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I haven’t blogged in a while, so I thought I’d share some thoughts on this last weekend I spent in Baltimore (a city chock-full of radical history for anyone interested in reading up). I attended the Renewing the Anarchist Tradition (RAT) annual conference—a conference for developing anarchist theory collectively and having conversations about anarchist thought and practice. I’d never been to RAT before and was excited to attend this year’s gathering, as it was organized to be different than other conferences.

The board for the Institute for Anarchist Studies were explicit about this in their conference booklet: 

…the…board decided to reshape RAT as an “anarchist intervention”…We devised twenty-two questions for RAT that we hope capture some of the key concerns and dilemmas that contemporary anarchism and anarchists face at present. Each question serves as a panel, but rather than a distinction between speakers and audience, the panelists will briefly offer their thoughts on the question as a way to open up space for everyone to engage in conversation and debate.

Further, the conference was explicitly organized as “a space outside professionalized, commodified sites of learning and education, where longtime anarchists can meet as peers and comrades to grapple with ideas together.”

                Fantastic on both counts for me. I’ve been to a number of conferences, talks, and events organized as experiments to create more participatory environments than the usual speakers-as-authority formats—with varying degrees of success. Here, it was hard not to notice that we still seem stuck in the same old models. At most of the panels that I went to, attempts were made to create a “conversation”, but people tended to defer to the authority of the opening speakers who were, by and large, treated like regular panelists, asked questions (beyond simple clarification), and relied upon to give their “expertise” on whatever question they were presenting on. I’d be interested in hearing more about successes and failures in a more open assembly format for theoretical discussions, such as those held recently in the Bay, for comparison.

                Further, it was, at times, difficult to have a “conversation” under the circumstances that were largely determined by the spaces in which the talks occurred. Two of the discussions I went to were in a large room that required folks to talk into a microphone to hear each other. It was a little nerve-racking in a big space like that—particularly when there were a lot of people present. It made it feel stiff and formal at times, broken at times, however, by joking participants.

                The idea of a space to discuss theory outside of professionalized spaces appealed to me too, as I’ve tried to create those kinds of spaces myself and not done so well at it. I’m also often in conversation with folks in the anarchist milieu who seem allergic to difficult theoretical discussions, so being able to have those kinds of conversations with other anarchists meant a lot to me. For me, hearing about developments in anarchist theory from people’s mouths, in conversation, makes things “click” for me in ways that reading rarely does. I was glad to have discussions about a number of developments in theory that I wanted to learn more about and thankful to do so in a friendly environment where disagreements didn’t lead to shouting matches or insults.

                And the first discussion seemed like a good place for me to do some learning. Titled “Insurrectionist Politics and Movement Building”, I assumed the conversation would center around some of the conflicts around strategy that are all but ubiquitous now—pitting “insurrectionist tactics” with “movement building” as opposed principles seemed like this would flavor the discussion in a way that might not be all that productive. Like many anarchists, I’ve been inspired by some of the insurrectionary and left communist interventions in political practice and, if I’m going to be honest, I guess I wanted more conflict on the panel. It seems like one of the positive things that have been provided by those developments in theory are the relentless criticisms of left practice that have opened up contradictions like new wounds (or, perhaps, re-opened old wounds). This is, at least, what has led me to reconsider my own politics in a number of ways.

                Peter, Suzy Subways, and David Combs opened up the discussion, which ended up meandering around the room. I’m still not quite sure how to piece together Subways’ piece of the conversation. Peter focused on those insurrectionary critiques of the left, but made some criticisms that, to me, sounded pretty sweeping and grandiose (e.g. the Spanish Pistoleros were more radical in the Civil War, while the syndicalists were more “conservative”; there are many insurrectionary theories in a diverse body of ideas, while the “left” seemed treated like a monolith, etc.). I spoke to him after the panel and I think perhaps limits in time made it hard to add much nuance to the openers (speakers were given 10-15 minutes a piece). David Combs was critiquing the supposed divide between insurrectionary practices and movement building when I had to duck out to use the restroom. When I re-entered the room, folks spent time having a dialogue based on the opening remarks and speakers were asked questions and given a chance to develop some of their arguments more. Being the first discussion in a large room with a lot of folks in attendance and having to speak into a microphone no doubt took some of the wind out of the discussion. I personally would have liked to see this conversation take place between folks who, perhaps, identify more discreetly in the categories provided (“insurrectionary” and “movement building”). Instead, the talk seemed to hover around the center.

                The next day, the first panel I attended was on developments in queer politics. Jackie Wang talked about the turn to queer negativity explored by Jack Halberstam. A challenge to the “hegemony of happiness” (as I saw one person recently call it) seems in high order and a focus on negation allows us to build weapons to intervene in our social world and destroy those things that confine us. But, as Jackie pointed out, this leaves us without a sense of vision or some guess as to which direction we might go in to bring about social change—indeed, queer negativity is critical of those very visions and critical of a belief that a better future might await. Abbey Volcano talked about using non-monogamy as a metaphor to think about political theory. Like we might have many lovers, we might also borrow from any number of theoretical perspectives if we find them useful, and discard those things we find useless. She also talked a bit about using queer critiques of identity to criticize the idea of political identity (which often leads to rigidity and dogmatism). Derek Roy talked about asexuality and how the notion of sexual desire in queer discourse often assumes some discreet place for the sexualization of desire that invisibilizes some people. I especially appreciated his focus on capitalism and its implication in the creation and maintenance of notions of “sexuality” and “sexual orientation”—understandings that we might challenge in a number of ways. Perhaps the most provoking intervention in the conversation afterward was from Mark Lance, who critiqued the idea of destabilizing political identities in the same ways that we might destabilize sexual and gender identities, arguing that we use those markers to distinguish ourselves from people who don’t share similarities with us in ethics, strategy, and vision. This was a larger conversation that had me thinking the rest of the weekend about the limits and the possibilities in “political identity.”

The next panel I attended was on gender and feminist politics. I presented an opener on this panel about intersectionality and how anarchists might learn from the theory, as well as critique it. I argued that the typical laundry list of being opposed to “racism, sexism, classism, ad nauseum” makes it sound like we want rich people to treat us nicer instead of abolishing class itself. Further, these hierarchies function in unique ways and I would advocate for a class war that smashes capitalism, but can’t think of a corollary for race or gender (to name two examples). Melissa Forbis talked about her experiences working with indigenous women in the global South and how our understandings of gender and identity in the North often shape our understandings of their struggles in problematic ways. Anna Kruzynski talked about the ways that the CRAC collective (an anarcha-feminist research group in Canada) uses intersectionality to connect between different movements. The discussion mostly centered on the concept of intersectionality (with some interesting veering here and there) with one commenter critiquing how our laundry lists often leave out other forms of hierarchy (like ability, gender performance, etc.). It was an interesting intervention, asking us to consider how we talk about these things with a sense of holism. And it certainly made me re-think the uses of laundry lists in any form in the future.

The last Saturday panel I attended was on contesting the ecological crisis. Chris Spannos asked us to think about environmental politics with a sense for connecting it to kinship, the economy, polity, etc.—arguing for a relative autonomy within a totality of these institutional arrangements. Michael Loadenthal suggested that ALF and ELF campaigns of property destruction were creating ruptures in capitalism and, in his words, these milieus were doing more to challenge capital contemporarily than any other movements (I disagree, but the post-discussant conversation never quite got back to this). Flint Arthur argued against the Malthusian concept of “over-population” and noted what he saw as its racist implications. He further argued for urban density (while building a critique of the suburbs) as a possible solution to the kinds of waste associated with industrial capitalism as it has developed in the US especially. The level of the discussion at this panel was particularly bad, with respondents suggesting that arguing for urban density was treating people like “pawns” (indeed, any proposed collective solution seemed to be included in this) and one commenter asserting that cell phones are more desirable than toilets (a conclusion they were able to draw from three months “roughing it” in the wilderness with a trough and a cell phone, from what I could gather). I would have liked to hear an intelligent critique of urban density as a solution—or perhaps entertaining the question “And then?” A further consideration of environmental movements outside of ELF/ALF style politics would have been interesting (and the ELF/ALF's intersections with things like the mountaintop removal campaigns, Climate Camp, etc.) or some more probing of institutional connections within a totality (that Spannos initiated), but the conversation wandered around other things. Quite frustrating.

Saturday night, the conference organizers and volunteers from Red Emma’s bookstore (and I’m sure many other volunteers) made attendees a vegan dinner of 100% deliciousness. I sat with friends at dinner, and later at a bar in Baltimore, discussing the two days’ events thus far. And I stayed at the bar much too late resulting in me missing the first discussion session the next day.

And so I caught, during the second session, a discussion on recent lessons from convergences and protests. To be honest, I was pretty spent by this time. I expected the discussion to be an acrimonious debate over “summit hopping” or “movement building” and, thankfully, that’s not what took place. Some contributions I do remember are Irina C.’s suggestion of public “justice” to hold the state accountable for their trampling of people. It reminded me of the community review board stuff around police brutality that some ARA crews I knew were organizing for when I was younger, except less institutionalized and more…theatrical. I was fascinated by the idea and interested to see what gets put together in Toronto. Marie Scoczylas talked about lessons from Pittsburgh and Dave Onion also presented with reflections on summit strategies. I remember thinking about these disruptions as interventions in everyday life, stopping business as usual at their best, but my brain was pretty much fried so I can’t really remember much more about the discussion.

And likewise with the final group discussion, with no discussants opening up the conversation, moderated by Mark Lance on confronting the current rise in right-wing populism, I caved to my own braindead—no doubt still recovering from the night out late before. I remember several participants suggesting models for organizing (I mentioned liking the Seattle Solidarity Network—and the copycats that seem to be popping up here and there). There was also a discussion on the limitations of trying to appeal to the “normal, average” person, problematizing what we mean by that (I quite liked that—if I hear the words “normalaverageworker” chanted over and over again like a mantra by some well-meaning “organizer” one more time, I might fold from the overload).

Shortly afterward, I had to leave and catch my ride.

In retrospect, one of the most valuable things about the conference was the opportunity to see so many old friends and comrades, catch up, and talk critically between and after discussions. Learning in conversation with others is so much more valuable to me than auto-didactic methods of “self-study”—as a collective endeavor it also allows folks to criticize us and keep us on track. And so if I were to point to a highlight of the weekend, it wasn’t in the organized talks, but in the social spaces between them, where friends talked to each other without the pressure of an audience, where I got to spend time with old friends, as well as meet new ones and connect with people who I respect, but don’t always agree with. It’s in these spaces of collective tension, I think, that theory informed by practice informed by theory (ad nauseum—what we call “praxis”) is best articulated and developed—in many ways, for a short time, dissolving the contradiction between the individual “writers” and the collectivities that actually produce ideas.

To move beyond older and established ways of conferencing requires experiments like this and I appreciated the attempts to move beyond.  It made me think about how creating specific structural conditions can only go so far in addressing some of the issues with “speakers-as-authorities” and how much of the problems associated with those kinds of formats are internalized as we defer to a sort of “business as usual” approach in our communication. I also found myself wanting those other formats for some of these discussions. I would have liked to hear Peter, for example, develop his arguments and answer criticisms from the crowd or, perhaps, listen to Jackie Wang speak more about the tensions in an anti-political project of queer negativity while retaining commitments to building a new world in the shell of the old. Nonetheless, I was excited about the experiment as a conversation and invested in seeing how it would work and appreciated being able to participate and observe.

The conference organizers and the people at Red Emmas should be commended for such a wonderful event. It’s a headache to put together large gatherings like this and hard work to help them run—not just in terms of physical labor, but also emotional labor and investment. Thank you, to each and every one of you.