A-Infos (en) Italy, FDCA, Cantiere #43 - The Pleasure of Anarchist Militancy: History, Meaning, and Relevance of a Political Idea - Alessandro Granata (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

In the language of Italian radical movements, there's a phrase that 
aptly sums up the spirit of an entire political era: the pleasure of 
anarchist militancy . It's not a slogan created by a single author, nor 
a theoretical formula codified in a specific text. Rather, it's a 
widespread sensibility that permeated collectives, militant newspapers, 
and self-managed spaces between the late 1960s and the 1980s. ---- Those 
words encapsulate a precise idea: political engagement shouldn't be 
merely sacrifice, discipline, or austere dedication to a cause, but can 
also be an experience of freedom, creativity, and community. Militation, 
from this perspective, becomes a place where people already experiment, 
in the present, with the forms of life and social organization they 
would like to see established in future society.

A new culture of militancy

The expression took shape in the climate of the Italian 1968 movement 
and the social movements that followed. Beginning in the late 1960s, 
thousands of young people entered the circles of radical politics, from 
New Left organizations to libertarian collectives, profoundly redefining 
the very meaning of political participation.

In the anarchist world, but also in circles close to Workers' Autonomy, 
militancy was increasingly seen less as a simple tool for seizing power 
or influencing institutions. Rather, it became a space for social 
experimentation: a collective laboratory in which to test new forms of 
relationships, cooperation, and political organization.

This conception was clearly distinct from the militant culture of the 
major parties of the traditional left. In the Italian Communist Party, 
for example, militancy was often portrayed as discipline, personal 
sacrifice, and loyalty to the organization. In anarchist and libertarian 
groups, however, a different vision took shape: politics should also be 
an experience capable of generating enthusiasm, personal satisfaction, 
and a sense of belonging.

The meaning of "pleasure"

Talking about the "pleasure of activism" didn't mean trivializing 
political engagement or reducing it to a form of entertainment. On the 
contrary, it underscored a fundamental tenet of libertarian culture: 
social transformation must also affect everyday life.

For many anarchist militants, politics could not be limited to the 
horizon of a future revolution or the conquest of a new institutional 
order. It had to manifest itself already in the present through social 
relations founded on equality, cooperation, and individual autonomy.

The pleasure of militancy was therefore born from several concrete elements:

the ability to organize without rigid hierarchies or authoritarian 
leadership;

the sense of solidarity between comrades;

the construction of independent and self-managed social spaces;

the experience of alternative communities within existing society.

For many young people in the 1970s, joining an anarchist collective also 
meant finding a network of friends, a shared social dimension, and a 
different way of experiencing the city and free time.

The theoretical roots of libertarian thought

This sensibility was rooted in the historical tradition of anarchism. 
Thinkers like Mikhail Bakunin and Peter Kropotkin had envisioned a 
society based on self-management, voluntary cooperation, and the 
abolition of political and economic hierarchies.

In particular, Kropotkin had developed the theory of mutual aid, 
according to which cooperation among human beings represents a 
fundamental evolutionary force as much as competition. This idea helped 
strengthen the belief, widespread in libertarian movements, that a 
society based on solidarity and self-government was not only desirable 
but also realistic.

In the 1960s and 1970s, these ideas intertwined with new cultural 
influences. Philosopher Herbert Marcuse critically analyzed advanced 
industrial society, arguing that modern capitalism tends to integrate 
dissent through consumption and social conformity. At the same time, 
Situationist theorist Guy Debord described the transformation of social 
life into the "society of the spectacle," where direct experience is 
progressively replaced by media representation.

These reflections helped spread the idea that the revolution should not 
be limited to economic or institutional structures, but should involve 
the entire daily experience: work, culture, social relations and the way 
of experiencing urban space.

The practices of libertarian militancy

In the concrete life of the movements, the pleasure of militancy was 
expressed through a great variety of practices that intertwined 
politics, culture and sociality.

Many anarchist collectives promoted independent publishing, self-managed 
newspapers, militant libraries, and cultural initiatives. Horizontal 
assemblies were the main decision-making tool, while solidarity and 
mutual support networks constituted a concrete form of social organization.

In numerous Italian cities, self-managed spaces emerged that hosted 
concerts, debates, exhibitions, social activities, and gatherings. In 
these places, politics intertwined with everyday life: theories were 
discussed, social campaigns were organized, but at the same time, 
relationships, friendships, and communities were built.

Militancy thus became a true form of life, capable of questioning not 
only the structures of power but also daily habits, cultural models and 
dominant social relationships.

Why this militancy remains current

Decades later, the idea of the pleasures of activism remains highly 
relevant. The contemporary world is marked by profound economic 
inequalities, job insecurity, environmental crises, and growing distrust 
of traditional political institutions.

In this context, many social movements are once again questioning forms 
of organization based on cooperation, self-management, and solidarity. 
The commitment to anarchism is often interpreted as an attempt to build 
a libertarian communist society: a society without authoritarian state 
rule and economic exploitation, based on the collective management of 
resources and the direct participation of people in decisions that 
affect their lives.

Libertarian activism can therefore appear not only as a moral duty or a 
political necessity, but also as a positive and liberating experience. 
Participating in practices of mutualism, solidarity, and self-management 
allows us to build social relationships in the present that anticipate 
the kind of society we desire.

David Graeber's contemporary contribution

An important contribution to contemporary reflection on anarchism has 
come in recent years from the anthropologist David Graeber, often 
defined as an anarchist communist thinker.

Through his anthropological and historical studies, Graeber has shown 
how cooperation, mutual aid, and collective decision-making have 
characterized many human societies throughout history. According to 
Graeber, anarchism should not be understood so much as a rigid model of 
future society, but rather as a political method: a way of organizing 
social relations based on the idea that people are capable of 
cooperating and governing themselves without oppressive structures.

This perspective restores a creative and experimental dimension to 
activism. Political engagement consists not only in denouncing 
injustices, but also in concretely building alternatives: practices of 
solidarity, mutualistic economies, horizontal assemblies, self-managed 
social spaces.

A living legacy

The idea of the pleasure of anarchist militancy thus lives on in 
contemporary experiences of mutualism, social movements, social centers, 
and solidarity networks that seek to address society's problems with 
collective and horizontal tools.

From this perspective, activism isn't just a means to achieve a distant 
political goal. It's also a way of living politics in the present, 
transforming everyday relationships and building spaces of freedom 
within existing society.

And it is precisely in this dimension - between politics, community, and 
the desire for emancipation - that that expression born in the Italian 
movements of the second half of the twentieth century continues to find 
meaning: the pleasure of anarchist militancy.

The risk of global war and the urgency of a libertarian alternative

The contemporary geopolitical context makes the reflection on the need 
for commitment, activism, and militancy, and the transformation of 
society along a libertarian communist path, even more timely. In recent 
years, the international system has once again been marked by open 
conflicts, tensions between great powers, and a growing and 
exponentially accelerating arms race. Regional wars, neocolonialism, 
imperialism, strategic rivalries, and the expansion of military spending 
are leading the world back toward a logic of opposing blocs that many 
observers interpret as a potential prelude to a new world war. In this 
scenario, the anarchic idea of a society founded on cooperation between 
peoples, the reduction of state power, and the collective management of 
resources takes on a dimension of political as well as ethical urgency. 
For many libertarian thinkers and activists, the construction of social 
structures based on self-management, mutualism, and international 
solidarity represents not only a project of social emancipation, but 
also a response to the militaristic spiral that has historically 
accompanied nation-states and economies based on geopolitical 
competition. From this perspective, working to build an anarchist 
communist society also means imagining and practicing forms of 
coexistence capable of progressively removing space from the logic of 
war, rearmament, and domination by power.

Organizing anarchists: the lesson of the Platform

Alongside the spontaneous and communal dimension of anarchist militancy, 
a significant part of the libertarian tradition has always emphasized 
the need for organization. As early as the 1920s, some anarchist 
militants engaged in the Russian revolutionary experience critically 
reflected on the libertarian movement's limitations and its difficulty 
in making an impact at decisive moments in history.

Among them were Nestor Makhno, Pyotr Arshinov, and Ida Mett, 
protagonists of the Ukrainian revolution and of the peasant resistance 
against the White Army and counterrevolutionary forces during the 
Russian Revolution. After the defeat of the Makhnovist movement and 
their exile in Europe, they contributed to the drafting of a document 
that would spark widespread debate in the international anarchist 
movement: the Organizational Platform of the General Union of Anarchists 
, published in 1926.

The text began with a simple yet radical observation: anarchism, though 
rich in ideas and fighting practices, was often weakened by 
organizational fragmentation, a lack of coordination, and the difficulty 
of developing common strategies. According to the Platform 's authors , 
to truly impact revolutionary processes, anarchists needed to adopt more 
coherent and stable forms of organization.

The proposal put forward by Makhno and Arshinov was based on some 
fundamental principles:

theoretical unity, that is, a shared basis for analysis and political 
objectives;

tactical unity, to avoid dispersion and contradictions in action;

collective responsibility in decisions and activities;

federalism, as an organizational method capable of reconciling local 
autonomy and general coordination.

These ideas were the subject of heated debate within the international 
anarchist movement. Some militants feared that greater organizational 
structure could bring anarchism closer to centralized party models. 
Others, however, considered the Platform a necessary attempt to overcome 
the historical weaknesses of the libertarian movement.

Even today, a century later, that debate continues to influence the 
thinking of contemporary anarchists. In a world marked by profound 
social crises, growing inequality, and the risk of global conflict, many 
activists believe that building strong anarchist organizations, rooted 
in local communities and capable of coordinating on a broader scale, is 
a fundamental condition for the effective implementation of the 
libertarian communist project of social transformation.

From this perspective, organization is not seen as a limitation of 
individual freedom, but as a collective tool for realizing and defending 
it. Anarchist militancy thus continues to move between two complementary 
needs: on the one hand, the creative spontaneity of libertarian social 
practices, and on the other, the conscious construction of 
organizational structures capable of sustaining the emancipatory project 
over time.

Today more than ever, getting organized: a historical necessity

In light of the transformations of the contemporary world, the question 
of anarchist organization thus once again assumes central importance. 
Recurring economic crises, rising social inequality, the global 
ecological crisis, and the resurgence of military tensions between great 
powers demonstrate how unstable and deeply contradictory the existing 
social order is.

In this context, limiting oneself to individual testimony or simple 
critique of the system appears increasingly inadequate. If the goal is 
to build a libertarian communist society based on self-management, 
solidarity, and cooperation among human beings, it becomes necessary to 
develop collective tools capable of truly impacting social processes.

It is precisely from this perspective that the reflection initiated by 
Nestor Makhno and Pyotr Arshinov in the Organizational Platform of the 
General Union of Anarchists becomes highly relevant . Their proposal was 
not to build an authoritarian or centralized party, but to develop a 
libertarian organization capable of uniting theory and practice, local 
initiative and general coordination, individual autonomy and collective 
responsibility.

Today more than ever, in an era marked by social fragmentation and the 
weakening of traditional forms of political participation, building an 
anarchist organization rooted in local communities and capable of 
connecting diverse experiences of struggle becomes a fundamental 
challenge. It's not just about strengthening the anarchist movement as 
such, but about contributing to the emergence of a social force capable 
of promoting practices of mutualism, self-management, and solidarity on 
an increasingly broad scale.

In this sense, building an anarchist organization does not represent a 
renunciation of the libertarian spirit, but rather its most mature 
expression. It is through collective commitment, shared responsibility, 
and cooperation among militants that the ideas of freedom, equality, and 
libertarian communism can transform from theoretical aspirations into 
concrete reality.

For this reason, building a solid, coherent, and rooted anarchist 
organization today appears not only desirable, but increasingly 
necessary. In a world gripped by systemic crises and the risk of new 
social and military catastrophes, organizing means giving continuity and 
strength to the project of libertarian emancipation. It means 
transforming the pleasure of activism into a collective practice capable 
of truly impacting history and paving the way for a society founded on 
freedom and cooperation among all human beings.

https://alternativalibertaria.fdca.it/wpAL/
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