I think Murray Bookchin is all about taking horizontal power in school boards, community Councils, local councils etc, in the West the state is to strong for a frontal assault but local councils can change supermarkets into community markets, it can set up departments to help small businesses and cooperatives, it can give all contracts to small local businesses undermining multinationals. Unfortunately anarchists refuse to take part in these local elections?
One way of thinking about May's discussion of power, which he gets mostly from Foucault, is to remember that we sometimes use the same word in English - power - to translate two different French words, pouvoir and puissance. I forget which, but one of these terms has a sense closer to what we invoke when we talk about things like the power of the state. This is the traditional idea of power as a repressive operation: 'I have the power (e.g., a monopoly on violence) to make you do what I want you to do.' This is often referred to as 'power over'.
The other term means something more like capacity or force, in the sense of physics. 'It took a lot of power for her to clear 2.5m in the high jumping competition.' This second sense of power as capacity or 'power to' can be traced back to philosophers like Nietzsche (and before him Spinoza) and was influential for early anarchists like Emma Goldman. CrimethInc, a contemporary anarchist group, draws on the distinction between power-over and power-to with their popular sticker that reads 'we love power and hate authority'.
If you want to read more on micropolitics, which comes mostly from Deleuze and Guattari, Thomas Nail's work on the Zapatistas is really useful. The Deleuze and Anarchism edited collection (disclosure: I'm one of the editors) also has several relatively accessible chapters on this stuff. Finally, Daniel Colson's Little Lexicon of Anarchism from Proudhon to Deleuze is a great resource if you want to see the extent to which many of the so-called classical anarchists - Bakunin for instance - actually anticipate a lot of what is later thought of as poststructuralism.
I find books to be fascinating, the printed words on the pages are always the same. However, when rereading these words, I see something different. It is not the words that have changed, it is I who has changed.
Knowledge; how much do we really know? Very little, knowledge is not gained by reading or listening to others. The more I know, I realize how little I know.
In 1992 after watching the film Operation solstice. I said to Tash featured in the film. But what can I do?
He said ‘ lad ‘ I ‘ can’t do anything but WE can change the world ‘
Glad your back. ✊🥰✊
Yes please!!! update on Rojava and Syria!!! 🙏
thanks!
I think Murray Bookchin is all about taking horizontal power in school boards, community Councils, local councils etc, in the West the state is to strong for a frontal assault but local councils can change supermarkets into community markets, it can set up departments to help small businesses and cooperatives, it can give all contracts to small local businesses undermining multinationals. Unfortunately anarchists refuse to take part in these local elections?
Great piece.
One way of thinking about May's discussion of power, which he gets mostly from Foucault, is to remember that we sometimes use the same word in English - power - to translate two different French words, pouvoir and puissance. I forget which, but one of these terms has a sense closer to what we invoke when we talk about things like the power of the state. This is the traditional idea of power as a repressive operation: 'I have the power (e.g., a monopoly on violence) to make you do what I want you to do.' This is often referred to as 'power over'.
The other term means something more like capacity or force, in the sense of physics. 'It took a lot of power for her to clear 2.5m in the high jumping competition.' This second sense of power as capacity or 'power to' can be traced back to philosophers like Nietzsche (and before him Spinoza) and was influential for early anarchists like Emma Goldman. CrimethInc, a contemporary anarchist group, draws on the distinction between power-over and power-to with their popular sticker that reads 'we love power and hate authority'.
If you want to read more on micropolitics, which comes mostly from Deleuze and Guattari, Thomas Nail's work on the Zapatistas is really useful. The Deleuze and Anarchism edited collection (disclosure: I'm one of the editors) also has several relatively accessible chapters on this stuff. Finally, Daniel Colson's Little Lexicon of Anarchism from Proudhon to Deleuze is a great resource if you want to see the extent to which many of the so-called classical anarchists - Bakunin for instance - actually anticipate a lot of what is later thought of as poststructuralism.
I find books to be fascinating, the printed words on the pages are always the same. However, when rereading these words, I see something different. It is not the words that have changed, it is I who has changed.
Knowledge; how much do we really know? Very little, knowledge is not gained by reading or listening to others. The more I know, I realize how little I know.
Thanks Carne!
.-)
Much of what you are describing here I would say are the best insights of feminism