The new issue of Black Flag: Anarchist Review is now available:
This year’s second issue starts with Peter Kropotkin’s obituary for his friend and fellow anarchist and geographer Elisée Reclus (1830-1905). This is followed by various articles by Reclus which should hopefully indicate why he was as influential within the anarchist movement in his life as Kropotkin.
Then we have Louise Michel (1830-1905) who needs no introduction. A communard driven by her experiences to anarchism, she played a major role in the French movement from her return from exile in 1880 to her death. As we discussed in a previous issue (Volume 3 Number 1 [Spring 2023]), her hoisting of the black flag during an unemployed demonstration on 9th March 1883 played a key role in turning it into the symbol of anarchy it is today. Very little of her writings are available in English, much of it perhaps unsurprisingly related to the Paris Commune.
Next is Italian Anarchist Luigi Fabbri (1877-1935). Until recently only his excellent “Bourgeois Influences on Anarchism” and “Anarchy and ‘Scientific’ Communism” – his systemic debunking of Bukharin’s typically misinformed attack on anarchism – have been available in English. This has changed and we are happy to include a selection of his writings which we are sure will be of interest. His death at the early age of 57 undoubtedly deprived the movement of an important thinker.
We then present three reviews, one on Paul Avrich’s The Russian Anarchists to mark the 1905 Revolution and another on a recent flawed book on the Syndicalist Revolt of 1910 to 1914 by a member of the SWP. We also include a short review of Tom Brown’s Syndicalism written for Black Flag when it first appeared in the 1990s but which never seemed to have been published before.
We end with obituaries for Colette Durruti and Glasgow anarchist John Couzin as well as our round-up of movement news, Parish Notices.
Original translations which appear in Black Flag: Anarchist Review eventually appear on-line here:
https://anarchistfaq.org/translations/index.html
This year we aim to continue to cover a range of people and subjects. These should hopefully include articles on and by the likes of Louisa Sarah Bevington, Ethel MacDonald, Sylvia Pankhurst, amongst others. Plus the usual reviews and news of the movement.
However, this work needs help otherwise at some stage it will end. Contributions from libertarian socialists are welcome on these and other subjects! We are a small collective and always need help in writing, translating and gathering material, so please get in touch if you want to see Black Flag Anarchist Review continue.
This issue’s editorial and contents are:
Editorial
Welcome to the second issue of Black Flag in 2025!
We start with Élisée Reclus (1830-1905). Like Kropotkin, Reclus was a world-renown geographer as well as a leading anarchist thinker. In his recollections of Kropotkin, Malatesta listed him alongside Bakunin and Kropotkin as those who had contributed most “to the elaboration and propagation of anarchist ideas.” However, he is not as well-known as these three in the English-language movement, something we hope to address with our selection of articles.
Next, we mark the birth and death of Louise Michel (1830-1905). An active participant in the Paris Commune, she became an anarchist when sent into exile after its crushing. Michel played a key role in the French Anarchist movement (and the British, when she was in exile here). Her use of the black flag – a symbol of the French labour movement – at an unemployed workers demonstration ensured its association with anarchism.
Then we turn to Luigi Fabbri (1877-1935), the leading Italian anarchist. While somewhat in the shadow of his friend and colleague Errico Malatesta, Fabbri was an important anarchist thinker in his own right. Sadly, his writings have not been extensively translated into English – for a long time only his “Bourgeois influences on anarchism” and “Anarchy and ‘Scientific’ Communism”, his debunking of Bukharin, were available. This is, happily, changing and we present a selection of recently translated works which we are sure will be of interest to anarchists today.
We follow this with three reviews, one on the Russian Anarchists to mark the anniversary of the 1905 Revolution, another on a flawed account of the 1910-1914 Labour Unrest and a short one of an important collection of essays by British Syndicalist Tom Brown. Next are obituaries to two recently deceased comrades, Colette Durruti (daughter of Buenaventura) and Scottish anarchist John Couzin. We end with our usual movement news, Parish Notices.
If you want to contribute rather than moan at those who do, whether its writing new material or letting us know of on-line articles, reviews or translations, then contact us:
blackflagmag@yahoo.co.uk
Contents
Peter Kropotkin, “Elisée Reclus”, The Geographical Journal, September 1905
- “Worker, seize the machine! Seize the land, peasant!”, Le Révolté: Organe Socialiste, 24 January 1880
- “Evolution and Revolution”, Le Révolté: Organe socialiste, 21 February 1880
- “Anarchy and Universal Suffrage”, Liberty (Boston), 4 March 1882
- “Anarchy: By an Anarchist”, The Contemporary Review, May 1884
- “Why are we Anarchists?”, La Société nouvelle, Year 5, No. 2, 1889
- “Anarchy”, Freedom: A Journal of Anarchist Communism, August and September 1895
- Preface to Socialism in Danger, F. Domela Nieuwenhuis, Le socialisme en danger (Paris: P.-V. Stock, 1897)
- “The Anarchist”, Almanach anarchiste pour 1902
- “Today and Tomorrow”, Freedom: A Journal of Anarchist Communism, July 1908
Gillian Fleming, “Louise Michel”, Freedom: Anarchist Fortnightly, 6 February 1982
- Marseillaise of the New World
- How I became an anarchist
- Speaking on women
- “Why we are Anarchists”, The Commonweal: A Revolutionary Journal of Anarchist Communism, 26 September 1891
- “The Eighteenth of March”, The Rebel: Anarchist-Communist Journal (Boston), March-April 1896
- “Why I am an Anarchist”, Liberty: A Journal of anarchist-communism, March 1896
- “The Eighteenth of March”, Freedom: A Journal of Anarchist Communism, March-April 1901
Francesco Lamendola, Remembering Luigi Fabbri, Umanità Nova, 6 November 1988
- “Revolution and Dictatorship: On one anarchist who has forgotten his principles”, Volonta, 1920
- “State and Revolution”, Umanità Nova, 26 January 1921
- Dictatorship and Revolution (1921)
- VII. Marxism and the Idea of Dictatorship
- X. The Anarchist Concept of the Revolution
- XIV. The Defence of the Revolution
- “The revolutionary method”, La Protesta (Buenos Aires), 21 May 1923
- “About a Project for Anarchist Organisation”, Il Martello (New York), 17/24 September 1927
- “Theory and Tactics”, Views and Comments, March 1958
- “Anarchist Organisation Individual Freedom”, Views and Comments of the Libertarian League, Fall 1963
Reviews
- Iain McKay, The Russian Anarchists
- Iain McKay, A Missed Opportunity
- Tom Brown’s Syndicalism
Rob Latchford , Adios to Colette Durruti
James Kelman, John Couzin, in Memoriam
Parish Notices
Elisée Reclus, “To Vote is to be Dupes”, Freedom: A Journal of Anarchist Communism, January 1910
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