Rebel Alliances

The Means And Ends of Contemporary British Anarchisms

Paperback, 475 pages

English language

Published Nov. 16, 2006 by AK Press.

ISBN:
978-1-904859-40-6
Copied ISBN!
OCLC Number:
914636047

View on OpenLibrary

View on Inventaire

(1 review)

Rebel Alliances offers an applied philosophical perspective on contemporary class-struggle anarchism in Britain. It identifies the main principles distinguishing this tradition from competing Leninist, liberal, and social-democratic groupings. From these key characteristics, Franks constructs a consistent anarchism, which both shares characteristics with politically-engaged post-structuralisms and has a distinctive ethic.

The theory and practice of contemporary groups are then assessed against this "ideal-type" of anarchism. Many of the central themes of anarchism are consequently subject to original scrutiny: the nature of the revolutionary subject; workplace and community organizing; violence and pacifism; the meaning of direct action; and propaganda by the word and deed.

(Source: AK Press)

1 edition

Review of 'Rebel Alliances' on 'Goodreads'

This is an excellent book. While its focus is the contemporary British anarchist groups, it is much more than that. While the author discusses intellectual and organizational debates within these groups, he discusses debates relevant to anarchism everywhere. These include the question of non-hierarchical organization, of violence, of non-hierarchical ways of struggle, etc. All of these are debated intelligently and sympathetically. The author does not try to impose his point of view, but presents the debates fairly. I learned a lot about anarchist theories from this book.
The book is largely about battles of ideas, rather than about actual political struggles. I found this useful, since I was interested in reading something good about various anarchist theories.

Subjects

  • Anarchism
  • Politics/International Relations
  • Political Science
  • Politics / Current Events
  • British Isles
  • General
  • Political Science / General
  • Government - International
  • United States - 20th Century