The Best of Social Anarchism

Howard J. Ehrlich

• Publisher: See Sharp Press
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9789781937521
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politik & Internationale Beziehungen
• Subtopic: Anarchismus

Since 1980, Social Anarchism: A Journal of Theory and Practice has developed into a premier anarchist periodical, a feat that is honored in this anthology that showcases the journal's finest pieces. Dividing its focus equally between theoretical works and descriptions of contemporary practice, the anthology boasts such notable contributors as Noam Chomsky, Colin Ward, Kingsley Widmer, Murray Bookchin, and Richard Kostelanetz, and all contributions have been reviewed by an international board of editors—avoiding the sectarian diatribes that characterize so much of political writing. The book is divided into five major sections that cover theory, practice, education, historical figures, and contemporary voices, and each article includes a summary abstract written by the editors. This fascinating and relevant collection presents a unique and rewarding perspective on the fresh and vital contributions of anarchism to the modern world.

Practice

This article is a comprehensive look at community organizing from an anarchist perspective. Since the 1960s, anarchist organizers have been looking for a way to present a non-elitist perspective on community organizing. Knoche offers a detailed set of points to strengthen the organizers’ work in local communities, arguing for retaining anarchist principles within their work.

Originally published in issue 18.

Organizing Communities

Tom Knoche

Many anarchists probably cringe at the notion of any person or group being “organized” and believe that the very idea is manipulative. They can point to countless community organization leaders who ended up on government payrolls. They can’t see how winning traffic lights and playgrounds does any more than help the system appear pluralistic and effective.

Such skepticism makes sense. Community organizing has always been practiced in many different ways to accomplish many different things. In reviewing the history of neighborhood organizing, Robert Fisher summed it up this way:

While neighborhood organizing is a political act, it is neither inherently reactionary, conservative, liberal or radical, nor is it inherently democratic and inclusive or authoritarian and parochial. It is above all a political method, an approach used by various segments of the population to achieve specific goals, serve certain interests, and advance clear or ill-defined political perspectives. (Fisher, 1984; p. 158).

If we just look at some of the progressive strains of community organizing thought, we still face a lot of confusion about what it is and how it is used. Saul Alinsky, a key figure in the development of community organizing as we know it today, wrote:

We are concerned about how to create mass organizations to seize power and give it to the people; to realize the democratic dream of equality, justice, peace, cooperation, equal and full opportunities for education, full and useful employment, health and the creation of those circumstances in which man can have the chance to live by the values that give meaning to life. We are talking about a mass power organization that will change the world (Alinsky, 1971, p. 3).

The Midwest Academy, a training institute for community organizers founded by some ex-civil rights and SDS leaders, asserts that:

More and more people are finding that what is needed is a permanent, professionally staffed community membership organization which can not only win real improvements for its members, but which can actually alter the relations of power at the city and state level. These groups [citizen groups] are keeping government open to the people and are keeping our democratic rights intact (Max, 1977; p. 2).

A senior member of ACORN (Association of Communities Organized for Reform Now), a national association of mostly urban community organizations, describes the goal of organizing as strengthening people’s collective capacities to bring about social change (Stables, 1984; p. 1). ACORN organized local communities, then employed its constituency at the national level, attempting to move the Democratic Party to the left.

Finally, a participant in a workshop on community organizing I conducted a number of years ago characterized community organizing as “manipulating people to do trivial things.”

In this article, I will focus on how community organizing can be useful in advancing an anarchist vision of social change. Community organizations that build on an anarchist vision of social change are different from other community organizations because of the purposes they have, the criteria they have for success, the issues they work on, the ways they operate and the tactics they use.

My experience with community organizing spans a 16-year period including four years in Baltimore, Maryland and twelve in Camden, New Jersey. I have primarily worked with very low income people on a wide range of issues. I will draw heavily on my personal experience in this article. I use the term “community organizing” to refer to social change efforts which are based in local geographically defined areas where people live. This is the key distinction between community organizing and other forms of organizing for social change which may be based in workplaces or universities, involving people where they work or study instead of where they live. Some issue-oriented organizations are considered community organizations if their constituency is local.

Goals of Anarchist Organizing

Anarchist community organizing must be dedicated to changing what we can today and undoing the socialization process that has depoliticized so many of us. We can use it to build the infrastructure that can respond and make greater advances when our political and economic systems are in crisis and are vulnerable to change.

The following purposes illustrate this concept.

1. Helping people experiment with decentralized, collective and cooperative forms of organization.

We have to build our American model of social change out of our own experience; we can’t borrow revolutionary theory in total from that developed in another historical and/or cultural context. Community organizations can help people log that experience and analyze it. Because of our culture’s grounding in defense of personal liberty and democracy, social change engineered by a vanguard or administered by a strong central state will not work here.

David Bouchier is on the right track when he says, “for citizen radicals evolution is better than revolution because evolution works” (Bouchier, 1987; p. 139). We must learn new values and practice cooperation rather than competition. Community organizations can provide a vehicle for this “retooling.” “This means that a cultural revolution, a revolution of ideas and values and understanding, is the essential prelude to any radical change in the power arrangement of modern society. The purpose of radical citizenship is to take the initiative in this process” (Bouchier, p. 148).

Any kind of alternative institution (see Ehrlich, et al., Reinventing Anarchy, p. 346), including cooperatives, worker managed businesses, etc., that offers a chance to learn and practice community control and worker self-management, is important. We must experience together how institutions can be different and better. These alternative institutions should be nonprofit, controlled and staffed by residents of the community they serve, and supported by the people who benefit from them. Most charities and social service agencies do not qualify as alternative institutions because they are staffed and controlled by people who usually are not part of the community they serve; they therefore foster dependence.

The recent proliferation of community land trusts in this country is an exciting example of community-based, cooperative and decentralized organizations. Through these organizations, people are taking land and housing off the private market and putting them in their collective control.

I have been a board member of North Camden Land Trust in Camden, New Jersey since its inception in 1984. The land trust now controls about thirty properties. A group of thirty low income homeowners who previously were tenants without much hope of home ownership now collectively make decisions concerning this property. The development of the land trust embodies many of the elements that describe community organizing grounded in a social anarchist vision for society.

2. Increasing the control that people have over actions that affect them, and increasing local self-reliance.

This involves taking some measure of control away from large institutions like government, corporations and social service conglomerates and giving it to the people most affected by their actions. David Bouchier describes this function as attaining “positive freedoms.” Positive freedoms are rights of self-government that are not dependent on or limited by higher powers (Bouchier, p. 9).

In the neighborhood where I live and work, residents are starting to demand control over land use decisions. They stopped the state and local governments’ plan to build a second state prison on the waterfront in their neighborhood. Instead of stopping there, the residents, through a series of block meetings and a neighborhood coalition, have developed a “Peoples’ Plan” for that waterfront site. Control of land use has traditionally rested with local government (and state and federal government to a much more limited extent), guided by professional planners and consultants. Neighborhood residents believe they should control land use in their neighborhood, since they are the ones most directly affected by it.

The concept of self-reliant communities described by David Morris (1987) also helps us understand the shift in power we are talking about. Self-reliant communities organize to assert authority over capital investment, hiring, bank lending, etc. — all areas where decision making traditionally has been in the hands of government or private enterprise.

3. Building a counterculture that uses all forms of communication to resist illegitimate authority, racism, sexism, and capitalism. In low-income neighborhoods, it is also important that this counterculture become an alternative to the dominant culture which has resulted from welfare and drugs.

The Populist movement can teach us a lot about building a counterculture. That movement used the press, person-to-person contact via roving rallies and educational lectures, an extensive network of farm cooperatives and an alternative vision of agricultural economics to do this (Goodwyn, 1976; 1981).

Every movement organization has to use the media to advance its ideas and values. Educational events, film, community-based newspapers, etc., are all important. The local community advocacy organization in North Camden has done a good job of combining fundraising with the development of counterculture. They have sponsored alternative theater which has explored the issues of battered women, homelessness, and sexism. After each play, the theater group conducted an open discussion with the audience about these issues. These were powerful experiences for those who attended.

The question of confronting the dominant culture in very low-income neighborhoods is one of the greatest challenges facing community organizations. Many families have now experienced welfare dependence for four generations, a phenomenon which has radically altered many peoples’ value systems in a negative way. People must worry about survival constantly, and believe that anything they can get to survive they are entitled to, regardless of the effect on others. It has not fostered a cooperative spirit. The response of low-income people to long-term welfare dependency is not irrational, but it is a serious obstacle to functioning in a system of decentralized, cooperative work and services.

One experience in this regard is relevant. A soup kitchen called Leaven-house has operated in Camden for 10 years, during nine of which it was open to anyone that came. A year ago, the soup kitchen changed into a feeding cooperative on weekdays. Guests now have to either work a few hours in the kitchen or purchase a ticket for five dollars which is good for the entire month. Daily average attendance has dropped from 200 to about 20. The idea of cooperating to provide some of the resources necessary to sustain the service is outside the value system of many people who previously used the kitchen. Leavenhouse realizes now that it must address the reasons why people have not responded to the co-op, and is planning a community outreach campaign designed to build some understanding, trust and acceptance of the idea of a cooperative feeding.

The 20 people who have joined the co-op have responded favorably. They appreciate the more tranquil eating environment and feel good about their role in it. The co-op members now make decisions about the operation of their co-op. Friendships and information sharing (primarily about jobs) have been facilitated. Fewer people are being served, but meaningful political objectives are now being realized.

4. Strengthening the “social fabric” of neighborhood units — that network of informal associations, support services, and contacts that enables people to survive and hold on to their sanity in spite of rather than because of the influence of government and social service bureaucracies in their lives.

John McKnight (1987) has done a good job of exposing the failure of traditional social service agencies and government in meeting people’s needs for a support structure. They operate to control people. Informal associations (“community of associations”), on the other hand, operate on the basis of consent. They allow for creative solutions, quick response, interpersonal caring, and foster a broad base of participation.

A good example of fulfilling this purpose is the bartering network that some community organizations have developed. The organization simply prints a listing of people and services they need along with a parallel list of people and services they are willing to offer. This strengthens intra-neighborhood communication. In poor neighborhoods, this is especially effective because it allows people to get things done without money, and to get a return on their work that is not taxable.

Concerned Citizens of North Camden (CCNC) has supported the development of a Camden “Center for Independent Living” — an organization that brings handicapped and disabled people in the city together to collectively solve the problems they face. Twelve-step groups are another example of informal, nonprofessional associations that work for people.

Criteria For Success

Many community organizations measure success by “winning.” The tangible result is all that matters. In fact, many organizations evaluate the issues they take on by whether or not they are “winnable.” The real significance of what is won and how it is won are of less concern.

For organizations that embrace an anarchist vision, the process and the intangible results are at least as important as any tangible results. Increasing any one organization’s size and influence is not a concern. The success of community organizing can be measured by the extent to which the following mandates are realized.

1. People learn skills needed to analyze issues and confront those who exert control over their lives;
2. People learn to interact, make decisions and get things done collectively — rotating tasks, sharing skills, confronting racism, sexism and hierarchy.
3. Community residents realize some direct benefit or some resolution of problems they personally face through the organizing work.
4. Existing institutions change their priorities or way of doing things so that the authority of government, corporations and large institutions is replaced by extensions of decentralized, grassroots authority; and
5. Community residents feel stronger and better about themselves because of their participation in the collective effort.

Picking Issues

Much of the literature about community organizing suggests that issues should be selected which are: 1) winnable; 2) involve advocacy, not service; and 3) build the organization’s constituency, power and resources. “Good issue campaigns should have the twin goals of winning a victory and producing organizational mileage while doing so” (Staples, 1984; p. 53).

These guidelines have always bothered me, and my experience suggests that they are off the mark. Issues should be picked primarily because the organization’s members believe they are important and because they are consistent with one or more of the purposes listed above. Let me offer a few guidelines which are a bit different.

1. Service and advocacy work must go hand in hand, especially in very needy communities.

People get involved with groups because they present an opportunity for them to gain something they want. It may be tangible or intangible, but the motivation to get involved comes with an expectation of relatively short-term gratification. The job of community organizations is to facilitate a process where groups of people with similar needs or problems work together for the benefit of all. Through this process, people learn to work cooperatively and learn that their informal association can usually solve problems more effectively and quickly than established organizations.

I will offer an example to illustrate this point. When Concerned Citizen...