The Australian/NZ/Pacific libertarian/anarchist movements

Hi all.

I think over the last 5 years the most interesting formations have been

Mutiny ( sydney)

Treason (canberra)

Disobediance ( Melbourne)

They have varied a lot in activity but generally they are/were loose groupings commited to direct action and a pretty wide anti-authoritarian praxis. The dominant influences would be elements of the Sits, ultra-left, anarcho and autonomisty stuff. they were pretty much given the cold shoulder by the more traditional capital A types. Oh anti-war stuff was often a focus

Pre-dating them was a collective in Wollongong ( a small industrial city) called Revolutionary Action. Almost totally overlooked by people in the big cities, it is amoungts the best things that i every was involved in. It formed pre-Seatle with a wide libertarian socialist orientation and then become a hot house for intellectual development, was crucial in the promotion of numerous direct action struggles, no border actions, work place stuff , free parties etc. Its effects in wollongong are still felt - to the point where the default position for young radicals is an open libertarian one. Ex-members are currentlt working on a new formation

there were also interesting developments amoungst people who broke from a student union faction called Left alliance. The Libertarian Communist Collective - come - Red and Black was one of the first formations that spread autonomist ideas....except for small groups of melbourne comrades ..

there are some bookshops too

I think all of them were influenced by those formations but are not directly comparable.... the Woomera ( refuge camp) break out was a high point for many

cheers

Dave

I know the Anarchosyndicalist Federation (Eastern Suburbs Wing) split up, not sure about the North East or whatever the other one was...

And as I've been learning here, there is some sort of low-key anarcho-communist group in Melbourne... a lot of the presence seems to be largely internet-based these days (in Melbourne) but I won't speak for the other states

From my memory in high school days, it was organisations like Resistance (Reds?) that pushed the revolutionary stuff to the youth... @ndy probably has more knowledge of said group than I

Re ASF: as far as i'm aware, there's currently one group in the 'federation'. The mob out east died soon after they was born. Dunno why; might've had something to do with members' travel + work commitments. (Never having been a member of the ASF, it would prob be best if someone who is to outline the group's recent activities.)

Re MAC-G: they (viz, Dimitri) has posted a number of announcements from the MAC-G on libcom. They formed in November 2004, and announced this fact in March 2005 at the @ conference in Melbourne.

(Btw, there's been five of these in the last five yrs: Melbourne 2001, Sydney 2002, Brisbane 2003, Perth 2004, Melbourne 2005.)

Re Resistance: pffft. Anarchist orgs have been 'pushing the revolutionary stuff on da yoof' for yrs... *Activate* was a zine aimed esp at yoof; i reckon there's been literally hundreds of (other) @ zines doing this for yrs...

Basically, there's been lotsa stuff goin' on... the 'Melbourne Anarchist Club' is one of the more exciting projects i is involved in.... ignorance of the lore is, however, a reasonable excuse.

Anarchist groups and groups that have high anarchist involvement currently active in Aotearoa (hopefully should get them all, might miss some though):

Auckland

Auckland Animal Action - (animal rights)

Class War - (very small)

Blackcat - (mostly defunct except for their website)

Radical Youth - (huge, very active! heavily involved in the SuperSizeMyPay campaign of the Unite! union)

Cherry Bomb Comics - (anarcha-feminist infoshop)

Radio Chomsky (radio station)

Food Not Bombs

Wellington

The Freedom Shop - (infoshop, running for over 10 years)

128 Collective - (activist community centre, turning slowly into fully fledged social centre)

Oblong - (collectively run internet cafe and political exhibition space, has joint space with Freedom Shop)

Wildcat Anarchist Collective - (class struggle anarchist group, publishes SNAP! online and in paper form)

Wellington Anarcha-Fems - (anarcha-feminist discussion and support group)

Wellington Radical Youth - (just starting to reform after a period of dormancy)

PHAT (Phorum for Anarchist Thought) - (University based anarchist discussion group)

Peace Action Wellington - (anti-war group)

WARN (Wellington Animal Rights Network) - (animal rights group)

Food Not Bombs

Motueka

Community Action For People & Planet - (infoshop/community group)

Christchurch

New infoshop about to form (in discussion/planning stage at the mo)

Food Not Bombs

The Really Free Market (bi-monthly markets where everything is free!)

Monthly activist film nights

Dunedin

Black Star Books - (infoshop)

National

Aotearoa Indymedia - (also has local groups in many cities that run film nights, put out publications and other stuff)

Save Happy Valley Coalition - (campaign to stop a coal mine in an environmentally significant part of the South Island. local groups in Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch and the West Coast)

Enzyme - (website, email address and email list hosting for activist/community groups)

Animal Liberation Front (periodically active in various parts of the country)

I've only been reading about events in Aotearoa for a few months, I've been astonished at the level of activity, the energy there. One day I'll visit.

Thanks for that great list Asher, I think we can consider that as a response to @ndy and my request for more links for anarchy,org.au! I'll update the directory

EDIT: buggerit, most of em are already there. I ought to check first sometimes. I'm too slow.

*crawls back into hole*

Oh, and Thr@ll hasn't been active for years, you should probably remove it.

Aotearoa is pretty sport (especially rugby) obsessed too - there was a big article in the paper couple of days ago criticising Helen Clark for not attending commonwealth games - the headline was "She doesn't like sport?"

howdy, sorry for hijacking your forum, but can someone please tell me how to pronounce Aotearoa?

i've only ever read it on paper

A-o-te-a-ro-a pronounced : "Pies in 2006!"

Oi!

Incidentally, I heard it pronounced on the radio the other day as

'Oh-tah-row-ah'

The supersize my pay campaign. I'm not in Auckland so i dont know too much about it, but its awesome that its taken off so well in Auckland and taking on the fast food giants, industries that are notorious to organise. Its a real sign of some militancy from below and its been successful, so it has got some confidence going among young workers.

But the union that runs supersize my pay, Unite, is slightly dodgy. It was supposed to be a community based union with autonomous locals, limited hierarchy and so on. The opposite has been the case. ie. its your normal bureaucratic union with a notoriously nasty social democrat as president. Lots of anarchists have grumbles about Unite.

The sad thing is that i feel that Unite is using the energy of some anarchist unite union organisers to get the campaign going, and then watch this space, the unite bureaucrats will swoop down on this activity, and bring it under their control for their own ends. ie. its a not a campaign i see getting out of control of the union bureaucrats.

Hey Skraeling, welcome!

i cant speak for Asher. I prefer Aotearoa for the simple reason its nicer than New Zealand. Aotearoa means "land of the long white cloud" which is very appropriate cos it is cloudy here much of the time. New Zealand is named by Dutch explorer Abel Tasman after a province of the Netherlands which is hardly more innappropriate in my view. Aotearoa is aboslutely nothing like the Netherlands. Yet i guess if Zealand means Sealand it can be argued it is appropriate cos NZ/Aotearoa is surrounded by sea.

I believe most activists here use the term Aotearoa to show solidarity with the indigeneous Maori tribes who got invaded and almost exterminated by the Brits in the 19th century. (and yes, the British did invade Aotearoa). The New Zealand state was a product of that near genocide. Hence the term NZ is considered colonialist/capitalist/imperialist/racist etc. Using the term Aotearoa questions that legacy.

Also Maori is an official language here. So officially these islands should be known internationally as New Zealand/Aotearoa, a bit like Wales/Cymru i guess.

Its up to you guys what you call yourselves, I can only give a outsiders view.

In London I have met plenty of Kiwis, and no one has ever used the word Aotearoa. Is it just people on the left/anarchist movements who do?

I can recall quite a few people on the left in the 80s over here tried to introduce the name "Azania" for South Africa. This rather died a death when the ANC took over (the left was not interested in S Africa anymore) and the ANC government never bothered with the term either!