Episode 7 Exploring Anarchism with Ruth Kinna

02/22/22 • 69 min

How we organise ourselves is central to the way our society functions. We often take for granted the power dynamics and values that are present in the modern-day nation-state, but who do these arrangements benefit and who does it disempower? Is governance from the top the best way of realising our values and creating the kind of society we desire? Often associated with chaos, Anarchism is a generally misunderstood political philosophy that suggests that nobody needs to be in charge.
In this episode, I chat with Ruth Kinna about Anarchism. We explore the history and context out which anarchism emerged, the core values and critiques, as well as some practical embodiments of it. I think this episode is quite complementary to Episode 6 where I spoke with Fleur and Marco, in which we explored power dynamics and the difficulties of trying to create spaces free of domination within social movements which is a central value of anarchist thought and reflects the process of anarchisation that we speak about in this interview.
Link to Ruth's books
The podcast about revolutions mentioned at the start is, Revolutions by Mike Duncan, and is part of the series on 1848.

Previous Episode

Episode 6 Power, Prefiguring and the Margins with Fleur and Marco

In this episode, I talk with Fleur and Marco about power dynamics and pedagogies within social movements generally but is focused on our experience with Extinction Rebellion. One of the themes that lie at the heart of this discussion is about whose voices are heard. Fleur's research has focused on an understanding of social movements as places of learning and has looked at the role of the urgency narrative within the movement in reproducing the dominant logic, and how the pandemic brought marginal voices closer to the centre. Marco's research has focused on the role of power within the non-hierarchical organisation, and in particular, the power of facilitators to mitigate for power and make space for those who are less dominant in space.
In the systems change framework, in this episode, we look at how information flows (whose voices are heard) can influence the underlying paradigm we operate from, and some of the practices and forces that have helped to enable this.

Next Episode

Episode 8 Anthea Roberts on The Six Faces of Globalisation

Economic globalisation is a complex process that affects everybody. There are many stories told about globalisation, that it benefits everybody, that some people benefit at the expense of others, or that everybody stands to lose from it. So which is true?
Stories help us simplify and understand reality, however, each one is focused on describing only particular aspects of the complex whole. Each story highlights particular scales, actors and normative values.
In this interview, we unscramble the Rubik's cube of dialogues that surround globalisation with Anthea Roberts. We discuss the importance of stories and metaphors, the dominant narratives of globalisation, and how identifying the underlying values can help us find fertile ground for co-operation or identify points of tension. By unravelling these stories Anthea demonstrates a powerful approach to understanding complex systems.
Anthea's Website
A short article summarising the narratives