The parliamentary road to anarchism
- Thread starter hibee
- Start date
Depends. Some call for boycotts, some for spoiled votes. The Oz government doesn't like calls for boycott one little bit and tends to crack down on this, plus if they catch you not voting, you can get a really enormous fine. Hence, it tends to be the more counter-cultural types who advocate this line as they live in squats and so on and aren't easy to find in order to give fines too. Of course, some of these types also denounce anybody who votes as a sell out and so on (ignoring the fact that most people don't live in squats, can't afford to pay enormous fines and are easy for the state to find). Others on the 'soft' anarchist fringe (the large body of people who have become attracted to anarchist notions of direct democracy and direct action in recent years but are relatively unversed in the history and theory of the movement) advocate voting for the 'least bad' candidate.hibee said:
So, the answer is, as always, that different anarchists advocate all sorts of things, mostly sensible and well thought out, but with some putting forward impossibly utopian demands (eg squatters) and others impossibly optimistic (voters). So it is with anarchism and probably always will be. Political movements which have one single 'correct' answer to real-world problems are well on their way to being cults.
For what its worth, speaking personally, this approach is basically the loose theoretical backing for my electoral activities. Not heard it described as 'Fabian anarchism' before though - quite like that. 
Matt
P.S. However, what gurrier says above is basically right, IMO: >>However, in general, it is safe to say that as soon as somebody decides to genuinely try the parliamentary route, they are no longer an anarchist. One of anarchism's core principles is that people should have the power to take decisions on the things that affect them rather than a representative having the power to take these decisions on their behalf. Hence an anarchist representative is a contradiction in terms.>> One of the many reasons I wouldn't call myself an anarchist, despite many sympathies in that direction...
Matt
P.S. However, what gurrier says above is basically right, IMO: >>However, in general, it is safe to say that as soon as somebody decides to genuinely try the parliamentary route, they are no longer an anarchist. One of anarchism's core principles is that people should have the power to take decisions on the things that affect them rather than a representative having the power to take these decisions on their behalf. Hence an anarchist representative is a contradiction in terms.>> One of the many reasons I wouldn't call myself an anarchist, despite many sympathies in that direction...
rebel warrior
Soca Warrior
Inside the can of worms
It appears so. See http://www.election.demon.co.uk/by1987.html
J. Duignan who 'supported the revolutionary organisation, 'Class War'.,
got 60 votes or 0.3% of the vote, in the 1988 by election of KENSINGTON and CHELSEA. They came 8th.
They were beaten by, among other candidates, a Mrs C D Payne, who had been prosecuted for living off immoral earnings several years before the election. She was the candidate of the 'Rainbow Alliance Payne and Pleasure Party', which she had formed. This rainbow party got more than 3 times the votes that British anarchists managed.
Perhaps this result helps explain why 'Fabian anarchism' has not taken off in Britain, and also explains why Pickmans gets upset by Respect managing over 15,800 votes, or 35.9%, in Bethnal Green and Bow seventeen years later.
However it does compare favourably to Eddie Adams, from the Alliance for Green Socialism, who got 101 votes or 0.3% in 2005 in Kensington and Chelsea.
oisleep said:
It appears so. See http://www.election.demon.co.uk/by1987.html
J. Duignan who 'supported the revolutionary organisation, 'Class War'.,
got 60 votes or 0.3% of the vote, in the 1988 by election of KENSINGTON and CHELSEA. They came 8th.
They were beaten by, among other candidates, a Mrs C D Payne, who had been prosecuted for living off immoral earnings several years before the election. She was the candidate of the 'Rainbow Alliance Payne and Pleasure Party', which she had formed. This rainbow party got more than 3 times the votes that British anarchists managed.
Perhaps this result helps explain why 'Fabian anarchism' has not taken off in Britain, and also explains why Pickmans gets upset by Respect managing over 15,800 votes, or 35.9%, in Bethnal Green and Bow seventeen years later.
However it does compare favourably to Eddie Adams, from the Alliance for Green Socialism, who got 101 votes or 0.3% in 2005 in Kensington and Chelsea.
I am shocked at the poor results. Kensington and Chelsea has long been a hotbed of malcontents, anarchists, revolutionaries and Communists of all kinds. Second only to Mole Valley.
K&C is the place to go this side of the Channel for the perfect Tarte au Citron. Revolutionaries have them with a sliced strawberry on top - it's a kind of code.
K&C is the place to go this side of the Channel for the perfect Tarte au Citron. Revolutionaries have them with a sliced strawberry on top - it's a kind of code.
I thought his name was "Albert" Albert Meltzer? 
sihhi
Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered
I think Class War did it a protest on an anti-gentrification ticket to tell the rich voters of Kensington & Chelsea not to gentrify Kensal Rise, Notting Hill etc with wine bars yuppie "pads" etc.Random said:
A google has revealed this bizarre-o author's history of inner West London.
http://www.historytalk.org/Tom Vague Pop History/Chp 9.pdf
I'm a bit confused and hopefully the CWers will sort this one out.
shame durrutti02 has made his posts for the month i believe he knows something about CW's brief encounter with electoral games
as for hibee's questions about why there is no moderate wing of anarchism - there is as matt s has made clear, it can be found among the green party, and a working class moderate element can be found among some iwca/hi supporters i reckon
as for hibee's questions about why there is no moderate wing of anarchism - there is as matt s has made clear, it can be found among the green party, and a working class moderate element can be found among some iwca/hi supporters i reckon
hibee said:
But as In Bloom said, anarchists put a far heavier emphasis on the idea that "Nobody can be trusted to wield that kind of power and not use it for their own ends" than other leftist groups - and anarchism emerged as a seperate strand from marxism specifically because of the arguments about capturing state power back in the first international.
There are a few other examples - elements in the CNT-FAI towards the end of the civil war wanted to reform the anarchist movement into a "Libertarian Movement" which stood in elections, before the civil war there was the moderate split from the CNT which stood in elections (forgotten its name). Also there's Bookchin's libertarian municipalism which argues for taking power in local government (though even most Bookchin fans disagree with this). Proudhon once held office. There are a few other obscure examples of French/other European groups standing in local elections. Georges Fontenis wanted an anarchist movement that mimicked the communist party and eventually argued for standing in elections.
Bernie Gunther
Fundamentalist Druid
I have to say some of Bookchin's arguments for libertarian municipalism made a lot of sense to me as a pragmatic approach for building alternatives. I can see a bunch of flaws, but you'd probably manage to get at least some good stuff done that way and you'd learn a lot about what works and what doesn't
rebel warrior
Soca Warrior
rednblack said:
Liberarian muncipalism - yeah - take over the libraries! No wonder he called himself 'Bookchin'.
LLETSA said:
I've got this great image of our student swappies like rebel, levein, mattkidd etc throwing up on LLETSA's doorstep, running down his road with traffic cones on their heads at 2am and holding up the queue at his local chip shop by paying for their fish suppers with a cheque.
The Black Hand
Unclean
sihhi said:
What do you want sorting? The last time I met John Duigan was on 'Portillo Night' - when Portillo got elected back into Parliament for Kensington and Chelsea after getting booted out of Enfield. The Monstor Raving Loonies grassed us up to the filth that nite
The stuff about the Warwick pub is all true... haven't been there for ages though.Tim Scargill stood in a council ward in Surrey for Class War in the early 1990s too.
(at the same time as mine mind 
)Paul Marsh
NeitherWashingtonNorMecca
There was also an "Anarchist Party" that stood in either the 1979 or 1983 general election, I can rememer seeing their manifesto lying around in the old Polytechnic of North London library, and dithering other whether to nick it or not for posterity!
Do anarchist groups elect their leadership or spokepersons or have agms where leaders are held to account?
hibee said:
And trying to pay of their gratuitously-acquired debts*by getting jobs behind the bars in the local pubs and, instead of remaining alert, spending most of the time talking to their twatty mates-who come to the pub because they know that they can treat it like an extension of the union bar.
Dozy bastards.
*Beyond the loans, I mean, before anybody starts.
In Bloom said:Bloody students, eh? All the fucking same
The policy of concentrating them all in a few areas of most university cities has mostly negative consequences, especially with the ever-growing student population.
It's all profit for the student industry though.
rednblack said:
That explains Monty's climb up the ladder of leadership then.
LLETSA said:
And also concentrating on a very narrow age range, perhaps colleges etc should raise the minimum age level to 25.
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