After the last edition, which took place in 2023 in Italy, more precisely in Massenzatico (RE), it is now Greece's turn to host the thirteenth congress of the International of Anarchist Federations (IFA). It will be held from April 3 to 5, 2026, in Athens, at the headquarters of the International's Hellenic federation, the Anarchist Political Organization (Anarkhis Prolikos Orgonais - APO). Since the IFA was founded at the famous Carrara Congress in 1968, the Congress has been the main meeting, organizing, and decision-making moment of the Anarchist International. The importance of this location must first be emphasized, as this is the first time this meeting has been held in Greece. This decision follows a trend seen in recent years, with the IFA expanding beyond the countries that were traditionally the "cradles" of its early activities, specifically the Italian, French-speaking, and Iberian regions.
In recent years, the Balkans have been among the regions that have seen some of the most vibrant international activities (the Balkan Anarchist Bookfair being one of them), while the IFA currently has federations outside Europe, particularly in Latin America, associated projects such as a Kurdish-language transnational anarchist forum, and various contacts with non-European communities, from Cuba to Sudan.
The agenda is particularly rich in topics related to the global challenges facing our movement in this difficult period, which will be explored in plenary sessions and thematic seminars. War will inevitably take center stage. In recent years, our federations have been particularly committed to building a social and class opposition that embraces an uncompromising antimilitarist response to the many conflicts underway around the world: from the struggle against the genocide of the Palestinian people to support for conscientious objectors and deserters in all conflicts, starting with the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, to campaigns against military spending, the production of death, and increasingly pervasive militarist propaganda.
A portion of the discussion will be dedicated to analyzing the various movements of insurgency and social opposition active around the world and how to foster their development horizontally, beyond the state, developing ethics and practices of internationalist and class solidarity-concepts that, unfortunately, are not taken for granted in an era of nationalism and ethnic and religious hatred, which are increasingly effective in dividing exploited classes. One of the main problems identified in this regard, and to which a specific point will be dedicated, is the global rise of the far right, which in various forms continues not only to threaten the prospects of social transformation, but also to accompany reactionary shifts of various kinds and at various levels, for example, in the reduction of spaces for freedom, including the right to demonstrate, and in the resurgence of repressive policies (far from being a right-wing monopoly, moreover).
Another central theme will be the struggle against patriarchy and gender violence, which will bring together various approaches, and the FAI will bring the positions expressed in our recent conferences on the need to adopt a transfeminist perspective that deconstructs gender and works inclusively on alliances between all those subjected to the various "axes" of domination.
Among other topics, we will discuss libertarian pedagogy and struggles against the privatized restructuring of educational systems, the plundering and destruction of the environment, anarchist approaches to digital tools, and proposals such as organizing a Mediterranean anarchist meeting, in addition to the organizational aspect.
This latter aspect reminds us that the challenge of internationalization is not a given. On the one hand, anarchism was born internationalist and has a formidable tradition of transnational practices, beginning with those generations of militants who, for reasons of political persecution or economic migration, had to move between countries and continents, facing situations characterized by different languages and cultures. These migrant situations have allowed the circulation of libertarian and solidaristic ideas and practices across material and immaterial borders, as well as enriching our idealistic heritage through contact with other traditions of struggle. This was the case, for example, of the encounter between anarchism and the centuries-old experiences of resistance among indigenous and Afro-descendant populations of so-called Latin America, an adjective that decolonial critique considers inappropriate given that it identifies only the European side of an area that has had a much richer and more complex history.
On the other hand, we see day after day that practicing internationalism brings challenges. These challenges arise primarily from the borders imposed by the nation-state system, which do not always allow travel and encounters, since in the world there are passports that allow you to go anywhere and passports that allow you to go nowhere. Then there are linguistic barriers that require a translation effort that is not only technical, but also conceptual, because there are terms that can be understood differently in the context of one country or another, which requires everyone to be fully willing to listen and understand different local contexts.
Then there are the constraints that arise from living in a world dominated by nation-states and their borders, which requires the effort of knowing how to imagine a different world, one to be prefigured starting from our practices. To begin to do this, many of our federations are organized according to a territorial structure that does not correspond to that of their respective states, being inherently transnational, such as the Francophone Federation and the Iberian Federation. To address all these challenges, once again, encounters, direct contact between activists, and networks of social interaction and solidarity are essential: only by practicing internationalism can barriers be broken down. We will do it in Athens, but we must do it every day.
F.F.
https://umanitanova.org/internazionaliste-sempre-xiii-congresso-internazionale-federazioni-anarchiche/
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Link: (en) Italy, FAI, Umanita Nova #10-26 - INTERNATIONALISTS ALWAYS! XIII International Congress of Anarchist Federations (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]
Source: A-infos-en@ainfos.ca
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