Hi! I myself are an anarchist, but I find myself agreeïng on a lot of what some left communists here say in the forums. Especially regarding the critisism on anti-imperialism, the stance on anti-electorialism, and a lot of the discussions in anti-fascism especially on the whole anti-bnp hype on that forum. But now the question arises which I wanted to ask for a long time: What are the major ideological diffrences with anarchism? Left communists too reject vanguardism, statism, anti-imperialism and nationalism, do they not? Where do we differ the most, and where can we find one another? Please elaborate, because I am interested in left communism for some time now, but can't really find the right articles on this subject, mainly because I am not to familliar with the left communist community in the whole (organisations, websites, magazines, etc.) Thanks in advance!
I suppose it depends on what sort of anarchism you're referring to, as each form has a different response, i.e. you can't critique syndicalism in the same way you critique individualism or insurrectionism. From the ICC, I found these two: What is revolutionary syndicalism? Is it possible to reconcile anarchism and communism? They should be of some use. It should be noted, however, that these are only one of many critiques.
For me Omi when I was breaking from anarchism over twenty years ago, there were two questions that concerned me. One was the union question as we were going through a extremely volatile period of strikes at my work, and the second was that when the left communists said they were against the state they actually meant it. The two main left communist organisations today are the ICC and the IBRP. They can be found here: http://internationalism.org/500/ http://www.ibrp.org/ Devrim
Hi Omi, I think the comparrision between left communism and anarchism go a bit deeper than just that, being more of a comparission between marxism and anarchism. I think the key difference between marxism and anarchism is the difference of method. While marxists by definition uphold a historical method, anarchists either don't hold anything as such or even if they have some sort of an understanding of a historical method, they do not use it on theoretical/practical questions, disregard it etc. While this might seem to be a more or less minor aspect, it is in my opinion the key one. Using the historical method, marxists managed to form and maintain a dynamic, always drawing lessons from the past, always seeing things not only in what they are but in what they were and what they will or can become. It became a living dynamic, an ever-developing one. Anarchism, on the other hand, due to this lack of method, has always been a more or less static ideology in all its forms, unable to draw historical lessons, unable to prevent the momentary, daily conditions determining the line of thought and action, unable to develop as an ideology, unable to improve itself through series of self-criticisms. All this makes anarchism a very confused ideology. This is the principle difference in my opinion between genuine marxism and all sorts of anarchism. This of course doesn't in any way negate the fact anarchists can be revolutionary internationalists in which case we would work with them, be in the fullest solidarity with them as we are in several different countries. It does on the other hand mean that revolutionary internationalist anarchists walk a thinner line due to all the weaknesses of anarchism, which are what inherently makes anarchism anarchism.
Thank you all for the info!
