have given NHS work to private companies, often signing ridiculous contracts meaning the companies got paid even if there was no work. There’s plenty of evidence that some of them cherry-pick the easy work, leaving the expensive operations to the NHS.

Aside from losing the goodwill of health workers by selling them out to the lowest bidder, the subsidies required in most private services once they are the only provision are enormous. Look how much care home costs have rocketed (and standards fallen) since the whole sector was taken over by private equity vultures.

The NHS is far from being a decent employer – there are regular employment tribunals that tell of bullying and a long hours culture. Whistle-blowers have been disgracefully hounded, something that gets little coverage outside of Private Eye – presumably the rest of the media rely on private health insurance, which is now standard in a surprising number of professions. The government’s reforms are aimed at fragmenting the service and making it less attractive to the middle classes, with the ultimate aim being to abolish it for all but those on benefits. Then it really will be hopeless, as the economies of scale inherent in it become lost in a maze of ever-increasing insurance premiums.

What can be done? A defence of the NHS without recognising its flaws is daft. But all the same, the principle of free healthcare needs to be defended. An alliance of health workers with, well, almost everybody, ought to do the trick. A vote for Labour isn’t going to help – they started it all. Instead, we will need to take direct action, such as occupying private health care companies and backing strikes against service closures.

Svartfrosk

This article originally appeared in the new monthly October edition of Freedom newspaper see here
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If we look at the past ten years in radical politics from the anti-globalisation movement that manifested itself in summit mobilisations to the ecological anti-roads campaign that morphed into the climate change radical agenda, and crucially the anti-war movement that defined and defiled a generation of political activists, we see anarchism as a battle against its own involvement.

After the generation that made the poll tax their own, fuelling a new dynamic around the anti-roads and criminal justice bill campaign, came the anti-capitalists of the 2000s which could have been a point of realignment for the anarchist movement as a political entity. [When I say anarchist movement here I mean just that, not groups nor individuals, but the physical manifestation of a political idea realised in all those things that embody it]. Yet it wasn’t to be. The rise of internet anarchism and the dull force of the left (perhaps best exemplified by the Socialist Workers Party) created a paralysis of involvement, a crisis of identity and something oddly lacking in a recognisable force for change. The past ten years saw anarchism in search of its own sense of being.

How that impacted on those who were involved was to veer often wildly between vexed outsider critique (where so much energy was dissipated defining what kind of anarchist politics they were not)  and whirlwind activity based on identifiable, yet abstract concerns. Targeting the IMF necessarily meant buying into the dynamics of the dominant political discourse. Concepts and key words became our lexicon. Academics led the way and we nodded sagely as we tore at summit fences and avoided the plumes of drifting tear gas. The thrill was liberating, explaining it to someone in the post office queue the following week less so.

But what we are seeing today is yet another realignment, one not reliant on traditional internal anarchist tribalism. So we get members of Solfed cracking open squats and opening social centres, we get ex-Wombles hosting a meeting of over a hundred people about supporting the general strike action on 30th June – the mood has shifted away from an entrenched defence of identity and retreat into ideology to an open realisation of actually affecting change. It is not so much all that is solid melting into air, but all the hot air of the last ten years solidifying into some sort of meaning.

A new decade and a new generation of people are being politicised – the mass student protests and university occupations, the snowballing of UK Uncut, all blithely accept anarchist methodology as natural forms of organisation. Our work is how we engage and develop with these movements. In years to come we can look back and we can say we were there, we were involved, the anarchist movement was, perhaps for once, in the right place at the right time.

Article originally appeared in Freedom #7211
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Just as the workers movement in the 1970s successfully defined itself as militant opposition to the prevailing forces of capital, so the far right in the form of the National Front and British Movement emerged to gain a significant foot hold and popularity amongst sections of society, promoting the politics of social division within the working class. If we are not careful the deepening resentment and social pessimism amongst the most affected may again find solace within the voices of the far right.

Fascism as an ideology expresses itself as the rear guard action of capitalism through the promotion of ultra-nationalism, a moral and racial superiority, a stark authoritarianism, and crucially a physical force violent presence on the streets. During the 1980s and 1990s it took the concerted efforts of a committed group of militant anti-fascists to successfully confront the far right and literally force them off the streets. Anti-Fascist Action are still remembered and feared by neo-Nazi gangs, racist thugs and members of far right nationalist parties as being unrelenting in their stated aim to confront fascism both physically and ideologically. So successful were AFA in their objectives that the BNP had to retreat completely from ‘street politics’ and reinvent itself as a parliamentary euro-nationalist party.

Not only did AFA redefine the spectrum of how fascists operated they also offered us a warning on the far right’s ability to adapt to their circumstances. In the final chapter of Beating The Fascists AFA set out the task ahead in challenging the new forms of far right expression, and offers up the question “what happens if an extreme right party emerges that immunises itself against the charges of nazism? What happens when, with generational shift, the strength of ant-nazi feeling and memory of war fades?” What does happen is in part entirely up to us. We have been warned.

Beating The Fascists: The Untold Story of Anti-Fascist Action (Freedom Press) £15

Article originally appeared in Freedom #7206
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By refusing to submit to austerity we resist the attack of state and capital on our living standards. When the public sector is cut and privatised, we face an enclosure of resources that were formerly held in common. ‘Enclosure’ was originally used to describe the private take-over of common land in the earlier years of capitalism, yet enclosures happen continuously as the ruling classes strive to increase profits and roll back past working class victories.

Of course, nowadays we’re not defending grazing rights for our pigs on ye olde commons but services and resources badly managed by the state. Yet there’s a rich history of people opposing cutbacks and challenging the way these resources are controlled – for example, hospital occupations in the 70s and 80s such as Hounslow and the South London Hospital for Women. Staff and local residents took over hospitals slated for closure. The occupations became centres for general resistance, with debate and action on what healthcare could look like in a human community based on freedom and cooperation. There were also campaigns waged by benefit claimants to counter cuts in welfare, resist state snoopers and disrupt earlier versions of workfare. More recently, student occupations have featured ‘teach-ins’ with a curriculum based on struggle and self-education.

But too often anti-cuts activism has been lumbered with a dour tradition of dullness and worthiness. Many of us have sat far too often in draughty halls listening to droning lefties and trade union officials. Or stood in front of town halls listening to the same, wondering why we’re there. In the end we know it’s because we’re dealing with life-and-death questions: health, education, housing, social welfare. But why did action on these issues have to be so devoid of imagination? Where was the combativeness, spirit, confrontation of the root problem?

Then the student and EMA demonstrations last year moved things in a much more vibrant direction, with initiatives like Arts Against the Cuts or Queer Resistance springing up. And now we’re occupying town halls and taking the streets. During last December’s student demo when the Treasury was attacked, schoolgirls chanted ‘we want our money’ rather than ‘tax the rich’. Perhaps that partly expresses our approach, though ultimately we want much more than money. We aim to reclaim social wealth, and we don’t trust politicians to do it for us.

– LM

The locals didn’t want Tesco there. In Cameron’s Big Society, local residents are meant to get a say when the council decide on something they don’t like. The pressure from the council to accept the store, and the role Tesco may have played in pushing for neighbouring squats to be evicted, give the lie to this. The fact that it is to be a Tesco Express, the higher-priced even poorer service version of the big stores may have had something to do with it.

Some argue that there is no innate difference between shops and what matters is the prices that we, as working class people, pay for our food and other necessities. I have some sympathy with this point of view, as someone more at the Tesco end of the retail spectrum than the M&S. But I still think it’s ultimately wrong.

I read blogs afterwards decrying Tesco as the thin end of gentrification. Hmm, wait till you’ve got a Waitrose or an organic deli opening up in your neighbourhood before you claim that!

Tescos are not the thin end of gentrification, they’re the thin end of corporatisation. Tesco Express are the shock troops of this, popping up in terraces where previously it would have been a convenience store, and offering a safe alternative to those people who find street markets too intimidating. Corporate stores are often better employers than the small shops, not that that is saying much. They will likely have central HR departments and policies which the small trader will flout if he can get away with it.

But there is still something soul-less about them. I enjoy planning meals and getting the food for my family. But I never look forward to going to a supermarket. They may do cheap food, and we may need cheap food, but it doesn’t make either right.

Before the Iron Curtain fell, the Eastern Bloc was derided for the monotony of its shops, how everywhere looked the same because it had all been cut from the same cloth. Some on the left counter-posed the basics available to everyone as a price worth paying for the lack of political and economic freedom. I think this misses the point that all humans need some sort of aesthetic side to their lives. Crude Marxists might reduce everything to economics, but it is no reason we should. I don’t wish to see chain-store towns whose only difference is the arrangement of letters on their street signs. Anarchists have always fought against alienated wage labour and the drudgery of work, but we don’t limit ourselves to that, all the dismal alienation of everyday life should be challenged, and shopping is a big chunk of that.

Svartfrosk

Article originally appeared in Freedom #7209
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Once again our devoted subscribers have been put through the mill as yet another production disaster delayed the posting of the previous two issues. So in case you’ve thought we been shut down by the state here’s the true story. Our printer broke. Easily fixed you may think but no! Although a new printer was rapidly ordered it proved incompatible with the Windows 98 of the old computer whereupon all the top secret data about Freedom subscribers is held. While this is good news for anyone not wanting their details leaked, not being able to access the mailing list by the interwebnet has resulted in a labyrinthine nightmare as we have had to buy new software and painstakingly transfer the data to a format that the shiny new printer approves of.

Article originally appeared in Freedom #7209
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But does the loss of the May Day bank holiday really matter? International workers day on 1 May has been with us for over a century, since it was adopted by the Second International a few years after the murders and mayhem in Chicago in 1886. However the May Day bank holiday was only introduced in the UK in the late 1970s, at the end of decade of enhanced class warfare, and more often than not the holiday does not even occur on 1 May. It has in fact been a distraction from the reality of May Day, an attempt perhaps by the ruling class to remove the focus from the 1 May international celebration of working class struggle, to just another paid day off granted us by the charity of our masters.

Well bollocks to that, celebrating May Day on any day other than 1 May is frankly absurd. We are all for as many paid days off as possible, but what we really want goes much further and deeper than that, and means making every day like a May Day. So by all means defend the May Day bank holiday, but more importantly celebrate May Day on 1 May.

May Day will continue to be celebrated around the world on 1 May, be it for its original pagan roots or more recently for its celebration of workers struggles, and preferably for both. We don’t need permission from the bosses or the state to celebrate our histories and traditions, and we shouldn’t bother asking. Just do it.

Reports on the streets indicate that Bristol may well see a Celebration of May Day parade this year, following discussions involving individuals from a large number of groups. It is believed they will go public with their plans for an inclusive public event in a few weeks time. Keep your eyes peeled for news of how you can join in.

From Bristol Anarchist Bookfair Collective whose annual bookfair is on May 7th this year [see P1]

Article originally appeared in Freedom #7208
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I don’t believe it is and will try and show why. Bureaucracy is a term reminiscent of the Soviet Union or EU – faceless unaccountable officials making decisions far removed from common sense. However, if we pick apart this tabloid definition, we might ask how much more accountable are officials under “democracy”. Or what “common sense” is, and whether the decisions to slash public spending to bail out banks counts.

In reality, in all forms of hierarchical rule, officials ultimately dance to the tune of the ruling class. So EU officials work hard for the interests of multinational corporations, and Soviet officials worked for the interests of the Communist Party. The fact that they had to be in the CP to be officials is not significant – all state systems require high level officials to be on-board. If you think I’m wrong, ask yourself why there are no high ranking officials in Britain with a background in, say Class War or al-Muhajiroun? Any job with even a tiny bit of power is vetted, and the questions asked include membership of political organisations that don’t support parliamentary democracy.

Administration is something that is necessary in all organisations. Small ones can get away without formal admin sometimes, but even then it is pushing it. Administration is the process of running an organisation. It can involve keeping in touch with people, looking after finances, booking rooms and sending out notifications. There are lots of administrative tasks that any organisation needs to do, just to survive. Those that do them badly often don’t survive, or end up fracturing because without administration there can be no accountability. Those of us who’ve been around plenty of anarchist groups may recognise this – it shades into the tyranny of structurelessness, whereby groups are dominated by one or two individuals because there are no structures to hold them to account.

Apply the same principles to public services, which according to politicians need less administration. If admin staff are cut, do the processes still need to happen? I agree some don’t, but  if they do, who does them? So, a nurse might record the medicines given to a patient, on a device by the bedside. That information might well be crucial for the patient’s future care – but passing it on in a useful way requires admin or back office functions.

Where I work an admin post was recently transferred to a third party company as part of the cuts. The end result is that my colleagues and I have spent a lot more time dealing with that third party. I could have been doing my own work, which still needs doing, hence a cut in admin usually means an increase in workload for those left. Only one of my mates ever had a secretary at his job – he worked in the City. They wanted him managing funds, not typing letters or arranging meetings. His management saw that those things were necessary so they employed someone to do it.

So whenever a politician talks about “protecting front line services”, remember that what they mean is increasing the workload and stress on front line services by ill thought-out cuts to back office functions.

Svartfrosk

Article originally appeared in Freedom #7208
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