Grassroots Victories, Lobbyist Gridlock
This article originally appeared in Z Magazine, February 1995. On an unusually balmy November morning, eco-activists in the northeast awoke to some long-awaited but entirely unexpected news. In the immediate aftermath of the 1994 elections, any good news would be unexpected, but this one would be an occasion for celebration in any season. The new […]
Social Anarchism or Lifestyle Anarchism: An Unbridgeable Chasm
For some two centuries, anarchism — a very ecumenical body of anti-authoritarian ideas — developed in the tension between two basically contradictory tendencies: a personalistic commitment to individual autonomy and a collectivist commitment to social freedom. These tendencies have by no means been reconciled in the history of libertarian thought. Indeed, for much of the […]
What is Communalism?
Seldom have socially important words become more confused and divested of their historic meaning than they are at present. Two centuries ago, it is often forgotten, “democracy” was deprecated by monarchists and republicans alike as “mob rule.” Today, democracy is hailed as “representative democracy,” an oxymoron that refers to little more than a republican oligarchy […]
The Clinton Forest Plan
This article orignially appeared in Z Magazine, April 1994. After nearly a year of back room deals, political arm-twisting and viciously polarized debate, the Clinton administration has released the final details of its long-awaited plan for the ancient forests of the Pacific Northwest. In early April, a federal judge is expected to decide whether the […]
History, Civilization, and Progress: Outline for a Criticism of Modern Relativism
Rarely have the concepts that literally define the best of Western culture–its notions of a meaningful History, a universal Civilization, and the possibility of Progress–been called so radically into question as they are today. In recent decades, both in the United States and abroad, the academy and a subculture of self-styled postmodernist intellectuals have nourished […]
To Remember Spain: The Anarchist and Syndicalist Revolution of 1936
This document can also be found at Spunk.org Preface These essays are less an analysis of the Spanish Revolution and Civil War of 1936-39 than an evocation of the greatest proletarian and peasant revolution to occur over the past two centuries. Although they contain a general overview and evaluation of the Anarchist and Anarchosyndicalist movements […]
Nationalism and the “National Question”
Nationalism and the “National Question” Tuesday, November 18 2003 @ 01:19 AM PST Contributed by: murray By: Murray Bookchin One of the most vexing questions that the Left faces (however one may define the Left) is the role played by nationalism in social development and by popular demands for cultural identity and political sovereignty. For […]
The Enemy of Nature: The End of Capitalism or the End of the World? Reviewed by Brian Tokar
This book review was published in Tikkun Magazine, Jan.-Feb. 2003. This past August, civil society representatives, public officials and heads of state from around the world converged on Johannesburg for the tenth anniversary of the landmark 1992 United Nations “Earth Summit” in Rio de Janeiro. While the U.S. media focused largely on symbolic issues such […]
From Movement to Parliamentary Party: Notes on Several European Green Movements
This article was originally published in Society and Nature 3 (1993). It is a revised synthesis of “Western European Greens: Movement or Parliamentary Party?” Green Perspectives 19 (Feb. 1990); “Farewell to the German Greens,” Green Perspectives 23 (Jun. 1991); and “U.K. Greens Face the Future,” Regeneration 4 (Fall 1992). Thanks to Murray Bookchin for his […]
Society and Ecology
The problems which many people face today in “defining” themselves, in knowing “who they are”–problems that feed a vast psychotherapy industry–are by no means personal ones. These problems exist not only for private individuals; they exist for modern society as a whole. Socially, we live in desperate uncertainty about how people relate to each other. […]
