Constructive Anarchy

Smashing the state gently: Radical realism and realist anarchism

“…Wolff, 1970), a nuanced approach to the state is the most contentious element of the tendency that I have been referring to as realist anarchism. It is implicitly affirmed by some (Malatesta, 2014 [1925]a: 473; Shantz, 2010: 85–86), and explicitly but without emphasis by others (Gordon, 2007: 154–155). However, those who have openly and defiantly stated this position (Chomsky, 1996) or have been perceived as doing so (Bookchin, 1998) have courted denunciation and ‘excommunication’ by other anarchists.…”

“…Anarchist involvement in local social organising has imbued the contemporary milieu with a keen awareness of the relatively positive effect of state-based social services considering the increase in suffering created by their withdrawal. Therefore, in recent decades under widespread neoliberal political and ideological hegemony, anarchists have often opposed privatisation of public services and other state-owned enterprises (Shantz, 2010: 85–88). Their sensitivity to social issues also leads many contemporary anarchist groups to enter into alliances with non-anarchist radical and non-radical community and activist groups, including single-issue reformist campaigns that call directly on the state for social provisions, in order to more effectively tackle issues of marginalisation, inequality and hardship (Gordon, 2007: 58–59).…”

“…This position entails efforts towards the prefigurative construction of such alternatives, and indeed much of the energy of contemporary anarchist movements is dedicated to such efforts (see e.g. Shantz, 2010). However, it also recognises the relatively positive use of state power that many anarchists are reluctant to admit explicitly but that realist anarchists openly acknowledge (Bookchin, 1979: 29; Chomsky, 2002: 344; Gordon, 2007: 154).…”

“…This engagement with the state is not only accepted in order to combat the social symptoms of capitalism in a passive form of harm-minimisation that has given up on the possibility of far-reaching radical social change, but it is also endorsed as a method to pursue such change. So while realist anarchists argue that state control of social services is preferable when the alternative is neoliberal privatisation and for-profit services, they also see a flawed but somewhat democratic state system as a better platform for achieving their revolutionary goals of social, political and economic re-organisation, including the long-term goal of state transformation and replacement, than a state weakened in its social and economic roles, and dominated by corporate capitalism (Chomsky, 2005: 213; Shantz, 2010: 86).…”

“…It will argue that radical forms of realism should indeed be included in general accounts of the realist disposition, and it will defend this assertion with reference to several of the commonly cited ‘central tenets’ of realism. Realist anarchism constitutes a meaningful addition to radical conceptualisations of realism both for its example as a theoretical perspective and as practice in the ‘real politics’ of anarchist social movements (Gordon, 2007; Mueller, 2003; Shantz, 2010). This article clarifies the scope of the realist disposition by demonstrating how an existing radical perspective interprets the ‘central tenets’ of realism.…”