SATURDAY 26th
(6:30pm) Insurrection Now! – presentation of Insurrection magazine
SUNDAY 27th
(1pm) Anarchy Against Organisations (the critique of formality in At Daggers Drawn with the Existent, its Defenders and its False Critics)
(2:30pm) Hatespeech and Fire Against the State! Presentation in Solidarity with N, M and all the ghosts haunting the Bavarian smart-city known as Munich
(4pm) The Struggle Against Development in South East London
Insurrection Now! – Presentation of Insurrection magazine (Saturday, 6:30pm)
“Small actions, therefore, easily reproducible, requiring unsophisticated means that are available to all, are by their very simplicity and spontaneity uncontrollable. They make a mockery of even the most advanced technological developments in counter-insurgency. This is what capital and the State are afraid of, this is the news that never makes the headlines but is carefully concealed from the public eye. This is the good news that we intend to spread and augment in this and our future work.”
Consiting in 6 issues spread through the 1980s, Insurrection brought many of the ideas being innovated in that decade by anarchists globally – in the great crucible of struggle – into the English language for the first time. It remains a significant contribution to the struggle. Its editorial choice to place sabotage guides next to analysis of the postindustrial restructuring of capital – next to news of vandalism and riots of youth in the peripheral places in England, next to organisational hypotheses for formations based on direct attack – remain vivid indications from an anarchism which never retreated or relented in front of the openings of revolt in the present (and must not do so either today). Reproduced below is an especially succinct and remarkable editorial from the 5th issue (October 1988).
Editorial / Back Again
And much has happened lately to encourage us to repropose – more clearly and more directly – a road towards a form of anarchist organisation and action that is relevant to the present day. In the period that has elapsed since we last produced an issue of Insurrection we have seen: a more advanced restructuring of capital, reduction in the importance of the political apparatus, the phenomenon of planetary reformism (ie Russia, China), and a tighter control over Third World struggles, all part of the ruthless trajectory of a self-propelled mechanism that will not come to a halt until it reaches the ultimate destruction of all that contains a thrust towards life – or until it is destroyed.
Not much cause for encouragement you might say. Certainly an assessment of the struggle against this reality based on the logic of counter-attack in quantitive or military terms is doomed to failure. This has been demonstrated over the past decade on the one hand by the decline in the trade unions, on the other that of the clandestine armed groups. The latter, from being the stars of the front pages all over Europe for a decade, have become in their miserable remains nothing more than a scarecrow flying a tattered flag of surrender, repentence and complicity.
But scarecrows serve against the high flyers, those who want to take over the cabbage patch to exploit it as their own. They have little effect on the contradictions within the field subjected to a planned culture which in order to survive must dominate the whole of the living terrain upon which it has imposed its project. We can see this in many areas of the world today, not least in Western Europe and Britain itself. Here the contradictions produced by the relentless restructuring of capital, the instauration of information technology, robotisation of production, redundancy of the traditional worker, urban projects of ‘social dispersion’, reduced schooling, reduced public spending, increased policing, self-policing, creation of consensus, etc, are enough to show that capital’s transition to its post-industrial phase is not going to happen smoothly. The mini-riots, intergang violence amalgamated into attacks against police, arson attacks, acts of sabotage, small actions undertaken by individuals or groups of individuals in various parts of the social terrain, all point to a new direction that the struggle is taking, one that is turning away from the old massive structures which could count thousands of members, but which substantially followed the directives of a few, filtered down through a tightly-hierarchical structure; and away from the closed, clandestine specific groups with their spectacular actions carried out in a neomilitary logic. Small actions, therefore, easily reproducable, requiring unsophisticated means that are available to all, are by their very simplicity and spontaneity uncontrollable. They make a mockery of even the most advanced technological developments in counter-insurgency. This is what capital and the State are afraid of, this is the news that never makes the headlines but is carefully concealed from the public eye. This is the good news that we intend to spread and augment in this and our future work.
With this issue of Insurrection we are addressing ourselves to anarchists and all those who feel themselves in a situation of antagonism against the domination of the State and capital. We also address ourselves to those who are disheartened and perhaps even disgusted by the absorption of certain structures that once held high banners and hopes within the workers movement. We address ourselves to those who have begun to see the charade of pacifism as futile in the attempt to move the nuclear industry (both civil and military) an inch. We address ourselves to those who realise that school has taught them nothing and that university is becoming more and more an annex of industrial development. We address ourselves to those who see that science is no longer neutral – if it ever was – and to those who see that the struggle against the vile experimentation on animals in all fields cannot be fought as a single issue struggle but must be brought into the global project of the capitalist enterprise. We address ourselves to those who see that the feminist movement while bringing women ‘s issues into the open, cannot alone bring women to be free beings. We address ourselves to those who see that although the colour of their skin is the most immediate cause of their oppression, to fight back on that level alone merely leads to a more refined form of exploitation. To those who see that even if their colonial exploiters are chased away there will still be a local bourgeoisie to contend with. To those who see that moral indignation is not enough, that simply adhering to a movement in name and having no concrete project is not enough. We address ourselves to those who want to take the risk of throwing old schema out of the window and look for a new road, an informal, flexible road, one that requires the constant engagement of comrades in a dimension of permanent confiictuality, not sporadic moments, spectacular displays of numerical strength. To those for whom reform is nothing but a support to capital. To those who are not afraid to speak of revolution without a cynical smile on their lips. For those who want everything now and are prepared to make sure they get it, realising that this can only be done through the development of both a specific anarchist movement organised informally, and the relationship of that movement with mass organisms which give themselves intermediate aims in an insurrectional logic. We address ourselves to those therefore who realise that this road is one that we must work to create, experimenting together. What we are offering here is one instrument in that project.
Not abstract theory but an attempt to go forward and develop means that are adequate to the present day in the struggle towards a free society. Much of the analytical and theoretical contributions are the fruit of involvement in the struggle elsewhere in recent years, also by some of the Insurrection comrades ourselves. It is therefore also an attempt to break down some of the geographical and linguistic barriers that prevent a full development of the struggle.”
Anarchy Against Organisations (Presentation of some flashes of insight discovered in the pages of At Daggers Drawn with the Existent, its Defenders and its False Critics). (Sunday 1pm).
Anarchists, since the age of Bakunin have always harboured a tension in their midst. There have been those always analysed that the ideal of a full life, one which dances on the skulls of law, tradition, convention and morality, is a beautiful dream, but fundamentally unrealistic given the present state of global triumph for exploitation and control. Given this gap, how out-of-this-world anarchy really is, it was deemed necessary to invent, or to participate, in organistions which would prepare the exploited masses for anarchist revolt. These organisations, whether federations, assemblies, coalitions, popular fronts, unions, popular armies, councils, communities, single-issue groups etc. would bring this inaccessible anarchy down to earth, by getting rid of the violent utopias and proud negations, replacing them with programmes to effectively grow these organisations which will one day be large enough so that the break with authority will be quite easy, everyone having already been prepared and their consent having already been obtained. Straightforward expression and action would never accomplish this, because expression of anarchist ideas would not be accessible or understandable to people used to being governed, and anarchist action might be downright terrifying to the same. Organisations would accomplish everything by creating a context for allying with the ‘progressive’ elements against the ‘reactionaries’, by giving ‘critical’ support to popular reforms, by trying to compete to be at the front and centre, never giving in to reckless words and actions which would risk expulsion from this competition, or too-fast condemnation by the law.
But not all anarchists can be made to see the virtue of this kind of ‘common sense’. At Daggers Drawn with the Existent, its Defenders and its False Critics is one such case. Published in the late ‘90s in Italy, it came at a time of the total eclipse of the worker-based struggle, the full retreat into ossified solipsism of the armed struggle organisations, and the growing confidence in citizenist ‘participation’ in society in the form of alternativist ghettos approved tacitly or officially by the state, symbolised by in Italy the prevalence ‘legalised’ squats, ‘social centres’ etc. At Daggers Drawn put forward the choice of some anarchist comrades to turn a repressive atmosphere into an offensive perspective, to turn profound isolation into the basis for a search for accomplices and affinity, to turn a moment characterised by general resignation, surrender and betrayal into an occasion for rediscovery and elaboration of the wildest, most audacious elements of anarchism.
In particular, this book revived a critique of organisations as a surrogate for action. On many occasions in the book an ‘anti-organisational’ way of associating is suggested, one where the minimum organisation necessary to facilitate action is preferred. It puts forward a vision of anarchist intervention in formations which are small and light – not held down by a weight of logos, acronyms, consensus, membership, programs or pedagogy. Formations which can therefore, it suggests, ‘show up where they are not expected and be where they are not waiting for us.’ Another vision of subversion is elaborated, which is accountable to another ethic to that of the organisational fetishists. Not large movements growing in popularity and notoriety, but dispersed action and struggle, representing nothing and being represented by no one. The wager is that this vision of the social war is uniquely placed to disturb the lethargy of modern, technological domination and immediately open horizons of revolt where they are not supposed to be.
Hatespeech and Fire Against the State! Presentation in Solidarity with N, M and all the ghosts haunting the Bavarian smart city known as Munich. (Sunday 2:30pm)
In the last few months a new round of raids in Greater Munich and Austria abducted two comrades, sealing them in the prisons of the German Federal Republic. This was commenced under the pretext of finding the authors of an anonymous agitational paper called ‘hatespeech against the windfarm’ and also taking nebulous ‘persons of interest’ in 6 arson attacks against various noxious structures the state calls ‘critical infrastructure’. This is only the latest in a repressive campaign dragging on since at least 2022, when the anarchist library Frevel was shut down, its contents stolen, the same as with a printing space, where an entire crane was used to confiscate all machines used for putting words to paper. At the same time a proceeding was initiated against the alleged authors of another Anarchist paper ‘Zundlumpen’.
Leaving repressive bullshit to one side, we want to meet to talk about the living nightmare the forces of order have been subjected to in this notoriously conservative Baravarian region, a place used to being ‘troubled’ only by occasional bleeting from left-wing pedagogues and militants. But since at least 2019, something quite different has been evidenced in increasingly hysterical media reports, as well as increasingly frequent and visible interruptions to the daily routine of voluntary servitude.
Over 50 incendiary attacks on ‘critical national infastructure’ causing millions of euros of damage and incalculable disruption , spanning construction equipment, railway signalling, police vehicles, mobile phone masts, fibre optic cables, electrical substations, geothermal power plants, cement works etc. At the same time, especially when the loyal citizens, applauded by the entirety of the Left, ran over eachother to lock themsleves in their homes during the totalitarian lunge forward in the covid lockdowns, the walls have been saturated with liberatory graftitti – various publications, including the prolfiic Zundlumpen were spread all over (including in letterboxes) in their thousands, and many small public interventions stealing back the space to speak clearly with radical critique against all aspects of the present misery broke all pretence to abject silence.
This is why the state (and its formal opposition) have found themselves with a real pain in the ass. But also why rebel hearts everywhere have much to celebrate, proclaim from the rooftops and defend to the very end, and most importatly to learn from and spread everywhere. The indomitable subversive stance of the arrested comrades speaks for itself: no solidarity campaign is wished for, all ‘assistance’ from specialist ‘prisoner support’ groups has been rejected apriori. All that is requested is the continuation of the struggle against power in all its disguises, a redoubling of audacity, analysis, and attack wherever we are. It’s not an invitation we wish to pass up on.
So, let’s go back to the bad example we’ve been generously given so far, including in many translated texts, and reports of attacks (particularly due to the inimitable work of Sansnom.noblogs.org and Actforfree.noblogs.org), and make illegal and outlandish and ideas come to life. After all, if, as a wall in Munich eloquently stated in 2020, “THE WORST VIRUS IS BLIND OBEDIENCE”, then this material can be the beginning of a process of reinvigoration and healing of every pathetic slavish social reality the smart prison-world has mass produced. After all, if we are warned by the experts and catastrophists alike that nuclear waste has radiocative half-life of hundreds of years, let’s remember that the subversion of greater Bavaria, its beauty and quality, its anti-authoritarian potency will live forever!
Presentation of the Struggle against Development in South East London. (Sunday 4pm)
After decades of post-industrial neglect and managed collapse, some neighbourhoods of south east London have been selected by politicians and capitalists for a new phase of ultra-development. On the one hand they propose the extension of the transport network, in order to traffic human livestock to and from the economic and administrative centres at greater speed. At the same time, an explosion in construction sites forge towers of ‘luxury units’ everywhere, with all the ‘smart’ mass-control infrastructure which the beneficiaries of ‘modernised’ living require (5G, e-commerce, smart sensors and cameras).
In order to make space for this, the ‘clearing out’ and ‘sorting’ of the population designated useless, unproductive and undesirable, has accelerated with the ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ means the British State has always excelled in combining. There is a systematic attack on the remaining homes of the poor, creating the conditions of fire-risk, flooding, pest infestation, overcrowding and poisoning by mould, ending ultimately in eviction and demolition. There is a harshening of exploitation and control, hiking food, energy, water prices, rents and transport fares, whilst turning all the spaces of this part of the city into miniature battlegrounds, with facial recognition, police-state stops, searches and controls, private security making it clear who is allowed where in the new ‘developed’ regime.
To manage the fall out, a whole industry is thriving consisting of ‘welfare’ administrators, religious organisations, charities, artists commissioned to decorate ‘regeneration’ as well as left-wing political babblers. Their objective is to handle the potentially explosive human mixture in this area who may always be on the verge of realising how little there really is to lose, to ‘train’ them, ‘educate’ them, keep them grateful, participating and manageable.
But over the last year there has been expressed, here and there – in graffiti, flyers and anarchist papers, posters and public encounters – a perspective for direct struggle against the development of south east London. This is a struggle characterised by two choices: on the one hand, to break all communication with those in power, and on the contrary to resolve to act directly to make the jobs of all those bosses, administrators and cops as difficult as possible; on the other hand to desert the ghettos that power has put us in and create the spaces for communication between everyone who wants to break with obedience to the plans of profit and power in this area.