Review of a pamphlet on the state of the anarchist movement in America. It appeared in Anarcho-Syndicalist Review No. 78 (Winter 2020)
(more…)Articles and Reviews
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Review: Black Flame
A short review of Black Flame which, in general, is very good. I have my disagreements with it, particularly on its inclusion of Marxist-syndicalists into the wider anarchist tradition and exclusion of Proudhon. This was written before the revelation that Michael Schmidt had ties to white nationalism. Needless to say, the book itself shows no signs of that and remains a good, if flawed, account of class struggle anarchism.
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One Step Forward, Two Steps Back
A review of Imagine by Tommy Sheridan and Alan McCombes, the (then) leaders of the Scottish Socialist Party. An attempt by Trotskyists (formerly of Militant) to become libertarian sounding are not very convincing. At the height of its electoral success in 2003, the party had six Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs) but it then imploded, in thanks to the activities of its leader, Sheridan, and the cult of personality the party had created around him. It appeared in Black Flag no. 224 (2004).
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Lies, Damn Lies and Economics
A review of five works on economics and the economy published in the late 1990s. It was my first significant article for the magazine Black Flag, whose editorial committee I had just joined. It appeared in Black Flag No. 215 (1998)
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Black Flag: Anarchist Review Spring 2026 issue now out
The new issue of Black Flag: Anarchist Review is now available:
This year’s first issue has the usual mix of articles, re-prints and reviews, starting with an evaluation of German Anarchist John Most (1846-1906) and the development of his politics. We show that in the years following his arrival in America, he was not a consistent anarchist in both tactics and vision of a social revolution. The latter reflected his Marxist-Blanquist past while the former – his advocacy of “propaganda by deed” – was due to misinformation on Bakunin spread by Marx and Engels. While he did help the emerging American revolutionary anarchist movement grow as well as becoming a consistent anarchist after 1887, his politics before that were in transition. We include a selection of writings from his anarchist period plus a report from The Alarm of one his speeches as well as The Beast of Property (1883), so that the anarchist and non-anarchist aspects of it can be seen.
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