Popular Education for a Free Society
What is Communalism? The Democratic Dimension of Anarchism by Murray Bookchin 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,” …
History, Civilization, and Progress Outline for a Criticism of Modern Relativism by Murray Bookchin 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 …
Social Ecology: International Reports Editors’ note: After a year and a half hiatus, we are pleased to submit to our readers the reemergence of Green Perspectives. Over the past year, we have been deeply involved with writing projects for journals and books that did not fit the Green Perspectives format, as well as lectures, teaching, …
Ecofascism: Neither Left nor “Up Front” but Far Right If the Green slogan “we are neither left nor right but up front” was ever meaningful, the increasingly notable emergence of an “ecological right” defines its bankruptcy conclusively. A political ecology that is dubiously conceived as a ideology that privileges the natural world over the social, …
European Reports This issue of Green Perspectives is devoted to a series of reports: from a Russian eco-anarchist, a U.K Green, Italian social ecologists, and a German radical ecologist. They provide glimpses into how people in different cultural contexts are working with ideas familiar to North American social ecologists. First, Sergey Fomichov, one of the …
From Left to Right: New Right Ideology as a Problem Facing Leftism Today Introductory note: The National Front in France, the Republicans Germany, the Freedom Party in Austria, the Vlaams Blok in Belgium–all these ultra-right, even fascist parties have gained startling electoral successes in recent European elections. In increasingly multicultural Western Europe, tensions over “too …
A Critique of the Draft Program of the Left Green Network by Murray Bookchin and Janet Biehl Editors’ note: The Left Green Network is in the process of writing, developing, and debating its program. The draft proposal for the program was published in the April/May 1991 issue of Left Green Notes, number 7. The following …
The Left That Was: A Personal Reflection by Murray Bookchin I would like to recall a Left That Was–an idealistic, often theoretically coherent Left that militantly emphasized its internationalism, its rationality in its treatment of reality, its democratic spirit, and its vigorous revolutionary aspirations. From a retrospective viewpoint of a hundred years or so, it …
Libertarian Municipalism: An Overview by Murray Bookchin Perhaps the greatest single failing of movements for social reconstruction–I refer particularly to the Left, to radical ecology groups, and to organizations that profess to speak for the oppressed–is their lack of a politics that will carry people beyond the limits established by the status quo. Politics today …
Radical Politics in an Era of Advanced Capitalism by Murray Bookchin Defying all the theoretical predictions of the 1930s, capitalism has restabilized itself with a vengeance and acquired extraordinary flexibility in the decades since World War II. In fact, we have yet to clearly determine what constitutes capitalism in its most “mature” form, not to …