Everyday Anarchism

In this episode I'm joined by Asao B. Inoue to discuss contract grading, a radical (even anarchistic?) form of grading which strengthens the student-teacher relationship, lessens the power of hierarchy in the classroom, and fights the oppressive structures which are distorting education. If you'd like to learn more about contract grading - including how to integrate it into your syllabus - check o...

Welcome back to my continuing coverage of the Graeber and Wengrow book The Dawn of Everything . This week, is the conclusion of my conversation with four members of the Black Trowel Collective, a network of anarchist archeologists: James Birmingham, Lewis Borck , James Flexner , and Aris Politopoulos . This conversation covers next steps: in the wake of The Dawn of Everything and work done by the...

In this episode of Anarchism 101: An Anarchist Syllabus , I read Lucy Parsons' "The Principles of Anarchism"  and  "Speech on June 29 of the Founding Convention of the IWW"  . This project is year-long; on the first of each month of 2022, I'll be posting my reading of an important anarchist text. Later that month, I'll post an episode in which I discuss each text and its author with...

In this June 2022 discussion episode of Anarchism 101 , I discuss Gandhi's "Passive Resistance" with KP Shankaran . Join us as we discuss Gandhi's place in the anarchist movement, why his ethics based anarchism is the purest form of anarchism, and how his critique of colonialism is more important now than ever before. This project is year-long; on the first of each month of 2022, I'll be posting m...

Welcome back to my continuing coverage of the Graeber and Wengrow book The Dawn of Everything . This week, I'm joined by four members of the Black Trowel Collective, a network of anarchist archeologists: James Birmingham, Lewis Borck , James Flexner , and Aris Politopoulos . This is part one of our roundtable discussion, covering first impressions of the book and its place in recent work on archae...

Kim Stanley Robinson joins me to discuss his new book, The High Sierra: A Love Story . Stan and I discuss literary form, the need for Keynesianism in a crisis, utopian camping, his solution to leftist infighting, and how humanity can survive our current climate nightmare. You might also like Stan's most recent novel, a future history of how a worldwide crisis response to the climate emergency woul...

Iain McKay joins me to discuss the new edition of Kropotkin's Words of a Rebel from PM Press . In this book, Kropotkin's very first, he lays out the need for a revolution and how to prepare for that revolution. It's strikingly relevant, beautifully written, and packed with all sorts of context from Iain. I highly recommend the book!

In this episode of Anarchism 101: An Anarchist Syllabus , Abby Russ and I read Gandhi's " Passive Resistance " from his anarchist manifesto, Hind Swaraj. This project is year-long; on the first of each month of 2022, I'll be posting my reading of an important anarchist text. Later that month, I'll post an episode in which I discuss each text and its author with a scholar of anarchism. Look forward...

Labor journalist Kim Kelly joins me to discuss her new book, Fight Like Hell: The Untold History of American Labor . We talk unions, what they did historically, what they're doing right now, and most of all how they can make an impossible future possible.

The heart of modern capitalism is the exploitation of workers. But according to all of the great theorists of capitalism, capitalism will actually prevent the exploitation of labor. So maybe all those thinkers are just wrong. But maybe what we call "capitalism" is just an updated form of feudal serfdom in which CEOs and middle managers have replaced monarchs and aristocrats. But if we are living n...

This week I'm joined by Bruce Glavovic , Iain White , and Tim Smith to discuss their recent article " The Tragedy of Climate Science ." In the article, these three climate scientists point out the obvious: climate scientists keep making increasingly dire predictions, and politicians keep doing nothing. In a recent survey , a majority of climate scientists expect catastrophic global warming to occu...

This week I'm joined by Corey Robin, author of The Reactionary Mind , to discuss American democracy in the wake of the January 6th attack and the supposed crisis of democracy it caused. Corey and I discuss democracy as a process, the work that needs to be done to support that process, and how Karl Rove was right about one thing: it's our job to imagine and realize a different world.

In this May 2022 discussion episode of Anarchism 101 , I discuss an excerpt of Bakunin's God and the State with Mark Leier . Join me and Mark as we discuss Bakunin's place in revolutionary thinking, his status as a founding anarchist, his dispute with Marx, and his relevance to contemporary debates about science and democracy. This project is year-long; on the first of each month of 2022, I'll be...

On this episode I'm joined by Aris Politopoulos, an archeologist who works on video games, to discuss the way that video games can help us understand the past, help us educate people about the past, and possibly make the entire project of understanding history more anarchist. Aris does much of his work on video games as part of the VALUE Foundation; you can find them on Twitter , Twitch , YouTube...

For this episode I'm joined by Gabriel Kuhn, author of Life Under the Jolly Roger: Reflections on Golden Age Piracy , to discuss the anarchist nature of 18th century pirates. Join us to learn about all the ways that pirates lived more freely, more justly, and with less violence than their counterparts in European navies and merchant ships. Gabriel also discusses the connections between pirate radi...

I'm joined by one of my dissertation directors, John McGowan, to discuss the philosophy of John Dewey in the context of anarchism. Dewey is today remembered as one of the premier advocates for democracy, and especially democratic education, in the entire history of the United States. And like his teacher William James and his collaborator Jane Addams, he seems more than a little anarchist to me. W...

On this episode I'm Graeme Robertson, co-author of Putin vs. the People, joins me to discuss Putin's invasion of Ukraine, the formation of the new Ukrainian national identity, and the way that nationalism, imperialism, and neoliberalism have shaped the current situation. Graeme debunks right-wing talking points about the war, provides necessary context from recent Ukrainian and Russian history, an...

In this episode of Anarchism 101: An Anarchist Syllabus , I read Bakunin's famous discussion of science and authority from God and the State This project is year-long; on the first of each month of 2022, I'll be posting my reading of an important anarchist text. Later that month, I'll post an episode in which I discuss each text and its author with a scholar of anarchism. If you have any questions...

In this March 2022 discussion episode of Anarchism 101 , I discuss an excerpt of Proudhon's "What is Property" with Edward Castleton. Join me and Edward as we discuss Proudhon's theory of property, the revolutionary context of his works, and the sense in which he deserves to be considered one of the founders of anarchism. This project is year-long; on the first of each month of 2022, I'll be posti...

Cathy O'Neil - a veteran of both Wall Street and Occupy Wall Street - joins me to discuss her new book, The Shame Machine . We discuss her previous book, Weapons of Math Destruction , how it led her to The Shame Machine , and how shame has become an invisible currency sustaining capitalism's most exploitative practices. Cathy outlines how social media "cancellations" are just free advertisements f...

Just before his death, David Graeber completed a manuscript of a book called The Dawn of Everything - both a serious attempt to provide an entirely new story of the origin of "civilization" and playful takedown of other recent books that purport to explain civilization. Written with David Wengrow, The Dawn of Everything raises many fabulous and provocative questions: what if it was indigenous Amer...

In this emergency Ukrainian war episode, I'm joined by Stan, the coeditor of the website for Assembly, an anarchist group in Ukraine. Assembly's  main role, as he explains in our talk, is organization and mutual aid in neighborhoods of Kharkov. In our conversation, Stan and I talk about the situation in Kharkov, the role of anarchism at this time of crisis, and what you can do to help. Below...

Finally, on Everyday Anarchism, we turn to bread! I'm joined by Mark Bittman and Kerri Conan to discuss their new book, Bittman Bread , and how baking bread using their method can be considered anarchism. We also talk about whether governments can be used to fight corporations, how to create a bread-based utopia, and why I was naive to think that the federal government would ever create a healthy,...

In this episode of Anarchism 101: An Anarchist Syllabus, I read Proudhon's famous declaration that property is theft in What is Property? This project is year-long; on the first of each month of 2022, I'll be posting my reading of an important anarchist text. Later that month, I'll post an episode in which I discuss each text and its author with a scholar of anarchism. If you have any questions yo...

In this episode, Meredith King of the University of New Orleans joins me to discuss Mardi Gras. We begin with the liberatory possibility of historical carnivals, as drawn from the works of David Graeber and Mikhail Bakhtin, then examine all of the many ways that Mardi Gras does and doesn't provide a space for freedom and grassroots organization. As always, you can find me at www.everydayanarchism....