Subversion

Subversion was a libertarian and council communist group that published the journal Subversion and a variety of pamphlets throughout the late eighties and much of the nineties. Never very large, it had its origins in the earlier Wildcat group, and further back in the groups Solidarity and Social Revolution.When the members of Subversion decided to cease publication, a number of its members joined the AF. The Subversion website still exists and is maintained after a fashion by Manchester AF members. It is our intention to copy the most useful parts of the Subversion site over to this one. In the meantime, they can all be accessed by going to: www.geocities.com/knightrose.geo

Archiving update: Geocities is gone but try archive.org

Subversion 12. Articles and letters on Class, Council Workers, Militant and Gay Rights, the IRA and Anarchist Economics

Roads - the discussion continues - an article sent to us by a reader. "Gridlock, voices from the M27 Corridor."
Employment Service Strikes - should we support them, or are they our enemy? Debate between Brighton Autonomists and a Subversion member.
Miserable Worker
Postal Workers Dispute
Liverpool Dockers
Spain 1936, The End of Anarchist Syndicalism?

Subversion 23 - mostly readers letters, covering work, the unions, green issues, claimants.

Monument or Movement? Arguably the text that started it all for Subversion. Written in 1972 when some of us were still members of the SPGB. We used this as the lead article in a magazine we called Critical Theory and Revolutionary Practice. A bit pompous perhaps, the title changed eventually to Libertarian Communism.

Labouring in Vain. A critical analysis of the origins of the Labour Party. Published in 1993.

The following links will take you directly to the Subversion web site:

Subversion 17: Anti-Roads Struggles, the fight against the Job Seekers Allowance (JSA), technology and the changing nature of the working class, cameras on demonstrations, the role of the local state in recuperating class struggle, Anarchist Communism in Japan. Produced in the summer of 1995.

Subversion 19: The JSA, the Death of Anarchism?, Postal Workers Disputes, more on the Dockers. Produced mid-1996.

Subversion 20: Yet more on the Dockers, the JSA, the Postal Workers, Democracy and Ballots, the invasion of the Australian Parliament, the second issue of Miserable Worker. Produced November 1996.

Subversion 21: The Dockers, Green Communism, strikes in Korea, the JSA, the IRA, an article from the Poor, the Bad and the Angry. Produced January 1997.

Subversion 22 : Features a continuing discussion of Green Communism, a debate between ourselves and primitivists; the Job Seekers Allowance and Wales Against JSA; the March for Social Justice in London and the ensuing riot; Getting a Job; more correspondence with Class War on Northern Ireland and the IRA. Produced in July 1997.