The Institute for Anarchist Studies

Landlords, Nonprofit Directors, and Politicians Turned Low-Income Hotels into COVID-19 Hotspots

by Toshio Meronek

“As you grow older,” she told me, “you will discover that you have two hands. One for helping yourself, and the other hand is for helping others.” Especially when the government and its contractors chase money and media attention while revealing how deeply they loathe poor people.

Mutual Aid Dispatch
by anonymous

I try to put the brakes on my self-righteousness. She’s trapped in this dystopian hell-hole too. There is so much need and so little support. I don’t know her story. Everyone is trapped. But I am angry. I want to rip that “Fight Fascism” sticker off her car. What does she think fighting fascism is?

In Defense of Autonomy: Seattle’s Organized Protest Zone Advanced the Movement for Black Lives

by Michael Reagan

What is unthinkable, or was at the beginning of the month, is the power of the Black Lives Matter movement in the streets. The emergence of the autonomous zone is a pinnacle of that power, a significant victory. It demonstrates the ability of popular power to win the impossible from structures of white supremacy – the state and the propertied interests they represent. That victory, and the subsequent diminution of state violence, is a major step forward for community self-control and autonomy. It shows that ending anti-Black violence is the first and most basic step to honoring Black life.

Anarchist Studies Reviews Guerrillas of Desire
by Robin Jervis

Guerrillas of Desire begins with a self-confessed provocation: the left misunderstands resistance. The implications of this claim, which forms the central thesis of the work, have huge significance for those with an interest in both Marxist or anarchist approaches to resistance, and the book goes a long way towards building bridges between these two approaches, highlighting the contribution made to the understanding of class conflict by autonomist Marxists.

Casting Spells, Blowing Bubbles

by Hoyt

The hard part of this distancing at work—other than not being able to hug anyone, even though we’re all under stress and i haven’t had a single hug in weeks—is navigating the smaller spaces, like the kitchen. We have to do a lot more communicating. “I just need to get water at the sink.” “I’m passing through to the office.” “I’m going that way.” “You go first.” We treat each other with exceeding courtesy.

MUTUAL AID: AN ANTIDOTE FOR THE “COVIDITY BLUES”

We know how important it is to have each other’s back in times of need, and there are no cops on island to usurp the ability of the community to take care of itself when a crisis arises.

COVID-19: or, How I learned to stop worrying and love the virus

by Jakob Larrew

Like watching Dr. Strangelove, our present situation is an experience that makes people ask challenging questions about the mystification of our society.

Covid-19 and Catch-22

by Kristian Williams

“It has become increasingly clear to me that Catch-22 is a book, not only of its time, but for ours. It supplies the right model for making sense of the anxieties of this crisis and the irrationalities of the government’s response. There may be other reasons, or other kinds of explanations, that account for the various problems I’ve mentioned—to say nothing of the rush to ‘open the economy,’ the misallocation of vital and scarce medical supplies, or anything that Donald Trump has said, done, or tweeted.”

Caregiving in Arizona

by Catherine Marr

Global pandemics are just the tip of the iceberg as far as mass deaths are concerned. Learning how to love each other as we and our planet dies is a necessary skill.

When Adam Dolve: Pandemics and Social Revolution

by Tom Martin

The Black Death or bubonic plague of 1348-1350 was perhaps the worst pandemic in history, killing up to a third of Europe’s population … It was not the first pandemic, and Covid-19 will not be the last. Psychologically, this one may be the worst yet – we are better at denying our mortality than our medieval ancestors were. The omnipresence of unpredictable death forces us to remember that we’re all mortal. But can pandemics lead to social progress, even revolution? It’s happened before.