fgrtngghflyC 13“. March, 1981 anarchist Vol 42, No. 5

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JUST as we were putting the fin- democracy is that the armed forces ablishing the more relaxed stability ishing touches - on the evening of must be subservient to the civil it hoped for, with Christian demo- Monday 23rd February - to our authority: Parliament. And with the crats and Social democrats fight- last issue, the news started coming changes that have followed the death ing for the middle grotmd - much as through the radio of the attempted of the Caudillo, new attitudes and we might see them doing here in the coup in Spain by a Colonel of the codes of behaviour have emerged not too distant future. While outside Civil Guard. which must have annoyed the auth- of Parliament, extremist groups We held our breath and the front oritarians in the Army more than felt free to emerge and start bomb- page until the Tuesday morning, by somewhat. Even a Communist Party ing and shooting each other up. which time it was clear that the has been permitted I The most determined and mili- coup had been abortive. Appeals by There might even be a feeling tant of these, of course, had already King Juan Carlos to the Army and that they have been betrayed by the been going before the death of the police to remain ‘loyal’ to the old dictator. He chose no successor Franco: the Basque separatists, infant Spanish democratic constit- from their ranks to follow him as whose militarist wing, ETA-Militar, ution had found the likely response Head of State. Instead he ordered has realised that the coming of and ‘reason’ had prevailed. a the return of the monarchy - nomin- ‘democracy’ in Madrid made no diff- It woul d be extraordinary if ating Juan Carlos. Now this might erence to their struggle, since all there were not a lot of hatred we ll be thought to be acceptable to gove rnmentsare centrist in concept among the upper ranks of the any army with a history of working and determined to hang on to every Spanish army for the political within a democracy - but not the bit of territory under their control. ‘democracy’ which has followed, Spanish Army, with no such history, It was the Guardia Civile which along with the establishment of the for right away King Juan Carlos had taken the brunt of ETA's viol- King as the He ad of State, the death declared his intention of leading the ence. As is so often the case, civil of Gene ralissimo Franco. country back (back?) to democratic guards we re sent to the area from Under Franco's merciless Fal- forms of government. other regions of Spain, having no angist rule, the Army was the elite The Army therefore had to stand sympathy for the local struggle and of Spain. With no external wars to and see its old enemies from the not even speaking the local language. fight, the Army was the effective bitter struggle of the Civil War re- But the ease with which they were government, subject only to its emerge and re-form. Not only pol- picked off amused burning resent- leader. Delegating most of the dirty itical parties of the centre and the ment back in the elite squad’s head- work to the Civil Guard, the Army left, but trades unions; even the quarters in Madrid. bathed in its power and privilege, CNT re-eme rged with, no doubt in It was not surprising, therefore, the prize for its triumph over the the military mind, the spectre of that it was a Colonel of the Guardia Spanish people in the Civil War. an anarchist movement in its back- Civile who was prepared to lead the With the coming of this democ- ground. A coup last week. Lt-Col Antonio racy, however, the Army has been Nor has the political democracy Teje ro Mlina had only recently gone demoted, since one of the tenets of been an unqualified success in est- back to his post after serving a term 2 FREEDOM

demonstrators shouted fascist slog- bequeathed by Franco. But Juan ans of support for the stranded Col- Carlos knows that this is 1981, not onel. 1936. The whole of Europe is diff- Some odd facts have emerged. erent; there is no Nazi Germany, no Like, the rank-and-file civil guards fascist Italy, but there is the EEC, who followed Te je ro into the cham which Spain desperately wants to ber were simply rounded up outside join, and which her economy needs, and ordered to follow him in with- and there is NATO.

‘~‘4kx,&h41‘._. out knowing why. ‘We were just The authoritarian European states I obeying orders’ was their story - which were thought right and proper and it seems to have been accepted in the 30s and to the extent that by the investigation committee, for Spain still maintains the outward whom, of course, such behaviour trappings of fascism, like in the P is only too right and prope r. There maintenance of the Guardia Civile, § ‘ §t__:_ . were some, however, who deser- her presence among the ’democracies‘ ted the Colonel and walked back out could be an embarrassment. Old- of the building again as soon as they fashioned brutality might be all found out what he had led them right in Sal Salvador but not in into. (Will they be rewarded or Europe . punished for disobeying orde rs ‘?) Nov; then, is the appropriate All in all, it wasn't the Colonel's time to demand that the hated day, a fact which seems to have Civil Guard be disbanded. What- dawnded on him quite early in the ever governmental structures of detention for indiscipline in the proceedings, for one report had remain which we, as anarchists, past. He was ve ry clearly finding it him saying - as the deputies were would reject, the retention of this very difficult to live with democracy being led out of the chamber- ie, outward relic of Franco's 30 years The extent of the plotting has not yet long before he surrendered - ‘You of tyranny can surely not be justif- been revealed, although what is al- are leaving all right. Nothing will ied by anybody. If the activities of ready obvious is that it is more happen. The only thing I know is the Basque guerillas seem to just- widespread than the event of 23rd that I'm going to have to spend 30 ify its continuance - then let the Feb might have indicated. or 40 years in prison.’ And so he democratic Spanish King tell the Only one high- ranking army off- We ll may. Spanish Parliament to let thom icer acted on that same evening: Mopping-up ope rations have foll- people go. Give the Basques their Major-General Jaime Milans del owed. High- ranking army and civil independence; remove the excuse Bosch, stationed in Valencia, sent guard officers have been arrested, for para-military police. his tanks into the streets and declar- including Major-Gene ral del Bosch Disband La Guardia Civile I ed a state of emergency. From the of Valencia. It is being hailed by re st, whoever and wherever they the deputies, safe ly back in their were: nothing. seats as a ‘triumph’ for dem- (Illustrations taken from Bicicleta) But Colonel Tejero's antic was ocracy, when really 1t was either a bungled farce, or a , spectacular enough. Choosing a ,--~ moment when the Spanish Cortes deliberate plot to flush out (the Parliament) was in a state of potential military conspitators. \;. flux - for they were in the middle of On a great wave of relief, the electing a new prime ministe r- he Spanish people, spectators at the ' led a squad of 200 civil guards into game s, filled the streets four days the chambe r, scared the daylights after the events. l, 400, 000 came out of the deputies by ordering his out in Madrid, 350, O00 in Valencia, men to shoot up the ceiling and he rd- whi le in Barcelona, Spain's second ed the deputies out, covered in largest city, only about 200, 000 F plaster and confusion. marched. Could it be that the people One of the press photographers of Barcelona were not so impresse still in the building had managed to after all with the democratic trium- get a photograph of Te je ro waving ph ? his arm and brandishing a hand-gun Whatever the truth of this extra- The photo went round the world and ordinary affair, we must remember must have made the lucky pressman that in terms of Spanish political a pretty peseta. history, it's not so extraordinary. But from then on, the intrepid For the reasons we outlined at the Colonel didn't know what do to. He beginning, a great deal of resent- //’ must have been getting reports ment and bitterness 1s simmering 1 / from other regions and must have among the state's forces in Spain. known that, with the exception of The lid has just been lifted a little Valencia, he was on his own. What- and we have been allowed a glimpse. "1 ever promises he had been given of There can be no dount that the support, none came. Outside and military and the para-military Civil throughout the night, units of the Guard have both been disappointed Army and the police quietly surr- at the role played by the King, whom ounded the Parliament building. no doubt they expected to carry on aw-1"" Outside them, some right-wing the same authoritarian structure y‘/(“gal/KM-ua.:58 FREEDOM 3 touch 0 anarchism WHY has there been so much ment- "Thedoctrine that, I believe, Heffer continues with an attack on ion of anarchism in the press rec- distorted and eventually defiled the anarchist concept of government ently (by which I mean an increase Marxism was the dictatorship of the as the root of evil. He does not, with in references thereto by 100 to 1)? proletariat, a dictatorship that has Reagan or Thatcher, want less gov- What can it possibly have to do with nowhere been superseded by a class- ernment, nor, with the ‘true anarch- any of the political parties, let less communist state. Bakunin ex- ist’, no government, but competent alone with the ‘Gang of Four‘ and plained why: 'These previous work- and not-excessive ly-bureaucratic the newly-fledged Council for Social ers having just become rulers or government. For, "Is government Democracy? representatives of the people will wrong to create a health service Before such questions are dis- cease being workers; they will look which ensures that everyone has a missed as meangingless we might at the workers from their heights, right to proper health care? Is gov- give them a small thought. For the they will re present not the people ernment wrong to create a social strange, the distasteful, the rather but themselves - he who doubts it security system with unemployment improbable and the mildly amusing does not know human nature"'. benefits, among others? Should gov- fact is that over the lastfew months And she wenton to show how party ernme nt not be concerned’ to ensure of upheaval within the Labour Party bureaucracies put themselves before that there is a good system of educat- an ideological battle of sorts has the [B0p1€.' But again, she was care- ion for all and decent houses for been waged on the basis of anarchist ful not to mention the word ‘anarch- people to live in? " ideas. ism’. This is less the place to enter into This odd business can be traced Then, suddenly, in January, here a refutation of Heffer's idea of gov- back at least to the day Dr David is Eric Heffer, regular writer in ernment - which any study of anarch .- Owen (Plymouth) became Foreign The Times, devoting two of its august ist theory should not make too diffic- Secretary in the Callaghan govern- columns to President Reagan under ult (and Heffer, besides, is here me nt and when, as this writer re- the heading, ‘A touch of anarchism missing the point about anarchist members, he appeared on television but is it real? ' criticism) -' than to remark on the to reveal that there were actually From George Woodcock's The strangely convoluted way in which he two main schools of socialism - one Anarchist Reader, Heffer quasa expresses his apprehensions about which followed Marx, but - wait for “Bylderivation (sic), anarchism is the Reagan administration. Why go iti - another which followed Proud- the doctrine which contends that to such lengths to equate Reagan's hon. He thereupon announced that he government is the source of most of with anarchist concepts in the first was Proudhon’s man, a championof our social troubles and that there place if at the same time he must decentralisation as opposed to Marx- are viable forms of voluntary organ- cover himself by stating that he istcentralism. But, of course, he isations. And by further definition, knows full well that Reagan is really was careful not to mention the word the anarchist is the man who sets out anarchism's implacable enemy? ‘anarchism’. to create a society without govern- Does this not seem an unnecessarily It was later the turn of Shirley ment. " He then compares this defin- clumsy approach? Williams. In her reply to an earlier ition with Reagan's inaugural speech, If, however, one remembers that Times article by Eric Heffer (Liver- concluding that one could be forgiven the article is being written at a time pool, Walton) this second Gang mem- for believing that parts of it "were when the Labour Party is under threat ber defended her socialist ideals. from anintroduction to a treatise on from a centrist alliance between Lib- She reminded Mr Heffer that she too anarchism. " erals andsocial democrats, and if t wanted equality, full employment and Heffer goes magnanimously on to one recalls not only Owen's re marks a united Europe, and saidithatMarx point out that Reagan is "clearly an about Proudhon and Williams‘ about was not a bad sort of a fellow, but implacable enemy of anarchism, Bakunin but the last Liberal confer- after all he was still fallible. After which with all its faults is a form of ence chairman, Michael Meadow- quoting from Anthony Crosland on non-state socialism". However, croft's,about the anarchist strand in the virtues of political democracy "like other devotees of the private Liberal tradition and the need for she then administered her coup de enterprise system he unwittingly open and de ce-ntralised_economic grace . goes part of the way with the anarch- ists". (Continued on page 6)

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ground and from helicopters. Police conditions by an International Comm- intelligence agents, in vehicles ission for the Protection of Prison- whose licence plates, like those of ers and Against Conditions of=ISolat- their opponents’ cars, were blacked ion, the observance of the minimal out, observed events from inside guarantees of the Geneva Convention Brokdorf compound through binoculars on prisoners of war, and the release QB and telephoto lens cameras. of the RAF prisoner, Gunther Sonnen- berg, who is still seriously ill from "The intelligence_is then stored on microfilm or fed into a computer- a head wound he received during his capture some years ago. ised data bank. It enables security Since the publication of Amnesty agents to keep 'troublemakersY under lnternational's report on isolation almost constant surveillance- and solitary confinement in West Ger- "On the propaganda front, police TO HE LL WITH many, which urged the abolition of responded to anarchist leaflets call- these as "regular forms of imprison- ing for mass action against 'the CHKFHCIAIJ ment", conditions are reported to be fascist pigs’ at Brokdorf with leaf- as least as bad, if not worse, than lets of their own. VATICAN CITY.It should come as neither before. Many people are still kept "Imitating the internationally- a surprise nor a disappointment to for several years at a time in solit- known anti-nuclear badge with a note that on 2 March the Roman ary confinement or isolated in tiny smiling sun and the slogan 'Nuclear Catholic Church's Congregation for groups. Energy . No Thanks', the leaflets the doctrine of the faith confirmed, carried a smiling police badge and in an official declaration, that the motto 'Police Protection - Yes, FTIB.Pd§C7TEHEFtiHLCX}Cfl?F freemasons, nihilists, charcoal- Please'. burners+ and anarchists are to be TORNESS. The last of the Torness "But senior police officers ack- considered as automatically ex- trials, following the arrest of nowlgdged that the hard-core anarch- comunicated from the Church. Such 27 Beople during an action in May ists were unlikely to be convinced by evil-doers are thus deprived of 198 at the proposed nuclear site such ‘hearts and minds’ campaigns. burial according to the Catholic of Torness, was held in Haddington, "Some l5,000 policemen and elite rites and will, of course, be con- East Lothian (Scotland) last month. units of the paramilitary federal signed to the innermost circles of From Aberdeen, the Torness Public guard were called in from all over hell. » Parks Department report that the the country for the giant Brokdorf The declaration was made follow- fines from the nine trials total £625 operation (earlier this month) which ing an attempt by clerical ‘progress- (excluding high travel costs) and was described by officials as the ives’ to do away with the order of that it was on the police evidence biggest police exercise in West GEr- excommunication. The main protagon- that the magistrates’ courts relied. man history. ist of this line, a certain don Picketing and leafletting, sit- " With crash helmets and gas masks, Rosario, who wrote a book entitled downs and other demonstrations have they presented a fearsome spectacle, La-ricgggiliazionegtraglg*Chiesa been taking place during the trials. marching beside the giant water g_la massoneria (The reconciliation "On the day of the last trial", cannons and banging their truncheons between the Church and the freemason— they report, "two of the November on perspex shields to raise morale. ry) has been denounced as a heretic 20th defendants presented the Hadd- "Brokdorf was defended like a and a traitor to the Christian faith. ington Sheriff Clerks Office with a strategic fortress — ‘Fort Apache’ £300 cheque covering earlier fines as one official called it. + The charcoal burners, or Carbo- - the court officials were somewhat Those helicopters that were not nari, were an underground radical perturbed that the cheque was writt- filming the troublemakers dipped in sect of the last century, dedicated en on a six foot long coffin, but and out of the compound, scooping their frantic phone calls to the to the unification of Italy and esta- up fresh border guards to chase the bank confirmed that the~cheque was blishment of a republic! protestors into the icy marshlands perfectly legal and would have to around. be accepted. * POLICE PROTECTION - "The anarchists did their best to "Following the February 12th confuse the police, for example by trial a sit-in was held in the SSEB YES PLEASE flying aluminium kites to disrupt showrooms in nearby Dalkeith. Lack communications between the helicopters WEST GERMANY. According to a Reuter of numbers prevented this being fully and ground forces. effective but the management were report, the authorities in northern "A clandestine transmitter ident- West Germany are "locked in almost disturbed enough to summon the local ifying itself as 'Radio Free Brokdorf' weekly battles with well-organised forces of Law and Disorder to evict beamed tips to demonstrators trying anarchist groups and police have the protestors. Solidarity action to avoid police roadblocks and searches started to imitate their tactics - was taken in London the same day, on the way to the nuclear site. at mass demonstrations". in the form of a picket of Slr Robert "Some anarchists managed to A police intelligence chief in- McAlpines offices - McAlpines being smuggle Molotov cocktails, slings side the besieged nuclear compound major contractors at Torness. and a couple of air rifles past the at Brokdorf is quoted as saying that "The resistance to the trials was barriers. there are 4000 "such extremists" in. worthwhile. But to develop from being "Police said they seized dozens the north German area and that they a nuisance and embarrassment to the of dangerous ewapons, including iron are recognisable by the fact that state to being a real threat we needed bars, knives, incendiary devices and they group around flags, hang behind much greater numbers prepared to act. even a crossbow and arrows at the peaceful demonstrators, lobbying The only real answer to state repress- checkpoints". Molotov cocktails, and wear crash ion is the Plogoff-style response of helmets, masks and nondescript cloth- RAF HUNGER STRIKE thousands beseiging the court when- ing. ever anti-nuclear people go on trial. Renter goes on to remark that, WEST GERMANY/BERLIN. Prisoners of As one of our placards read ... in response to the barrage of stones the Red Army Fraction and 2 June BURN ALL COURT HOUSES TO THE GROUND! and home-made fire bombs, the police Movement groups have been on hunger "Torness nuclear power station is seem "almost as clandestine and cons- strike since early February. They still under construction. It couldn't piratorial as the anarchists them- are demanding greater interaction be stopped in 1980. SCRAM in Edin- selves. Dozens of plainclothes police with eachother outside the control H- burgh called a meeting in January and photographers mingled with the its or high security wings that have various groups throughout the country Brokdorf crowds and every second of been established in several of the attended to plan activities for Torness the demonstration was filmed on the prisons, control of their prison 1981. Who else is going to stop the FREEDOM 5

insanity if it is not us? The only Party leade rshipwe re on. A large defeat for those who stood trial for number of Labour Party members BOMMI BAUMA NN Torness 1980 is no Torness 1981. Every voiced their disgust with their anti~nuclear group is asked to contr- leaders total disregard for their WEST German urban» guerrilh ibute to the actions this year. Reg- members, their voters and for the Bommi Baumann was arrested ular planning meetings are now being recently in Hackney, east London. held for an anti-nuclear week of action workers cause and socialism in general. He had been living underground for in the Edinburgh/East Lothian area about eight years after leaving from May 9-17th. Minutes of meetings Itwas the disgusting attitude of so far and details of future meetings Foot and the Labour leadership urban guerrilla activity in the early from SCRAM, 2a Ainslie Place, Edinburgh." which was the main topic of conver- 70s. He was a founder member of Donations have now covered the sations in pubs and on the weary the June 2nd movement which grew £625 worth fines imposed in the Tor- road home, no the succe ss of the y out of the West Berlin counter- ness trials. TPPD thank all who have culture in the late 60s. Contrary to given to the Torness Charges Fund. march, the turnout or how we've got to get the Tories out...... popular belief they were never in They can be contacted c/o Box 23, any way connected to the Baader APP, 163 King St, Aberdeen, Scotland. MICHAEL FOOT spoke again 21 Week Meinh0f RAF . They were in fact ON THE LEVEL later, at the meeting to celebrate formed lon g before RAF and were _ ' _ __l _' the centenary of the Leicester Sec- always severely critical of RA Fs ular Hall on Sunday afternoon, 1st SATURDAY. March 7th. 7 saw a politics (Marxist-Ieninist) and their ‘Teach-in on the State‘ held by the March. Leicester was one of the methods (separatist). Junje 2nd Leveller Collective at the Poly- most active centres of the freethought always insisted on maintaining con- technic of Central London. Lasting movement outside London during the tact with the counterculture that J for eight hours subjects ranged nineteenth century, and in 1881 the gave the n~ birth and one of the from, the security force s: their Leicester Secular Society opened reasons for Bommi giving up such aims and methods, to the use of its own hall. The society is still activity was that he felt they had laws such as the Drug and Immig- the only independent secular society lost contact with the people they ration 1‘ cts to harras minority outside London, and the hall is now were supposedly fighting for. groups. The presentation was the only secular hall in Britain. According to the press Bommi somewhat hampered by a breakdown Michael Foot accepted the invitat- ’agreed' to return to Germany to of the film projector which meant ion to speak at the meeting last year, face charges - hardly likely con- that the event was reduced to a before he became leader of the Lab- sidering the nature of the likely long ‘talk-in‘. Still, it was an our Party, and it was quite a sur- charges. Clearly the West German interesting day and perhaps further prise that he kept the engagement. state has learnedits lessons from efforts like this will be more As a result, the occasion became the difficulties it had extraditing succe s sful . almost a Labour Party celebration, Astrid Proll a couple of years ago with a packed hall and two local and they quickly got Bommi on the WHAT THEPAPERS DIDN' T ,Sf_-KY; MPs on the platform (the third was next plane home and safely behind SAT. 21st FEB. UNEMPLOYMENT just joining the Social Democrats). bars before a whisper of protest .__ i Q} I1 *| _ _ ' l\L/IARCH: But this is not what was inte rest- could be voiced. ing about the meeting. That was the Clearly an arrest of this sort MICHAEL FOOT spoke three times unexpected anarchist element. The must come as something of a shock after a ludicrous platform led chant president of the Leicester Secular especially for anyone engaged in of ‘We want Michael’. After his third Society, who took the chair, is any sort of serious opposition. speech the meeting was wound up, Peter Miller, who is an anarchist. Bommi had been living underground despite hundreds of people shouting Fraternal greetings from the nation- for close on ten years including tart and indicating that hundreds, if not al freethought organisations were of the time he was active in Ger many. thousands, of marchers were only brought by Barbara Smoker of the He had only been heard of since about just arriving and many more were National Secular Society and by 1973 through the publication of his still on route. They were ignored. Nicolas Walter of the Rationalist book Wie Alles Anfing (How It all Someone jumped onto the stage and Press Association, who are both Begani. He was also known to be said that these people - the marchers, anarchists. The local Labour MPs a master of disguise and at adopting the workers - were the ones that didn't say a word from beginning to false identities. matte red that they had marched four end. And Michael Foot, who was This means that for him to be miles in the freezing cold and snow, meant to be giving a lecture on arrested, either he was given away for what? The plug was pulled out of Socialism and Freethought, made by an ex-comrade or that the police the microphone as MPs indicated only very general remarks and went are far cleverer than we thought. that they were the ones that matte red. out of his way to include favourable Rumour has it that the police had Amazing scenes followed as hun- references to anarchism. a tip-off from Germany, but it would dreds of angry demonstrators swar- One of these was almost incredible. be a good idea to keep a lookout med down to the front of the stage Among the many well-known people over your shoulder anyway. DS and the cries of ‘Right to work’ were who have spoken at the hall during replaced by ‘Right bspeak'. Police . the past century and whose names arrived and the remnants of the were listed in the chairman's intro- PART OF THE SERVICE vanguard party still on stage were ductory speech was Peter Kropotkin. ushered through the back. However, Foot actually said towards the end UNDER Statutory Instrmnent the demonstrators reassembled at of his own speech that, while anarch- No. 405 (Ammendment, Police the exit of the stage where Jimmy ism may not be entirely a good thing, Regulations 1980) Police office rs Milne and other we ll known revolu- it would be a good thing if the ideas may claim an allowance for R tionaries were trying to defend their of Kropotkin were preached far and emptying cess pits. . . . So next party line. Apolice cordon was wide. time your ce ss pit fills up, ask a formed which left no doubt in most Well, Comrades, we do our best. . . . policeman I peoples minds which side the Labour MH 5 FREEDOM r A TOUCH OF ANARCHISM _ (Continued from page 3) After all, some hack is bound to structures (thereby taking up the SHOCK HORROR I get in and it does not matter which. Kropotkin-quoting element of the Dateline §'7:2:§l "Secondly, talk to your friends Young Liberals) it all begins to make and other people about the problems more sense. THAT staunch defender of liberty, you share an your course, in the poly Anarchism, as we know, is the only Ken Weetch (Lab. Ipswich) revealed and in the rest of your lives. "Above all, take part in the ideology which offers a coherent to a commons committee that Union between Students. Work out with critique of the centralised state ‘certain political groups‘ are having people on your precinct what you socialism which labour represents their mail intercepted (and read want, not what the hacks tell you to - or at least, to which many of its presumably) by the special branch want. Decide for yourself when and members aspire - and from a social- and M15. He mentioned the case of how to achieve what you wantI..... ist position. Because a nunber of the reciept for six intercepted "Take part in grassroots events, social democrats and Liberals wish, groups and organisations where you letters that was'accidently' delivered take all the decisions, where you from a more or less left wing pers- to Freedom Bookshop. ‘There is a have all the power. Ignore the bureau- pective, to justify their dissent, they touch of Inspector Clouseau in this crats. If you must, use the Union have begun to grasp (albeit in a fur- type of investigation ' said our Ken but never let it use you. tive and highly selective sortof way) and went on to call for'a ban on all "Finally, if one of these Hacks, at anarchist ideas. It is only to be interceptions, except for detecting all smiles, approaches you, calling expectedthat Labour's faithful will serious crime, terrorism and you by your first name (when did he/ retaliate by trying to show how dang- she find that out?) and asking you to erously anarchism lends itself to espionage. ' (That should just about vote for him or her tell them to cover all eventualitie s, shouldn't GET LOST." right wing and reactionary forces. it?) i (Extracts from 1980 leaflet). The irritating thing about all this, He didn't seem to be very worried of course, is that it gets us nowhere. about the rights and wrongs of It is hardly necessary to stress that, checking peoples mail, just that it FREEDOM has received the for all their references to Proudhon, should be done properly. following Communique: Bakunin, or that gentle market-gar- Courageous Ken's comments were dening Prince, Council for Social described by Industry Minister a,_u."r..e.:,1m -p s,A.s.= o Democracy members and Liberals Kenneth Baker as ‘rather exagge r- are as 'imp1acably opposed" to anar- ated’ though whether this refers to The RUTB claim responsibility chism as President Reagan, who has the amount of mistakes made or the for hitting the Jeanetta Cochrane never heard of any of these people. amount of mail che cking that is done Theatre recently with paint, super- The Limehouse Declaration, with was not made clear. Verily, the art glue and.bricks. TWfis"was done as which the Council introduced itself, of 'humbug' is alive and well and a protest at the presentation, in the reveals a ragbag of contradictory living in We stminister. ' form of entertainment, of the aims - paying tribute to the principles training and direct action ofthe of equality, classlessness, decentral- MAK SAS Regiment killers. The hopes isation and elimination of poverty are l) that the SAS is disbanded and while swearing firm allegiance to 1 i TAKING ON THE UNION Z) that RADA state their purpose in NATO, the EEC and a thriving and becoming involved as a publicity competitive capitalism-. Truly, there is nothing in their outlook to disting- LONDON. Anarchists at the Polytechnic organ for these thugs. of North London report: usih them from the dreary David ‘ Further action will follow. Steels of this world, and it is to Roy As a result of our activities Jenkin's credit that he made no bones during last year's elections for the student union, PNL Anarchist Society this week about the Council's elector- was warned by the union that our al ambitions. money would be cut off and that we "At that (the next) election", he would lose the use of union facilities "“ // '¢é announced, “working in close and This means that in effect we are \ \ i AN» friendly arrangement with the Liber- banned from printing leaflets/posters, R ill 1’anarchy" over capital- ~ Dear Comrades at Freedom, signed by several people is most ism. Such behaviour only confirms The arrival of FREEDOM every effective.) It should be written the view held by many anarcho- fortnight is always welcorne. As "To Whom it May Concern" and be capitalists - that the only gripe a fairly strict vegetarian (no sent to me to be read aloud in so-called socialist anarchists flesh of beast nor fish but milk, court by my Attorney. such as yourselves have with the cheese, etc.) I was very pleased Please state that you are aware state is that it prevents you from to read the article on Veganism. of Reich's work and think his coercing and bullying "free market I know one vegan and am amazed theories have merit, that the world shits" and anyone else who dares at that person's resolution to has great need of his discoveries, disagree with your ludicrous and boycott all animal products. Such and that to keep it secret is a crime inhumane collectivist vision. a decision requires great self against humanity. State that you Yours sincerely, discipline and a lot of hard work approve any action which furthers CHRIS R. TAME shopping and cooking. Even as a access to his papers and that the vegetarian, I find it hard to eat Trustee, Mary Higgins, is acting Libertarian Alliance out especially in ‘English’ rest- Contrary to the welfare of the public by bringing charges against Not only do I strongly object to aurants and cafes. Thank you for being described as ‘ludicrous and bringing the subject to the eyes of me. If I get enough such letters I inhumane’ but also feel that ‘free your readership. I hope a few market shits‘ is too lenient a people look again at their eating should have no trouble. description of so called ‘anarchist habits and start buying beans Please hurry, as the trial is soon and international mail is often capitalists‘. Longer reply in next instead of beefburgers. However, 1ssue...... slow. we must beware of the ‘fashion- Layout artist able’ health food shops with their Thank you for your help. M I mm-m__ soya mince and 'Sosmix'. Health food is another section of capital- J OE L CARLINSKY ism and many big food companies Franklin County Dear FREEDOM exploit us that way as well as Jail, I personally am involved with with instant mash and pot-meals. SANE, CND, Amnesty International 1 Park Street, S Long may the corner green- Campaign Against the Arms Trade Farmington, Maine, grocer survive_ with his local grown (CAAT) and War on Want. However, I U. S . A. produce. Fresh fruit and vegetables feel great contradictions are involv- ed. As anarchists we are opposed to are all we really need. parliamentarism - yet all such groups Yours in solidarity, consider, to varying degrees, that FRANK. ‘free market letters to MPs and petitions to the government are important and legit- imate. Similarly CAAT, for example, shits’ advocates writing letters of protest to companies over particular arms Dear Freedom, deals. But can I as an anarchist leg- Letters In your issue of l7 January you itimately engage in such action, quoted an absurd statement ("Lib- which implies that there can be such ofprotest ertarianism is not the same as a thing as 'good' capitalism (as anarchy. Anarchy is chaos. 90% of letters to MPs imply that there could Dear Freedom, the present laws promote anarchy"). be a 'good' state)? ' However, the other side of the. Some people may remember me made at a meeting of the Libertar- coin is what would be legitimate, ian Alliance. from my visit a few years ago. I effective activity over such issues was interested in the theories of Since you combined that quote if anarchists shouldn't participate Wilhelm Reich and had heard of with childish abuse of the LA in such organisations. On the posit- some of his works that had been re- (calling us "free market shits") ive side they do involve quite large printed in London (by Rising Free ?) many of your readers will infer numbers and do_have some effect (eg. When Reich died he left a lot of that the statement represents the CAAT pressure sometimes helps to stop an arms deal). On the negative side, unpublished manuscripts and notes views of the LA. I hope you will I believe that ultimately they are therefore have the decency to all- which remain under control of a cherishing political and economic court-appointed executor, Mary ow us to correct such an impress- illusions in many minds, that are _ Higgins, who refuses to allow,any- ion. The meeting was a public one highly reactionary and dangerous. one to read them. Recently I obtain- and the statement you quoted was To sum up, do other comrades ed copies of some of the papers made by a notorious eccentric who think anarchists should take part in and while trying to distribute photo- is neither a member of the Alliance such organisations as I've named? If so, to what extent ii it either copies I was arrested and am now nor an exponent of libertarian views. right or useful writing to the MP I in jail awaiting trial. I could get 5 despise? But if not, what d2 we do years in prison if convicted, and Perhaps you might also allow me on such issues as political prisoners, many of the American Reichians are to use your columns to thank your the arms trade and Third World opp- so concerned with trying to look ideological comrades who one ression, that will be effective and - ‘respectable’ that I have not had night last week hurled a brick not subject to the twin evils besett- much support. through our window, urinated ing anarchism - isolation and ineff- American courts are more sens- through our letter box (perhaps ectiveness? . inspired in this propaganda of the Love and solidarity itive to public opinion than British ADRIAN JAMES courts, and it would greatly help deed by your scintillating scatol- Dyfed, Wales - FREEDO SC ACTS PAGE ABERDEEN Libertarian Group LONDON c/ 0 Students Union, Falmer House c/o 163 King Street, Aberdeen. Anarchist-Feminists, Box_33, University of Sussex, Brighton. ABERYSTWYTH. David Fletcher, Rising Free, 182 Upper Street N1. SUNDERLAND anarchists/DAM 59 Cambrian Street Aberystwyth. Anarchy Collective, 37a Grosvenor c/o 183 Durham Rd. Sunderland BARRY. Terry Philips, 16 Rob... Avenue N5(0l-359 4794 before 7pm) SR3 4BX ert Street, Barry, South Glamorgan. Meets each Thursday at Litt1e@ SWANSEA. Don Williams, 2.4 Derl- BELFAST Anarchist Collective, Press, C1 Metropolitan Wharf, wvn, Dunvant, Swansea. Just Books, 7 Winetavern Street, Wapping Wall, Wapping El.(22a SWIND ON Area. Mike, Groundswell. Belfast 1. bus or Wapping tube). Farm, Upper Stratton, Swindon. BRIGHT ON Libertarian Socialist Anarcha United Mystics meet each TAYSIDE Anarchist Group, 3L 188 group, c/o Students Union, Falmer Thursday at 8pm, Halfway House Strathmartine Road, Dundee. House, University of Sussex, Pub, opposite Camden Town tube. TORBAY Anarchist Federatign, 24 Falmer, Brighton. Freedom Collective, Angel Alley, Beverley Rise, Brixham, Devon. BRISTO L Bedminster, 110 Gren 84b Whitechapel High Street El. TORNESS 1=ubn¢ Parks Dept. ville Road, Bristol 3. (Ol- Z47 9249). Aldgate East tube, Contact for the 27 Parkkeepers CAMBRIDGE Anarchists, Box A, near Whitechapel Art Gallery. c/o Box 23 163 King St. Aberdeen. 41 Fitzroy Street, Cambridge. Kingston Anarchists, 13 Denmark NATIONAL CANTERBURY A]:ternative Research Street, Kingston upon Thames, DIRECT ACTION MOVEMENT. Group, Students Union, University (O1-549 2564). c/o Box 20, 164-166 Corn Exchange of Kent, Canterbury. London Workers Group , Box W, Buildings, Hanging Ditch, Man.-" - CARDIFF. Write c/o One-O-Eight Rising Free, 182 Upper Street, N1. chester, M14 3BN. Bookshop, 108 Salisbury Road. »meets Tuesdays 8pm LIBERTARIAN C OMMUNIST GR OUE’ COVENTRY. John England, Stud- at Metropolitan Pub, 75 Farringdon l Grove Gardens, Leeds LS6 4EG Road, EC1. ents Union, University of Warwick, MIDLANDS Federation. Secretariat Middle sex Poly Anarchists, Students Coventry. c/ o Coventry group. _ Union, Trent Park Site, Cockfosters CUMBRLA 12 Bath Terrace, NORTH EAST Anarchist Federation Road, Barnet, Herts. Drovers Lane, Penrith, Cumbria. as for Hull. Black Bomber Anarchists, Hackney! DUBLIN. Love v Power, Whelan's SC OT LAND . Local libertarian Larnbeth/ Barnet, Box 29 Rising Free Dance Studio, 51 Sorth King Street groups zriay be contacted via: 182 Upper Street N1. Bi-monthly Dublin 2. J. Covcan, 3R 17 Cheviot Crescent, magazine out in December , 15p. EAST ANG-LIA DAM Fintry, Dundee DD4 QQJ. West London Anarchists, Box WLA Martyn Everett, 11 Gibson Gardens, SOLIDARITY libertarian communist Freedom. Saffron Walden, Essex. _ organization(Pub1iSh Solidarity for!‘ ESSEX. Oral Abortions, The Cat- Xtral Structureless Tyranny, 182. Social Revolution) c/o 123 Lathom skills, Maldon Road, Ga_yBowers. Upper Street N1. Road , LOI'1Cl0I'1 E6. Groups and Danbury, Essex. MALVERN and Worcester area, members in many towns. EXETER Anarchist Collective c/o ‘J-ock Spence, Birchwood Hall, Stor- THAMES VALLEY Aiiarchist Fed- Community Association, Devonshire ridge, Malvern, Worcestershire. eration - contact (jgford g1-0up_ House, Stocker Road, Exeter. NORWICH Anarchists, c/ o Free- GLASGOW Anarchist Group, John wheel Community Books, 56 Saint Cooper, 34 Raithburn Avenue, Benedicts Street, Norwich, Norfolk. Castlemilk, Glasgow G45. NOTTINGHAM 1, c/ o Mushroom, ._.|\l|?§t_i'_'9_§_ HASTINGS Anarchists, 18a Mark- 10 Heathcote Street(tel 582506) or Welsh Anarchist Conference . wick Terrace, Saint Leonards -on- 15 Scotholme Avenue, Hyson Green Saturday Zlst March 1981. Sea, East Sussex.(O424)420 620. (tel 708 302). Towards a Federation/Sexism/ HULL Libertarian Collective OLDHAM. Nigel Broadbent, 14 Educationl Individualism and Big 70 Perth Street, HULL, We stminste r Road, Failsworth. Words/Disabilities/Agism/ Musicl HU5 3NZ. OXFORD anarchist group, solidarity Peoples Militia etc. KEELE Anarchist Group, c/ o c/o 34 CoW_leY Rd- cruel-<1. Details, proposals, Map, contact: Students Union, 'The University, PAISLEY Anarchist Group are un- A Conference Centre Keele, Staffordshire. fortunately contacta-ble through the 3 Maes Teg, KEIGHLEY anarchists. c/o Simon Students Union, Hunter Street, Pontardulais, Near Swansea. Saxton_ lSe1bourne Grove Keighley Paisley, Renfrewshire . W. Yorks BD21‘ ZSL. PORTSMOUTH area anarchist group Solidarity Conference . LAMPETER Anarchist Group. c/o Garry Richardson 25 Beresford Open discussion on Unemployment, c/o Adian James, SDUC, Lampeter, C1956 Wiater1°°Vi11e Hams or its causes, organisation of the unem- Dyfed SA48 7ED, Wales. Duncan Lamb, - 'Nirvana', Chichester ployed and the potential for revol- LIVERPOOL Anarchist Group, c/o Yacht Basin, Bisrham, West Sussex ution. Hywel Ellis, Students Union, Liv- PLYMOUTH ‘Anarchists, 115 Saint 2. 30pm Saturday 21st March 1981 erpool Uni/ersity, Liverpool. Pancras Avenue, Pennycross, Ply- West Oxford Community Centre LEAMINGT ON and Warwick, c/ o mouth. i Helen Road, off Botley Road, 42 Bath Street, Leamington Spa. RH ONDDA and MidGlamorgam, Oxford. LEEDS a}1ar¢hi'st g'}Qup -and'“DAM Henning Andersen, ‘Smiths Arms‘ ‘Dave Brown, 2A Seaforth Place Treherbert, MidG1amorgan. FREEDOM PRESS .l+Ie1.'ehi_1lS. L<-=

GANADA:

CANADIANS generally take great pride in their political freely amend the constitution and even abrogate any rights system and, in world opinion Canada has been looked upon presumably guaranteed by the Canadian Bill of Rights. favourably as a land of fair-minded, tolerant and unabrasive The ideal of the supremacy of Parliament is a highly people. But one who probes behind the facade may see a questionable form of political arrangement which appears to sanctimonious and smug people, too readily ‘respectful’ of be 'parliamentocracy', a sub-type of oligarchy. In the law and order and subjected to a political system which is actual ope ration of the Canadian system there are other more closer to a benevolent oligarchy than it is to a participant formidable forces of power aside from Parliament. Most democracy. Two recent books look at the Canadian polity important is the federal cabinet which can enact and so and certainly deflate any idealization of it. Edgar Z. legislate at will what are called ‘orders in council‘ and Friedenberg in Defereingce-_ to Authority: The Case of Canada these have the force of law. It is in fact possible to conceive is essentially concerned withdémonstrlatiiig outposts; one, of a perfectly legal and plausible situation of direct rule that the Canadian political system is not very much concerned through a cabinet in which none of the members except the about freedom and, two, that Canadians are especially prime minister is an elected official. While it is normal for deferent to authority and have little respect for liberty. In cabinet ministers to be members of parliament there is no The State Elite ‘Dennis Olsen ends up making the point that law that says they have to be and we have several cases of the Canadian system is not very democratic, but his aim is cabinet ministers who we re not. A ll that needs to be done to show that the upper levels of political power in the country is for the prime minister to appoint and for his party caucus constitute an elite having group qualities of cohesiveness and To approve - and God help the member who withholds their common purpose. (1) He also seeks to demonstrate that the assent. This cabinet can in turn proceed to operate with the federal state has been fragmented within the last thirty years issuance of orders in council. These orders, incidentally, so that provinces have greatly enhanced their power and, are by no me ans always trivial since during World War II consequently what now exists is an ‘institutional pa rallelism' Japanese-Canadians were placed in concentration camps ‘ and an ‘executive federalism’. Friedenbe rg's is the better through an order in council. ‘Peace, order and good book in part because Olsen too often does not make a convin- government in Canada depend ultimately on the deep ac- cing case. Yet Friedenberg‘s work would have been enriched quiescence of the people in the idea that they have no in- by a more thorough analysis of the question of why Canadians alienable rights, ultimately the final decision rests with the are so deferent to authority. A s it is he does not adequately cabinet‘ (Friedenberg). explore this important topic. Olsen points to yet another centre of power: the provinces, In the following I propose to review some of the salient although more correctly it is the provincial cabinets - and features of the Canadian political system as discussed by then it is really four or at most five provinces which have these two authors and then to note Friedenberg's evidence any clout. Prince Edward Island, for example, has only that Canadians are deferent to authority by way of a preface turnip power. Olsen recites a familiar litany of how the | to observations on why this might be so. state has been accumulating power - including gigantic in- A first principle of the ideal Canadian polity is the suprem creases in the percentage of GNP devoted to public spending acy of Parliament. This is fie belief that the citizenry (from 5% in 1867 to 41. 5% in 1976) and an incredible one freely elect representatives to the supreme legislative- third of the population presently economically dependent upon executive body of the federal state. In ordinary Canadian the state. But he then argues that within the last thirty thought this means that one delegates (abdicates may be a years or so the central state has lost power as the provinces better word) ones individual authority, responsibility and have gained it. He rightly does not consider this shift in _ decision making to that representative. Consequently it is power to be decentralization, but rather it is the ‘growth and common in Canada to hear from both citizenry and politicians proliferation of bureaucratic and institutional parallelism in alike that one has no right to criticize elected officials since Canada, a fragmentation of the state and state power. ' I authority to govern and make decisions has been delegated to Instead of. one state with ten subordinate provincial govern- them. Citizens may participate only on election day by ments, according to Olsen we now have a state with eleven voting for one of candidates who happen to appear on the ‘parallel’ institutions of power (that is, the ten-provinces and ballot. A s a corollary of the supremacy of Parliament the federal government). Provinces are not called to principle one also finds strong opposition to such participatory account by the central government and they are able to veto features as referenda or recall. It is held that these inter- national programmes and some times to refuse to cooperate fere with the proper governing function of Parliament - even with the central state. Major pieces of legislation are only that they are not democratic! Parliament, as Friedenberg enacted as a result of usually behind the scenes conferences note s, is not limited by any checks to its authority by other between provincial and federal representatives. Some are institutions as in the United States. Parliament may in fact deals made by the federal government with a provincial 10

government which are then put to Parliament which has no membership and attendance at the same meetings. But alternative but to approve. The agreement of the federal Olsen can indicate no real network of kinship, only that a few government with the Province of Quebec on the Canada of his elite are able to establish some kind of kin tie to some Pension Planis a case in poin_t. other person who has at some time in the recent past held ' ‘Along with fragmentation . . . . went a complex new method high office. His argument regarding attendance at common of elite coordination, which one author called "executive meetings has a circular flavor. If one belongs to the top federalism" and another referred to as "federal-provincial executive and a major mechanism for its operation is the diplomacy". ' Basically a series of committees and sub- committee then the members will obviously attend common committees of cabinet ministers and bureaucrats from the meetings. two levels of government wheel and deal in what are in- Che of the characteristics of such a group would seem to variably secret meetings. They are not exactly a ‘govern- me to be continuity of personnel over time. But this is not ment of gove rnments' . . that is, they are not purely auto- the case as Olsen himself notes. What we have then is a nomous entities since they depend upon implementation by group of higher officials who by the oligarchis committee the federal and provincial governments. But I would add nature of the system manipulate power and recruit support that that is no problem since recommendations by committees and successors from a broad common pool. All this is are made only when prime minister and provincial premiers accompanied by a rather rapid circulation of elites. Con- have reached an agreement. And these chiefs readily bring tinuity and unity in what superficially may appear as a nest their party following within the respective legislatures into of competing and conflicting factions is provided through a line . In this kind of system parliaments tend to take a back commonality of ideology. It makes no difference whether seat. one is Liberal, Conservative, New Democrat or Social Olsen notes a very high turnover of individuals at upper Credit all are in tte system to play the game according to levels of government but considerable stability of party consensually agreed upon rules with the intention - the control. ‘What this smacks of is government by a series of supreme intention - of maintaining the continuity of state cliques‘. It is government as well by chieftainship: eleven power. (2) As Olsen says the elite must unite to realize a chiefs each with his small band of followers, analogous to a national policy on major issues. It is then this statist feudal power arrangement. ideology which gives the elite whatever cohesiveness it might Why or how the state in Canada has become ‘fragmented’ have. And Olsen does not bring out this point. is not made entirely clear to me. Olsen seems to believe Friedenberg’s discussion casts yet further light on the that both Prime Ministers King and St. Laurent shared an Canadian system. Secrecy, for example, is pervasive. ideology of minimal federal state power and that they were in Cabinet and other government meetings are usually held in office at a crucial period after World War II at the beginning secret. At least the important issues are thrashed out of a long period of peaceful economic expansion and growth away from public view. Even with a freedom of information which is favourable - he says - to provincial assertion of act - only very recently enacted - there are all kinds of power. Within this context the provinces began to take ad- materials which may be kept secret. This emphasis upon vantage of their positions and shift the balance of power secrecy percolates down to the lowest levels of government. before King or St. Laurent knew what was going on. This I know school boards which insist upon meeting in camera left the succeeding prime ministers, Pearson and Trudeau, even when the re is nothing confidential to be discussed. And with well entrenched provinces and a weakened federal this is all hlandly accepted by Canadians. . . . . ’After all we government. Olsen discounts the constitution as a factor in elected them to run the country's business. . . . . ' To provincial power claiming, correctly, that that document Friedenberg '. . . the fundamental function of secrecy in never prevented the state from doing what it wanted anyway. Canadian governmental practice is not concealment but the However, I think the constitution is not so easily dismissed. cultivation of docility . . . . Governments are somewhat more After all, it has given specific powers to theprovinces and. successful in keeping information from their own citizens, ‘but they are thereby provided with a key at least to fit into the only from those citizens who would rather not risk knowing. ' door of power. Nothing as yet has been said about that other branch of But has this ‘fragmentation’ really altered the power of government, the judiciary. And certainly there is little in government and the state? Olsen suggests that the state the Canadian judicial system which should instil confidence. . . elite often appears divided and at odds with itself but this unless you do want to get into jail easily. In the Canadian doesn't preclude collective action. ’. . .(T)here is no evidence legal system the prosecution can appeal against any acquittal. to suggest that these conflicts lead to any permanent ruptures In effect this means it can hound a victim down until he gives of relationships among members of the elite, ncr do they up from sheer exhaustion, despair and financial ruin. This prevent the elite from uniting very quickly in the face of a makes the law that one cannot be tried twice for the same threat. The fragmentation of power within the Canadian crime redundant and a farce. state system does not preclude in and of itself the possibility A judge can deny a jury trial to a defendant who may be of strong state action . . . it normally makes that action much subject to less than a five year jail sentence. He can freely more difficult to achieve but certainly not impossible. We admit evidence which has been gained by unlawful means and should also recall the role of private negotiations between a under some circumstances a person may be tried in secret few government leaders. In these cases the state elite is ( as witness the Alexander Peter Treu case). There is no very small in operational size. It reduces itself to a few statute of limitations on prosecution and no such thing, as i.n leaders and their advisers from the federal government and the United State s, of class action suits which permit a group the more powerful provinces. ’ In essence then Olsen's talk of poor individuals collectively to bring a suit against a large of fragmentation of the federal state, is misleading; what corporation. really happens is a realignment of power - a more ‘rational’ One of the most astounding features of the Canadian legal alignment since it brings together exactly those cliques of system is the absolute power held by a judge especially political power which really cotmt. Power is concentrated regarding so called contempt of court. A judge may order into at most the eleven ‘executive’ branches of the govern- imprisoned any person who makes any criticism of any judge ment. More realistically it is concentrated into the federal or any decision he might have made. That is, if I were to state cabinet and those of the Provinces of Quebec, Oitario, in my classroom that Judge Dullbooby made a ridiculous A lberta and British Columbia. A descision in the Fallderall case, Judge Dullbooby or any other The main thrust of his book - the attempt to show a kind of judge could have me tossed into jail until I retracted the state- ruling elite in Canada - is not always convincing. He does ment and most humbly begged the court's pardon. not explain what he means by elite but‘ one surmises it is a I will conclude this catalogue of barbarisms with a mention top level cohesive social group, conscious of its common of the crowning Canadian infamy, the War Measures Act, interests and acting as a group to pursue those interests. whose nature is best revealed by ta retrospective view of its Much of what he notes about the boys at the top is not new: last implementation in 1970. In what amounted to a ‘threat’ that they come from the middle and upper classes, that over by a couple of dozen Fte nch-Canadian liberationist-revo- half are lawyers and that they are heavily derived from the lutionaries to the stability of the state, Trudeau with the col- two major etlmic communities: British and French. The lusion of the Premiere of Quebec and the Mayor of Montreal cohesiveness of the elite is based on kinship ties, club invoked the War Measures Act, pushed it through a properly Review -1, IM. primed Parliament so that all civil liberties we re revoked, Irish immigrants, Catholic Highlanders, and middle class people could be arbitrarily arrested and held in jail without English and Scots. Finally, -of the 22% or so of Canadians who right to bail; the federal cabinet could rule entirely by decree have other overseas antecedents the great majority never and without consulting Parliament until the cabinet decided emigrated for any ideological reasons." The only significant the ‘national emergency’ had ended. This law is still on the ideological immigrants have been those in the Mennonite- i books awating another ’emergency‘. Hutte rite tradition and a large munber of escapees from Communist tyranny. The first represent a relatively small i number and while they have whatin essence is an anti-state tradition they at the same time inculcate a tradition of Deierenceto authority docility and quiet obedience. The Czechs, Hungarians, Poles FRIEDENBURG is quite rightly alarmed by the tolerance of the Ukranians and Vietnamese who have fled Communism have not lack of fundemental guarantees to freedom in Canada and by done so out of oppposition to authority, but rather it is in the stupid and naive faith on the part of most of its inhabitants opposition to what they deem as the wrong kind of authority. in the altruism of those in power. ‘The problem is that Can- Some of the major bulwarks of a thinly vieled fascistideology adians think the RCMP* is the law. . . Canadian sociaty is in Canada today are to be fotmd amongst these groups. Thus a deficient not in respect for law but in respect for liberty. ' major reason why Canadians are deferent to authority is that Friedenburg warns against exaggerating American attitudes the country has been settled predominantly by a subservient and note s, ‘what is clearly absent from canadian political body of people who are’ born serfs’. (cf., Etienne de la Boetie, consciosness though salient in the American is the conviction The Politics of,Obedience: The piscourse of Voluntary Ser- that the state and its apparatus are the natural enemies of vitude . ) if I freedom. ‘ Beside being settled by those commited to ‘order’, Canada _ Watching American TV Canadians observe the rights was long perpetuated. as a colony of the British Empire. Indeed available to Americans and, Friedenburg points out, are not it spent a longer time than most in this status. Like any colony, disturbed because they find they do not have the same rights: subordination and subservience are the order of the day, they are disturbed because this is another example of Can- although on the whole it was a benign and paternalistic sub- adians being exposed to alien (e specially American) ideas. ordination. Perhaps its benign character is in part explained \ Canadian politicians love to allude to_the great ‘multicultural’ by the push and pull of major power force s: the French vs. melting pot in Canada as a shining example of tolerance and the English, the Catholics vs. the Protestants, the East vs. ' freedom. Rather than a melting pot Friedenburg suggests it is the West. In any case for a people who in large part occupied a septic tank since what ‘finally pours into the mainstream of the area because they prefered order, this benevolent pater- Canadian life is substantially colourless, odorless, nonin- nalism was exactly what they wanted. At the same time, as fectious and inoffensive, though not entirely sterile. ’ Where Friedenburg points out, a constant approved theme in Canada else.but in Canada would one find the glorification and sanctr is the struggle against nature. People could spend themselves _ in the battle for survival in an outrageously Arctic and inhumane ification of a national police force and when that force,‘ the famous Mounties, is found guilty of all kinds of dirty tricks climate so that any struggle against human oppression, ‘ ‘ _; and criminal acts, ’in pursuit of its duties’ the widely acclaimed especially if it were a mild form is dwarfed into insignificance. solution proposed is to change the law to make the tricks and In that struggle against Nature it may be comforting as well to illegal acts legitimate when performed by the RCMP. have the big old grandfather State around to lend a helping hand. As I remarked above Friedenburg's work is deficient in As Canada began to loosen its colonial ties in the last half of atttending to the question of why Canadians are so defe rent to the nineteenth century the state paternalism was seen by authority. Part of the answer to such a query is, I believe, business and industry as essential in encounters with the United States. While Canada eventually passed out of direct colonial to be found in the social/cultural origins of the countries in- status under the British Empire it immeadiately fell into habitants. First, the French-Canadians one of the ‘founding another kind of subordinate status in relation to its giant neigh- nations‘ comprise close to 30% of the population. These more bour to the south. Friedenburg devotes his fifth chapter to than six million people are almost entirely descended from this as an 'EcOnomy of Deference’. To anyone in Canada this French immigrants who settled Quebec and Acadia in the problem of foriegn (especially American) domination of the seventeenth century. The original immigrants were screened econ omy has been discussed so much and so often as to become to ensure that they were good and faithful Papists -- no more than wearisome. Realations and attitudes with and Huguenots need apply. They were rural, essentially serfs. towards Americans are highly ambivalent. Canadians want the They were well away from France before the Enlightenment American goodies and good life. They are on the whole not and before the Revolution and they certainly spent the centuries sufficiently imaginative or daring themselves and, so, produce until the present in marvellous isolation from the dangerous bad copies of American efforts or take them over overtly thoughts and revolutionary activities of eighteenth and nine- (usually as Friedenberg observes the worst features of Amer- teenth century Europe and United States. Rural Quebec in say ican culture). This timidity and lack of inventiveness is 1940 was the closest one might come in contemporary times clearly implicated with the attitude of deference. (Ballet is the to a picture of rural seventeenth century France. The combined only artistic endeav0ur.which Canadians stand out says Frie- forces of British Imperial rule and the Roman Catholic church denbe rg - and he might also have mentioned the Russians. exerted every effort to imbue the French-Canadian population Ballet is an art form highly dependent upon strict discipline with docile subservience to authority. and adherence to well established tI'3.diti.Ol'lS‘.) Those who are de scendents of immigrants from the British Canadians insist that the ever present paternal state must Isles constitute a larger segment of the population - about 45%. help them out of every problem. Canadian capitalism is a In the United States a major part of the British settlers were blatant and rather disgusting example of the expectation that adherents to dissenter sects; more than half the colonies were the state exists to indulge its every whim. The Canadian originally settled and largely populated by Congregationalists, capitalist screams and hollers at any attempt at government Friends, Baptists, etc. The cultural milieu evolved by such a regulation which might cost him and protect the exploited . At group is partly responsible for the development of American the same time he screams and hollers for government regu- traditions treasuring individual liberty and instilling suspicion lations and subsidies which will guarantee him huge profits. of authority. But the early British settlers in Canada lacked No risk taking self reliant or independent capitalists here! any such ideological prolictivities. Indeed, the large st number Why is there so much foreign, especially American, dom-_ of British settlers in Canada up to about 1814 were those who ination of the Canadian economy? Certainly one factor insuff- came via the American Colonies/the United States. And most iciently emphasised is that foriegners dare to tread where of these were the so called United Empire Loyalists, those Canadians would never venture. It is said euphamistically that who were so devoted to the English king that they abandoned Canadians are more ‘conservative’ investors : perhaps they their homes when their land was conquered by republican are just more ‘yellow’. revolutionaries. If the original seed bed of British settlement In sum I have mentioned that the timid, deferent, and ‘con- in Canada can be described in any way it is as a group of " servative’ traits of Canadians are generated and fostered rebels against rebellion. " the interaction of several elments: 1) A basic ‘seed-bed’ of Later British settlers in Canada comprised other elements not particularly noted for any devotion to freedom: rural ' continued on Page I4 Review The truggl to The following are two reviews of the book, The struggle to be human: crime, criminology and anarchism. By L. Tifft &D. Sullivan. Cienfuegos Press 1980, available from Freedom Bookshop.

This drift into what Stuart Hall has called a ‘law and order‘ society manifests itself in a variety of forms: in the develop- ment and refinement of a whole technology of political ‘Badly written. . surveillance and control; in changes in the role of the police THIS is a garrulous, repetitive and badly written book, in and the nature of policing; in the criminalisation of sections which a fascinating and important topic is buried beneath a ~ of working class youth; in the advocacy (and adoption) of‘get we lter of meaningless Californian-style patter. The inability tough’ penal policies and methods; in ideological forms of the authors to write plain (Ame rican) English produces through the creation and manipulation of public opinion, and sentences which make the reader wince with pain: more generally still, in the attempts to impose new forms of ‘(Criminologists) must now choose either to be subsumed social discipline. All of these represent urgent objects of into an energy force of the impending fascism of the analysis for a libertarian social science. To give them their nascent police state or to transform themselves into due, Tifft and Sullivan are we ll aware of this. Unfortunately, scientific energies that foster discovery of how persons those wishing to undertake such analyses will find little to . can balance their human and spiritual needs with the guide them in this book. natural rhythms of the universe‘ (p. 1). Overall, the work suffers from a lack of originality. Many This bastard metalanguage, a me lange of ecobabble, psycho- of the issues covered are dealt with better elsewhere. In babble, sociobabble and plain old Dave S part, permeates the particular, it suffers from an excessive reliance on quotation. entire book. We are told that questions of why individuals I estimate that if the quotations were removed little over one inflict harm on one another ‘are related to the human struggle third of the book would remain. And this is not merely a for a cosmic sense‘; urged ‘to be in touch with the continuing stylistic quibble, the citation of long passages from say, demands of our own biorhythms’; reminded that ‘an organic Bakunin, is no substitute for reasoned argument. conception of humanness can reject neither technology- Che useful feature of the work, however, is its recognition rationality nor poetry-affe ct’ and warned that ‘to do so would be of the importance for radical criminology of the historical be to count on suppressive analytical processes to en ancipate background to the emergence of crime and the penal sanction. a fantasy‘. Empty verbiage of this kind detracts heavily This historical context has, with one or two exceptions (the from the few merits the book possesses. It's all very well Marxists Rusche and Kirchhe imer and, from a Whiggish for the authors to dismiss ‘the tedious arguments of scientific perspective, Radzinowicz's massive researches), been rationalism‘ and to assert instead the superiority of ‘personal notably absent from criminology until recent years. It is statement and presence‘, but a little more rational argument one thing to argue, from general theoretical premise s, that on their part, or even a more lucidly presented statement, ruling classes produce crime through their classbound would have better served the attempt to construct a libertarian definitions of crime in the criminal law, their dominance of criminology. What of some of the substantive arguments of judicial institutions, and their control of penal and police the book? ‘Modern criminology‘, Tifft and Sullivan claim, functions in the bourgeois state, what is needed are a series ‘is on the brink of extinction. . . . . beyond the possibility of of concrete historical investigations that reveal these pro- further evolution‘. As with a nun".-ber of their assertions, cesses in convincing detail. Pioneering examples of such one doubts it To begin with, you have to decide which investigations can be found in the work of Edward Thompson criminology is being talked about. Broadly speaking, modern (1975) and his associates (Hay et al 1975) on eighteenth- criminology can be divided into two camps, what one might century English criminal law, Michael Ignatieff (1978) on the call ‘official’ criminology (typified in this country by the creation of the penitentiary in nineteenth century England, and Cambridge Institute of Criminology and the work of Home Michel Foucault's work on incarceration in France in the same Office researchers), and ‘radical’ criminology (which grew period. Disappointingly Tifft and Sullivan show no sign of out of the National Deviancy Symposium in the l960‘s). being aware of this European work. Neither camp shows any signs of awareness of their own In the final analysis, then, the work fails completely. The imminent demise. Official criminology, even in these days measure of its failure can be seen if it is placed alongside of spending cuts, continues to receive state funding in its Frank Pearce ‘s attempt to lay the foundations of a Marxist quest for ‘appropriate’ strategies for the control of crime criminology, in his excellent Crimes of the Powerful: ' and deviance. Secure in its position, it remains relatively Marxism, Crime and Deviance (T976), or even the now rather unruffled despite over twenty years of theoretical attacks from dated contribution to an anarchist criminology of Alex Comfort, radical criminologists. Possibly because, as Michel Foucault Authority ani Delinquency (1970). These books are every- (1980, p47) says: “Che has the impression that it is of such thing Tifft and Sullivan's book is not - cogent, to the point, utility, is needed so urgently and rendered so vital for the well written and well argued. Pity. working of the system, that it does not even need to seek a theoretical justification for itself, or even simply a coherent ERIC HYDE. framework. It is entirely utilitarian". As for radical criminology, the last few years have been a References not included intext. period of theoretical development and proliferation. Indeed, a recent review of the field (Carlen, 1980) claims to be able to Pat Carlen: ‘Radical Criminology, Penal Politics and the Rule discern at least four strands of radicalism in contemporary of Law‘ in P. Carlen and M. Collison (Eds.) Radical criminological discourse, most seeking to develop politicised Issues in Criminology. (1980) perspectives on crime informed in varying degrees by Michel Foucaultzf Discipline and Punish (1978) Marxism. Michel Foucault: ‘Prison Talk‘ in Radical Philosophy 16 This is not meant to imply that there is no need for an (London 1977) W I if anarchist perspective on crime and deviance. Given the curr- D. Hay et al: Albion '_s Fatal Tree (1975) ent state of both camps in criminology, an approach designed Leon Radzinowicz: History of English Criminal Law, 4 vols. to confront all forms of statist criminology is long overdue. (1947 - 56) I" W” M if But the essence of this need lies not so much in the academy George Rusche and Otto Kirchhe ime r: Punishment and Social as in the changing nature of the state and society, in the Structure (1939, repr. 1968) I I "IO W C L I I steady shift towards ever more authoritarian state forms. E. P. Thompson: W_higs,_and*Hunters (1975) We have tried to answer -that question in our ‘Social Anar- chism‘, but the important point which the authors m§E, .. relentless inveetive’ though not in so many words, is that in order to defend “THE, STRUGGLE TO BE HUMAN" by L. Tifft and society, society must first be there. The tragedy of our ‘D. S‘ullivan*(CienfI1ego‘s*Press, £5. 00) is an invective, time s, which points to anarchism as the only salvation, is relentlessly carried through one hundred and fifty page s, that the state is not only exploiting society while speaking in against the law, its supports and supporters, the interests it its name, but that it is out to destroy it. ‘The new mandarms protects, and the arguments that are invoked for its justifi- are consciously creating institutions which should guarantee cation. Nothing can be right with the law, and that for the a reliable, uniform, homogenous population‘, the more like simple reason that it is one with the state, and the state is a machine the better. It is not the fact of living side by side, the wrongest of all wrongs, wrong erected into a system and and of doing more or less the same things which makes a presenting itself as right. Anarchists need not be told what society, but it is what people feel about one another, it is is wrong with the law or the state, whilst other people think above all the feeling of having a destiny in common, and the more or less favourably of both according to the degree to will to be a positive element in the life cf one another. What which they feel and think themselves injured or protected by makes a society is a complex of values, and the living thereof, them. Yet even anarchists may have something to learn from such things as ‘the quality of life in the person, spontaneity, this book, especially concerning ixmovations and institutions, creativeness, initiative, a.ffect the consciousness of life, conditions and outlooks which are not what they seem or claim sympathy, an ethic of shared responsibility, cooperation, to be, but so many ways of doing the very job which the law equality, and libe rty'. By equality the authors mean that and its enforcement are meant to do. The book is an im- ‘the rights of every person are as unassailable as those of passioned one. Its position is taken right from the start, and any other‘, and concerning liberty they give the warning that it is a battle position. The ‘struggle’ is felt throughout, ‘it cannot emerge through revolutionary violence any more whilst ‘to be human‘ is not. Both style and vocabulary are than through statist penal sanctions‘. We must be ‘from the expressive of the struggle, and as for the feel of human idea of freedom as an end‘, they say. Freedom, anarchy, warmth which the book does not give we can think of only one society, all are now, in the present, in us, or they are not. explanation, namely that it is written by Americans and for Anarchy is first and foremost a matter of being, and only Americans, and that in the U. S .A. today it is far more of a secondarily a matter of doing. If we are anarchists, that is struggle to try to be human than it is in any other country, if we are social beings, and if by being what we are, by our and that because the instruments of conditioning , manipulation socialness, we encourage others to be themselves, and bring and domination have there reached. the highest degreeof out their socialness too, then we may constitute a society, sophistication, and the re the capitalist disregard for culture and sharing the same concern for preserving our integrity and all cultural values has found its most favourable conditions and our togetherness, we would know what to do. The more and least inhibited supporters. There cannot be much of a society there is, the less state there will be. society where there is little culture. Culture is first and foremost a matter of tradition, a heritage from the past. GIOVANNI BALDELLI. Whether we like it or not, our roots are in the past, and as a plant derives its energy from the soil in which it is rooted, and not only from the air and the light of the sun, so in order to be human the present and the future are not enough; our faith needs the assurance of past experiences. The state is crime organized and turned into an institution. It stifles and exploits society, while pretending to act in its name and clothing itself in society‘s sanctity. Though set on it, and developing more and more effective means to do it, it thestruggle has never fully succeeded in desiccating socialness in the hearts of men, in extirpating feelings of social hope and to1 be human responsibility. Such feelings, and the intelligence which goes with them, do not always lead to dissent and rebellion, crime and thus it is that within the very fabric of the state, and in the shaping of the law, something genuinely social has found its way. There are Stoic influences, for instance, in Roman law, and though democracy may be turned into a great swindle, §Ii.".I§.'}f=’|'.‘i’?..‘{ much that is social has gone into building it, witne ss the difference between a democratic and totalitarian state, fully appreciated by any one who has experienced them both. The authors‘ division of humanity between a power elite and a mass of oppressed is too clear-cut and simple to be true. If it were sufficient to get rid of the power elites in order to put all things aright, it is long since there would be no power ueumqaqora|58n.|;saq; elites about any more. Not only are there as many states as the re are governments; not only are there states within the r_ state under the form of parties, castes and organized interests, but any criminal who can appreciate the advantages of impunity, $4 organization and intimidation is already a state potentially. Society has to defend itself from crime, and if not actually arisen from this necessity, it is on it that the state rests its justification. The state is there to defend society, as if it were its property, from the criminal intentions of other "SW31 state s, and of any of its members who would like to enjoy the 6. power and impunity of the state. How a society can defend , 3 itself against the crimes of its own state or how, having got rid of it, it will prevent the emergence of another, prevent harm done to its members from being rewarding, and thus encouraging more harm to be done, is a question which the it |..1'ima D.Sullivan authors do not satisfactorily answer, if they answer it at all. It is a crucial question, and the fundamental one when it comes to convincing people of the rightne ss of anarchism, of its being other than sheer rhetoric and wishful thinking. never beat the turtle remember ...... Many of you get a copy of many publications, so pick priority need, one( s) which interest you the most. If all you can do is one, that's all you can do and is better than rfithing at all. Stop reading suggestion and shit calming our literature, or putting it down and for- getting it! If you can't make copies put it where some OBVIOUS LY we all would like to put out a first class and professional publication whether it be a pamphlet and/or a interested person will find it (doctor's office, library, school, newspaper. Doing such a publication isn t the problem work?) orgive it to a friend who can make copies. though, because many of us do a pretty good publication. Subscriptions as we presently know them could be replaced The problem is copies, distribution and costs of our public- by mailing lists. Every person on the mailing list more ation. If we all would think big and work small we could than a mere reader. Donations can be requested in every solve the problem. Check the following out ...... issue, but basically panhandled where we are. Sure you all Do a good original, then make at least enough copies to can come up with some change and some stamps amongst distribute where you are and to friends nationally and inter- yourselves, and sure you've got friends who can come up with nationally who can and will make at least three to five copies a little more - and sure you and they know how to panhandle if not more, and do the same as you did. Put a request in plus where to score paper, envelopes and access to copy every issue for people who read the publication to do the machines if you can't afford a printer. When the boss, the same and suggest where and how they might get it copied at teacher ain't looking lots can be done, especially if you do it no cost to them, i.e. at work when the boss ain't looking, at right. We in the A.B.D.C. began with two people, some school when the teacher ain't looking etc. . . . . We in the paper, an envelope, some stamps and a typewriter, so what's Anarchist Black Dragon Collective of the Washington State your malfunction out the re‘? You out there are wasting Penitentiary got our publication, the Anarchist Black Dragon, precious time, energy and funds farting aromid, which in turn printed and distributed nationally and internationally like this. wastes lives. Want to make revolution let's get down, 7 We did the original and sent it out to friends, who made as especially where it counts a very great deal, most especially many copies as they could, and sent the copies to our and right now. We don't need a lot of money etc. We need to their friends who did the same, who did the same, who did think and act accordingly. We talk about self-reliance and the same, plus got copies where they were to interested mutual aid, but how little we practise them. And piss on people. Our last count of issues no. 5 and 6 combined is petitions , except in places like factories and schools. approximately 1, 000 copies - that means altogether at least Who's got the time etc. to run all over town and/or the that many people read it and a few were involved in printing damned country side getting the necessary signatures??? and distributing it. Some of those people also sent donations, Do good PRE-WRITTEN PROTEST LETTERS. The wrote protest letters etc. for us specifically and/or for those interested and concerned have got time or will make the we mentioned in our publication. minute or two necessary to clip it, sign it and mail it, or Our cost for each issue was time to put it together and just sign it and mail it, but no time and rarely can make it postage to mail it out. Cost to some friends only postage to write the fucking thing and survive, much less even attempt for copies they managed to make and mail. Other friends to get ahead personally and/or politically. Think about it put out what they could, from $5. O0 total to whatever for brothers and sisters. . . . . printing and postage. Out there you, the originators, could Get it together out there! do wonders. In the process we could all come closer to each other and be supporting each other 210 times better and CARL HARP more than we ever have. The theory is called Mutual Aid, for those who don't know it. It can be applied to petitions, protest letters, flyers, posters, Defense Fund requests, Canada demonstration calls, etc. , etc. S imilar to the Squatter continued from Page 11“ Phone Tree trip (I call you and four friends and give you the settlers who were already well endowed with a 'serf' mentality. necessary information, time s, dates etc. and you call five 2) A long period of benign paternalistic colonialism coupled people you know). Simple, cheap, and above all it works. with a powerful and influential Roman Catholic Church . 3) A Say I was out the re - I could produce with a good hustle at struggle with more over whelming climatic conditions, while least 50 to 100 copies even if I had to steal the paper. C)nce the power elite encourage the populace to focus on such a produced I would give 25 or 50 to the interested and to friends struggle. 4) Paternalistic colonialism is succeeded by an who would make and distribute at least three to five to the independent political existence in the shadow of the world's interested and to their friends where I was. Then I'd take wealthiest, most powerful and most vigorous state which is my other 25 or 50 copies and send them to friends nationally and internationally, wdl}o would print and distribute all they ever driven to expand and spread its culture, investment and power especially into those areas which are seen as most could to the intereste and their friends. The more friends you got the more copies get made and distributed where you 'stable' friendly and benign, e. g. Canada. 5) A point which I are, nationally and internationally. Simple , cheap and did not discuss but one which has some bearing on this issue above all it works. is the rather prolonged isolation of Canada from the mainstream of international thought. Even today Canada remains a comp- This trip gets people involved and spreads our literature far and wide. We become a Collective 'I', no matter what arative backwash, always a good environment for cultivating our difference s, and our alternative to the bullshit reaches docility. more people. If we used our heads we wouldn't beat our HAROLD B. BARCLAY brains out trying to produce and distribute our publications. EDMONTON, ALBERTA. If we used our heads we could produce a lot of pressure and Notes i who knows what else over a wide are a, and on many levels. 11$ Edgar Z. Fredenberg: Deference to Authority : The case Our DRAGON, believe it or not, put pressure where we of Canada, l\/..E. Sharpe, White plains, NY, I935 "- needed it and helped others at the same time. We made and Dermis Olsen: The State Elite , McClelland and Stewart, make the forces of evil sweat. We helped make some i Toronto, 1980. It '- changes. To do more we need your help. To do more out Note that Olsen's book put out by Canadian publishers at there you all must use your heads and help each other. $14. 95 for 125 pages of text is in line with Canadian publishers When you see an aid request in any of our literature no matter overwhelming desire for a fast buck. . who ffom, so long as they are anarchist and/or worthy of (2) The Quebec and Western separatist movements introduces support, help them if you can as best you can via the Mutual a new dimension. Yet aside from the fact that they, too, share A id Theory herein.’ You who have mailing lists ask every- the statist ideology, desiring to establish separate state s, they one on it to help you. Those who reply positively send first have been unsuccessful in their respective efiorts. Furthermore copies and; if necessary and they are Willing and able, send the separatist Premier of Quebec, Rene Levesque, continues two or more names from your mailing list for them to mail to play the game and performs like a typical Canadian prov- a copy to. Why spend $50. 00 on international postage when incial premier i you can spend only 50 cents? A bit slower, but the rabbit =* R. C. M. P. Royal Canadian Mounted Police . i Rgvieu;

rchistabstractions

WHAT follows are abstracts from three papers presented opt and transform their goals. However, the pragmatic . at the session on Anarchism (spoken in German) at the Marxism of the Kautskian variety has just as little chance of convention of the Modern Language A ssociation last December succe ss in a post-revolutionary age. - in Houston. The session was arranged by Professor Lawrence Stone of the Comparative Literature department, MICHAEL OS SAR University of Washington, Seattle, Washington. MlihS3IIl Toller Erich 1vlunsam_,anq, the Antifascist Struggle. K ropotkin, _ Landaue r, Bubs r *E_rnWst_Tolle r . a MUHSAM was imprisoned by each of the three regimes under TOLLER research has for some time recognized the funda- which he lived, but it remained for the "Nazis to murder him mentally anti-authoritarian, anti- statist and anarchist in a concentration camp. He has been claimed by both orientation of Toller's first play, Die Wandlung. To some communists and ‘non-dogmatic‘ leftists as one of their own, extent, this critical judgement has been abetted by the am- and editions of his works were published in both East and biance of the first, so-called 'anarchist' Rate republik, in West Germany in 1978. That year, one of his heretofore which leading German anarchists such as Gustav Landauer unpublished plays, Alle Wetter (1930), appeared in print for - and Erich Muhsam were to a greater or a lesser extent in- the first time . Based on his biography, his essays, and the volved. However, most Toller scholars have detected a play, his role in the antifascist struggle can be recreated. rapid diminution of anarchist elements in his plays, perhaps Muhsam remained within the anarchist tradition concerning starting with Masse-Mensch and substantially completed with forms of struggle, calling fo.r direct action and electoral the publication of Die Maschinensturmer. - abstentionism. His critique of parliamentarism is document.- In fact, it can bélfsliownlthiatfl anarchism plays a significant ed in A lle Wetter and is partially directed against the KPD. role in all of Toller's prison dramas as uell as in Hoppla, wir But m archists, Muhsam did not downplay the lebeni _§nd at least a peripheral role in some of fl danger of a fascist takeover, and he criticized the petty plays. Moreover, it decisively influenced the lyric work, sectarianism of anarchist groups as strongly as he criticized Requiem den gemordeten Brudern (dedicated to the memory of the apparent reformism of the KPD. Landaiiejlq and I§as*S*chwal'b€fiEuch. Toller's personal Although he criticized the KPD's thesis that the Great acquaintance with Gustav Landauer dates back to December, Depression signalled the ‘death crisis‘ of capitalism, Muhsam 1917, the year of his first anti-war‘ agitation and of the was remarkably close to the KPD in -his definition of fascism, fotmding of the Kulturpolitischen Bundfider Jugend. The which he interpreted in an instrumentalized way as a political character of the revolution advocated by *Ffie*dfiEh in Die expressionism of monopoly capitalism. Moreover, Muhsam Wandlung, with its rejection of both capitalist exploitatibn fell victim to a certain determinism he was otherwise quick and what Toller perceived as authoritarian Marxism, is to criticize in the KPD when he argued that a fascist takeover largely congruent with Landauer's anti-Marxist polemic, would lead directly to socialism. Finally, Muhsam adopted Aufruf zum Sozialismus. Moreover, it amounts to a poetic most features of the KPD's ‘social fascism‘ thesis first version of the dynamic? of some varieties of utopian revol- p1‘0pOl.lI1d6(i in 1928. In sum, Muhsam agreed with the KPD utionary thought described by Martin Buber in his Pfade in on most strategic questions. Utopia. Muhsam criticized the KPD for opportunism when it aped Similarly, in Toller's next play, Masse-Mensch, the ethical the volkisch sloganeering of the Nazis, but at the same time demands that the Woman makes on herself amount to an ardent he himself turned increasingly to the volkisch strain of plea for the primacy of the moral strictures of the individual Landauer's ethical socialism. This brought him into close over the exigencies imposed even by class loyalty in the proximity with the views of Otto Strasser's Black Front and struggle between the classes. the National Bolshevists, if not the Nazis themselves. By In Die Maschinensturmer the conflict is defined in economic invoking the concept of Volksgemeinschaft and the Fuhrer ‘ rather than in the ethical terms-of Masse-Mensch. The concept, Muhsam regressed tothe same petit-bourgeo1s' economic conflict is seen from the point of view of the clash utopian ideologemes which the Nazis drew upon. of two theories of human social behavior - that of social Darwinism and that of Kropotkin's concept of mutual aid. KPD - German Communist Party Textual as well as philosophical evidence strongly argues for the influence of Kropotkin's book, Mutual Aid on Toller's JAMES D. STEAKLEY play, probably through the translation of Gustav Landauer. In Hinkemann Toller deals with the limitations of all economic theories of social progress. He again argues for the importance of the claims and needs of the individual that are beyond the capacity of social engineering to fulfill by fixing on the psychology of one victim of war and social exploitation. On the_Sense,of Anarchism in Paul Celanfs _L_ate Poetry. Finally, in Hoppla, wir lebeni Toller deals with the prob- lem of revolutionary tactics in the so-called stabilization PAUL C-elan's remark in the Meridian speech that he grew up phase of the Weimar Republic. He appears to argue that with the works of Kropotkin and Landauer has only been given only hard, day-to-day organizing activity is a rational res- fleeting attention by his interpreters. The apparent discrep- ponse to the circumstances, thus picking up the syndicalist ancy between an immediate aesthetic fascination and the theme of Die Maschinensturmer. But at the same time, he difficulty of interpretation has led to an early hermeneutic conclude slwith profound pessimism that the Bernste inian approach, often from an unacknowledged He ideggerian base. revisionism of those who, like the Majority Socialists, claim Politically oriented interpretations have balanced and widened to achieve change from within the system will gradually co- these attempts somewhat recognising Celan's socio-political “ thrust as “opposition by aesthetic negation‘ essentially from Aside from bitter personal experience he seems influenced by positions influenced by Adorno. A specific type of-anarchism his Rumanian countryman E.M. Cioran, whose work he - is one of several important thought patterns that affected translated into German. What one may tentatively call Celan's poetic labors. The sense of such anarchism points anarchist epiphanies, moments, when the individual asserts towards a unity of reality and transcendence, towards a itself in seemingly absurd and paradox expressions are A ' concrete and very individualized reality that has essentially described in Celan's Meridian speech. The functional meta- absorbed its spiritual yearnings. Its basic roots lie in phor of the Meridian itself serves to facilitate the reader's _Chassidic mysticism as it has been brought to life and inte- understanding of the directions in which his anarchism is grated into social concepts by Martin Buber as well as in the meant to move. Earlier poems ('Schibboleth', ‘In Eins', etc.) strongly mystical oriented Social Anarchism of Landauer. have had specific anarchist related incidents as their theme. Kropotkin seems essentially integrated into the horizons of It is in his later poems, however, that he has more intensely Buber and Landauer. Celan's anarchism while manifestly put to the test the hopes he had expressed in the Meridian anti- ideological and individualistic does not make an ideology speech - often with no more than ‘rabbit ears‘. These out of its antipathy towards closed systems. It rather ignores attempts as exemplified i.n the poems 'Fah1stimmig‘, ‘Die these and instead concerns itself with specific manifestations Brabbelnden', ‘Du liegst im grossen Gelausche', and others A of direct humaneness that are seen as embedded into their serve to gain a better understanding of Celan's sense of historical context. It also lacks the enthusiasm of Landauer anarchism and its implications for the interpretation of his or the faith of Buber and alternates between hope and a deep poetry . pessimism sometimes manifested by a desperate sarcasm. WULF H. AHLBRECHT

Robert Houston: Bisbee 1'7: A Documentary Fiction. (A Semi- Fictional reconstruction of Wobbly agitation in Bisbee, Arizona in 1917) (28'7pp. cloth) £5.95 (87p) Bll IIF NIITES Bernard Crick: Orwell. A Life (473pp. cloth) Please add postage as in brackets. Titles marked * are £10. 00 (£1. 62) published in the USA . E1‘e“_°h Emgllise 'Ei‘i1e_§ New this Week We have recently received 12 issues of an interesting series *Stuart Christie: The Christie File (3'?0pp. ppr.) of brochures published by Le Groupe Fresnes - Antony de la Federation Anarchiste under the imprint of Volonte Anarchiste:- E. O0 (87p)

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New Penguins . " ii _ iii _ Andrei Amalrik: Will the Soviet Union survive until 1984? (ppr. 224pp.) ' $.50(30p) Premises Bland Crispin Aubrey: Who's watching you? Britain's secirity " services and the Official Secrets Act. (ppr. 204pp.) _D_onations Received. February 12th - 25th Incl. ' £1. 50 (24p) Ronald Fraser: Blood of Spain: The Experience of Civil Isaac Fawkes Fund per anon. $.90; Sunderland. A. N. D. War. 1936-1939. (ppr. 628pp.) £4.95 (87p) $.50; Accrington. G.H. £5.00; D.P. $.50; London N19. N.A_. $.00; Ilford. W.G. £3.50; London NW4. $.00; Bolton. D. P. £1.00; London SW2. M.D. £6.00; London NW6. I. B. $.00; Stafford. G. L. £1.00; Wolverhamp- A Miscellany ton. 5"‘ 1.-1? $.00: A » p TUI‘AL= £35.40 J .R. White: The Meaning of Anarchism. (with an intro. by Previously acknowledged = £111. 50 Albert Meltzer) (ppr. 13pp.) $.50 (16p) TOTAL TO DA TE =£146. 90