Let's begin with the obvious: in capitalism, common issues are rarely resolved by the people directly involved. While the hegemonic relationships in our society-those that shape the dominant social models-are structured on the basis of political domination, they are not, however, the majority relationships. The majority relationships are what we could call, in broad political terms, anarchist relationships; that is, relationships not mediated by command and obedience.
In our daily lives, we participate more in the collective creation of rules (explicit or implicit) than in the drafting of laws, and we assume more responsibilities than orders. This is not usually considered in this way, of course, not even by those around us. For most people, the Aristotelian assertion that in the world something always commands and something obeys seems irrefutable.
This preeminence given to relationships based on domination operates within a paradigm of just domination that pervades almost all political philosophy, with very few exceptions. According to this paradigm, relationships of domination, of leadership, are inevitable. It doesn't matter if they are forever, given that "man is a wolf to man," or only for a period, while leading him along the "path of truth," but political domination would be just and necessary.
This view, challenged time and again by the ideas and practices of self-institutionalized spaces, tends to render invisible the multiplicity of existing relationships. And it is precisely in this multiplicity that we can find support to dismantle its established assumptions. Although rendered invisible, self-institutionalization, that series of processes through which the commons are produced and sustained without hierarchical mediation, is a fundamental part of antagonistic struggles and the daily life of communities.
In politics, however, there has been no greater fear than that of the downtrodden, the rabble, the poor. The idea of the need for representation of the will and for leadership has found support, time and again, in this fear. Even for most critics of current populism, the real problem, as if it were a malignant essence, a sleeping monster, resides in the subordinate classes. The "sin" of populist parties, in any case, would be to exacerbate, to unleash, this evil.
To reject any elitist and paralyzing vision that turns anarchy into the preserve of an enlightened minority, we need to re-examine the notions from which we define ourselves. Today, even in our initiatives, there seems to be less clarity-or agreement-about exactly what we are defending.
Two Ways of Understanding the Commons
An identity-based conception of community-understood as a stable set of characteristics shared by a human group, ultimately, a shared property-is contrasted with a broader notion understood as a way of being in common. In this more dynamic and relational conception of community, people are not merely passive recipients of a property, but a fundamental part of a continuous and collective process of construction. Therefore, the community is not something external, nothing "outside" of the people themselves. Nor, it is understood, is it an immutable, owned asset that must be defended.
Instead, the community arises through the relationships in which people establish the commons and in which, at the same time, those same relationships establish them. Establishing, then, refers to the processes by which people sustain collective life: they give it meaning, protect it, and organize its continuity. To act as if all these processes somehow belonged to the State-that is, to identify society with the State-is as mistaken as thinking they are free from the interference of state mechanisms.
The identity-based political paradigm, then, reproduces a rather limited view of these processes and of the role of individuals in the creation of the common good. While in the process of jointly instituting reality, the new does not emerge from nothing, but rather from what has been previously established, it is never an exact reproduction of what already exists. Each person, in relating to the world and to others, recreates it, always modifying it. The new inevitably emerges, although fundamentally transforming what has been historically established is not easy.
The common good is never something static, separate from, or superior to the people who comprise it, as the identity-based perspective suggests. The common good is a co-presence, a being together, a sharing that becomes an ethical responsibility toward others. It might seem obvious, but people living together means they are involved with one another, not just standing next to each other. This distorted view of how reality is established contributes to the reproduction of the current order by generating an idea that disconnects us from the process.
Otherness and Co-involvement
In the identity-based paradigm, otherness-any relationship with the other-is also considered a negative process. The relationship is not productive; rather, it is always a relationship of stagnation. To the passive role assigned to people in the construction of the common good is added the interpretation of social interaction as a continuous conflict between individuals negotiating their survival.
This individualistic ontology, largely associated with the liberal idea-independent subjects or, at best, intersubjective relationships-fails to adequately describe the relationships between people. Even when it is suggested that something ultimately positive might emerge from the negation of the other, the view of limits is always negative. This has led to the erroneous interpretation that anarchism is merely a mirror image of established political power. This error explains, at least in part, a certain false antagonism and reductionism between the destituent and instituting capacities of antagonistic and anti-authoritarian movements.
However, it is possible to conceive of otherness from a different perspective that implies a different experience of limits. We are not obligated to outlive others; rather, our singularity, ourselves, emerges from a vast series of relationships-not only of negation-that we establish with them. Contrary to what those who stoke fear of the other claim, other people are the very condition of possibility for all our possible developments, both good and bad. Those around us are part of who we are, and in otherness we increase or decrease our own potential.
The relationship between individuals and their environment, then, is one of co-implication and co-functioning, not separation or mere negation. What is common is what emerges from this relationship. Thinking about community and its relationships from the perspective of difference and otherness challenges a certain authoritarian pretension of uniformity and homogeneity within communities.
An Anarchic Figuration of the Common
By abandoning the idea of an always negative otherness and of substantial subjects, we can move on to the challenge of thinking about the common as the very condition for anti-authoritarian collective developments, where difference becomes productive. The common is the terrain of conflict and the condition of possibility for anarchic creation: self-institution. The uniqueness and vitality of this type of creation lies in practices that dispense with both external and internal leadership, as well as any form of representation or passivity.
The culture of the commons must emphasize the contingent, relational, and transformative nature of being together. The inherent contingency of life reinforces this proposition. In practice, self-institution, for its part, implies the rejection of representation and any connection to abstract, universal principles that are placed above people. Therefore, while proposals of all kinds are extremely important, there is no place for models with universalist pretensions that seek to replace those involved or attempt to encompass all social complexity.
An anarchic figuration of the culture of the commons can emerge in the collective imagination as the affirmation and maximum possible enhancement of collective power.
Establishing Difference
We shouldn't worry about the common, in the sense that it simply already exists, but we should worry about the possibilities that open up when we think about it differently. Why cling to an idea of otherness that doesn't recognize the infinite possibilities of interaction? Why adhere to an elitism that reduces anarchy to the exceptional?
The antagonism between construction and destruction is false. Anarchism cannot be reduced to the simple negation or specular reaction of the established order, which, while conditioning it, cannot determine it. In practice, negation, as the partial or total destruction of the established world, is inseparable from the institution, and at the same time, from other worlds. Even from an insurrectionary perspective, there is no end to capitalism without more "anarchist institutions," that is, without generalizing this support of collective life in an anti-authoritarian key. Therefore, rejecting the need for an anarchist projection is already tantamount to failure.
At the same time, anarchism cannot be reduced to a parodic construct where, in some way, a future ideal is lived out. Anarchist practices affirm and amplify common powers, transformations, and conflicts in the present. The projection of movements, the projective impulse of the capacities of the grassroots, does not entail creating unique models or fighting monsters with monsters. Self-instituting creation is always provisional, open, and changing. It is the battleground of the possible.
What we defend does not belong to the future, nor is it abstract, nor is it outside of or above us. There is no anarchism without getting our hands dirty; the struggle to generalize the self-institution of the commons does not guarantee results, but precisely for that reason, it makes everything possible.
Regino Martinez, Member of the Anarchy movement and newspaper of Montevideo
https://regeneracionlibertaria.org/2026/02/11/la-cultura-anarquica-de-lo-comun/
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Link: (en) Spain, Regeneracion: The Anarchic Culture of the Commons - The Foundation of a Subversive Collective Imaginary (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]
Source: A-infos-en@ainfos.ca
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