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Post-anarchism or postanarchism is an anarchist philosophy that employs post-structuralist and postmodernist approaches. The term post-structuralist anarchism is used as well, so as not to suggest having moved beyond anarchism. It is not a single coherent theory, but rather refers to the combined works of any number of post-structuralists such as Michel Foucault, Gilles Deleuze, Jacques Lacan; postmodern feminists such as Judith Butler; and post-Marxists such as Ernesto Laclau, Chantal Mouffe, Jacques Rancière; with those of the classical anarchists, with particular concentration on Emma Goldman, Max Stirner, and Friedrich Nietzsche. Thus, the terminology can vary widely in both approach and outcome.

Background

The prefix post- is not used to denote a philosophy "after anarchism", but instead refers to the challenging and disruption of typically accepted assumptions within frameworks that emerged during the Enlightenment era. This means a basic rejection of the epistemological foundations of classical anarchist theories, due to their tendency towards essentialist or reductionist notions—although post-anarchists are generally quick to point out the many outstanding exceptions, such as those noted above. This approach is considered to be important insofar as it widens the conception of what it means to have or to be produced, rather than only repressed, by power, thus encouraging those who act against power in the form of domination to become aware of how their resistance often becomes overdetermined by power-effects as well. It argues against earlier approaches that capitalism and the state are not the only sources of domination in the moment in which we live, and that new approaches need to be developed to combat the network-centric structures of domination that characterize late modernity. Although thinkers such as Foucault, Deleuze, Derrida, Butler, Lacan, and Lyotard are not explicitly self-described anarchists, their ideas nevertheless serve of great importance, given the anti-authoritarian nature of their thought. Some of them also showed interest, to varying degrees, in the events of May 1968 in France.

Common concepts within post-anarchism include:

• the misalignment of the subject in relation to discourse
• the denaturalization of the body and sexuality
• the rejection of the repressive hypothesis
• Foucault's genealogy
• the deconstruction of the binary oppositions of Western thought
• the deconstruction of gender roles through feminist post-structuralism

Approaches

The term "post-anarchism" was coined by philosopher of post-left anarchy Hakim Bey his 1987 essay "Post-Anarchism Anarchy". Bey argued that anarchism had become insular and sectarian, confusing the various anarchist schools of thought for the real experience of lived anarchy. In 1994, academic philosopher Todd May initiated what he called "poststructuralist anarchism", arguing for a theory grounded in the post-structuralist understanding of power, particularly through the work of Michel Foucault and Emma Goldman, while taking the anarchist approach to Ethics.

The "Lacanian anarchism" proposed by Saul Newman utilizes the works of Jacques Lacan and Max Stirner more prominently. Newman criticizes classical anarchists, such as Michael Bakunin and Peter Kropotkin, for assuming an objective "human nature" and a natural order; he argues that from this approach, humans progress and are well-off by nature, with only the Establishment as a limitation that forces behavior otherwise. For Newman, this is a Manichaen worldview, which depicts the reversal of Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan, in which the "good" state is subjugated by the "evil" people.

Lewis Call has attempted to develop post-anarchist theory through the work of Friedrich Nietzsche, rejecting the Cartesian concept of the "subject." From here, a radical form of anarchism is made possible: the anarchism of becoming. This anarchism does not have an eventual goal, nor does it flow into "being"; it is not a final state of development, nor a static form of society, but rather becomes permanent, as a means without end. Italian autonomist Giorgio Agamben has also written about this idea. In this respect it is similar to the "complex systems" view of emerging society known as panarchy. Call critiques liberal notions of language, consciousness, and rationality from an anarchist perspective, arguing that they are inherent in economic and political power within the capitalist state organization.

Recently the French hedonist philosopher Michel Onfray has embraced the term post-anarchism to describe his approach to politics and ethics. He advocates for an anarchism in line with such intellectuals as "Orwell, la philosophe Simone Weil, Jean Grenier, la French Theory avec Foucault, Deleuze, Bourdieu, Guattari, Lyotard, le Derrida de Politiques de l'amitié et du Droit à la philosophie, mais aussi Mai 68" which for him was "a Nietzschean revolt in order to put an end to the 'One' truth, revealed, and to put in evidence the diversity of truths, in order to make disappear ascetic Christian ideas and to help arise new possibilities of existence."

Another anarchist and French intellectual with a dedication to post-structuralism is Daniel Colson who published Petit lexique philosophique de l'anarchisme de Proudhon à Deleuze in 2001.

See also

• Anarchism and Friedrich Nietzsche
• Existentialist anarchism

References

Further reading

External links

This article's use of external links may not follow Wikipedia's policies or guidelines. Please improve this article by removing excessive or inappropriate external links, and converting useful links where appropriate into footnote references. (May 2011)

• Archive of Post anarchist articles and on post-anarchism in english at the Anarchist Library
• "Postanarchism in a Nutshell" by Jason Adams
• "Post-Anarchism and Social War: Post-structuralism, and the Revival of an Anarchist Subterranean" by Torrance
• "Toward a Post-Anarchist Critique of Anarchist Businesses" by Saint Schmidt
• "Postanarchism is not what you think: The role of postanarchist theory after the backlash" By Saint Schmidt
• Accursed Anarchism: Five Post-Anarchist Meditations on Bataille by Saint Schmidt
• Derrida's Deconstruction Of Authority by Saul Newman
• "Anarchism and the politics of ressentiment" by Saul Newman
• "Anarchist Subjectivities and Modern Subjectivity" by Daniel Colson
• What's Wrong With Postanarchism? by Jesse Cohn and Shawn Wilbur
• Anarsi postanarchist texts in Turkish and translated from other languages