Warning: self indulgent middle aged (ex?) anarchist post....
The London Bookfair has been a massive thing for me in the last 30 years. I've rarely missed a year (and usually only if out of the country) and it was always an exciting, inspiring, and fun thing to go to. I started going when I was 17, and finding and meeting other anarchists (...anarchists sarge, thousands of 'em) and all their groups (and staunchly anti-organisational non-groups) was brilliant, and sparked and fueled many a friendship.
It was the big public event that people gravitated towards (from all over the world too, there was always loads of international comrades there); its history, being in London, being brilliantly organised and well advertised all helped make it this, as well as its (mostly) open-ness and broad scope of what was there. It sucked it many a burgeoning young anarchist as it was something they knew that was going on and they could relatively easily go to, especially people from small towns and villages where there was no visible anarchist presence.
So it was very important in my opinion, and the groups, people and workshops/talks there informed what the movement looked like to people, what anarchism is about, and so what groups and projects people then go on to be involved with. I think it had a big impact, even if that was sometimes not easy to see. It was always pretty broad brush in who and what attended, and I think that was also very important, reflective of what anarchism (and even anarchy) looks or might look like - for good and bad, for sensible and mad.
It seems to be heading towards a more narrow definition of what this type of politics is now, and despite the insistence of some (on here and elsewhere) that's it's still challenging, revolutionary, and potentially transformative, that's not the impression it gives out, both from the attitude of the organisers and the stalls and workshops there. It does seem to be reflective of the times and cultural and political shifts we've talked about at length on here for sure, and longer term to me this direction looks like it will increasingly relegate anarchism and anarchist attitudes and activity into just a weird sub-cultural offshoot of left wing progressive politics that's just more militant in its moralistic and judgemental positions, and more about personal stuff than anything wider, even if it does pay some kind of vague lip service to its history.
No comment.
