Talk:Left anarchism

Proposal for overhaul
Although this article itself is a minefield of POV, OR, uninformative mishmash, the sources look pretty strong and the topic itself is surely worthy of inclusion. Thus, I propose we stub the article right down to one line and rebuild, cited statement by cited statement, from the references. Any thoughts? скоморохъ 23:20, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
 * No responses, so I was bold and went ahead with the stubbing. скоморохъ  01:55, 27 February 2008 (UTC)


 * All it needs are some more sources. But you seem to have taken some out.  maxrspct  ping me  02:30, 27 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I took out some of the external links that didn't seem to address the issue directly - I don't have a problem restoring them if you feel they're relevant. But to say all the text of the article needs is a few more sources is to overlook the fact that the article has been in this sorry state of uncited original research since its creation. My idea is, if we strip he article back to an uncontroversial definition and a list of sources, we can start building it back up, line by line, from those sources instead of having to contort them to fit problematic text. So how about the compromise - re-remove the text I originally purged, but restore all the previous sources? скоморохъ  02:34, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Actually.. i am probably more in favour of deleting it as a NON-Notable term. I have never seen this in print and even a simple google search comes up with nothing but Wendy Elroy (?) site, wikimirrors, rightwing blogs and one essay -"The Incredible Lameness of Left-Anarchism " which has been syndicated in a few anarchist columns including the 'Institute of Anarchism's journal. -- maxrspct  ping me  02:43, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, you could nominate it for deletion, but I tried that before and it was unsuccessful. In the meantime, what to you say to my proposal? скоморохъ  02:47, 27 February 2008 (UTC)


 * At the very least some of the ancap trash needs to be removed. People like Bryan Caplan simply are not reliable sources simply for the fact they espouse the irrational nonsense that anarcho-capitalism is a form of anarchism when by definition we know it isn't (It fails the principle test of anarchism of being against bosses and tolerates the sort of rothbardian "its ok to sell children into slavery"(rothbard literally argues this) nonsense that all anarchists are by definition opposed to. Why the hell is the confused and fucked up anarchist faq (Incorrect answers for frequently asked questions!) by caplan in there, or at least not marked as suspicious whilst the excellent and well researched faq at infoshop dismissively marked as a "social anarchist" text (And does anyone IRL refer to themselves as a "social anarchist", we're bloody economic anarchists too because we advocate the overthrow of capitalism ffs. RANT RANT. 121.45.242.182 (talk) 08:29, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

Title change?
It looks like it's much more often called "left-wing anarchism." Operation Spooner (talk) 06:09, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Google begs to differ: 643 for "left-wing anarchism" vs. 5,170 for "left anarchism". скоморохъ  06:14, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Ok. Operation Spooner (talk) 06:19, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Get a grip Spooner/RJII.. i am still up for deleting the article. This is still just a POV ditty with only a few fringe and obscure references.  maxrspct  ping me  15:25, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Well.. i just reread the archive. RJII all over it plus other voices on the term being non-notable. -- maxrspct  ping me  15:28, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I am going to remind you, max, to assume good faith on the part of your fellow editors. You have accused, and not for the first time, two editors in good standing of being sockpuppets of another editor, and you have done so with no evidence whatsoever.  Please try to remember that, for the most part, the motivations of other editors are at least as pure as your own. ---  RepublicanJacobite  The'FortyFive'  17:26, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
 * You have no information on what evidence or not I have. Don't bite me over something that goes back 4 years.  maxrspct  ping me  18:19, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
 * All I will say is that Wikipedia is an openf forum, so if you have evidence relating to another editor, present it and make your case. Otherwise, please refrain from making accusations and, once again, assume good faith. ---  RepublicanJacobite  The'FortyFive'  19:49, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
 * It is arguable whether it is forum or not or more. I do assume good faith but if I see subsequent behaviour or activity that shows otherwise I will adjust my responses accordingly. Are you not just wound up about my editing of this article? feel free to contribute. - maxrspct  ping me  20:52, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Dear Admins and all those concerned
I spend 15 mins reading the contorted AFD guidelines and information .. but i am obviously none the wiser. How am i spossed to know how to clear AFD old nomination backlogs? For those in the dark about the reasons for my nomination - Its a non-notable or fringe term that belongs in wiktionary + the page is just being filled with fringe right-wing libertarian claptrap. -- maxrspct  ping me  15:36, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I nominated it properly for you; the discussion is Articles for deletion/Left anarchism (2nd nomination). Friendly advice: with your current rationale, editors are likely to vote keep, because the term has received coverage in reliable third party sources. You might want to find another reason for deletion besides notability, such as WP:FORK or WP:SYN. скоморохъ  15:43, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Bob Black?
Doesn't Bob Black talk about "left anarchism", with respect to "post-left anarchism"? Isn't that a starting point for a decent article? I definitely think a very good first-class article can be built here, even though it might take a lot of time and several volunteers. AllGloryToTheHypnotoad (talk) 17:22, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Article Should Be Deleted
This article should be deleted. Having references does not make a subject automatically valid. Anarchists do not use the term "left anarchism" and it is most certainly not a positive term. The term has been used to attack anarchists, sow confusion, or place them on an equal footing with the left. Terms like "Social anarchism" and "left libertarianism" are not interchangeable. simply because one person said this or that, especially discredited writers or unpopular ones does not make this term valid. This entry was created by RJII/Operation Spooner who had their account deleted, and their activities on Usenet still show their intention to rewrite and redefine history, terms, language, etc around the concepts of "anarchism" in a basically dishonest manner. --Radical Mallard 8:22 AM EST 5/16/09
 * There's nothing stopping you from nominating the article for deletion again, but please don't vandalise the article by making it about "right anarchism" – there is an empty space at right anarchism for that. The last deletion discussion did not attract a great deal of input, so I don't think the article would be an automatic keep if it were put up for deletion again. But until such a discussion has occured, please respect the existing consensus in favour of giving the article a chance. Sincerely,  Skomorokh   16:48, 16 May 2009 (UTC)
 * (THIS IS A RESPONSE TO BOTH "Skomorokh" and "RepublicanJacobite") I don't believe consensus has been reached, there has been no real effort towards it. The problem with this issue, and several others I have been trying to deal with in regard to my edits is that there are some misinterpretations of anarchism created by a small number of individuals who will make an entry and then post-facto people will search for references, which come from a different context, or in which mention of the term is by a writer who is not an anarchist but a person doing research who encountered the misrepresentation from the person who made it in the first place. With absolutely EVERY concept on wikipedia this is an issue. I do believe there is an unspoken reality established on wikipedia in which certain subjects cannot be edited by adherants of a given group because they are like members of a cult.. however in other cases, people supporting a subject (so long as their support is more of a secular an non-fanatical nature) are the ones who have to make most edits because they are the source of accurate information - for example, the people editing the "Libertarian" entries are obviously followers of the pro-capitalist tendency in the United states. Whether they find references to back up their assertions or not, they will give a specific point of view and will use or discard certain terms. In the case of this issue (regarding the unused-by-anarchists terms "anarchist socialism, anarcho-socialism, socialist anarchism" ("socialist anarchism" was used once by Bakunin and then abandoned and today it is only used by detractors and some non anarchist bloggers) and the semi-valid term "social anarchism", used by Bookchin but no one else... "left anarchism" has been used specifically by Bob Black and his friends as an attack/degradation term, as well as by some rightists) there is overwhelming evidence that these terms are used by detractors who wish to misinterpret what anarchism means. I am sure even you would agree that individualists of the capitalist sense would prefer to not have people understand that anarchism's socialism comes from egoist, self-interest, and not the traditional authoritarian left's moral and altruistic arguments. And yet without this distinction made, anarchism (and it's synonym, libertarian socialism) becomes indistinguishable from "run of the mill socialism". The pro capitalist libertarians have gone out of their way to put forth their arguments, yet anarchists are repeatedly made to have their ideas misinterpreted. This is not a "personal vendetta", this is the same process anyone would go through who tried to set a record straight. I want to know two things from you, to prove you are interested in something fair and objective... 1) are you willing to let people discuss this in the talk pages and find ways to make more people aware of this issue so they will come here. And 2) Is there some way a "call for papers" from existing anarchists can be made so their own positions on this can be made clear? A 3rd question is: 3) What if I or others do not have a lot of time to deal with this issue? Is the Wikipedia rule that "he with the most time to spend wins"? It would take me a tremendous amount of effort to contact people and persuade them to take this issue seriously, and yet there's no guarantee that any changes made based on such research would even be accepted. I want to also mention a final problem here. Once the misleading terms "anarcho-socialism", "anarchist socialism", and "socialist anarchism" are used, repeatedly in anarchist and libertarian entries, a sentence in which the legitimate terms (anarcho communism, left libertarian, libertarian socialist) are said to be the same as the illegitimate terms is added. Do you even care who is responsible for doing this, what their motivation is, and what effect it has? Let me give you a simmilar example... it would be like writing that "lifestyle anarchism is used by some to mean anti work anarchism, anti civilization anarchism, and primitivism", when the fact is, the situation is more complex than this and clarification is needed. It would be also simmilar to saying "anarcho-capitalism and free market anarchism are synonymous with anarcho-fascism", because detractors wrote books in which comparisons were made between private economic capital concentration and state economic capital concentration... and yet even if you gave all the references in the world the anarcho-capitalists would protest and change the entry. Would you then call this "vandalism"?  Do you see what I am saying here? I am no paltry vandal to wikipedia. I have created entries from scratch that exist today, and I have cleaned up entries and made them relevant.. many that are non political. I ask you to please take me seriously and not simply revert my edits, if you care about what Wikipedia is about. Also, note: the reason this statement is not broken up into paragraphs is because of the nature of the structure of the wikipedia talk page response format.--Radical Mallard June 23, 2009, 5:35 PM EST

Call for Deletion if this Entry
It is a fact that anarchists do not use the term "left anarchism", and it is NOT synonymous with libertarian socialism and left libertarianism, which are the proper terms that anarchists actually use. Anarchism that opposes capitalism derives it's core concepts not from morality, marx, socialism, etc but from the rational self interest of the working class individual. terms such as "left anarchism" and "socialist anarchism" or "anarcho-socialism" imply that such an anarchism is just another flavor of marxist or leninist or moralistic ideas that have characterized the traditional authoritarian or statist left. to allow people who have a pejorative point of view of anarchism to define it doesn't make any sense... should the same thing be done about those who believe in capitalism? I have noticed more and more attempts to remove the terms "libertarian socialism" and maneuver it into terms like "anarcho socialism"... this was done originally by the banned user "RJII", "Anarcho-Capitalist" and "Operation Spooner", who was very likely silicone vally resident James Donald who has done everything he can, especially on Usenet, to attack and destroy the definition of anarchism in all the encyclopedias from the past 100 years (along with the help of Bryan Caplan) and make everyone believe that the only anarchists are those who believe in capitalism. This section should be deleted or left as a stub. --Radical Mallard June 23, 2009, 9:09 AM EST
 * You are obviously on a vandalism spree motivated by a vendetta. Please stop. ---  RepublicanJacobite  The'FortyFive'  14:50, 23 June 2009 (UTC)
 * No, I am making the edits based on actual history. It is a fact that the people who started these entries were banned from Wikipdia.. how is this a vendetta? And how are my edits vandalism but yours are not? I explained my reasoning. There is evidence to back it up. Update: Please see the long comment in the above section.--Radical Mallard June 23, 2009, 4:50 PM EST
 * Your right that anarchists don't use the term 'left wing anarchism', but thats principally because there isn't a right wing version (the misleadingly named anarcho-capitalism isn't a type of anarchism as it supports capitalism, rather its a form of stateless capitalism). But I don't know where this rational self-interest stuff comes from. Its certainly not a feature of early writing on the topic. However the concept of left-anarchism does exist in reference to post-left anarchism, which is a (mostly) individualist rupture in theory from workerist accounts, either from a post-structuralist perspective, or primitivist/green perspective. 121.45.247.39 (talk) 16:15, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * actually on reflection I'm not too up to date on the earliest mutualist stuff. Maybe it was talked about in that? 121.45.247.39 (talk) 16:16, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Post-left anarchism is not a reference to left anarchism, considering there is no such thing as left or right anarchism, it is a reference to left and post-left ideologies in general. Socialism is left, and primitivism or insurrectionism is post-left, therefore primitivist anarchism or insurrectionist anarchism would be post-left anarchism.--  Void kom  talk 13:26, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

External links modified
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Only anarcho-collectivism?
Whether you all like my edit of the link in the first sentence, from anarcho-collectivism to social anarchism, or not, please bare in mind anarchocollectivism is specifically distinct from anarchocommunism and other models because of the use of labor notes, (currency), and is associated mostly with Bakunin and popularly contrasted with Kropotkin's communist model. It never should have specified left-anarchism was a term meant to contrast anarcho-collectivism with so-called right-anarchism, that excludes most left-anarchism from left-anarchism. Many other philosophies/movements/sets-of-tactics exist other than anarcho-collectivism and most are distinct from anarchocollectivism as far as terminology and most do not necessarily have much overlap. Traditionally the philosophies of the "big three" are compared and contrasted to represent the spectrum of opinion in classical anarchism. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.82.67.49 (talk) 05:35, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

Page should be deleted and be a redirect
It's my belief that this topic doesn't warrant a page, just like Right-wing anarchism is a disambiguation page only; but only a subsection as part of Issues in anarchism and/or Anarchism and capitalism. Unless somebody can show me that Left anarchism has been used or described as a concept by someone other than just anarcho-capitalists, I stand by what I said.--87.17.95.218 (talk) 21:32, 3 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Per the sparse sourcing, this topic is more of a comparative phrase than an independently notable concept with its own body of literature. I agree that a restoration of your prior redirect to Issues in anarchism would be sufficient. czar  15:32, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Thank you.--Davide King (talk) 23:00, 17 August 2019 (UTC)


 * I think that there should be a redirect to Social anarchism as the most complete article about "left-wing" anarchism.
 * What is your opinion?
 * Yours sincerely, Гармонический Мир (talk) 02:52, 14 November 2019 (UTC)
 * If we did that, we would probably still need a hatnote to explain why "left anarchism" is redirecting there, if it won't be explained in the lede. The redirect to Issues in anarchism does a good job of explaining the term and then offering a direct link to social anarchism to read more. How does that sound? czar  03:10, 14 November 2019 (UTC)