Anarchy & Organization: The Debate at the 1907 International Anarchist Congress

I have now created a separate page which includes the previously posted speeches by Amédée Dunois, Errico Malatesta, Emma Goldman and Max Baginsky from the debate on anarchy and organization at the 1907 International Anarchist Congress in Amsterdam. Despite his membership in the revolutionary syndicalist CGT in France, whose slogan was “syndicalism is sufficient unto itself,” Dunois advocated the creation of a dual, explicitly anarchist organization, similar to those Spanish anarchists who later created the FAI in Spain to work alongside and within the anarcho-syndicalist CNT. While Malatesta disagreed with the claim that syndicalism is sufficient unto itself and argued against the creation of specifically anarchist trade unions (Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas, Volume One, Selection 60), he was also in favour of separate anarchist organizations through which anarchists could coordinate their activities. However, he was opposed to the Platformists and other like-minded anarchists who sought to create a single anarchist organization which required adherence to its policies and programs because this would inevitably lead to disagreements and schisms (Anarchism, Volume One, Selection 115). Neither Emma Goldman nor Max Baginski was opposed to syndicalist or anarchist organization, but both were careful to emphasize the need for individual autonomy, as was Malatesta. More recently, anarchists as diverse as latter-day Platformists, with their doctrine of especifismo, student anarchists during the May-June 1968 events in France (Anarchism, Volume Two, Selection 51), eco-anarchists such as Murray Bookchin in the 1960s and 70s (Volume Two, Selection 62), Colin Ward (Volume Two, Selection 63), the Open Road anarchist newsjournal in the  1970s and 80s, anarcha-feminists (Volume Two, Selections 78 & 79) and anarchists involved in global justice and indigenous movements against neo-liberalism have moved toward a position which emphasizes the self-organization of the people instead of the creation of separate anarchist organizations, raising questions regarding the utility of or need for the latter.

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