You may not realise it, but you are probably already practicing anarchism in your daily life. From relationships to school, work, art, even the way you organise your time, anarchism can help you find fulfilment, empathy and liberation in the everyday.
From the small questions such as 'Why should I steal?' to the big ones like 'how do I love?', Scott Branson shows that anarchism isn't only something we do when we react to the news, protest or even riot. With practical examples enriched by history and theory, these tips will empower you to break free from the consumerist trappings of our world.
Anarchism is not just for white men, but for everyone. In reading this book, you can detach from patriarchal masculinity, norms of family, gender, sexuality, racialisation, individual responsibility and the destruction of our planet, and replace them with ideas of sustainable living, with ties of mutual aid, and the horizon of collective liberation.
Table of Contents:
Introduction
1. Am I Already Doing Anarchy?: Anarchy On and Off the Streets
2. Are Relationships Even Possible?: Anarchy at Home
3. You Call this Living?: Anarchy on the Job
4. Can I Relearn That?: Anarchy in School
5. How Do We Pay for It?: Anarchy in your Wallet and in the Market
6. Can We Still Enjoy Ourselves?: Anarchy and Art
7. Who Will Fix the Roads and Collect the Trash?: Anarchy in your Neighbourhood
8. When Will It End?: Anarchy, Time, and the World
Coda: No Place, or Living a World Without a State
Further Reading
Acknowledgements
About the Author :
Shuli Branson is an anarchist writer, translator, editor, and teacher, currently living on unceded Lenape land (so-called New York). She is the author of Practical Anarchism. Shuli translated The Abolition of Prison by Jacques Lesage de la Haye, and edited Surviving the Future: Queer Abolitionist Strategies. She hosts the podcast, The Breakup Theory, conversations on ending things and collective liberation, and is a member of the worker-writer collective CAW Journal.
Review :
'A joyful rethinking of anarchism. Branson draws on a wealth of cutting-edge theory and the messiness of activism to illuminate new ways to transform society. The result is a practical guide to everyday revolutions. A real treasure'
'Clever and inspiring! Branson's brilliant method of weaving together our collective and individual lives alongside our most complex relationships with the systems that we are part of is truly refreshing and ground-breaking. I feel that I and many other radicals have walked the edges of so many of these conversations that Branson has skilfully and necessarily busted open'
'Steeped in knowledge of Black and queer feminisms and decolonial struggles against the state, 'Practical Anarchism' is a powerful guide to the collective manufacture of utopia now'
'Presents clear, astute critiques of work, school and the destruction of community in capitalism and serves as a handbook for liberation, both optimistic and intensely motivating'
'Time and time again, anarchists have been involved in improving social relationships, empowering dispossessed and marginalised communities, and supporting struggles on the right side of history. In this highly readable and passionate book, Scott Branson sheds a light on many examples of everyday anarchist engagement'
'This brilliant book is an antidote to giving up. Weaving practical advice alongside women of colour, queer activists, abolitionists and more, Branson offers us a beautiful reminder that we do anarchism everyday - through care, through imagining, through loving - against and in spite of the state'
'An anarchist kaleidoscope, inviting us to shake up this world and see the endless array of beautiful possibilities that are already present in the here and now. This book - tender, dreamy, actionable - inspires us to pick up all the sparkly, even if sometimes jagged, edges of daily life that too often go unnoticed and toss them, time and again, into utopian play'
'Deftly and joyfully shows us that lives lived with compassion and collective autonomy in the engagements we call anarchy have practical applications in our everyday living'
