Why haven't you joined the WSM or Organise!

There are probably around 200 self described anarchists in Ireland who are in some way regularly active. Of these no more than 40 are members of either of the two specific anarchist federations (Organise or WSM). Why is this the case?

An attempt to revive one aspect of the 'Irish Anarchism and Organisation' thread with a survey that may provide some interesting answers and opinions on one of the levels of organisation being talked about.

It's anonymous so don't be shy!

For me its important to be involved in organised class struggle anarchist groups.

a) we need organised movements, which share common political methods and aims, to spread anarchist ideas. encourge self-organisation through confronting the bosses.

b) it brings a sense of strength and confidence

Em, i'm involved in Anarchist Youth, so for the time being im ok where i am.

Although its healthy to have other groups which focus on issues such as prisoners support

Sure but Anarchist Youth as I understand it is a different thing from either WSM or Organise. It's what I was calling a sector group in the other post - one based around bringing together a particular type of anarchist (under 25's in you case, women in WAG's case) rather than bringing together anarchists to implement a particular program. So there would be nothing odd about being in AY or WAG and the WSM or Organise. All our women members are involved in WAG AKAIK and I think our under 25's should be involved in AY (I think some are?).

im not really in the right country... but ill probably join the cult when i get back, as long as i dont get another case of ' all organisations are against the proletariat´that is

probably join Organise! when I get back if they'll have me

posted 'other' because at the moment i'm trying to think about what people who identify as anarchists can/should do within the class struggle, what an anarchist organisation can/should do.

i think there may be a tendency to conflate a strong anarchist organisation with a strong level of class struggle, and i want to avoid that. however, i do think that an anarchist organisation can play a part in class struggle, i just want to spend some more time thinking about the particulars.

anyway, i'll put up some more questions on the irish anarchism and organisation thread to try and push the discussion.

I'll hop over to the other thread but one comment on this.

What do you mean by 'strong'. If you mean strong in numbers then in the Irish context (pop 5 milllion) a strong organisation would be one with at least 5000 to 50000 members (ie between 0.1% and 1% of the population). That is I think something that would take some time to work towards (ha) and which would only be reached when you had a high level of militancy in the class.

The current situation where both groups combined have 0.0008% of the population in their ranks can't really be discussed in the context of a 'strong movement'!

There's some truth in that, unfortunately. Probably we're a bit shy, maybe an unconscious reaction to the Trots.

But on the other hand, it should be a bit harder to join something like the WSM. The committment required is greater in my experience and should be sustained for the long term. I wouldn't like people to be drifting in and out of it like can be done with things like grassroots. That's one of the strengths about grassroots, you can dip your toes if you like but it's not appropriate for a long-term organisation.

We've actually had dual membership. Or no we didn't we had a member who was also a member of the ASF. (I think).

Also it's not WAG its RAG-Revolutionary Anarcha-feminist Group.

I suspect we'll be seeing more of the (pretty good) acronym than of the (clumsy at best) full name!

and plenty of jokes as to why they are so angry....

While jimmys right about commitment and agreement and all that I've always been surprised that people get put off by the fact that you are an 'organisation' and don't seem to be able to just ask can they get involved. Even people you work with regularly. This came up quite recently when someone said they were thinking of joining Organise! - apparently they had been for some time but didn't know how to go about it. So they eventually asked, and all this time we really didn't think they were interested! Its really that simple to get involved, or to start moving towards joining - just ask.

But yeah, on the other side of this there seems to be an anarchist aversion to 'recruitment', something we should get over at least in terms of asking people who are close to us to join (as opposed to aggressive recruitment for the sake of all too often short-term numerical growth).

And Conor of course we'll have you.

No, I don't see any reason for not having members in Anarchist Youth or RAG and WSM or Organise!. Though George I'm sorry to burst the bubble the joint member of WSM & ASF left the ASF in large part because of differences in position on the north. He thought the WSM position closer to his own and the ASF position and his untenable - so I'm not certain thats an argument in favour of joint membership.

Off to suggest we do a join Organise! leaflet as a result of guy's advice.

Cheers;

Yeah two WSM members are in RAG and one WSM member is in the AYC. So no problem.

Yeah I always thought it was funny that our most republican member was in the joint member.

Wow. This is possibly the most honest statement about the anarchist movement in ireland i have ever read.

the truth hurts but its time we - you - faced up to it. fair play.

Its nothing new - the WSM 'Our Persepctives' paper is based around a similar apprasial. See

http://struggle.ws/wsm/positions/perspectives.html

Two extracts

"We have to recognise that right now we are an organisation of only a handful. We have to face that, at this stage we are only a handful. Secondly we have to recognise that our tradition has no historical existence in Ireland, and this means that there are few others to rely on but ourselves. Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, we know that these times are very hard for building what we are building. Though we may be clear in our politics and make the best effort to further them, even the most moderate of successes will be few and far between for some time."

"Having stated our assessment of the times we are living in, we also have to look at the condition of the WSM. We have done a lot that we can be very proud of but we have also made bad mistakes in the few years after our formation and it is these we had to identify. Though serious errors occurred we survived and gained a deeper and clearer understanding of our politics. There is nothing wrong with making mistakes as long as we learn from them and are better prepared in the future."

Actuallly is used to be a whole lot more miserable up to last year when the document was amended. It's probably worth reading in full in the context of this debate

http://struggle.ws/wsm/positions/perspectives.html

I am a cynic when it comes to arnachist groups in Ireland

I am a cynic when it comes to anarchists groups in Ireland

it is good for the health

also age.

What was it Oscar Wilde said? 'The cynic knows the price of everything and the value of nothing'.

sovietpop

thanks for the contribution

Joeblack, I was just wondering where you get your two hundred anarchists in Ireland figure from?

Special Branch!

Na - its an educated guess based in part on our internal discussion about drawing up a guest list for the chomsky meeting (att. 90) the people who gave out about not being asked who we'd forgotten about, the people not able to make it and a head count of people from various actions and GG's. If anything it's probably an underestimate of the number of anarchists who engage in some form of activity on a regular basis as there are probably a fair few outside Dublin whom I'm unaware of.

I'm not counting 'everyone who ever went to a GG' if that's what your wondering and you could certainly make considerably higher estimates by other criteron.