“What keeps us going, ultimately, is our love for each other, and our refusal to bow our heads, to accept the verdict, however all-powerful it seems. It’s what ordinary people have to do. You have to love each other. You have to defend each other. You have to fight.” —Mike Davis At Haymarket, we believe that books are crucial tools in struggles against racism, imperialism, and capitalism—and for a better world. That’s why we’ve decided to make TEN key ebooks free to download: join us in reading these indispensable works of analysis, history, and strategy. Wherever each of us live, work, and are in community: the time is now to build power and fight back, together. A note for UK readers: Hope in the Dark, Freedom is a Constant Struggle, and Elite Capture are not available for readers in the UK. And, don’t miss out! Until Friday, November 15th, ALL Haymarket Ebooks are 80% Off (that means they’re available for just $2 each)!
Mutual Aid as a concept was first broached by Peter Kropotkin in 1902 (although the concept is older than that.) in a book of Essays called Mutual Aid: A Factor in Evolution.
Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution is a 1902 collection of anthropological essays by Russian naturalist and anarchist philosopher Peter Kropotkin. The essays, initially published in the English periodical The Nineteenth Century between 1890 and 1896,[1] explore the role of mutually beneficial cooperation and reciprocity (or “mutual aid“) in the animal kingdom and human societies both past and present. It is an argument against theories of social Darwinism that emphasize competition and survival of the fittest, and against the romantic depictions by writers such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who thought that cooperation was motivated by universal love. Instead, Kropotkin argues that mutual aid has pragmatic advantages for the survival of human and animal communities and, along with the conscience, has been promoted through natural selection.
Mutual Aid is considered a fundamental text in anarchist communism.[2] It presents a scientific basis for communism as an alternative to the historical materialism of the Marxists. Kropotkin considers the importance of mutual aid for prosperity and survival in the animal kingdom, in indigenous and early European societies, in the medieval free cities (especially through the guilds), and in the late 19th century village, labor movement, and impoverished people. He criticizes the State for destroying historically important mutual aid institutions, particularly through the imposition of private property.
Many biologists[3][4] (including Stephen Jay Gould, one of the most influential evolutionary biologists of his generation) also consider it an important catalyst in the scientific study of cooperation.[5]
He argued against Darwin’s “survival of the fittest” theory, and this has become somewhat of a tenet among anarchists.
Also there’s a new book titled Mutual Aid by Dean Spade.
Around the globe, people are faced with a spiralling succession of crises, from the Covid-19 pandemic and climate change-induced fires, floods, and storms to the ongoing horrors of mass incarceration, racist policing, brutal immigration enforcement, endemic gender violence, and severe wealth inequality. As governments fail to respond to—or actively engineer—each crisis, ordinary people are finding bold and innovative ways to share resources and support the vulnerable. Survival work, when done alongside social movement demands for transformative change, is called mutual aid. This book is about mutual aid: why it is so important, what it looks like, and how to do it. It provides a grassroots theory of mutual aid, describes how mutual aid is a crucial part of powerful movements for social justice, and offers concrete tools for organizing, such as how to work in groups, how to foster a collective decision-making process, how to prevent and address conflict, and how to deal with burnout. Writing for those new to activism as well as those who have been in social movements for a long time, Dean Spade draws on years of organizing to offer a radical vision of community mobilization, social transformation, compassionate activism, and solidarity.
Mutual aid is the radical act of caring for each other while working to change the world.
Organizing is what mutual aid is about, and it’s easy to do. You can just help your neighbor with a project, that is mutual aid. (The Amish know how to do this.) Start, or contribute to, a community garden, or a community tool share. Small things as well as big things.
Here’s a link to Mutual Aid Disaster Relief, which is helping in the wake of the devastating hurricanes, down south.
I’m going to close this here, I think I’ve given plenty of links to get you started with this. Good luck.
The accomplishment “paves the way for long-distance and long-duration missions where creating spare parts, construction components, and tools on demand will be essential.”
The long read: Nicholas Saunders was a counterculture pioneer with an endless stream of quixotic schemes and a yearning to spread knowledge – but his true legacy is a total remaking of the way Britain eats
1. All food must be prepared or at least packed on the premises.2. The ingredients must be “wholefoods” ie pure, without any additives, such as flavouring, colouring or preservatives. Highly refined ingredients must be avoided. 3. Prices must be reasonable.4. Descriptions (both verbal and written) must be straightforward, down to earth and objective. Persuasive, enticing or glamorising descriptions must not be used. 5. The size and style of notices must be simple – not attention-seeking, enticing, image-building or making any use of advertising or merchandising techniques.6. “Point of sale aids” must not be used. 7. Information about recipes, ingredients, quality and suppliers must be freely available. 8. The neighbours must be given consideration and cooperation. 9. All staff must be free to see the accounts and attend meetings where they can freely express their views.10. Jobs should be rotated as far as possible, and in particular no one should be left with the unpopular jobs. 11. Outside contractors should be avoided if the work can be done by the regular staff.12. In the event of a business growing, it should not expand or set up branches, but instead assist and encourage some of its staff to split off and start another independent business.
[He is] that beautiful white Christ which seems to be coming out of Russia … [One] of the most perfect lives I have come across in my own experience.—Oscar Wilde…View Post
Kropotkin’s observations in Siberia had drawn him to a startling and dramatic conclusion: mutual aid was not only common, but “of the greatest importance for the maintenance of life, the preservation of each species, and its further evolution.” Soon, he would be describing mutual aid as a biological law, particularily after he read a lecture on mutual aid that Karl Kessler, dean of the University of Saint Petersburg, had presented to the Congress of Naturalists.
Kropotkin’s time in Siberia turned him into not only an evolutionary biologist but also a full-fledged anarchist. “I lost in Siberia,” he would write, “whatever faith in state discipline I had cherished before. I was prepared to become an anarchist.” Kropotkin’s anarchist philosophy developed naturally from his work on evolution and mutual aid in animals. Anarchism argues that no centralized government is necessary for people to lead happy, just and equitable lives. The mutual aid that Kropotkin saw among the animals of Siberia led him to that same conclusion. He came to believe that mutual aid had deep biological roots because animals engaged in it despite the absence of anything remotely like a government. The process of natural selection had favoured mutual aid in animal populations: anarchy, Kropotkin writes, was “a mere summing-up of … the next phase of evolution. It is no longer a matter of faith; it is a matter for scientific discussion.” And since animals cooperated in the absence of government, it seemed to Kropotkin impossible that humans could not find a way to break free of government shackles.
Is FACEBOOK a Department of Defense data mining scheme run by the CIA and D.A.R.P.A.? Should you be trusting all your personal data to FACEBOOK’s management?
FACEBOOK was initially conceived by Mark Zuckerberg but the venture was first funded with $500,000.00 in capital from PayPal founder Peter Thiel. With millions more to come from sources with close ties to D.A.R.P.A, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Department of Defense….
Is this paranoid, or maybe true? God, I love a good conspiracy theory. I always say be careful what you hang out there on the web. Personall, after last week’s Term of Service fiasco at Facebook, I wouldn’t be trusting them much anyways.
