the perils of pocket dictionary politics

It seems Thr@ll can't make anyone happy these days. Fresh on the heels of a blistering attack from the left in the form of Third Eye magazine (who've since made up with us), we now find ourselves the target of an assault from the right in the form of an article in the September/October issue of The Free Radical, edited by Libertarianz Party boss and "free-market" capitalist, Lindsay Perigo.

In a rant in which he tries to argue that anarchism and capitalism are somehow compatible, "anarchist and wit" (barf!) Rex Benson describes Thr@ll as "pages of left-wing rant, with a complete absence of any genuinely anarchist perspective".

Benson supports his claim that anarchists need "not harbour anti-capitalist feelings" by quoting a line from an article written for The Encyclopedia Britanica by that old left-winger, Peter Kropotkin. Kropotkin begins the article by describing anarchism as "a principle or theory of life and conduct under which society is conceived without government". According to Benson, because Kropotkin makes no mention of capitalism in this tiny fragment, anarchists are therefore entitled to hold any views they like about it.

Benson again resorts to the "pocket dictionary" school of political theory when he claims libertarian socialism is a contradiction in terms. Left-wingers and libertarian socialists cannot be "genuine anarchists", he says, because - it seems - they will "inevitably call on the coercive powers of the State" to "iron everyone out flat". The lesson in this, of course, is that political theories should be identified by their actual features and history rather than single sentence definitions of the kind quoted above. Apart from a few individuals in the US, anarchists the world over have always identified themselves as anti-capitalist. This is because anarchism entails more than a simple opposition to government; it means opposing all forms of exploitation, including capitalism.

But perhaps we should leave the last word to Kropotkin, who in the very same article quoted by Benson states the following: "As to their economical conceptions, the anarchists, in common with all socialists, of whom they constitute the left wing, maintain that the now prevailing system of private ownership in land, and our capitalist production for the sake of profits, represent a monopoly which runs against both the principles of justice and the dictates of utility. They are the main obstacle which prevents the successes of modern technics from being brought into the services of all, so as to produce general well-being. The anarchists consider the wage-system and capitalist production altogether as an obstacle to progress." Ouch! Now that hurts, Mr. Kropotkin...