01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 The Spainish Civil War: Anarchism in Action La Guerra Civil Española (Spanish version)

First Steps toward Libertarianism At a conference held in Barcelona on 25 November 1992, called Creation and Culture, Chomsky began his address by telling the audience that it was a "particular pleasure" to speak in Barcelona because he had once written an article (by that time almost fifty-four years earlier) about the fall of Barcelona. In his words, "the events of the preceding years had an enormous impact upon my personal understanding of the world, and on my political and moral consciousness, and have left an impact upon my own thinking and understanding and feeling about things that's been of long duration" ("Creation"). The repercussions of the Spanish Civil War are indeed present in many of the political articles that Chomsky went on to write, because to him they demonstrated that people can, in the absence of a "revolutionary vanguard," rise up against systems of oppression and participate in spontaneous, loosely organized movements, the roots of which lie "in deeply felt needs and ideals of dispossessed masses" (Chomsky Reader 86).

Worker's Power and the Spanish Revolution Fenner Brockway writing about the CNT, 1937

This is an apt description of anarchosyndicalist ideals, as these ideals emphasize the inclusion of all individuals in projects that concern the generally ignored masses rather than the ruling elite. In a 1968 work called "Objectivity and Liberal Scholarship," Chomsky describes the Spanish conflict as a "predominantly anarchist revolution," which was "largely spontaneous, involving masses of urban and rural laborers in a radical transformation of social and economic conditions that persisted, with remarkable success, until it was crushed by force" (Chomsky Reader 86). The use of the word spontaneity in the context of this kind of revolutionary activity does need some qualification, because it falsely implies that change can be effected without effort on the part of those who are fighting against oppressive structures. Of spontaneous revolutionary action in Germany and Italy after World War I and in Spain in 1936, for example, Chomsky declares: The anarchosyndicalists, at least, took very seriously Bakunin's remark that the workers' organizations must create "not only the ideas but also the acts of the future itself" in the prerevolutionary period. The accomplishments of the popular revolution in Spain, in particular, were based on the patient work of many years of organization and education, one component of a long tradition of commitment and militancy . . .. And workers' organizations existed with the structure, the experience, and the understanding to undertake the task of social reconstruction when, with Franco's coup, the turmoil of early 1936 exploded into social revolution. (qtd. in Otero, "Introduction" 38) This kind of political action is underwritten by a belief that only when people address issues of widespread concern together can their efforts be meaningful. So, by the age of ten, Chomsky was already convinced that such action, exemplified by the Spanish uprising, was not the aberration or failure it was portrayed to be, but rather evidence that anarchist movements could be successful and brought on from below. When they do succeed in this way, to judge by certain important examples, they can fulfil the fundamental needs of the working class and the majority of the population. This belief has permeated Chomsky's subsequent actions and work; it fuels his conviction that efforts in this direction are worth pursuing in spite of the apparent utopianism of such a project.

"Notes on Anarchism" in For Reasons of State, Noam Chomsky, 1970

One might ask why, given the historical circumstances, the young Chomsky was not passionate about Leninism, a movement that seemed to many at this time to be a possible panacea, a positive alternative to the status quo. After all, the horrors of Leninism were, for the most part, uncovered later on, and a great number of people had been seduced by it. Chomsky describes his early interest in anarchism as a kind of "lucky accident": "I was just a little too young to have ever faced the temptation of being a committed Leninist, so I never had any faith to renounce, or any feeling of guilt or betrayal. I was always on the side of the losers ­ the Spanish anarchists, for example" (Chomsky Reader 13). A fortunate accident, as we shall see.