Toward a Post-Anarchist Critique of Anarchist Businesses

Toward a Post-Anarchist Critique of Anarchist Businesses

A Reply to Lawrence Jarach

Anarchist businesses are by their very nature dishonest and paradoxical; of course it should also go without saying that anarchism—with its corresponding belief in, if not quest for, an unmediated, and hence non-alienated, existence—is, by its very nature, dishonest and paradoxical. For all that anarchist thought is worth, it would seem that we can only go so far with it, that we can tolerate it only for so long. We are inevitably forced to seek out alternative lines of flight that proceed outside the narrow and limiting axioms of traditional thought. This can take a few different forms, the first of which is by way of an immanent transgression (best captured in the dictum “become who you already are” or, as in the christian bible verse, “you already have what you want! You’ve already become rich! You’ve [already] become kings without us! I wish you really [knew that you] were kings so that we could be kings with you.”). Another approach is to abandon anarchist thought altogether (the approach of a run-revolter) and take up a truly empowering hobby. Of course, one might also proceed by working traditional anarchist theory toward the threshold – but one must at least appear to be operating with this objective in mind. In any case, the flight will need to occur if only to save the indefinable spirit that once animated anarchist thought. It should finally be said that to abandon anarchism, or to “transgress” it, is not necessarily to abandon anarchy, but to become ever more of a serious anarchist. In lacking any of these approaches, by adopting a strategic approach, anarchists can only promise to fail in the as yet most perfect way.

As a particular case in point, Lawrence’s recent article on anarchist businesses (#64) was decidedly strategic and entirely faithful to the core tenants of traditional anarchist thought and, as a consequence, it approached the problem of anarchist businesses from a limited perspective. More pointedly, his dismissal of commodity exchange as divorced from any real analysis of Power—as being, for example, understood in its own right and on its own terms—has left him only with some vague “safe” space which he offered as an alternative to the cold logic of anarchist businesses. This is not only an example of the problem inherent in any alternative proposal of structure but also the problem of anarchist thought itself. To make my point: there is no reason to answer Zizek or Engels when they tell us that anarchism is great, `if only you could explain how you are organized`. Lyotard’s differend comes to mind here. The differend occurs when a situation arises in which one is forced to say that which simply can not be said – this is precisely what we are up against: we appear to have only to choose between this or that place of power. What authoritarians simply can not understand is a critique that does not embody elements of an alternative.

Although Lawrence was clearly operating with the most proper of intentions, he nonetheless fell into the disastrous trap of envisioning “commodity-free spaces,” and he proceeded by stringing together a carefully crafted and widely known narrative against the strategy of anarchist businesses. As much as I respect Lawrence’s work, I claim that a strategic standpoint such as the one he adopted in this particular article, combined with a narrow economic perspective, only makes anti-capitalist spaces ever more susceptible to the violence of Power through the illusion of safety. “[I]f only on a limited scale,” he says, there have been

. . important commodity-free spaces, where the economic considerations of making a buck are completely ignored. The discovery, embrace, and celebration of egalitarianism, real affinity, friendships, solidarity, support networks, and empathic intimacy occur more easily where commodity exchange is absent, where relationships are not mediated by money or the creation and use of economic value, where commerce is absent and/or deliberately shunned.

I believe that I am being faithful to Lawrence here, because I do not doubt for a moment that he has attempted to create an honest critique of anarchist businesses but lacked the necessary standpoint from which to mount his attack. If only I could remove some of the dead trees blocking his vision of the beautiful night sky, he might take a chance and see what is beyond anarchism—I was certain, after all, that Lawrence defended post-left anarchy!, not some strategic anti-capitalist agenda. Is this the same person who once declared that “we can . . free ourselves from the historical baggage and the ideological and strategic constraints of all varieties of leftism.“ Where Lawrence is fooled is with his belief that a closer, more immediate, existence exists beneath the veil of capitalism, outside the confines of money. Contrarily, this is precisely where alienation and oppression pokes its ugly nose ever more: it is precisely when we believe that we are closer to an existence free from alienation and mediation that we become ever more alienated by the great return of Power. There is nothing to “discover”: egalitarianism, real affinity, friendships, solidarity and support networks all have within them a hidden rotten core as a side effect from the contamination of Power and the prospects of self-sacrifice. The pain is always there whether capitalism exists or not—but at least, within capitalism, we can expect the pain, in friendship and affinity we have only to discover it and to suffer all the more for having thought we found a place to escape! I can only ask you to consider a more personal example of this, one that I can share with you with the permission of my dearest frienemy Emma. In her words:

I was a member of an anarchist collective in Fredericton. Gradually, at meetings I would notice that people would not take anything that I had to say seriously. Instead they would give me funny looks, mock me, or ignore me outright. Eventually their actions became more explicit. Each day after our meetings I would come home in tears wondering what was wrong with me—why would they not take me seriously, why did they treat me so different from everybody else? Was it because I was the one of only two girls who were in the collective? Eventually I noticed that they treated the both of us the same way. It hurt so much and I couldn’t say anything because these were the people who were supposed to know better and who have supposedly created a space free from that sort of thing.

The point that Emma is making, I think, is that, as anarchists, we come to expect the state to mock us, taunt us, and hurt us and for that reason it hurts exactly as much as we come to expect. But, in all honesty, it probably hurts much less than it would if the same action was carried out by our comrades. And so, while we might agree with Lawrence’s premise that “General anarchist acquiescence to the predominance of these businesses as the defining projects of 21st century American anarchism cannot continue,” we will nonetheless have to do so with reliance on principles that lay somewhere outside of typical anarchist thought.

Despite all of this I agree with Lawrence when he says that “[t]here is an uncomfortable correlation between the desire to make anarchism (or anarchist ideas/projects/methods) more [popular], and the pursuits of anarchist businesses.”  Here I think that Lawrence is truly on to something: AK Press, for example, will no doubt want to justify their reportedly 1.4 million gross with the claim that their earnings demonstrate the sustained proliferation of anarchistic ideas and the subsequent rise to victory of anarchism over the general population of thought.  Such a position is, of course, inherently ideological in the sense that it is `meaning in the service of power`. AK Press, and businesses of the like, must construct some sort of fantasy in order to justify their approach—for instance, the claim might be made by AK that their increased earnings allow for more anarchist material to reach the public (and, of course, they only get a humble portion of the earnings – oh how they sacrifice for the cause!), especially books from diverse anarchist perspectives (from Bookchin to Zerzan and back to Chomsky). However, the books that operate under their chain of command can only be reduced, in the final analysis, to the dominate strategy espoused by the capitalist money-maker—this is the risk that anarchist writers take when they publish their work with any publisher, they risk having their ideas found guilty by association. Of course this is why we all, as writers, try to find a publisher that best matches our set of beliefs and principles. In any case, anarchism and power—which is exactly what 1.4 million dollars gives AK Press—are well acquainted friends. It is only when AK Press reports that they are against capitalism and that they sell books that are against capitalism that they can, paradoxically, become exactly what they purport to despise the most (interestingly, this is precisely what happens when people are stuck in the discourse of `alternatives`: arguments that go something like this: `yes, we are not perfect but..`). Moreover, it is precisely with their self-confessed clingage to “anarchist morality” that they have exorcised their rights to cease the distribution, and call for a boycott, of AJODA (if only to make room for more moralist bullshit).

I want to briefly reiterate my main points. Though I have no problem with Lawrence’s object of critique, the particular strategic and traditional anarchist ideas in his piece along with his flimsy championing of anarchist safe(r) spaces only produces ever more problems for people, for Emma in my example, who are drawn to anarchist thought and practice. One does not have to rely on flimsy authoritarian notions such as “friendship,” “real affinity,” and ‘unmediated existence’ in order to interrogate capitalist money makers such as AK Press; if only to stop helping the capitalist business, we must find a passage for escape. Despite meager attempts to force the discourse of structure atop the discourse of chaos, in the guise of anarchist safe spaces, chaos prevails.

Never Fully Yours,

Saint Schmidt