Anarchist Writers

The week before last Erris fisherman Pat O'Donnell was jailed for seven months for his part in the communities ongoing resistance to Shell's attempt to impose an experimental gas pipeline on them. Across the country local Shell to Sea groups have been holding solidarity protests and other events for Pat. In Dublin this has included two protests and a public meeting in UCD (an audio recording of the meeting is at the bottom of this article). Meanwhile Shell have been forced to admit a temporary defeat in the face of local opposition and call off the construction they have planned for Glengad this year.

Over 50 Shell to Sea campaigners gathered at the Shell head quarters in Leeson street Dublin Tuesday evening to protest at the jailing of 52 year old Erris fisherman Pat O'Donnell for resisting Shell's experimental gas pipeline. Pat received a seven month sentence which has the added benefit for Shell of taking his boat off of Broadhaven Bay for the period they need to carry out major underwater construction work and repairs. Pat has twice previously been arrested and held without charge when Shell has needed to carry out work in the bay.

This audio interview conducted by mobile phone on Monday evening covers the protests at the COP15 summit in Copenhagen. Ronan who was a member of WSM in Ireland has been living in Denmark for a year and a half and is involved in a new Libertarian Socialist group and the local infoshop in the autonomous Youth House.

Our interviewee gets nicked on Saturday along with 960+ others

When the inland gas refinery near Rossport was proposed in the late 1990s, many local people welcomed the project. But when they did some research, they quickly became extremely concerned. They discovered this was an experimental project; nothing like it had been tried anywhere in the world.

Sellafield is a great vote winner for political parties come election time. It has got to be the single issue on which almost every person in Ireland agrees: Sellafield is bad and it should be shut down. So in the next months we can expect pickets of the British embassy, press conferences and the promises of European court cases as the parties vie for our vote.

This is an excellent book, crammed full of useful (and disgusting) "McNuggets" of information on the whole process of producing "fast food." From the industrialisation of farming, to the monopolisation of food processing, to the standardisation of food consumption throughout whole sections of North America, Schlosser's book exposes the horrors of modern corporate capitalism. He documents the impact of the rise of fast food on almost all aspects of North America, from farming to health, from working practices to landscape, and beyond.

In 2003 in Dublin over 20 people were jailed for resisting the imposition of the bin tax in Dublin. There were some who saw the bin tax struggle as being an example where the 'environmental agenda' is counterpoised to the 'working class' agenda. I don't and I think the few environmentalists who have supported the ruling class line in this have done great damage to the environmental cause. The bin tax pure and simple was about imposing the neo-liberal agenda, what some people call 'globalisation'. A core part of this agenda is to transfer the costs of running society from the rich and corporations to workers and the poor.

After a quiet period the struggle against Shell’s attempt to impose a dangerous experimental gas pipeline in Erris, Co. Mayo has escalated once more over the last month. Shell are now attempting to bring the pipe ashore at Glenagad and over 20 people have been arrested to date resisting this. Shell’s Solitaire pipe-laying ship has arrived at the port of Killybegs and is expected in the Erris area any day making this a key period for Shell and for the community that is determined to halt its project.

Peak Oil Theory has been around since the 1970s. Some think we have already reached 'peak oil', others think it will happen with the next twenty-five years. The theory argues that when we reach 'peak oil' the rate at which we extract oil from the earth (measured in millions of barrels per day) will reach a maximum and thereafter will start to drop.

One of the major confusions in the anarchist movement in the USA and parts of Europe arises out of primitivism and its claim to be part of the anarchist movement. But primitivism is not a realistic strategy for social revolution and it opposes the basic purpose of anarchism - the creation of a free mass society. Primitivists have attempted to reply to these criticisms but these replies are easily exposed as more to do with faith then reality.