Especifismo, Social Insertion and Recent Anarchist Organization

  A new edition of the “Especifismo Reader: Anarchist Organization and Praxis” has been made publically available. Topping 120 pages, the updated reader includes several newly translated pieces such as the short political statement “Who We Are, What We Want, The Path We Follow” by Coletivo Comunista Anarquismo in Brazil, the article “Anarchist Advances in Uruguay [...]

What’s Interesting in Upping the Anti #9

  Upping the Anti out of Toronto, Canada is perhaps the hottest and best radical left theory/movement journal since it first began publication in late 2005. Releasing its eighth issue as of May 2009, the journal has provided a steady content of articles, interviews, reviews and topic based roundtables by and with movement activists and organizers on the radical left.
  With the [...]

Reader on Especifismo

 
An informal reader has been put together on especifismo, the anachist tradition and practice from Latin America that speaks for the need to form specifically anarchist orgnaization and for ’social insertion’ within social movements. With similarities to the currents of Anarchist-Communism and Platformism, the especifists argue for a particular understanding of the charactor of anarchist organization and [...]

Lenin, Wallerstein and Understanding Imperialism

Lenin cleans house, but I think he missed a spot
 
 

Rough Draft

  What is the best way to understand what we call imperialism, which is basically the economic and political relationship between the first and third world? Lenin has been the main starting point around this question for most on the revolutionary left. Are there basic [...]

Wallerstein’s essential analysis

Notes on Wallerstein’s “Historical Capitalism”
 
Why the hell do I find Wallerstein so interesting? To be honest, when close friends have told me that I’ve been stuck on him for the last year or so, they are absolutely right. So now I aim to explain to them and others why this is the case and why [...]

Revitalizing Labor: “Another World is Possible” by Staughton Lynd

I love Lynd’s radical and critical perspective on the proposals that people are floating for the labor movement. On reform efforts he says: “Current efforts to revive the labor movement in the U.S. define their objectives so narrowly, that even if successful, they would not change anything fundamental.” Beautiful!
The 2nd half gets into debates on [...]

The Central Valley California: “The Beautiful and the Damned”

This is a excerpt from my manuscript on 2004/2005 Intermodal trucker organizing in the Stockton area. It is still rough. Below are the sections on the Central Valley. I’m really interested in the question of how might we charactorize a place like the Central Valley. The stats on poverty in the area- making it one of the [...]

Reflection on “Poor People’s Movements” and Review on Piven’s Latest: “Challenging Authority”

“Poor People’e Movements; Why They Succeedd and How They Fail” By Piven and Cloward was an instant classic for me once I started to read it. A professor from my community college recommended it to me. The conversation began with me lamenting about a figure on our campus left who generally defiled radical activism and upheld the social-democratic electoral [...]

Say Hello To My Little Friends: The Three Spirits of Marx

 

The Three Spirits of Marx:
A Discussion on Divergent Legacies

 
The conflicting ideas present in the writings of Marx as both philosopher and social revolutionary have supplied over the last 150 years the rivers and tributaries of discussion around the contradictory elements present in his work and where we might take them. He has served as a [...]