Anarchic update news all over the world - 17.12.2018

Today's Topics:

   
1.  initiative of women against patriarchy: Call for action
      against the murder of Eleni T. (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
2.  Greece, liberta salonica: Anti-capitalist gathering for the
      visit of Tsipra to Thessaloniki Friday 14/12, 19:00, Kamara
      [machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
3.  Czech, afed - A3: The clinic is ours [machine translation]
      (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
4.  Britain, anarchistcommunist group ACG - Leicester: Speaker
      from the People and Planet's "48hrs of Action Against Samsung"
      (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
5.  France, Alternative Libertaire AL #289 - Brazil: How
      Bolsonaro could win (fr, it, pt)[machine translation]
      (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
6.  anarkismo.net: An Anarchist View of State Formation --
      Review of Peter Gelderloos, "Worshipping Power: An Anarchist View
      of Early State Formation" by Wayne Price (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)


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Message: 1





CONCENTRATION: SATURDAY 15/12 12M., PL.GEORGIOU ---- A few words about the murder in 
Rhodes ---- On November 28, the 21-year-old Eleni T. is dead on a beach in Rhodes. After 
her rape and abuse, her murderers tie her and fly her half naked in the sea, from where 
she gets dead. ---- This is not an isolated event. It belongs to the broader context of 
tension of gender violence and sexism. That is, all those perceptions, which degrade the 
woman into an object to be used, with rape, are the wildest expression of man's dominance 
over the woman. ---- Perceptions that are not produced spontaneously by those who belong 
to the bottom of the social and class pyramid, but on the contrary, are cultivated and 
diffused by those who belong to the upper strata of this world. That is, from sovereignty, 
being the products of the organized society of socialization. An enterprise that has 
resulted in the awakening of the most conservative social reflexes, as was the murder and 
the lynching of the seropositive activist Zackie Oh, and the assassination of land worker 
Petrit Zifle by a fascist, Corfu.

The basic principle of the capitalist system is the exploitation of man by man. The 
hierarchically structured relationships that produce this basic principle of inequality 
and liberty separate societies from class, ethnicity, skin color, sexuality, gender. 
Patriarchy is a cornerstone of the world of power and a key element of its social 
reproduction. Like every form of power, it exists, is cultivated and enforced at every 
level of the capitalist organization of life. And in this way, sovereignty attempts to 
fragment the body of the oppressed, so that it will stand weak to confront it.

The attack on women's femininity is an effort to remind their feminine nature as something 
that separates them from men. Something that allows them to repress and rely more. Gender 
suppression is not separated from all the other forms of oppression that stem from the 
structure and operation of the dominant system.

At the time of the takeover of the state and the bosses, the main pillars of the world of 
power, attempt to transfer the sepulchralism of the state, capitalist and patriarchal way 
of organization into society. As the crisis deepens, the attack we take in all fields is 
intensifying. With it, modern events of patriarchy, such as the outbreak of gendered 
violence, are intensifying.

The ever increasing examples are clear. Going back a couple of years back, in 2012, with 
the insulting women of seropositive women, in a period of zero tolerance for the state and 
extermination of the excess, reaching the condemnation of a 22-year-old woman in Corinth 
who defended herself against her rapist, rapists in Greece and around the world, the death 
of the three immigrant women at the borders of the Evros and the recent condemnation of 
the cleaner from Volos, we will see thousands of everyday examples, institutional or 
otherwise, violence against women in different fields. The dozens of rapes, humiliation 
and further assault on female fighters in repressive operations, the special working 
conditions of women, the dismissal of pregnant women,

For us, the struggle of women to liberate them from the bonds of patriarchy is an integral 
part of the struggle for the abolition of state and capitalist imposition. Recognizing 
that freedom is neither granted nor granted, but is conquered through the struggles 
themselves, we choose to organize and collectivize - as women and as anarchists - and to 
fight together, with the workers, the unemployed, the students, the students, the people 
of the WORLD, to unite our voices and our action against our daily dynasties, all over the 
world, with a vision of a society of equality, dignity, freedom and solidarity. Because 
the eradication of gendered violence passes through the elimination of the rotten world of 
patriarchy, state and capital, and the building of this female emancipation,

NO REFLECTION TO THE WORLD OF PATRIARCH, STATE AND
CAPITALISM

WOMEN'S INTERNATIONAL AND TAX WELFARE FOR HANDLING
AND FREEDOM, LIFE AND DIGNITY

initiative of women against patriarchy
enantiastinpatriarxia @ gmail . com

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Message: 2





On 14/12/18, Prime Minister A. Tsipras is due to hold a speech at the Palace de Sport, 
trying to gain ground for the upcoming elections. In an attempt to oppose the conservatism 
of the main opposition, SYRIZA. tries to put on the agenda a poorly planned institutional 
"antifascism" (although he co-exists with the far right ANEL and continues unceasingly the 
anti-immigration policy of the previous governments, as well as the tours on the 
borderless islands together with representatives of the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn) , but also 
the supposed "progressive patriotism", in a grotesque attempt to re-integrate into the 
class movement. SYRIZA, as administrator of state power and civilian personnel of capital, 
At a purely demagogic level, the Prime Minister of the country officially demonstrates the 
new communication invention embodied by the SYRIZA government. - ANEL, the famous "exit 
from the memoirs", hoping in this way SYRIZA. to extend his term of office to state-owned 
parties through the attempt to retrieve the pro-government's social-democratic profile of 
the party, even with the words of the air. All of this construction, besides cynical, is 
also extremely fragile. Quite simply, because it is negated by the very material reality 
of the downward class devaluation, which has been steadily increasing over the last 8 
years. The new austerity measures may not be called "memorandums", but they will continue 
to intensify the predatory transfer of wealth from the bottom to the top of the social 
pyramid. Capitalist barbarism spreads like dense darkness, condemning to poverty and 
submissiveness, in the long run, from the bottom. International financial supervision is 
to continue at least until 2060. Surveillance is not going to expire before 75% of the 
public debt is repaid, resulting in bloody surpluses that the working class itself is 
about to bear in its entirety. In addition, the privatization of public property or more 
simply privatizations will be kept through the Superfund until 2114. Neither one of the 
700 memorandum laws passed has been revoked or abolished, nor one of the 60,000 memorandum 
provisions nor one of the 300,000 ministerial and implementing memorandum decisions.

It suffices to sit a little and remember what followed all the times that the coming of 
the coveted development in the past was announced: an escalation of the onslaught at work, 
insurance, social freedoms, environment and social goods. After the cuts in wages and 
pensions, privatizations, cuts in all public benefits, the gradual abolition of Sunday's 
holiday, the increase in taxes, the rise in prices for basic commodities, the change in 
the insurance system came, first-place auctions, and the attempt to abolish the right to 
strike by questioning the collective workers' organs. Warehouses now occupy more and more 
space in modern working reality. Exhaustive working hours,

It would be wrong to believe that the above are isolated incidents, unfortunate moments 
the "unconscious bosses". Or that it is a "difficult phase" that we all have to "make 
sacrifices" on the road to much-needed growth. All of the above is development. Only the 
growth of the profitability of the bosses is achieved only with the sacrifices of the 
workers. That is why we call it Chapter: someone buys and concentrates, the profits that 
come from someone else's work. Now the tragic thing is, that these guys who are fed by our 
sweat and blood have done - without much trouble being the truth - to convince us that our 
interest is identical to theirs. That their profitability is ours. That the "productive 
reconstruction" they are planning and implementing is and for our own benefit. What to say,

For those who remain skeptical or even unbelievers, the state - as the political form of 
capital - with the continuity that distinguishes it, and which so proudly assured the 
prime minister, guarantees the law (the powerful) and the class (that is, its 
enforcement). The squabbling discharges, the police crackdown, the litigation industry, 
the tortured trials, and the extortionate sentences imposed on anarchists and other 
fighters, even to their relatives, the "hardening" of encroaching conditions (with a more 
bizarre example the new punitive code to be enacted) and the systematic obstruction / 
obstruction of the licensing of political prisoners under the extortion of the declaration 
of political repentance, demonstrate the inseparable interference of interests state and 
capital.

On the day of Tsipra's speech, a nationalist retreat, with a distinct piece of fascists in 
its bosom, intends to descend on the road to protest the Macedonian. The world of the 
struggle, the exploited and the oppressed, all and all that we have not forgotten the 
brutality of the historical past, we must drastically curb any attempt to develop fascism 
and social cannibalism in the world of the social base. We have to crush fascism in the 
whole social field in which we move and live: in the streets, in the work, in the schools 
and in the schools, in our neighborhoods. We owe it to those who have fought fighting 
fascism in those who were assassinated by fascists, as happened recently with the 
63-year-old Albanian land worker Petritz Ziffle, who was murdered in cold blood by 
44-year-old Neurosci Chrysavigitis Dimitrios Kouri in Dragotena Lefkimmi, in South Corfu. 
We have no illusion that the final blow to fascism will come through the legal way from 
the hands of the state, since fascism is a weapon of the bourgeoisie itself. It is a fatal 
error to think of fascism from the bottom as a manifestation of naivety and 
picturesqueness, or as something insignificant, let alone that they are being defeated by 
defamation and indifference. Fascism is inextricably linked to capitalism. It is the 
ultimate and the most aggressive reserve of capital that is put to use when capitalism is 
shaken internally by its structural judgments. For this reason, the struggle against 
fascism to be global must be at the same time as an offensive, anti-capitalist and 
internationalist. The struggle against fascism and nationalism is a historic duty of the 
working class and a duty to liberate mankind from the state of detainment to which 
capitalism has been subjected to it by coercion.

On 14/12, we call each oppressed and exploited to descend on the road against his real 
class enemies, against the state and the capital, who continually underestimate our 
working and living conditions to enrich through our own hard work is the local and 
supranational bosses. We do not forget the moment that the so-called unity of the "good of 
the country" and its economic "recovery" and "development" constitutes an orderly retreat 
for our own struggles and finds only the social basis lost. On the other hand, when 
national unity or patriotism is upgraded to chauvinism and fascism, the components of 
which are initially seeded, then the way for the most barbaric and totalitarian form of 
capitalism opens,

Capitalism and statehood have, for centuries, been quite bloody and exterminating the 
world working class. Let us move concerted and internationally into the counter-attack 
against the state, capital and imperialism, with our weapons self-organization and direct 
action, class solidarity and proletarian internationalism, for the global social 
revolution, libertarian communism, anarchy.

AGAINST devaluation WORK OUR AND OUR ANIMAL depravity

ANTIKAPITALISTIKOS ANTIKRATIKOS AND GAME, UNTIL THE DESTRUCTION OF ANY POWER

to crush fascism and nationalism WITH OUR GUNS class solidarity, proletarian 
internationalism AND fighters fascism

ANTIPARTICAL - ANTIPAPPALISTIC CONCENTRATION IN VIEW OF THE CHIPRA VISIT TO THESSALONIKI:

FRIDAY 14 DECEMBER
19:00, KAMARA

Eleftherial Initiative of Thessaloniki - member of the Anarchist Federation
lib_thess@hotmail.com
libertasalonica.wordpress.com

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Message: 3





The clinic recently celebrated four years of successful functioning. In spite of many 
adversaries, she does not want to give up. Download, print and enlarge the December issue 
of A3 wall paper! ---- The Autonomous Social Center of the Clinic, located in Zizkov in 
Prague, has again raised the media attention in connection with the decision of the 
Supreme Court to evacuate. After the constitutional complaint was rejected by the college, 
its opponents began to rejoice that those who allowed themselves to occupy the building 
almost in the middle of Prague and still judge it would finally go to dill and stop the 
decent citizens from harassing their presence. Liberal leftists, who once visited the 
clinic once in the year of the year, again panic. The media competed for writing an 
article with a more subtitled title, and the Prague guru in Prague 3, Alexander Bellu, 
stood up in his sauna with which he occupied part of the house without the permission of 
other owners.

However, the "problem" occurred when it became clear that the people from the Clinic did 
not just give up and started negotiating the object with the owner, SŽDC. This has 
contributed to the general confusion and indignation of right-wing politicians and 
ideological advocates of the inviolability of private property, no matter what it is. What 
if they stay?

The clinic recently celebrated four years of successful functioning. The celebrations were 
magnificent. They have arrived as people who have moved around the autonomous center from 
the beginning, and those who have met something similar for the first time.

Since the building of the former pulmonary clinic in Žižkov has occupied, many projects 
have been developed for which there would be no other place. Whether it is the MamaTata 
collective kindergarten, community garden, English, Romani, Chinese or Portuguese courses, 
Black Books infoshop, or Self-defense courses and Street Culture radio or the new Seoul 
radio. There is also a test room for bands, galleries and sewing workshops at the Clinic. 
Formerly, folk meals were held and food was distributed to homeless people.

The clinic survived violent attacks by neo-Nazis, two attempts to police clearance after a 
bomb report, owner transfer, losing trials, water cuts, Alexander Bella's media outposts 
and SPD petition stalls. Even now, once again facing the threat of eviction, there is 
still hope.

In Jeseniova Street four years ago, they managed to build something completely unique. Not 
only has the Clinic team been able to make good use of the empty space and create an 
environment where people from different social strata and subcultures meet with people who 
have just strolled around, but there have also been numerous cultural activities, whether 
concerts, exhibitions and lectures, or screenings and theater performances.

There is a great deal of urgency in places like the Clinic in Prague and the whole of the 
Czech Republic, while in the empty buildings where the cities are full, all homeless 
people could easily come in three times. While some fidget the nose over the paintings on 
the plaster of the autonomous center, people are coming home because of the development 
plans for "new and prettier Prague" and the earnings of the executioner predators. If the 
clinic was not occupied, it might well have been a bad glass office building, AirBnB flats 
or a luxury hotel, and rents in the neighborhood would have risen by dozens of percent. 
Or, the building would become dilapidated by the masses of rubbish.

One crucial question is: Do we really need more chunks when we can instead have spaces 
where people feel good? The answer is probably clear.

Keeping the Clinic and building other similar sites is important. The clinic is not just a 
minority who has money for it. The clinic belongs to all of us.

Where else can you freely show up and meet a lot of people who are also aware of the state 
of the world today? Where else can you participate in creating space around you? And where 
else can you get a beer for a couple of times?

A3 ( December 2018) HERE to download http://www.afed.cz/A3/A3-2018-12.pdf

Download, print, spread!

The A3 wall paper is published annually by the Anarchist Federation. They are intended 
primarily for spreading through street lifts or posting in workplaces and schools.

https://www.afed.cz/text/6911/a3-klinika-je-nase

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Message: 4






Leicester's ACG is hosting a speaker from the Loughborough People and Planet group at our 
February meeting. The speaker will be updating us on the "48 hours of Action Against 
Samsung" anti union busting campaign and it's plans for the future. The event will include 
a short talk and a debate around the campaign and the strategies that the working class 
can use to make change. This is an open meeting and will be a great opportunity to find 
out more about local campaigns. ---- A summary of the campaign in People and Planets own 
word: ---- "People & Planet groups across the UK and Ireland took part in 48hrs of action 
on the 30-31 October supporting factory workers fighting union-busting at Samsung. We 
demonstrated outside Samsung stores in cities around the UK and Ireland in solidarity with 
electronics factory workers who are demanding the right to freedom of association. Workers 
are being denied the vital opportunity to join a union by Samsung's ‘no-union policy', 
meaning that workers facing dangerously unsafe working conditions or unfair pay have no 
secure way of demanding fairer treatment."

Meeting details:

When: Wednesday 20th February 7:30pm

Where: The Regent Sports & Social Club, 102 Regent Road,Leicester, LE1 7DA (link here)

Ask at the BAR for the "Libsoc" event.

https://www.anarchistcommunism.org/2018/12/13/leicester-event-speaker-from-the-people-and-planets-48hrs-of-action-against-samsung-campaign/

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Message: 5





On Sunday, October 28, 2018, a little over 55% of voters in Brazil made the choice of Jair 
Bolsonaro against the leftist candidate, Fernando Haddad. Jair Bolsonaro is right, very 
right, not to say fascinating ... ---- Jair Bolsonaro, 66, is a former captain of the 
Brazilian army. He clearly appears as a nostalgic of the military dictatorship, praising 
the repression of " reds ", torture and sexual violence. He had, in a famous sentence, 
told an opponent that she " was too ugly to be raped " [1]. ---- Bolsonaro assumes a 
certain connection with historical fascism. His campaign slogan is " Brasil Acima de tudo 
" (Brazil above all), which is a reference to " Deutschland über alles " , the phrase of 
the German national anthem put forward by the Nazi regime.
Ideologically, Bolsonaro's discourse is very similar to fascist rhetoric: the charismatic 
leader claims to energize the nation and restore order, community and social connection. 
The problem is that of course, this is done by the liquidation of the enemy, which in the 
case of Bolsonaro is all-out: the Reds incarnated by the Workers Party (PT), lesbian, gay, 
bisexual and transgender people ( LGBT) accused of " destroying the family ", and the poor 
of favelas and natives seen as a social danger. This vast liquidation program involves " 
naturally " an authoritarian, dictatorial state. Bolsonaro is openly nostalgic for the 
dictatorship he promises to restore.

A regime openly nostalgic for the dictatorship
The Bolsonaro program is in line with these fascinating perspectives. First, it is a 
patriarchal recovery and strengthening program, against medically assisted procreation and 
LGBT rights, with the support of evangelical churches.

It comes in the field of education with a reform of programs considered " red ". In the 
economic field, it does not bother with the pseudo social speech often agitated by the 
fascists, the objective is direct. He proposes an austere neoliberal purge: abolition of 
social and medical programs to help the poorest, privatization of almost all public 
services, and at the same time reinforcement of protectionism vis-à-vis Mercosur, the 
common market of America from South.

Finally, its program is catastrophic in environmental terms: it promises the continuation 
of the destruction of the Amazon rainforest, yet essential to the balance of the global 
ecosystem. Thus, the Ministry of the Environment would be merged with that of Agriculture, 
in the hands of landowners, and the indigenous reserves that cover 13% of the territory 
delivered to the interests of agribusiness.

He also proposes an ultra-repressive and vigilantist policy: in the face of a galloping 
crime (69,000 homicides in 2017), he proposes more police violence as well as the arming 
of " good citizens " who would be allowed to shoot at sight ...

Dominant support of the ruling class
The very rapid rise of Bolsonaro, which was previously perceived as both fascistic, 
whimsical and marginal, owes much to the support of the ruling class. There are three 
essential components. The first is that of the large landowners of agribusiness: in a 
country where the agri-food sector is essential for exports, they are very heavy. To a 
large extent, all of the big industrial employers also support Bolsonaro. Finally, the " 
security " sector gives its support: the high military and police hierarchies, but also 
the private companies of the security business.

This decisive support was manifested in particular by massive " fake news " campaigns on 
Facebook and especially WhatsApp, widely used in Brazil, which were revealed to have been 
financed by a group of more than 150 companies related to the big employers [2].

Bolsonaro has thus become a tool for big capital in the struggle they have been waging in 
the PT since the re-election of Dilma Roussef in 2014. The president from the ranks of the 
PT has been dismissed following an investigation for corruption at least questionable 
dismissal supported by the entire ruling class.

Right-wing interim president Michel Temer became so unpopular after a series of neoliberal 
reforms that his approval rate did not exceed 3%. Faced with the threat of a return to the 
PT, fascism guided by Bolsonaro then became an acceptable prospect for a Brazilian 
bourgeoisie that does not bother with scruples ... If the PT and its some redistributive 
measures are unbearable for the Brazilian ruling class, thirsty for profits, this does not 
mean that this party is exempt from responsibility in the election of Bolsonaro.

The responsibility of social democracy
In 2002, the PT came to power with the election of Lula who has the support of unions and 
all social movements. Elected on an anti-liberal and socialist basis, its record was poor, 
tarnished by compromises and endemic corruption. Very quickly, Lula gives guarantees to 
the big boss: he will not attack his interests nor the private property of the big 
industrial groups ... In the end, the PT only carries out a management policy on the 
margin of the capitalism: aid program for the poorest, Cuban doctors for the poorest, 
pensions that are somewhat advantageous.

In reality, it does not change much. Brazil has remained one of the most unequal countries 
in the world, where the middle class and the bourgeoisie can benefit from the protection 
of armed security guards to consume, while a large part of the population vegetates in 
unworthy conditions and the PT feeds a corrupt bureaucracy that does very little for the 
exploited. The betrayal and indignity of Brazilian social democracy has paved the way for 
fascism in Brazil. To meditate at the time of the electoral hopes around the insubordinate 
France ...

Matt (AL Montpellier)

[1] " Brazil, the deputy too ugly to be raped fears more violence ", August 22, 2018 on 
Liberation.fr.

[2] " Brazil, difficult campaign day for bolsonaro and haddad ", October 10, 2018 on 
Ladepeche.fr.

http://www.alternativelibertaire.org/?Bresil-Comment-Bolsonaro-a-pu-l-emporter

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Message: 6





It it important for anarchism to have a theory of the state, the fundamentals of 
government, its origins and development. This is my third essay on this topic, the first 
being a presentation of the class theory of the state, as held by both anarchists and 
Marxists (Price 2018a). The second was a review of a "post-anarchist" analysis of the 
state, proposed by Saul Newman (Price 2018b). This is a review of Peter Gelderloos' 
analysis of the nature of the state and its origins. ---- Gelderloos defines the state as 
"a bureaucratic, territorial, coercive organization with multiple levels of 
administration, in which power is institutional rather than personal, and power-holders 
monopolize (...) the legitimate use of force...." (5) "The state[is]a centralized, 
hierarchical system of political organization based on coercion and alienation...." (14) 
These are fine definitions.

In his broad overview of state formation, Gelderloos has two fundamental hypotheses. The 
first is his opposition to any specific theory of state origins. States are not the result 
of any one special force, but are the end result of all sorts of factors, he argues. 
"State formation is a multilineal process and not a teleological progressive evolution." 
(Gerderloss 2016; 234) "States...are...a social arrangement that evolved following a wide 
variety of evolutionary pathways, in very different conditions, on different continents." 
(13) His book is a hotch-potch collection of accounts of state formations, in no 
particular order, covering all sorts of possible causes in specific cases. This includes 
cultural and religious factors, as well as military, political, and geographic factors, 
among others. He ends up with no less than fifteen "models" of state formation. (233-234) 
That many factors go into the formation of each specific state is undoubtedly true. The 
question is whether any underlying generalizations can be made about the main factor or 
factors.

What I take to be his second main thesis is the rejection of the class (or historical 
materialist) theory of the state. He rejects the view that the state grows out of the 
tendency of early humanity to create a surplus which results in early class divisions 
(developing out of other early social divisions such as gender, age, or special 
knowledge). He regards the hypothesis that the state exists "to regulate economic 
production and surplus value" to be as "demonstrably false" as the myth that it exists "to 
protect individual rights through a social contract." (1) On the contrary, Gelderloos 
insists that the state was first formed and then it promoted class division and 
exploitation. In his view, the state does not serve capitalism (feudalism, slavery, etc.) 
but capitalism serves the state.

He claims that this is the classical anarchist view of Bakunin and Kropotkin (which I do 
not think is true; Price 2018a). He quotes Bakunin, "If there is a state, there must be 
domination of one class by another, and as a result, slavery; the state without slavery in 
unthinkable...." (4-5) He writes, "Capitalism can easily be read as the motor of the 
modern state.... Sometimes capitalists have modernized government in order to increase 
their power." ((6-7) These views would seem to contradict his own generalization.

It would be difficult to demonstrate, historically or by anthropology, either that the 
state created class societies or that class societies created the state. As Gelderloos 
agrees, very few statist systems began ab novo. Almost all states we know about began in 
societies which already had states-and had class systems of exploitation. Summarizing the 
evidence, he makes the important statement, "As a general rule, reciprocity is the basis 
of society and culture." (7) This is to say that class division created the state and the 
state created class division and so on, back and forth, intertwined, at the same time, 
(dialectically, if you will).

While Gelderloos discusses various possible pathways to state formation, he repeatedly 
returns to one model: early elites creating a state to serve their interests. "Local 
elites within the preexisting autochthonous hierarchies were impressed by the greater 
power amassed by elites in neighboring societies and sought to copy them." (38) "The 
exigencies of warfare...are exploited by an endogenous proto-elite to create a pathway for 
increasing social discipline and hierarchy. " (53) "The ascendance of the council and 
other institutional forms of leadership in the[early]Kuba state reflect a push by the 
elite to extend their power...." (5) "Incipient elites used military brotherhoods and 
resurgent patriarchy to establish a new kind of state authority." (133) "State formation 
was a strategic act of elite will." (153)

He does not discuss who were these elites which existed before the state but which 
deliberately created states to serve their interests. Were they not the local lords, rich 
farmers, clan leaders, patriarchs, slave holders, and so on-proto-ruling classes-who made 
states to expand their wealth and their power over others' labor? This is the view of the 
class theory.

"Primitive Accumulation" by the State

Against "the matter of economic accumulation...as the motor of state 
formation...,"Gelderloos says, "the very notion of understanding (...) the economy as a 
distinct sphere of social life is problematic...." (138) He does not realize that the idea 
of the distinction between the economy and the state was created by the experience of 
capitalism. Almost for the first time, the ruling class did not need to directly manage 
the state. Capitalist enterprises were run by businesspeople and their managers, while 
professional politicians could manage the state. In the U.S.A. today, the state claims 
legitimacy as "democratic," while the capitalist economy is justified on the basis of 
"freedom."

Gelderloos is right to challenge this apparent distinction between the capitalist market 
and the state. But then what becomes of his chicken-or-the-egg-which-came-first argument 
about which causes which? Are we not back to the "reciprocal" (dialectical) understanding 
that each causes the other? "History has been shaped by the conflict between rulers and 
ruled" (3) which is also the conflict between exploiters and exploited.

It may surprise Gelderloos, but that was the perspective of Karl Marx. In his discussion 
of "primitive" (or "previous" or "primary") accumulation, which began capitalism, Marx 
emphasized the role of the state and other non-market forces. "In general history, it is 
notorious that conquest, enslavement, robbery, murder, briefly force, play the great 
part....The history of this,[the workers']expropriation, is written in the annals of 
mankind in letters of blood and fire." (Marx 1906; 785-6) The different methods of 
"primitive accumulation," in different countries and different times, "all employ the 
power of the state, the concentrated and organized force of society, to hasten, hothouse 
fashion, the process of transformation of the feudal mode of production into the 
capitalist mode, and to shorten the transition. Force is the midwife of every old society 
pregnant with a new one. It is itself an economic power." (823-4)

Kropotkin criticized Marx's concept of "primitive accumulation," only because he thought 
it gave the impression that state support of capitalism was solely in its early period. 
Kropotkin insisted that the state continued to intervene in the economy, to prop up 
capitalism. "Force" continues to be "an economic power."

The Marxist geographer, David Harvey, writes, "In recent times, several commentators, 
including myself, have suggested that we need to take the continuity of primitive 
accumulation throughout the historical geography of capitalism seriously. Rosa Luxemburg 
put that question firmly on the agenda a century ago." (Harvey 2010; 305) The accumulation 
of capital, not only through exploitation of labor but also through state expropriation of 
existing wealth, has become ubiquitous. Harvey prefers to call it today, "accumulation by 
dispossession." (310) This is consistent with the views of anarchists such as Kropotkin.

Program to Destroy the State

Gelderloos has not written an academic work. With justification, he wants to strengthen 
the anarchist case against the state, to encourage "an unambiguous desire to destroy the 
state." (234) He wants to refute the liberal and reform socialist view that the state can 
be used to improve society in a consistent and permanent way. "No party has ever stood in 
the way of capitalism, yet people keep on voting." (238) He rejects the Marxist-Leninist 
program of overthrowing this state and replacing it with a new state (the "dictatorship of 
the proletariat"). He has an ambivalent discussion of the Kurdish movement in Rojava. This 
has been influenced by anarchism but "they have not made a complete rupture with 
preexisting governmental and capitalist institutions." (239)

Rojava aside, there are ambiguities in his programmatic approach. Since he sees capitalism 
as primarily a tool of the state, he does not advocate "socialism" (let alone "libertarian 
communism"), as did Bakunin and Kropotkin. He only uses "socialism" to mean "state 
socialism" rather than "libertarian socialism" (anarchism). Since he regards exploitation 
as only secondary to state domination, he does not emphasize the popular struggles of 
workers and other oppressed and exploited people. How wealth is generated and distributed 
is not central to his analysis of society.

He apparently opposes mass movements making demands on the state (such as ending specific 
wars, raising minimum wages, outlawing discrimination of women or People of Color, etc.) 
Instead anarchists should "disparage state representatives, insult them, mock them, ignore 
them, or silence them." (244) Disrespecting politicians is all right but not a strategy 
for destroying the state. Instead of working class struggles, he advocates "refusal to pay 
taxes,...willfully breaking every law that one can get away with....rejecting or 
abstaining from the private communications technologies that states increasingly use to 
monitor their subjects....using cash instead of credit cards...." (244) These are mostly 
individual, rather than mass actions. This too is hardly a program for overthrowing the 
state. Gelderloos praises anarchist and other terrorists who have assassinated "monarchs, 
generals, presidents, and governors." (246) Without shedding tears for the monarchs, etc., 
we have to acknowledge that such deeds (outside of the context of revolutionary wars) 
often killed all sorts of working people, antagonized the popular masses, and resulted in 
jailing or killing many good militants.

Peter Gelderloos raises many important questions about the relation of the state, its 
origin, and its future to economic, popular, and class forces. There is very little 
current material on the anarchist view of the state and this book makes a significant 
contribution.

References
Gelderloos, Peter (2016). Worshipping Power: An Anarchist View of Early State Formation. 
Chico CA: AK Press.

Harvey, David (2010). A Companion to Marx's Capital. Vol. 1. London UK: Verso.

Marx, Karl (1906). Capital: A Critique of Political Economy. Vol. 1. NY: Modern Library.

Price, Wayne (2018a). "An Anarchist View of the Class Theory of the State." Anarkismo.
https://www.anarkismo.net/article/31082?search_text=Wayne+Price

Price, Wayne (2018b). "Post-Anarchism on the State-An Anarchist Critique." Anarkismo.

https://www.anarkismo.net/article/31126

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