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Anarchism, Marxism and the Future of the Left: Interviews and Essays, 1993-1998

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Echoing Rosa Luxembourg in 1916, the founder of social ecology foresees an ineluctable choice in the new century between libertarian socialism and barbarism. The nature of this nascent barbarism will be manifested in the exponential industrialization of the planet, new state authoritarianism to cope with approaching ecological crises, the degradation of individuality as the corporate economy colonises all aspects of personal life, and the loss of the ability to conceptualise alternatives.

Resistance, to Bookchin, means first turning to history, to recover the `legacy of freedom'of popular revolutionary movements since the English Revolution which sought radical forms of political and economic democracy and the free time for ordinary people to become active citizens (see the historical trilogy, The Third Revolution). A long-term revolutionary, Bookchin advocates the formation of Left study groups to "rebuild radical consciousness" and eventually act as agitators for direct, face-to-face democracy within their own communities.

The book also contains fascinating (and sometimes quite funny) reflections on the Left in the 1930s and '60s from someone who lived through both eras and a sympathetic reassessment of the contribution of Karl Marx to revolutionary thought.

The book's tone is rather too negative, overall. Now that the epithet 'anti-capitalist' is being claimed by more and more people, there is surely more hope for radical movements than Bookchin seems prepared to admit. Are things really so grim?

I don't think I've ever seen a book quite like this before - one of the most preeminent Leftist author/philosophers in the world giving incredibly detailed, fascinating responses to questions about where the "Left" (for lack of a better word) originated from, where it has been, and where it could possibly go. If you have any sort of interest in radical politics, you'll probably be fascinated by reading this book. It would make a good companion piece to Ronald Radosh's _Commies_.

This text is most instructive in that it illustrates the fundamental failings of radical leftism better than any critique ever could. Bookchin comes off as incredibly humorless, smug, condescending, and almost completely lacking in humanity throughout the course of this book. Undoubtedly much of this is due to fighting for his entire life for an obscure cause and little recognition, yet even given this, the amount of bitterness expressed on these pages is surprising.

Bookchin is best described as a "Western hyperrationalist." Having nothing but contempt for anything resembling spirituality or God, he has subsequently misplaced his notion of the Divine into the human realm. As the realm of humanity and matter is inherently corrupt, it's no wonder that Bookchin's anarchism met with complete and utter failure. When you read some of his history in this book, it's not hard to see why: the reduction of all spiritual needs to mere material concerns hardly created anything resembling Heaven on Earth; you can easily see how the striving towards "unlimited human freedom" by Leftists of all sorts quickly and inevitably degenerates into a pointless hedonism, which paralyzes itself as a political movement.

Given the fact that Bookchin has no spiritual concerns, he is bitter at the fact that most defected from the radical movement the moment that improvements (in the form of the forty hour workweek and other reforms) entered the workplace. But why should he be surprised? The labor unions' "compromise" with capitalism did what the Leftists could never do. Most people got a little vacation time, better working conditions, etc. and they had no reason at all to continue in the "movement", save for a few relics like Bookchin, who are really just religious fanatics in an atheistic guise. (The religious impulse always exists, no matter how it is manifested.)

Bookchin does make some interesting points about the future, and makes some very good critiques against some of the "green fascists", warning of certain psychological tendencies which could easily manifest as "ecofascism." It's not surprising that Bookchin is mostly known as a Green thinker first and an anarchist second. Given that it seems all but inevitable that we will enter into a new, post-industrial phase of humanity within the next hundred years, ideas like these are particularly useful. I would imagine that a sane post-industrial society will probably closely resemble one that is envisioned by Bookchin.

Overall, a very good read, whether you want to look at it as a cautionary tale, primer on radical environmentalism and the perils therein, or indicative of the failures of the Left.

This book is a mildly interesting instance of radical history being rewritten using the interview format. If you believed everything you read in this book you'd have to think that Murray Bookchin was (or at least should have been) the pivotal character in the last 50 years of radical history, except that nobody knows it besides him because of the raw deals he's always gotten by those who have upstaged him, ignored him, or (like Rachel Carson)not even realized he existed! In other words, because he's rarely been successful at anything, even though he thinks he did all the right things at the right times, it's the world's fault that he's not the biggest radical sensation since the Spanish Revolution.
Read this book if you dare. But don't say I didn't warn you.