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donderdag 23 mei 2013

(en) My experience of Anarchism in Bulgaria - 88 yr old exile Jack Grancharoff at Jura books + audio

Jura Books in Sydney recently hosted 'Anarchism in Bulgaria as I see it' by the 88 year 
old exiled anarchist Jack Grancharoff. Around a dozen people listened intensely to Jack as 
he described his upbringing and his involvement in anarchism and challenges faced by both 
fascism and Stalinism. ---- In the early 20th Century, anarchism entrenched itself as a 
mass organisational movement in Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Poland - anarchists having 
already been active in the 1873 uprisings in Bosnia and Herzegovina against 
Austro-Hungarian control. But it was primarily in Bulgaria and its neighbour Macedonia 
that a remarkable case of anarchist organising arose, in the midst of the power-play 
between the great powers. This was the area of conflict where jack focused much of his 
early talk on.

Growing up in the midst of poverty, Jack soon began to challenge authority in his school, 
soon being expelled and according to his own words- was an anarchist before he even knew 
so. Working as a Shepard in the midst of various invasions starting with the nazi 
occupation and later the soviets, jack was expelled from one village to another before 
coming across anarchists for the first time while being incarcerated in a soviet 
concentration camp for a couple of months for being ' an enemy of the people.'

This poorly-studied movement not only blooded itself in national liberation struggles and 
armed opposition to both fascism and Stalinism, but developed a notably diverse and 
resilient mass movement, the first to adopt the 1926 Platform of the Ukrainian Makhnovist 
exiles in Paris 2 as its lodestone. For these reasons it is vital that the revived 
anarchist-communist movement in the new millennium re-examine the legacy of the Balkans.

The discussion provided a rare opportunity to hear about and to discuss a little known, 
but critically important, chapter of anarchist history: the ?Bulgarian Commune? of 
1944/45. Jack was a participant in those events, as well as knowing the rich variety of 
characters and organisations that were a part of the events leading up to 1945.

According to Jack,
http://m.mixcloud.com/workerssolidarity/anarchism-in-bulgaria-88-yr-old-exile-jack-grancharoff-relates-his-experiences/
http://www.mixcloud.com/workerssolidarity/anarchism-in-bulgaria-88-yr-old-exile-jack-grancharoff-relates-his-experiences/

"Anarchism succeeded in becoming a popular movement and it penetrated many layers of 
society from workers, youth and students to teachers and public servants. The underground 
illegal activities of the movement continued.'

The Bolshevik ?Red Army? rolled in at the end of WWII and destroyed what had been 
organised with the help of the anarchists of the region, just as the Stalinists had done 
during the Spanish Revolution in the Aragon region, almost ten years earlier. Jack was 
later forced to flee, first to Italy where he met italian anarchist partisans and later to 
australia where he found work in forestry in Queensland. Jack soon came into contacts with 
spanish and italian anarchist exiles in Melbourne anarchist club. also a founding member 
of the Jura Books Collective - also gave an up to date with what?s going on in the 
anarchist movement of today in Bulgaria.

If there our any lessons we can learn today from the Bulgarian experience is the 
importance of building a movement based on firm principles with effective organisation, 
strategy and vision.

As the 1945 Platform of the Federation of Anarchist Communists of Bulgaria(FAKB) noted:

'It is above all necessary for the partisans of anarchist communism to be organised in an 
anarchist communist ideological organisation. The tasks of these organisations are: to 
develop, realise and spread anarchist communist ideas; to study the vital present-day 
questions affecting the daily lives of the working masses and the problems of the social 
reconstruction; the multifaceted struggle for the defence of our social ideal and the 
cause of working people; to participate in the creation of groups of workers on the level 
of production, profession, exchange and consumption, culture and education, and all other 
organisations that can be useful in the preparation for the social reconstruction; armed 
participation in every revolutionary insurrection; the preparation for and organisation of 
these events; the use of every means which can bring on the social revolution. Anarchist 
communist ideological organisations are absolutely indispensable in the full realisation 
of anarchist communism both before the revolution and after.'

The meeting was also a benefit for the Jock Palfreeman defence fund. See more 
fohttp://www.freejock.com/latest_news.html

For more information on the Bulgarian anarchism please see: The Anarchist-Communist Mass 
Line: Bulgarian Anarchism Armed http://www.anarkismo.net/article/9678

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