Text of Workers Solidarity Movement leaflet
to anarchy in the UK festival 21st-30th Oct.

        Creating anarchism

Anarchism has a great potential to become 
the dominant force in oppositional 
politics following the collapse of the 
authoritarian left.  But this collapse 
also means we have no longer any excuse 
for failing to reach that position.  This 
conference will hopefully highlight that 
potential, however if in the future we 
fail to build mass anarchist movements, 
then that failure falls on our heads.

Mass anarchist movements have been built 
in the past.  In other countries sizeable 
anarchist movements exist today, and in 
most countries outside Africa anarchism 
is represented by at least one or two 
organisations.  In the last twenty years, 
although the rest of the left collapsed, 
anarchism has seen not only a recovery 
but real growth, both in numbers and 
geographical spread.

Britain unfortunately seems to be the 
exception  Despite the fact that over the 
last couple of decades tens of thousands 
have referred to themselves as 
anarchists, the organisations that exist 
today are tiny.  All the groups appear to 
be drifting away from anarchism, to 
'revolutionary unionism' , council 
communism  or undefined post-anarchism.  
Another national organisation the 
Anarchist Workers Group (AWG) imploded 
over two years ago.  The bulk of its 
members have either dropped out of 
politics or a few, more bizarrely, joined 
authoritarian organisations from the RCP 
to the Labour Party.

What can anarchists do in this situation?  
How do we go about creating a mass 
anarchist movement, capable of 
overthrowing capitalism?  This leaflet is 
an international contribution to that 
debate, produced by an organisation based 
in Ireland.

Firstly we have to recognise this is not 
a short term process.  There will not be 
an anarchist revolution next year.  
Anarchism will only become possible when 
the majority of society understands and 
also wants to introduce it.  Too many 
people spend their political life 
searching for the quick fix, the magic 
wand, instant revolution.  Trotskyists 
see this wand as a collection of 'right 
slogans and right leaders'.  Too often 
anarchists have echoed this by seeing the 
magic wand as media exposure resulting in 
a sense of importance.  From the period 
of the Poll Tax on, anarchists have 
received considerable media exposure but 
almost nothing has come out of this.

We advocate a more long term approach, 
one that recognises the possibility of 
revolution, but also recognises the need 
to build for it.  Ideas have to be 
developed and clarified.  Organisation(s) 
are needed that put forward coherent 
ideas and collectively act on these 
ideas.  We have to be able to develop and 
implement strategy for our organisations 
in a democratic fashion.  Anarchists have 
to be able to argue confidently with 
activists from other areas of the left 
and win these arguments without resorting 
to sectarianism.  

There has to be involvement in real 
struggle.  This means learning to work 
alongside other activists including those 
who may be hostile to anarchism.  There 
has been too much of a tendency to stay 
aloof from struggle in the interests of 
maintaining ideological 'purity' or 
setting up anarchist alternatives to much 
larger campaigns.  The need to confront 
other ideas has thus been avoided.

We need clear ideas on getting involved 
in struggles. There has been a tendency 
for anarchists to end up as the foot 
soldiers of campaigns, doing all the 
donkey work but not contributing much to 
the direction taken.  We have to be able 
to develop, put forward and win the 
argument for campaign strategies based on 
anarchist tactics.

There has to be a real commitment to 
building anarchist organisations, one 
that is reflected in the investment of 
time, energy and money.  This commitment 
has to come from all the members, not 
just a core group who volunteer and 
finance just about everything.  It's only 
with this sort of commitment that the 
small groups that are currently possible, 
once formed can grow to much larger 
organisations.

This outlines what we are currently 
trying to implement in Ireland, a 
strategy which has yielded us some 
success to date.  We are currently too 
small to put significant resources into 
helping people set up a similar group in 
Britain.  What we can do however is start 
to develop contacts here and help in 
putting like minded people in contact 
with each other.

If you find yourself agreeing with the 
broad outline of what we are putting 
forward then check us out further.  Talk 
to any of the people distributing this 
leaflet (or selling Workers Solidarity) 
or write to us at WSM, PO Box 1528, 
Dublin 8, Ireland.
If you want to be put on our 
international mailing list, fill out this 
form and send it to us.  Include a 
donation towards postage costs if you 
can.  (Please use block capitals).

Name
Address

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An introduction to the WSM

We can create a better society. A world 
where everybody is treated equally. A 
world where we, the working class, get to 
have the best of what we produce, and 
where we get to make the decisions about 
how we run our lives.

In order for capitalism to function, it 
must exploit the working class. It is 
only when capitalism is eliminated that 
we can end poverty, war and oppression.

We believe that the working class, as a 
whole, should take control of the means 
of production, factories, schools, 
hospitals, etc. The state must be 
destroyed and all forces of oppression, 
such as the police, army and judiciary, 
disbanded. A socialist society should be 
formed, based on workers federations, 
organised at the lowest possible level.

We are part of the "platformist" 
tradition within anarchism.  The best 
known statements from this current are 
the "Organisational Platform of the 
Libertarian Communists" (whose authors 
included Nestor Makhno) and "Towards a 
Fresh Revolution" by the Friends of 
Durruti in Spain. That is, we believe 
that the best way to fight for our goal 
is through an organised anarchist group, 
with clearly stated policies and 
objectives.

We believe: 

* The ends cannot be separated from the 
means. We must fight now against all 
forms of oppression against the working 
class, be it sexual, sexist or racist. We 
have to make sure that our methods of 
struggle are thoroughly honest and 
democratic.

* We believe in working within trade 
unions, in order to fight for greater 
union democracy and to argue our politics 
within the trade union movement.

* We are anti-imperialist. We want to see 
British withdrawal from Northern Ireland. 
We believe that it is important for 
anarchists to be anti-imperialist because 
only then can we be truly anti-racist, 
and support international working class 
solidarity.

* To be an anarchist is to be libertarian 
and socialist. Anarchists do not have to 
wear uniforms or act in a certain way. 
Groups such as new age travellers or 
punks are not anarchist movements, they 
are lifestylist counter cultural 
movements which may have anarchists among 
them. 

* We do not believe that fighting for 
revolution should be a hobby nor should 
anarchist groups make themselves out to 
be some sort of joke. We are asking 
people to fight with us, so we can better 
our lives. If we do not take ourselves 
seriously, then nobody else will.

The Workers Solidarity Movement  is an 
Irish anarchist communist group.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The Workers Solidarity Movement can be contacted at 
     PO Box 1528, Dublin 8, Ireland

or by anonymous e-mail to an64739@anon.penet.fi

Some of our material is available via the Spunk press electronic archive

             by FTP to etext.archive.umich.edu or 141.211.164.18
              or by gopher ("gopher etext.archive.umich.edu")
or WWW at http://www.cwi.nl/cwi/people/Jack.Jansen/spunk/Spunk_Home.html

in the directory /pub/Politics/Spunk/texts/groups/WSM
