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Foreword

Looking Backward/Acting ForwardMyrna Margulies Breitbart

School of Critical Social Inquiry, Hampshire College, Amherst, MA, USA;[email protected]

This special issue of Antipode on “anarchist geography” is a welcome and long

overdue effort to demonstrate the centrality of anarchist thought and practice to

twenty-first century geography. The essays are rich with theoretical insight andpresent many important examples of transformative social practice. I am delighted

that the Editorial Collective took up the challenge of establishing the currency of

an anarchist perspective and am deeply honored to be asked to write this brief

foreword.

First Encounters with Kropotkin and AnarchistGeography

When I first stumbled upon the geographical writings of Kropotkin and Reclus as a

graduate student I wondered why we had been fed so much Christaller and VonThunen without ever encountering the work of these astonishingly prescient activist

geographers. As students immersed in anti-Vietnam war protests and anti-poverty

struggles, we began to question the role of our institutions of higher education

in social change and we initiated many conversations about how best to bring

relevance to our discipline. With classes such as “Capital, Volume One ” and “The

Geography of American Poverty”, we felt well schooled in critiques of capitalism

and thought we understood the geographic dimensions of inequality. What many

of us hungered for was more attention to how spatial relationships and alternative

uses of space might become vehicles for radical social change.The editors of this special issue rightly underscore how “social transformation

is . . . necessarily a spatial project” (Springer et al 2012: Introduction). The desire to

explore this potential is what captured our imaginations as students in the 1970s. As

young geographers we were especially interested in finding new ways to think about

space beyond its constraints, and to examine its potential as a partner in struggle.

We searched for theories, or rather, practices, that would move us closer to the

kind of society we envisioned—changes that did not necessarily depend on mass

movements and yet could ignite often incremental, yet important, transformations

of everyday work and living environments. These activities eventually led to the birth

of Antipode .

My personal interest in the connection between geographic theory and social

change was reflected in an early essay entitled “Impressions of an anarchist

Antipode Vol. 44 No. 5 2012 ISSN 0066-4812, pp 1579–1590 doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8330.2012.01037.xC 2012 The Author. Antipode C 2012 Antipode Foundation Ltd.


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landscape” (Breitbart 1975). In this short initial effort, I used Kropotkin’s and

Proudhon’s writings to extract some of the spatial implications of anarchist ideology

and developed very preliminary thoughts on what I thought of then as “a people’s

location theory” (Kropotkin 1927 [1905], 1974).1 Eventually my graduate research

focused on the Spanish Anarchist movement, where the role of space in radical

transformation was quite explicit (see Breitbart 1978). My dissertation began asan exploration of the practices of worker’s control and community-based forms

of decentralized planning in the USA. A turning point occurred in 1974 when a

member of the Black Rose collective in Cambridge, Massachusetts informed me of

an upcoming lecture by Sam Dolgoff 2 on Spanish anarchism, a movement about

which I knew nothing. I decided to go to this lecture with Maria Dolores Garcia-

Ramon, a post-doctoral colleague at Clark. Dolores had grown up in Barcelona when

Franco was still alive. Due to the suppression of information under the dictatorship,

she too knew little about the anarchist social revolution that accompanied the civil

war from 1936 to 1939.

Dolgoff shared inspiring examples of urban and rural collectivization at this talk,

and provided us with the names of Spanish anarchists who were still alive in exile in

southern France. He also spoke at length about the direct influence of geographers

Kropotkin and Reclus on the Spanish anarchist social revolution (Dolgoff 1974).

This naturally piqued my interest, and before long I found myself sitting in the

Institute of Social History in Amsterdam reading through documents that had been

transported out of Spain before Franco’s fascist army had the chance to destroy

them. I remember sitting at a desk and reading the 1936 Decree of Collectivization,

which, in spite of its title, was actually a counter-revolutionary effort on the part of

the coalition Republican government of Catalonia to bring worker collectivizationunder control. Before long I felt someone tap on my shoulder. In imperfect English

this very large older gentlemen smiled and pointed to the signature on the bottom of

the Decree. The comrade, Josep Tarradellas, then pointed to himself with great pride.

I wrote my dissertation on this movement following many extraordinary interviews

with such anarchists as José Peirats [a member of the Young Libertarians, editor

of Solidaridad Obrera, a member of the Durruti Column, and an active participant

in the CNT (Confederacion National de Trabajo)]; Federica Montseny (the Emma

Goldman of Spain, who was a poet, novelist and anarcha-feminist, and who made

a controversial decision to become Minister of Health for the coalition governmentduring the Civil War); Frank Mintz (a scholar of the Spanish anarchist collectives

active the French anarcho-syndicalist movement); Federico Arcos (another Spanish

anarchist who moved to Windsor, Ontario after the Civil War and compiled perhaps

the largest library of anarchist literature and art in the world); and Pura Perez

(Federico’s companera, who was also in the anarchist youth movement in Spain

and a lifelong anarcha-feminist involved in Mujeres Libres). A key lesson from their

rich teachings is to maintain the ideal of and hope for change even in the face of

unspeakable obstacles or total defeat. José Peirats and Federico Arcos captured this

best as they reflected, near the end of the twentieth century, on the conclusion of

the Spanish Revolution following the Civil War:

Two things have to be distinguished in a revolution: the constructive work of changing

people’s minds and economic circumstances, which is the result of an incorruptible

C 2012 The Author. Antipode C 2012 Antipode Foundation Ltd.


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integrity; and the historical outcome of the revolution itself. It is not always possible to

control the fate of a political revolution, which has its own laws of rise and decline. But

we can see to it that when the revolution is over there remain concrete, constructive

achievements. Perhaps this residue of permanent achievement is the only real and useful

revolution. Pity the revolution that devours itself in order to obtain victory. Pity the

revolution that waits for a final triumph to put its ideals into practice (Peirats 1990:189).

One of the things that Emma Goldman said that I remember well is that “Life without an

ideal is a spiritual death. When you cannot dream any longer, you die.” We are idealists;

we have an ideal and this is our life (Arcos interview in Pacific Street Films 2010).

Spending time with these individuals provided an education that far exceeded what

I was able to absorb from the historical literature. What struck me then, and has

remained with me since, is the seamless way in which their anarchism became their

very being, infusing every aspect of their lives. Anarchism was not a “philosophy”

or a “theory” to these individuals, though it could surely be theorized and written

about. It was a way of life that influenced how you conduct your relationships

with others, and how you work to expand arenas of freedom in collaboration withothers during your lifetime. Nearly all of the social anarchists I met as a geography

graduate student had a “day job” that was profoundly different from the larger task

to which they committed their lives as agents of radical social change. Sam Dolgoff,

translator of Bakunin into English, and the author of many books, including The

Cuban Revolution: A Critical Perspective (Dolgoff 1976), was a house painter by trade.

Federico Arcos worked for years in the Canadian offices of Ford Motor Company

while creating networks of communication among anarchists worldwide. The point

is that their essential identity and life’s work was not formed through their paid

occupation; it was molded by their lifelong activism and continuing promotion of an anarchist social agenda.

I returned to Clark inspired by the character and generosity of the many anarchists

I had met and whose stories I wanted to share. With the support of Richard Peet, I

began to compile essays for the first issue of Antipode on anarchist geography and

decentralism.

Where has Anarchist Geography Traveled Since?

Since the early issue of Antipode on “Anarchism and Environment”3

there havebeen sporadic essays and books published that deal explicitly with the topic of

“anarchist geography”, including several written by non-geographers (eg Clark and

Martin 2004; Dunbar 1978; Fleming 1979; Miller 1976; Ward 1974). The editors of

this special issue make a point, however, of referring to the “quiet” that followed

these early forays (Introduction). They discuss how Marxist, feminist, and post-

structuralist critiques have dominated, while the more recent worldwide financial

crisis and Occupy movements, once again, emphasize the relevance and insight

of anarchist approaches to human geography in struggles for social change. While

I surely concur with this latter point, I think the notion that anarchist geography

lay dormant between the late 1970s and the present, or was overshadowed by

other radical perspectives, requires more discussion that I will only allude to briefly

here. From my perspective, anarchist geography did move forward both outside



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and inside the discipline of geography and the academy post 1980. It is important

to examine the where and how of this forward movement if, in fact, the ideas and

actions that are its products are to be given primacy over disciplinary affiliations or

over the publications that disseminated them.

One place to begin is with a large international gathering of anarchists that took

place in Venice, Italy in September 1984. This event was significant for many reasons,not the least of which was its drawing of attention to the spatial dimensions of both

oppression and liberation. The event was sparked by the anniversary of George

Orwell’s 1984, and its goal was to bring together a diverse array of activists to reflect

upon the present and future of anarchism. The week-long event, held in numerous

outdoor public spaces of the city (including a large circus tent erected on a main

square), attracted hundreds of people and provided an extraordinary opportunity to

engage in dialogue with syndicalists and anarcho-communists, older veterans of the

Spanish Civil War, feminists, young punk anti-nuclear activists, municipalists, and

social ecologists. Geography was prominent at this event. Environmental justice,

nuclear proliferation, housing needs, and inequities in resource distribution were

central to discussions, as was the role of insurgent place-making, occupations of

public space, and the role of visible transformations of the built environment in

resistance, community organizing, and experimentation in sustainable land use and

planning. Local school children were brought to some of these events to learn

about anarchism. Videographers and graphic artists produced amazing visual art in

the streets, and everyone was fed from makeshift kitchens. It was here, at a picnic

table in the middle of a small square, that I first met Colin and Harriet Ward. Writing

about the event for The Guardian, Ward described the gathering as an opportunity

to seek “new directions for constructive anarchism, with the emphasis on buildingthe new in the shell of the old”.

My personal memory of the event is two-fold. On the one hand, I recall the

enormous disagreements that emerged in discussions about strategies for change.

On the other hand, the sharing of so many diverse perspectives, informed as they

were by differences of culture, race, age, and gender, also contributed to the

development of a more complex and richer base of knowledge that all participants

could draw upon to envision alternatives and further their critique of the existing

state of the world. While I attended this event with the lens of a geographer and an

academic, I left with a broader vision of who could contribute to the development of anarchist geography from outside as well as inside the discipline. This partly explains

why I am reluctant to agree with the editors of this special issue that geography lay

dormant after the late 1970s.4

Anarchists always look for the interstices and marginal spaces where there is the

possibility of doing things differently. This is another reason why I do not believe

that anarchism ever went into remission in geography. Rather, it seems that those

influenced by its tenets were drawn into various occupations and forms of direct

action both within and outside the university. Some activist scholars left the academy

altogether to pursue their activism or to move into spatial-related fields with a more

hands-on dimension such as planning, design, environmental education, or even

community organizing. Some, like myself, did find a home in academia where it

was possible to continue work towards radical social change both through teaching



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and through community-based work. In my own case, this was made easier by the

fact that my home institution, Hampshire College, was birthed in the 1960s as a

deliberately constructed undergraduate alternative to traditional hierarchical forms

of higher education.5

Many activists and scholars from outside the discipline of geography have

sought to demonstrate the underlying role of social domination and hierarchy inenvironmental destruction. Notable here are Ynestra King (1982, 1989), Gwyn Kirk

(1983, 1989, 1997, 1998) and Murray Bookchin (2005). Several of these individuals

participated in major occupations (eg the anti-cruise missile Women’s Peace Camps

at Greenham Common and the surrounding of the Pentagon of the 1980s). They

published not only in feminist journals but also in popular zines and pamphlets,

much as Kropotkin and Reclus did in their effort to reach a larger audience in the

late nineteenth and early twentieth century. In the introduction to the first Antipode

issue on “Anarchism and Environment”, I tried to make the point that anarchism

and feminism converge in many important areas, whether it is in attacks on all forms

of hierarchy and domination or in seeing the “personal” as “political”. I still believe

that it is important not to draw clear demarcations between feminist and anarchist

contributions to geography, but rather look at their intersections. Similarly, while

there are some very clear distinctions to be made between anarchism and Marxism

in geography, the lines separating radical perspectives sometimes blur. This point is

implicit in the essay that Richard White and Colin Williams (2012) have written for

this special issue where they discuss the extensive work of J.K. Gibson-Graham and

the ongoing Community Economies project.6 This important body of work focuses

on developing a theory and practice of a post-neoliberal economic future using

extensive examples of already existing and viable cooperative economic and socialpractices. Many facets of this work converge with the aims of anarchist geography.

Other spatial practitioners, such as architect and educator, Colin Ward,

emphasized the importance of liberatory education as the core of anarchism’s

revolutionary project, and then worked to significantly alter secondary school and

college level art and geography curricula. Ward (1978), numerous public scholars

concerned with environmental activism and youth empowerment (eg Cahill 2006;

Chawla 2002; Hart 1997; Hart, Selim and Beeton 2006), and geographers (eg

Breitbart, 1995, 1997; Breitbart and Kepes 2007) worked to challenge traditional

in-classroom approaches to learning. Like Ward, they establish imagination andcritical inquiry through the study of the built environment as the very foundation

for meaningful citizenship. From my perspective, this project carries Kropotkin’s

ideas set out in the essay “What geography ought be” (Kropotkin 1885) forward

by pioneering hands-on participatory research that builds on young people’s

innate curiosity and familiarity with their immediate surroundings. Such approaches

establish a crucial role for geography in social justice activism at a local level by

building the research and critical inquiry skills of local residents of all ages, and

by developing the capacity of local neighborhoods to articulate needs and desires

while claiming space for alternative approaches to housing, cultural production, and

economic development.

Colin Ward and several of the practitioners named above did not generally publish

in academic journals, preferring to write for a more general audience. In Ward’s case



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this included classroom teachers with whom he founded the Bulletin of Environmental

Education as a vehicle to present examples of radical teaching practice. Ward also

helped to start several Urban Studies Centres in the UK, where new ideas and

creative practices could be collected for use. Many geographers post 1970 have

continued to challenge educational hierarchies and sought to break down the

borders between the academy and the community, as Farhang Rouhani (2012)describes in this special issue. Continuing the work of the Venice gathering, they

challenge restrictions to imaginative and fruitful critical inquiries that are erected

through the maintenance of strict disciplinary boundaries.

I realize that I may be accused here of favoring the work of those who identify

with social anarchism as a practice or “way of life”, viewing geography as a helpful

means to a radical end, over others who maintain more of an academic interest in

anarchism and a strong loyalty to promoting the discipline. In either case, we have

evolved to the point where interdisciplinarity is no longer a luxury but a necessity

if we are to fuel struggles for social justice and better understand global change

and the exercise of power. As geographers, we have a lot to contribute to this

epistemological mix.

Multiple Agendas for the Future of AnarchistGeographyThe simple point that anarchist geography continues to develop our understanding

of human/environment relationships, and exerts influence on theories and practices

of social change from outside as well as inside the discipline says little about where

it might go in the future. The authors in this special issue lay a basis for building anagenda that could reanimate radical geography through the application of social

anarchist principles. I want to underscore the importance of adopting this agenda

and also highlight a few areas where we could devote considerably more attention:

(1) radical pedagogy; (2) use of space for resistance and the incubation of alternative

social structures; and (3) dissemination of new ideas and spatial/social practices.

Radicalizing Pedagogy

The first of these areas was touched upon above and is addressed by severalcontributors to this special issue, as they point to the importance of denying any

false dichotomy between the academy as space of knowledge production and the

community as a site of struggle. We must not leave our own institutional structures

outside critique or beyond an agenda for change as we theorize and participate in

various autonomous movements for social justice outside the academy. This means

challenging tenure, research and teaching practices within the academy that restrict

definitions and sources of knowledge production, and that penalize or fail to value

research that is collaboratively generated or actively involves the community outside

the university. Challenging standard research practice and routes to tenure involves

questioning restrictions on what we write, where we publish, and who we partner

with in our writing. With respect to in-classroom teaching we must bring our own

approaches to the classroom into line with anarchist teaching methods that value



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the innate curiosity of students and their different ways of learning and approaches

to knowledge. We must, in short, do what Simon Springer (2012) suggests in this

special issue, and explore the untapped potential of anarchist praxis. This requires a

broadening of the possibilities for more cross-disciplinary teaching, the restructuring

of in-classroom learning using non-hierarchical methods, and support for what is

now called “engaged learning” outside the classroom. With respect to the latter, many colleges now promote community internships

as co-curricular forms of learning. Few, however, give real academic credit for

such experiences or require the kind of reflection that enables students to truly

integrate their out-of-classroom learning with their in-classroom work. Fewer, still,

allow community members outside the university to drive the research agenda;

nor do colleges generally prepare students and faculty to address community-

defined agendas in ways that benefit the community directly in their everyday

survival struggles. Community organizations challenge unequal and exploitative

community/college relationships and seek reciprocity as they assume a role in the

engaged learning of our students. Those of us who promote engaged learning

need to give serious consideration to how we might forge more effective local and

global partnerships that support struggles for social justice while also addressing the

educational needs of our students.

To answer this challenge, we can continue to extend the legacy of Colin Ward and

others who believe that the immediate neighborhood environments that we inhabit

provide fertile ground for critical learning and active engagement. At the same

time, we must require our institutions to become responsible citizens as opposed

to predatory land grabbers. We must also find ways to make the work we do,

and the resources our institutions have, more accessible and more relevant to theneeds of the larger surrounding community (everything from providing meeting

space; the opportunity to take or teach classes; access to computers and on-

campus events; community product purchasing agreements, etc . to encouraging

a greater community influence over our curricula and access to free consultancy

services).7

Another imperative is to recast rather traditional practices, such as academic

conferences, to better serve the needs of the larger community. Several years ago

the radical Planner’s Network, directed then by Ken Reardon, asked my institution to

host their next conference. Our response was to approach a number of community-based partner organizations in Holyoke, Massachusetts to ask if they would co-

sponsor the event with us. In the end, they set the whole agenda for the conference

around their own interests, which were to elicit ideas from planners on how to

overcome political and social obstacles to addressing the needs of lower income

Latino residents, and to create an environment in which the city could be defined not

by its deficiencies and the historical obsolescence, but by the innovative community-

building initiatives underway. The title they chose to represent these goals was

“Bridging divides and building futures in historic cities”. Community partners

went on to organize entire sessions, host participants on city tours of designated

community-based projects, and arrange a dinner catered by local restaurants that

included dance performances by local youth and a night of salsa. Only the first



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welcoming session was held in the auditorium of the college; the remainder was

held in the city of Holyoke (15 miles from campus), focusing on the work of

community-based organizations, who directly challenged attendees to help them

address key planning dilemmas.

Like so many of my colleagues, I share the experience of living in a liminal space,

one foot inside and the other outside the college. None of this personal history or a call for “exploding the school”—Colin Ward’s and Anthony Fyson’s (1973) term

for valuing and seeking knowledge outside the traditional classroom—is meant

to suggest that geography as a discipline would not benefit from a more active

engagement with anarchist spatial theory, particularly one as open to variety and

methodological interpretation as this special issue. It is to suggest, rather, that this

larger project expand to include more extensive and deliberate application of critical

pedagogical practices and outcomes to teaching and engaged research.

Creating Spaces for Resistance and the Incubation of Alternative Structures

We know that space is key to enforcing inequality, oppression and the exercise of

power in all of its many forms. Using the landscape and built environment to reveal

and educate on the issue of social injustice is central to building a movement for

change, as the first WTO protests in Seattle and the current Occupations illustrate.

As geographers, we need to do much more, however, to develop and document

decentralist alternatives.

In a short pamphlet entitled The Relevance of Anarchism to Modern Society ,

Sam Dolgoff (1989 [1970]) argued that the increased complexity of society madeanarchism more rather than less relevant. The focus was not to be on some distant

future utopia but rather on the stimulation of those forces “propelling society in

an anarchist direction” through the “practical application of anarchist principles to

the realities of social living”. Errico Malatesta (1965) said essentially the same thing

when he argued strongly for the importance of generating concrete examples of

how to live differently and collectively. Social anarchists are not in the business of

prescribing blueprints for a new society or the landscape that would support it.

They believe that social and spatial alternatives must emerge from specific historical

circumstances as well as local needs and desires. That said, there is a lot to bedone and more that can be documented in the pages of journals like Antipode

to bring attention to grassroots mobilizations that successfully subvert planning

agendas promoted by private developers or the state, and that create new spaces

for resistance and experimentation with alternative social, economic and cultural

formations.

The editors of this special issue point out that anarchism is a “philosophy of

everyday life” and at times “a tool for survival, well-being, and social change”

(Introduction). We need to identify and examine examples that illustrate this value

more closely, evaluate the elements that present obstacles or contribute to their

success, and theorize from this analysis. Drawing attention to positive examples of

even small spaces within which cooperative and heterodox forms of production,

distribution or consumption take place can expand our notions of efficiency.



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Examining the intricacies of new networks and federations established to aid

resistance movements, anchor a new economic base, or enable living arrangements

and cultural exchange that is more responsive to people’s needs and desires expands

the range of mechanisms available to promote freedom and achieve greater social

justice. Aided by technology, even small-scale examples can suggest new avenues for

labor and political organizing across borders. They can also promote the dismantlingof overly “ordered” landscapes that restrict the use of public space and exercise social

control.

The emphasis of anarchist geography on decentering knowledge has led to many

critiques of spatial planning. In the effort to demonstrate the efficacy of alternatives,

we should be documenting and evaluating more examples of participatory planning

and design processes, especially those that build on local assets and provide a means

for residents to better articulate their needs and desires. Anarchist geography must

continue to develop arguments against the practice of state-centered planning while

simultaneously demanding access to resources that enable the decentralization of

decision-making and support the reclamation by residents of public space. New

models of regional exchange, and new designs for flexible space that allows for

multiple and changing uses are also key.

Given the growing number of transnational communities in cities that are

characterized by heterogeneous cultural geographies, how might we identify those

structures and places where difference in the very conduct of daily life is effectively

negotiated without the intervention of the state? As more people choose or are

forced to move across borders, how can spaces emerge to best accommodate their

needs, and how do new attachments to place evolve or fail to evolve in the context

of neoliberal agendas? I am clearly not alone in identifying these topics as relevantto the future of anarchist geography (see, for example, Chatterton 2006; Pickerill

and Chatterton 2006, among many others).

Dissemination of New Ideas and Spatial/Social Practices Anarchists who were so successful in generating a movement for widespread change

in Spain prior to and in the midst of the Civil War pursued many different strategies

to share and build upon their ideas. They recognized that real and lasting change

had to start with the individual and move people on an emotional as well as factuallevel. This is why it was not uncommon for so many inspirational activists of the

late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries to combine journalistic and scholarly

writing with more artistic forms of expression. Federica Montseny’s family, for

example, started an important literary journal, La Revista , which published fictional

stories of people that illustrated both their imperfections and their potential. Such

writing inspired the imagination and provided a canvas upon which concrete

examples of non-hierarchical relationships, mutual aid, and the types of built

environments that could support these alternatives could be introduced. Kropotkin

functioned as a traditional academic geographer writing essays and books, and

delivering papers at professional conferences until his arrest while reading a paper

on the orography of mountain ranges in Europe. While in prison, he began to

write short pamphlets that could be more widely distributed and draw in a larger



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audience. These provided compelling examples of effective forms of collaboration

in work and social life that he observed in his travels among the Jura watchmakers

of Switzerland and the peasant communities of Siberia. The future of anarchist

geography still depends on where and how the ideas it generates are distributed.

Seeking a home for new ideas in academic publications is important but how

can we work to radicalize the process of getting ideas into print? Writing can be avery solitary and lonely act. This is one reason why I often co-author my writing.

Like co-teaching, a collaborative writing process affords an opportunity to push

oneself beyond a narrow sphere and consider different perspectives. For those of

us who work in the academy and are also involved in struggles within the larger

local or global community, co-writing can help to bridge the divide. For me, this

is not about “giving others a voice”. It is about opening ourselves up to a more

complex understanding of issues by incorporating experiences and knowledge that

literally emerge from a different place . Colin Ward occasionally co-wrote pieces and

also started an entirely new journal, Bulletin of Environmental Education, in order to

incorporate the ideas and practices of teachers working to introduce more freedom

of exploration into their curricula. This brought spatially oriented academics together

with on-the-ground educators in the invention of a new environmental practice.

There are now whole movements in academia to legitimize “public scholarship”,

as exemplified by the work of Imagining America in promoting knowledge making

about, for, and with diverse publics and communities.8 As practitioners of engaged

learning, this organization directly challenges elitist ideas about publication and

introduces new forms of critical pedagogy that attack the heart of hierarchical

university structures.

As geographers we have an obvious affinity already for representing the world invisual format through maps. The folks who produce An Atlas of Radical Cartography

(Mogel and Bhagat 2008) have found an especially effective way of bridging

activism and geography through art and design. They employ visual formats to

challenge our perceptions of the world through new representations of relationships

of power and their effects.9 These visual documents provoke debate and suggest

the potential of alternative forms of decentralized organization (eg networks and

federations). Taken together with other creative forms of idea dissemination, they

challenge us to think more about the important role of art, culture, and creative

interventions in social change. They encourage us to consider new venues fromwhich we might interrogate and disseminate the ideas and practices that emerge

from this special issue of Antipode as well as from any future efforts to promote the

further development of anarchist geography.

Endnotes1 The search for relevance also led us to many out-of-classroom involvements. In the Pioneer

Valley of western Massachusetts, we formed an anarchist affinity group with an eclectic arrayof colleagues that included Murray Bookchin and many notable anarchist feminists such as

Ynestra King and Martha Ackelsberg, among many others.

2 Sam Dolgoff was an anarcho-syndicalist and member of the IWW (Industrial Workers of the World) who translated Bakunin’s writings and material about the anarchist social revolutionin Spain into English. He also wrote several books, including one on the role of anarchists inthe Cuban revolution.



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3 See volume 10, issue 3 and volume 11, issue 1 of Antipode .4 I am also reminded of the 1976 Swiss film by director Alain Tanner, For Jonah Who Will Be 25 in the Year 2000. The action takes place in Europe in the aftermath of the 1968 studentprotest movements and other forms of radical resistance. The characters, who are in their 20sand 30s, go about their lives while trying to keep elements of this radical period alive in verypersonal and individual ways. The characters who come quickly to mind are a high-school

teacher who shares his theories of class struggle and inequality with his young students byremoving a long sausage from his briefcase and slicing it up to illustrate divisions of wealth;and a young checkout clerk at a grocery who gives unauthorized Robin Hood-like discountsto customers she believes deserve a little break. The film poses the question of what happensto ideals that are soundly dismissed and suppressed by the powers that be. Jonah, the youngson of one of the protagonists, represents the hope that radical ideals can be kept alive and

furthered in small ways even when the status quo seems to be winning. Jonah’s message, likethe later writing of de Certeau (1984), acknowledges the potential for resistance and changein modest everyday moments.5 Hampshire gives no grades, only narrative evaluation of portfolios of work, has no tenure,employs an equity salary model, and allows faculty to teach or co-teach whatever they wantwith whomever they want. Students assume a great deal of responsibility for their own

educations and faculty become learners as well as teachers. Interdisciplinarity is the norm,and so once I arrived in 1977, I was no longer a “geographer”; I reside in the School of SocialScience (recently renamed by faculty as the School of Critical Social Inquiry).6 See http://www.communityeconomies.org/home7 One example is an office recently established at the Syracuse University that provides

free GIS mapping and community design services to any non-profit community-basedorganization.8 See http://www.imaginingamerica.com9 See http://www.an-atlas.com/contents.html

ReferencesBookchin M (1995) The Ecology of Freedom. Oakland: AK PressBreitbart M (1975) Impressions of an anarchist landscape. Antipode 7(2)Breitbart M (1978) “The theory and practice of anarchist decentralism in Spain, 1936–1939:

The integration of community and environment.” Unpublished PhD dissertation, ClarkUniversity

Breitbart M (1995) Banners for the street: Reclaiming space and designing change with urban youth. Journal of Planning Education and Research 15(1)

Breitbart M (1997) Dana’s mystical tunnel: Young people’s designs for survival and changein the city. In T Skelton and G Valentine (eds) Cool Paces: Geographies of Youth Cultures (pp 305–327). London: Routledge

Breitbart M and Kepes I (2007) The Youth Power story: How adults can better support young people’s sustained participation in community-based planning. Children, Youth and Environments 17(2)

Cahill C (2006) “At risk?” The Fed Up Honeys re-present the gentrification of the Lower EastSide. Women’s Studies Quarterly 34(1/2)

Chatterton P (2006) “Give up activism” and change the world in unknown ways, or, Learningto walk with others on uncommon ground. Antipode 38:259–281

Chawla L (2002) Growing Up in an Urbanizing World . Oxford: EarthscanClark J and Martin C (2004) Anarchy, Geography, Modernity: The Radical Social Thought of

Elis ́ ee Reclus . New York: Lexington BooksDe Certeau M (1984) The Practice of Everyday Life. Berkeley: University of California PressDolgoff S (1974) The Anarchist Collectives: Workers’ Self-Management in the Spanish Revolution

1936–1939. New York: Free Life EditionsDolgoff S (1976) The Cuban Revolution: A Critical Perspective . Montreal: Black Rose BooksDolgoff S (1989 [1970]) The Relevance of Anarchism to Modern Society . Chicago: Charles

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Dunbar G (1978) Elis ́ ee Reclus, Historian of Nature . Hamden, CT: Archon BooksFleming M (1979) The Anarchist Way to Socialism: Elis ́ ee Reclus and Nineteenth-Century

European Anarchism. London: Croom HelmHart R (1997) Children’s Participation: The Theory and Practice of Involving Young Citizens in

Community Development and Environmental Care . London: EarthscanHart Rwith Selim I and Beeton P (2006) Undesigning For Children: Creating Space for Free Play

and Informal Learning in Community Gardens . New York: Design Trust for Public SpacesKing Y (1982) Feminism and the revolt of nature. Heresies 13(4):12–16King Y (1989) Healing the wounds: Feminism, ecology and the nature/culture dualism.

In A Jaggar (ed) Gender/Body/Knowledge: Feminist Reconstructions of Being and Knowing (pp 115–141). New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press

Kirk G (1983) Greenham Women Everywhere: Dreams, Ideas and Actions from the Women’s Peace Movement. London: Pluto Press

Kirk G (1989) Our Greenham Common: Feminism and nonviolence, and, Not just a placebut a movement. In A Harris and Y King(eds) Rocking the Ship of State: Towards a Feminist Peace Politics (pp 115–130; 239–252). Boulder: Westview Press

Kirk G (1997) Ecofeminism and environmental justice: Bridges across gender, race, and class.Frontiers: A Journal of Women’s Studies 18(2):2–20

Kirk G (1998) Ecofeminism and the Chicano environmental movement: Bridges across gender and race. In D Peña (ed) Chicano Culture, Ecology, Politics: Subversive Kin (pp 177–200).Tucson: University of Arizona Press

Kropotkin P (1885) What geography ought to be. The Nineteenth Century 18:940–956Kropotkin P (1927 [1905]) Anarchism. In The Encyclopedia Britannica . New York: BaldwinKropotkin P (1974) Field, Factories and Workshops Tomorrow (ed C Ward). London: Allen and

UnwinMalatesta E (1965) Life and Ideas. London: Freedom PressMiller M (1976) Kropotkin. Chicago: University of Chicago PressMogel L and Bhagat A (2008) An Atlas of Radical Cartography . Los Angeles: Journal of

Aesthetics and Protest PressPacific Street Films (2010) A Relentless Vision (a/k/a The Suitcase): The Legacy of Emma

Goldman, Federico Arcos and the Spanish Revolution. Cambridge, MA: Pacific Street Filmshttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHHchKNfgM4 (last accessed 6 July 2012)

Peirats J (1990) Anarchists in the Spanish Revolution. London: Freedom PressPickerill J and Chatterton P (2006) Notes towards autonomous geographies: Creation,

resistance and self management as survival tactics. Progress in Human Geography 30(6):1–17

Rouhani F (2012) Practice what you teach: Placing anarchism in and out of the classroom.Antipode this issue

Springer S (2012) Anarchism! What geography still ought to be. Antipode this issueSpringer S, Ince A, Pickerill J, Brown G and Barker A (2012) Reanimating anarchist geographies:

A new burst of colour. Antipode this issue

Ward C (ed) (1974) Peter Kropotkin Fields, Factories and Workshops Tomorrow . New York:Harper Torchbooks

Ward C (1978) The Child in the City . London: Architectural Press Ward C and Fyson A (1973) The Exploding School . London: Routledge White R J and Williams C C (2012) The pervasive nature of heterodox economic spaces at a

time of neo-liberal crisis: Towards a “post-neoliberal” anarchist future. Antipode this issue



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Reanimating Anarchist Geographies:A New Burst of Colour

Simon SpringerDepartment of Geography, University of Victoria, Victoria, BC, Canada;

[email protected]

Anthony Ince

School of Geographical and Earth Sciences, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, UK

Jenny Pickerill, Gavin Brown and Adam J. Barker

Department of Geography, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK

Abstract: The late nineteenth century saw a burgeoning of geographical writings frominfluential anarchist thinkers like Peter Kropotkin and Élisée Reclus. Yet despite the vigorousintellectual debate sparked by the works of these two individuals, following their deathsanarchist ideas within geography faded. It was not until the 1970s that anarchism wasonce again given serious consideration by academic geographers who, in laying thegroundwork for what is today known as “radical geography”, attempted to reintroduceanarchism as a legitimate political philosophy. Unfortunately, quiet followed once more,and although numerous contemporary radical geographers employ a sense of theory and

practice that shares many affinities with anarchism, direct engagement with anarchist ideasamong academic geographers have been limited. As contemporary global challenges pushanarchist theory and practice back into widespread currency, geographers need to rise tothis occasion and begin (re)mapping the possibilities of what anarchist perspectives might

yet contribute to the discipline.

Keywords: anarchism, anarchist geographies, direct action, everyday life, mutual aid,radical geography

In the late 1970s Antipode published issues on the environment and anarchism which, in

retrospect, were the last bursts of colour in the fall of its 1960s-style radicalism (Richard

Peet and Nigel Thrift 1989:6).

The relationship between anarchism and the academic discipline of geography has

a long and disjointed history. The late nineteenth century saw a burgeoning of

geographical writings from influential anarchist thinkers like Peter Kropotkin (Morris

2003) and Élisée Reclus (Fleming 1996). Yet in spite of the vigorous intellectual

debate sparked by the works of these two individuals, following their deaths in

the early twentieth century, anarchist ideas within geography faded. It was not

until the 1970s that anarchism was once again given serious consideration by

academic geographers who, in laying the groundwork for what is today known as

“radical geography”, attempted to reintroduce anarchism as a legitimate political

philosophy. Unfortunately, quiet followed once more, and although numerous

contemporary radical geographers employ a sense of theory and practice that shares

Antipode Vol. 44 No. 5 2012 ISSN 0066-4812, pp 1591–1604 doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8330.2012.01038.xC 2012 The Authors. Antipode C 2012 Antipode Foundation Ltd.


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many affinities with anarchism, direct engagement with anarchist ideas among

geographers have been limited and largely overshadowed by the popularity of

Marxist, feminist, and more recently poststructuralist critiques. This special issue

proceeds from the perspective that as contemporary global challenges—such as

the most recent financial crisis and the ensuing Occupy Movement—push anarchist

theory and practice back into widespread currency, geographers need to rise tothis occasion and begin (re)mapping the possibilities of what anarchist perspectives

might yet contribute to the discipline. In this light, we have sought to develop

an exploratory volume, where explicitly and unashamedly anarchist approaches

to human geography can be allowed to blossom in all their wonderful plurality.

Accommodating a diversity of positionalities demands an unconstrained and eclectic

embrace, and accordingly we understand the potentialities of anarchist praxis as

protean and manifold. Through the unfolding and variegated approach that this

special issue maintains, we seek to expose readers to a variety of epistemological,

ontological, and methodological interpretations of anarchism, unencumbered by

the strict disciplining frameworks that characterize other political philosophies, and

purposefully open to contradiction and critique.

The world we inhabit has changed significantly since 1978 when the last Antipode

special issue on anarchism was published (see Breitbart 1978b). To suggest that

human societies have undergone intense social, economic, cultural, and political

transformations in the interim is a profound understatement. The emergence of

neoliberal ideology and its consolidation as the dominant economic system has

radically reshaped the globe, intensifying already existing uneven geographies

and resulting in a new level of complexity as established political structures,

modes of governmentality, identity categories, economic matrixes, subjectivities,institutional frameworks, juridical processes, and epistemological positions are all

being remade. The apparent victory of laissez-faire neoliberalism and the fall of the

Soviet Union in the early 1990s shattered the assumed centrality of the state in

the practice of political economy and governance, yet it also gave succor to new

and sometimes terrifying modes of state control. Likewise, whereas the cheerleaders

of capitalism’s apparent victory over so-called communism initially declared the

end of history (Fukuyama 1992), we have instead seen capitalism morph and flex

over the years, creating new and unforeseen constellations of exploitation and

struggle. Despite such acute political economic and sociocultural transformations,the possibilities that anarchist geographies might hold for geographical scholarship

and broader strategies of political action are, to us, as relevant and potent as

ever. The selective memories of humanity’s past, the impoverished dialogues of the

present, and the static visions of a supposedly predetermined future that pervade

both academic and popular discourses are a testament to the paucity of the

political imagination in the current conjuncture. While neoliberal apostles of

the post-political consensus imagine that our world is best served by the

achievement of an integrated global village (M. Friedman 2002 [1962]; T.

Friedman 1999; Hayek 2001 [1944]), and geographers have responded with a

variety of critiques (Brenner and Theodore 2003; Castree et al 2010; England

and Ward 2007; Gibson-Graham 1996; Hart 2008; Harvey 2005; Peck 2010;

Smith, Stenning and Willis 2008; Springer 2010; Swyngedouw 2011), we are

C 2012 The Authors. Antipode C 2012 Antipode Foundation Ltd.


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left with a sense of disappointment that our discipline, as of late, has not been

even more radical in its response. While it is true that most critical geographers

are willing to go further than simply repackaging neoliberalism with a smiling

face, much of the socialist left appears bereft of ideas beyond a state-regulated

capitalism.

Social transformation is, of course, necessarily a spatial project, and a spatialdimension to the effective critique of existing structures is an important element of

imagining and forging spaces for new ones. Accordingly, we remain deeply cynical

of those ostensibly “radical” views that leave the prescriptions and authority of the

state firmly intact. Without appreciating the infinite possibilities that actually exist

if we only had the collective courage and freedom to explore them, we are left

with an all too limited vision of the geographical horizons of human organization.

We must similarly remain attentive to the idea that adaptations and abuses of state

power are intrinsic not only to neoliberalism and capitalism more generally (Peck

2001), but also to Marxism in its traditional sense. In the face of the sheer enormity

of the bloodshed that came with communist projects in the former Soviet Union,

Maoist China, and Pol Pot’s Cambodia, and the conflict, othering, and violence that

is facilitated by a Westphalian system of sovereign rule, we long for and are actively

committed to procuring alternative socio-spatial arrangements wherein people are

liberated from all forms of domination and are free to collectively make of themselves

what they will. While we are keen to critique Marxist-Leninism in all its various guises,

we acknowledge that there are heterodox Marxists working with more autonomist

and libertarian ideas that share similar concerns and are far less antithetical to

anarchist approaches. At the same time, we recognize that it is incorrect to suggest—

as post-left anarchists like Fredy Perlman (1983) have argued—that if we simplychoose to act differently then society will magically transform into a post-capitalist,

post-statist world. Anarchist thinkers have long interrogated complex matrices of

control and surveillance, highlighting the ways in which the agents of state and

capital converge to produce powerful regimes of containment or straightforward

obliteration of their political opponents (Graham 2005, 2009; Guérin 2005; Marshall

1992; Woodcock 2004). Indeed, Daniel Guérin’s (2010 [1936]) careful tracing of the

synergies between the rise of European fascism in the 1930s and the organizational

and disciplinary logic of the capitalist state can be read as a powerful warning from

history in the current context of recession, unrest, and the re-emergence of the far right.

Thus, anarchist approaches to understanding and acting in society operate in

a tension between an assertion of peoples’ agency to collectively self-manage

their affairs on the one hand, and the everyday matrices of power that constrain

autonomy, solidarity and equality on the other. However, anarchism is also a

philosophy that is healthily sceptical of analysis for its own sake, and combines

its powerful critique of capital and authority with a creative and decentralized

mode of praxis. So while we recognize the importance of utopian thought, we

are not content to dwell exclusively in the realm of ideas, and advocate for the

importance of direct action in changing for the better the material conditions of

our own lives as well as the lives of others (Graeber 2009). Notwithstanding the

now-clichéd refrain that anarchists were at the creative centre of the movements



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against neoliberal globalisation around the turn of the twenty-first century, anarchist

thought and action has profoundly influenced contemporary society in a much

more long-term and subcutaneous sense. The proliferation of wikis, peer-to-peer

file-sharing and open-source software; the continued popularity of the co-operative

movement, tenants’ associations and trade and credit unions; and a host of small-

scale mutual aid groups, networks and initiatives—these have, all to varying extents,been pioneered, inspired or run by anarchists. Our perception of anarchism’s role in

the world is, however, in direct proportion to our understanding of what anarchism is

and where (or how) it takes place. Although at times it may appear that anarchism is

chiefly (or solely) manifested in occasional spectacular riots on the streets of Athens,

Prague, London and Seattle, papers in this special issue indicate that anarchism is

a philosophy of everyday life, ingrained in its practitioners as a tool for survival,

wellbeing and social change. It is worth noting that, perhaps precisely due to the

legacy of Reclus and Kropotkin, anarchist geographers have tended to shy away

from engaging with the more insurrectionary approaches to anarchism, where

instead anarchism has been understood as a living breathing process that is acutely

implicated in our shared histories, our present circumstances, and our collective

futures. In this special issue, a broad understanding of anarchism is deployed to

demonstrate how it—much like other political philosophies—is a multi-vocal and

developing terrain, contested both from within and without.

We draw two particular exceptions to our conceptualization of anarchism precisely

because they rest upon confusions of ideology. First, we reject the crude rhetoric that

failed states are somehow representative of “anarchy”. Anarchism is not synonymous

with chaos and collapse, but is instead about “enacting horizontal networks

instead of top-down structures like states, parties, or corporations; networks basedon principles of decentralized, non-hierarchical consensus democracy” (Graeber

2002:70). The “failed state as anarchy” narrative is particularly misleading when

we consider James Sidaway’s (2003) contention that the failure of certain states

may be regarded as arising not from an absence of sovereign authority, but rather

as an excess of this exact logic. Second, we also reject the efforts of so-called

“anarcho-capitalists” and “right-libertarians” to appropriate anarchism, since the

political system that they propose, while calling for a reduction in or removal

of the workings of the state, is nonetheless premised upon a twisted neo-Social

Darwinism that promotes an atomistic “survival of the fittest” approach to sociallife. “Free market anarchism” is an ideology entrenched in the very system of

dominance and exploitation that anarchists have been fighting to overturn; it

is capitalism in its most quintessential form, and thus, if we are to appreciate

the historical trajectory and philosophical basis of anarchism as a variant of

socialist thought, “anarcho-capitalism” is a misnomer that represents the exact

opposite of what anarchism is all about. Instead, we understand anarchism as a

branch of political thought and action that promotes the collective, egalitarian,

and democratic self-management of everyday life. For anarchists, this necessarily

requires the dismantling of unequal power relations in all their forms, and is

manifested through practices of voluntary cooperation, reciprocal altruism, and

mutual aid.



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A Whirlwind Tour of Anarchist GeographiesGiven the implicit geographical framework laid down for anarchism by early

anarchists like Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (2008 [1840]) and Mikhail Bakunin (1990

[1873]) with their respective critiques of property and the state, it is perhaps

somewhat unsurprising that two of anarchism’s most celebrated thinkers, Élisée

Reclus and Peter Kropotkin, were also geographers. Reclus’s (1876–1894) primarycontribution was his emancipatory vision outlined in The Earth and its Inhabitants:

The Universal Geography where he imagined a merger between humanity and the

Earth itself. In seeking to assist humanity to discover deeper emotional meaning

by recognizing itself as but one historical being in the flowering of a greater

planetary consciousness, he bravely sought to abolish all forms of domination,

which were to be replaced with practices of engaged love and active compassion

among all animals, both human and non-human (Clark and Martin 2004). Although

he considered Reclus as a mentor, Kropotkin (2008 [1902]) is today the more

famous of the two “classical” anarchist geographers, having published the highlyinfluential Mutual Aid: A Factor in Evolution, which is regarded as a landmark in

the development of anarchism’s political philosophy. Kropotkin’s views were at

least partially a response to the Social Darwinism of his time, where he sought to

provide a scientific basis to the idea that a more harmonious way of life rooted in

cooperation as opposed to competition was not only possible, but that this was in

fact the natural order of things. His ideas were explicitly geographical, and differed

greatly from the industrial imagination of Marxists, as Kropotkin placed his emphasis

on decentralized organization, rural life, agriculture, and local production, which he

maintained would remove any need for a central government and would allow for

self-sufficiency. While anarchism remained a vibrant philosophical vehicle for radical politics into

the twentieth century, its intersections with geographical thought became less

overt. Emma Goldman (1969 [1917]), while not a geographer, nonetheless brought

anarchist geographies in a new direction, focusing on institutional structures of

domination beyond the state itself by injecting an embodied focus into her

critique in advocating free love, criticizing marriage, and admonishing homophobia.

Throughout the 1960s, having been strongly influenced by the ethical naturalism

of Reclus, Murray Bookchin (2004 [1971]) popularized his ecological and libertarian

ideas among the New Left and counterculture movements through a series of innovative essays that were later compiled in Post-Scarcity Anarchism. Colin Ward

(1982 [1973]) was also increasingly active around this time, publishing a number

of books that once again brought anarchism into conversation with geography,

including his well known book Anarchy in Action. Most of Ward’s work focused

on issues of housing and planning laws, where the solutions he proposed were

clearly influenced by Kropotkin, including recommendations to rescind authoritarian

methods of socio-spatial organization in favour of non-hierarchical forms of solidarity

(White and Wilbert 2011).

By the early 1970s some geographers had begun to notice the wider anarchist

currents happening outside of academic geography. Richard Peet (1975) is not

only responsible for getting this very journal off the ground, he also used its pages



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to argue that the newly emerging “radical geography” should take Kropotkin’s

version of anarchism as its new beginning. Myrna Brietbart (1975) similarly looked

to Kropotkin, while also drawing on Proudhon, to contend that the organization

of human landscapes should be based upon principles that benefit everyone living

upon them and not just a privileged few. A year later, Bob Galois (1976) did much

the same, invoking anarchism to make a claim for deeper radicalization in geographyby rethinking its past and particularly the influence of Kropotkin. He argued that

the linear and cumulative stories that had been passed down right through to the

positivist revolution were but one single account in a multitude of possibilities,

and that by restricting our view of geography’s history we limited contemporary

methods of enquiry and predetermined what questions were even worthwhile

asking. Radicalizing geography thus meant digging deeper into our collective past

and interrogating our inherited beliefs and traditions without prejudice, so that

something altogether new and emancipatory might evolve.

Encouraged by these exhortations, Breitbart (1978b) brought anarchist geogra-

phies centre stage within the pages of Antipode , organizing a series of papers

that cumulatively illustrated the enduring contribution that anarchist thought and

practice had on geography, and vice versa. The issue lived up to Galois’s (1976)

call for the exploration of our shared geo-histories, and included commentaries

on collectivization among workers and the disruptive spatial practices of the

Spanish Revolution circa the 1930s (Amsden 1978; Breitbart 1978a; Garcia-Ramon

1978), the profundity of Élisée Reclus and his geographically inspired version of

anarchism (Dunbar 1978), the inner workings of an anarchist community within

Paterson, New Jersey around 1900 (Carey 1978), the implications of Kropotkin’s

anarchist ideas on the spatial possibilities of cities (Horner 1978), libertarianismwithin contemporary Spanish politics (Golden 1978), and a brilliant piece by Peet

(1978) on the geography of human liberation, which once again unpacked the

creativity and ethics of Kropotkin’s anarcho-geography in staking a claim for the

socio-spatiality of decentralization as a means to achieve freedom. Bookchin’s (1978

[1965]) essay “Ecology and revolutionary thought” and Kropotkin’s (1978 [1885])

“What geography ought to be” were also reprinted as part of this special issue

to demonstrate Antipode ’s commitment to a radical tradition and the continuing

significance of these two thinkers on the radical geographical thought that was

emerging at the time.The early promise of the Kropotkin-inspired anarcho-communism of the 1970s

gave way to a decade that saw only one publication on anarchism in the pages of

Antipode . Jim Mac Laughlin (1986) critiqued the state-centricity of both geographers

and the social sciences more generally, lamenting the influence that ethnocentrism

had on the discipline of geography and its enduring prevalence thanks to the

influential writings of leading historical figures such as Halford Mackinder, Ellen

Churchill Semple, Ellsworth Huntington, Thomas Holdich, and Isaiah Bowman. In

once again invoking Kropotkin and Reclus, Mac Laughlin called upon geographers

to abandon the nationalistic historiography and statist imaginations that they had

inherited to explore antithetical alternatives. Within these pages the 1990s similarly

represented a dry spell with regard to anarchist geographies. Only a single paper by

Peter Taylor (1991:214–215) gives any sustained attention to anarchism, where he



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suggests that while he is “broadly sympathetic to the anarchist ‘political’ position”,

he is careful to indicate that his inquiry was “not another attempt to justify and

hence revive some variant of anarchism”, but instead sought “to locate anarchism

within a broader radical critique”.

Into the 2000s, we have a very brief intervention from a direct action media

collective called SchNEWS (2000), who outline some of their activities in relationto geographical concerns. A few papers followed in the early 2000s, with Paul

Chatterton’s (2002) exploration of squatting, Pierpaolo Mudu’s (2004) account of

Italian social centres in resisting neoliberalism, Jill Fenton’s (2004) examination

of surrealism and anti-capitalism in Paris, and Jon Anderson’s (2004) advocation

of environmental direct action. The Free Association (2010) has critiqued Black

Bloc tactics in championing love as a potential exodus from the antagonism of

neoliberalism, while Chris Carlsson and Francesca Manning (2010) also assess the

potential of exodus, in their case with respect to wage labour and the promise of

Nowtopia in reinventing work against the logic of capital. Chatterton (2006, 2010)

has continued to carry the flag of activism and autonomy from a broadly anarchist

perspective, and now serves as an editor of Antipode alongside Nik Heynen (2010;

Heynen and Rhodes forthcoming) who has also explored the radical potential of

activism and civil disobedience in relation to direct action and Black Anarchism

outside of these pages. The assembled guest editors of this special issue have also had

much to say about the productive relationship between geography and anarchism

(see Barker 2010; Brown 2007; Ince 2010; Pickerill and Chatterton 2006; Springer

2011, 2012b), and were motivated by this shared interest to further explore the

ongoing relevance of anarchist approaches within geographical praxis. This brief

genealogy of anarchist geographies brings us up to the present, where in 2011 theAntipode Editorial Collective (2011:185) re-confirmed their support for “political and

intellectual traditions that some scholars might feel uncomfortable using or those

that are relatively infrequently seen in geographical journals”, explicitly calling for

more anarchism in the pages of this journal. We are pleased to present this special

issue as a response to this appeal.

Outline of the Issue

Following this introduction, the special issue begins with Simon Springer’s (2012a)manifesto for anarchist geographies, which he situates as “kaleidoscopic spatialities”

that enable non-hierarchical relations of affinity between entities that maintain

autonomous positionalities. Springer exhorts geographers to rise to the challenge

of the contemporary neoliberal moment by exploring the untapped potential of

anarchist praxis. He begins by tracing the historical and contemporary intersections

between geographical scholarship and anarchism, attending to the early promise of

a radical geography with strong anarchistic tendencies and lamenting its eventual

eclipse in favour of both Marxist and feminist approaches. This discussion leads into

a critique of Marxism on the basis of its utilitarianism as well as its tendency to

be framed within nationalist discourses. Drawing an analogy between colonialism

and the state-making projects that Marxist positions have broadly supported, he

positions anarchism as a much more substantively “post-colonial” imperative. From



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here Springer begins to unpack the question of alternatives to the state, but rather

than provide a prescriptive set of guidelines or principles through which the future

should evolve, he purposefully draws back to an anarchist position that envisions

space–time as a perpetual unfolding to be determined not by the dictates or desires

of a single academic, politician, or otherwise, but through the continuous dialogue

and protean innovations of our shared collective will. Through such a processualunderstanding, Springer positions his contribution not as a call for revolution, which

he critiques on the basis of its implicit politics of waiting, but as an appeal that locates

the immediacy of the here and now as the dimension with the most emancipatory

potential precisely because it is the space–time in which our lives continually unfold.

In the next paper, Richard J. White and Collin Williams (2012) present us with

a reinterpretation of the economic landscapes that are so often claimed as capitalist,

providing a detailed analysis of non-commodified practices of co-operation,

reciprocity, and mutual aid that comprise a significant component of our collective

lived experience. In arguing that non-capitalist economic relations represent a

significant and overlooked component of production, consumption, and exchange,

they demonstrate how anarchistic organization can be understood as a grounded

material practice of the present. While their argument may be met with a certain

degree of cynicism by those who would ask what exactly about their observations of

existing economic practice actually constitute “anarchism”, parallels can be drawn

to J.K. Gibson-Graham’s (1996) productive critique of capitalism, and particularly

the swell of discursive production that perpetuates, reifies, and continually privileges

capitalist relations. To White and Williams such a line of questioning would actually

be welcomed, as their purpose is precisely to show how the everyday, mundane,

and quotidian patterns of human interaction actually intersect significantly withanarchist philosophies. In this regard, they contend that rather than perpetuating a

capitalist interpretation of the world, an anarchistic heterodoxy can be understood

to have a certain degree of pervasiveness if we care to look again at what we think we

know about existing economic geographies. Such a realization leads them to argue

that a “post-neoliberal” anarchist future is much more than a utopian dream, and

can instead be appreciated as a viable alternative to the contemporary orthodoxy,

where unfolding spatial patterns of autonomous organization and mutualism may

productively guide the way.

Anthony Ince (2012) offers a new theorization of territoriality by applying ananarchist approach that critiques the limited spatial imagination of contemporary

geographic inquiry and in particular its failure to interrogate how both capitalism

and authority are replicated, expanded, and reinforced through the space-making

practices of states. Ince aligns his critical appraisal to the anarchist concept of

prefiguration, which attempts to embed in the present the very modes of social

organization that are envisioned as part of a more egalitarian future. Through the

application of anarchist practice and thought, he contends that territory should be

viewed as a signifier for the contested processes of social relations. Drawing from

research conducted with a number of anarchist-inspired groups, Ince attempts to

think through how territorialization and bordering might be re-made in a more

productive and emancipatory sense by deploying the notion of prefigurative politics

as part of a re-imagining of space.



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Turning our attention to the motivations of anarchists, Nathan Clough (2012)

outlines what he calls “affective structures”, a term he utilizes to account for the

relations between affect, emotion, and radical politics. In arguing that anarchist

organizing operates through an imagined connection between the affective

capacities of direct action and the emotions of anarchists, Clough draws our

attention to the ways in which sites of affinity, or the convergence spaces suggestedby Routledge (2003), are actually troubled by the state insofar as the same affective

content that makes anarchist organizing and action viable, also renders it penetrable

by police and open to social control. In plugging his argument into geography’s

“affective turn” (Anderson and Harrison 2010), Clough’s interpretation goes beyond

the simple notion that social movements require emotional content to function

effectively. He extends this approach by arguing that social struggle is pursued

through the reciprocating relationship between the emotional organizing principle

of affinity and the energy and capacity of direct action, which actually becomes

the field of contestation itself. The infiltrations made by state operatives attest to

the central importance of emotional space, as creating friction and sowing discord

within this domain is a key tactical method of sabotaging the activities of anarchist

groups. What Clough persuasively suggests then is not only that emotions matter,

but that the affective-emotional linkages that are fostered by social movements

require the attention of geographers precisely because the spatialities of radical

politics and state control function as much in the embodied geographies of the

emotional terrain of the imagination as they do in the material spaces of the

city.

Next up is Jeff Ferrell’s (2012) theorization of “drift”, which he considers an

emergent form of epistemology, community, and spatial politics in the face of thecurrent conjuncture of consumerist economics, urban policing, and constrained

public spaces. To escape the regulatory framework of intensive urban governance,

Ferrell examines how groups seeking greater democratic control and accountability

utilize anarchic tactics and direct action to contravene the prescribed spatial order.

In its capacity to unravel rather than supplant everyday arrangements of power and

control, drift becomes the analytic focus of Ferrell’s argument, where he considers

it as a trajectory of interplay between anarchism and authority. Drift is at once both

the result of strategies of spatial control and a possibility of disorganization wherein

a new politics might be born. So while the social forces of our current politicaleconomic climate cast people and populations adrift in a sea of alienation, political

expulsion, mass migration, forced removal and marginalization, such disorientation

can be embraced by drifters as a moment for progressive possibilities in remaking

cultures and communities by drifting closer together rather than further apart. It

thus becomes entirely possible to turn the contemporary politics of disarticulation

into a revitalized politics of mutual aid and collective self-help.

Adam J. Barker and Jenny Pickerill (2012) also address issues related to communi-

ties of difference converging. Delving into the complicated, place-based collisions

of anarchist activism and Indigenous resurgence in the United States and Canada,

anarchist and Indigenous geographies are positioned as similarly radical but not

necessarily complementary. While acknowledging the difficulties faced by anarchist

activists seeking to act as allies to Indigenous communities, the burden is here



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1600 Antipode

placed on anarchists to bridge a longstanding gap in spatial understanding. Barker

and Pickerill note that there is a subtle but vital difference between anti-colonial

action concerned with power and hierarchy, and more fundamental decolonization

inherently linked to place. This distinction is often overlooked, in part because of

common assumptions about place and space that tend to obscure the needs of

Indigenous communities with respect to their lands. As a tool to assist in unpackingthe subtle differences in these conceptual geographical frameworks, anarchists are

urged to adopt an understanding of settler colonialism. Indigenous networks of

place-based relationships are the ongoing focus of settler colonization, a broad

and long-running dynamic of oppression that can sweep up even radical anarchist

movements. To counter this, Barker and Pickerill exhort would-be allies to find

their own roles in efforts to revitalize Indigenous-place networks by striving for

understanding across difference. Activists are asked to compliment rather than

replicate Indigenous relationships to place, and to change their thinking about

the nature of power in place.

In the final paper of the issue, Farhang Rouhani (2012) draws our attention to the

positive implications that anarchist practice and thought could potentially bring

to our pedagogical approaches in human geography. This is an engaging piece

that productively works through the contributions that geography and anarchism

have to make to each other. Anarchism has a long tradition of evoking radical

experimentation with teaching, while geography on the other hand seems

particularly well suited to a critical examination of education. Kropotkin (1978

[1885]) recognized this reciprocating potential over a century ago, and in tracing

his own ongoing attempts to bring anarchism into the spaces of a higher education

liberal arts context in the contemporary United States, Rouhani picks up thepieces. He urges us to think critically about how anarchism sheds the bondage of

commodified forms of knowledge production by fostering creative and non-coercive

learning opportunities both inside and outside of the classroom. In this respect his

essay sits well alongside recent works by Judith Suissa (2006) and Robert H. Haworth

(2012) in advocating the embrace of an explicitly anarchist ethos in our educational

approach, but Rouhani appropriately highlights how geography might productively

take centre stage in such efforts. Ultimately, we are presented with a powerful lesson

in how a combined anarchist-geographic pedagogical approach can lead to

alternative models of education that think outside of the top-down modalities thatdominate the contemporary education landscape by placing student-led liberation

and learning at the forefront of a critical pedagogy.

The issue you now (perhaps virtually) hold in your hands is the result of an imman-

ently rewarding process and there are many to thank along the way. We are grateful

to The Antipode Editorial Collective for their support, patience, and hard work in

seeing this special issue through to completion. Wendy Larner has applied her

sharp editorial oversight to all of the papers, which has increased the quality of the

manuscripts considerably as she asked tough questions of the assembled authors and

expected well thought out responses. Andrew Kent has slugged it out in the trenches

of administrative duty, keeping this project on time and moving ever forward.

Nik Heynen and Paul Chatterton have been vocal supporters of this initiative, and

while we stop short of holding them accountable for any of the content found



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herein, their scholarship and activism have been inspiring. James Sidaway has been

a source of encouragement and critical feedback throughout this process, while

the anonymous referees have similarly played a vital role. Uri Gordon (2012) has

graciously agreed to write an afterword to this special issue, and as a contemporary

anarchist theorist whose work has numerous synergies with those working within

the general framework of radical geography, we are excited to bring him intodirect conversation with geographical scholarship and hope that his work will be

more widely read among human geographers as a result. As over 30 years have

passed since Myrna Breitbart (1978b) previously assembled the first special issue on

anarchist geographies in these pages, we are tremendously excited about this issue

seeing the light of day and feel that it is long overdue. We are honoured that Myrna

has written a foreword that reflects on her original foray into anarchist philosophies

and contemplates the challenges and potential that come with exploring anarchist

geographies from within and importantly beyond the academy (Brietbart 2012).

With the torch now passed along to us, our biggest collective hope is that it is not

another 30 years before our call is answered. We are optimistic that this special issue

will motivate other radical geographers to begin exploring the fertile intellectual

soils that anarchist geographies have to offer. While the assembled essays cover

significant breadth in cultivating our understandings of what anarchism might yet

add to geographical theory and vice versa, we recognize our collective contribution

as inherently partial and incomplete. There is a great deal of work to be done and

much more to be said as anarchist geographies continue to evolve in various

contexts, stretching the limits of our geographical imaginations and inspiring a

wealth of innovative spatial practices. Let this special issue serve a mere starting

point in the flourishing of a new bust of colour.

References

Amsden J (1978) Industrial collectivization under workers’ control: Catalonia, 1936–1939.Antipode 10(3):99–113

Anderson B and Harrison P (2010) Taking-Place: Non-Representational Theories and Geography .London: Ashgate

Anderson J (2004) Spatial politics in practice: The style and substance of environmental direct

action. Antipode 36(1):106–125Antipode Editorial Collective (2011) Antipode in an antithetical era. Antipode 43(2):181–189Bakunin M A (1990 [1873]) Statism and Anarchy . Cambridge: Cambridge University PressBarker A J (2010) From adversaries

Documents

Springer, S. Et_al. 2012 Anarchist Geographies