Commune or Die - a gift from Banned in Braille magazine

I wrote the bones of this article in early 2020; soon after Boris Johnson won the Britain's biggest bastard competition (Corbyn didn’t stand a chance). The hope that the political system would somehow save us or make anything better was pretty well buried and I was feeling very aware of my own mortality. I knew that if I didn’t start to take control of my own situation soon, then the state would have it’s own solution to my problems and I could quickly find myself stuck on the wrong side of a chain link fence, eating Soylent Green with a plastic spoon.

In the light of last years events I now doubt the government’s capacity to provide everyone with a plastic spoon. The Covid experience delayed the release of this article and happily made it even more relevant. As I finish writing people are hitting the streets again to defend their right to protest, ignoring the fact that even in less desperate times protest mostly didn’t achieve very much. This article is aimed at people who want more than symbolic action; those who know in their hearts that we are not all ‘in this together’ and that the people with real power and wealth are making their own plans for hard times which don’t include you.

The quotes marked T.L. come from a short book called Total Liberation by anonymous and published in 2019. This book manages to be brutally realistic but also a little hopeful. I recently discovered another great anonymous book, published in 1983 called Bolo Bolo (written, it turns out by the German, Hans Widmer). This dares to imagine a global, stateless society rebuilt with the bricks of individual communes. These ‘bolos’ are a long way from the old cliché of the hippie commune. What’s described is ambitous but also deals quite sensibly with a lot of normal human problems. Quotes from this are marked B.B. and the full book can be read at theanarchistlibrary.org

"The bolo replaces the “agreement” called money. In and around the bolo the ibu [person] can get their daily 2,000 calories, a living space, the basics of survival and indeed much more… If a substantial part of all ibus unite in bolos, money economies die and can never return." B.B.

About ten years ago I got interested in co-ops and nearly ended up living in one. It seemed an obvious way of putting my ideals into action. The word 'commune' was out of fashion, but that was essentially what I was looking for, as a green anarchist-leftie seeking more independence from the capitalist and state system. A commune / co-op can create a space outside of the official economy, fostering a certain amount of self sufficiency, mutual aid and security. Resources and work can be shared between people who trust each other, and land and ‘businesses’ can be owned collectively without the usual financial risk or commitments.

Done properly they reduce communism to a workable, human scale and provide the bricks to build a better society. Alliances can be made with other communes; goods can be exchanged between them and as more of these groups link up the result is a growing money free zone that has pushed back the boundaries of the system which is trying to eat the world.

That was my analysis ten years ago. I left the co-op group just as we were making an offer on a six storey, half million pound house. It turned out we didn’t all have the same priorities. I wanted to create a showcase low energy housing project; for other members, getting themselves and their kids through the week was perhaps more important than installing solar heating and raising the cash for a hundred new windows. I realise it would have been a waste of time trying to resolve our differences and once the house was up and running they had no problems finding new people with the same needs.

"There's no excuse for losing faith in the species, not yet: the conditions of economic scarcity imposed by capitalism deem it physically impossible for most to realistically dream of changing the world... Only by reconnecting the struggle to the promotion of material autonomy can we expand its breadth of engagement, both for outsiders and ourselves... What's being proposed here basically is the need to make anarchy livable." T.L.

As part of the co-op planning I attended a Radical Roots gathering in an ex-factory building and spent most of one workshop staring at my cup of tea to see if it had started to freeze. Radical Roots is a great organisation that can help groups buy a house with little to no seed money, but there seems to be a certain masochistic tendency that I’ve noticed before amongst some more middle class and green conscious people. I got the sense that some people were slumming it. My first concern for a residential commune would be to make sure it is warm and cheap to live in, ie; it would make sense to people who have known poverty. We don't need martyrs. The solution must be something liveable and we should live well, or else no one will want to know.

We have to start looking after ourselves before the system crashes and be ready to expand that activity into new spaces. Certain groups will no doubt still be waving placards and asking for favours as things fall apart, while actual revolutionaries will be providing reliable supplies of food, power and medicine; sharing every type of expertise and providing security. No organisation will be arrogant enough to try and do all of this. There may be no formal organisations as such, just working groups that are small and tight enough to get a particular job done with few or no meetings.

The isolation of the last year was a bad experience for most, yet for millions it was nothing all that new. The decline of the nuclear family and a more individualistic culture leaves people alone and vulnerable. Internet and phones don’t solve the problem, they just make it more bearable. You might not want to literally live with the people you’ve chosen, but people and households can be part of bigger units that feel like an extended family and that don’t need electronic communications to talk amongst themselves.

Happily, this arrangement could make the next big infectious out-break a lot less stressful to deal with. Your support bubble would already exist and ideally it will be big enough for kids to play together and for grown-ups to have a party. If people can look after themselves within a clearly defined unit like this - with regards to infection control and many other things, then there is simply no need to let the police through the door. As funding is further reduced the local bill might even be happy that you’re looking after yourselves.

In our highly networked world it’s likely that most of the people you care about don’t live nearby. In a time of real crisis it won’t be possible to check everyone is okay and we could easily find ourselves stretched too thinly, not knowing where to focus our energy. A commune is a contract of sorts with the people who are part of your day to day life; one which might take priority over family members and old friends. It might be painful, but by keeping your group together and healthy, you can stand against the chaos and help the wider community to survive and recover, while others are running around like proverbial chickens.

There are still some thorny questions about what a modern, practical commune should be.

"The quality of unity is essential only for those movements attempting to seize power rather than dismantle it... Without unity the state is inconceivable." T.L.

"In a larger city we could find the following bolos: Alco-bolo, Les-bolo, Play-bolo, No-bolo, Sado-bolo, Maso-bolo… Marx-bolo, Anarcha-bolo, Krishna-bolo, and so on..." B.B.

A commune might embrace the idea of diversity without necessarily having diversity. How much time gets wasted trying to achieve consensus with people who you don't actually need to be in the same room with? Find people who think like you and get busy. The group must be small enough not to need long meetings (at least once things are established), secretaries or other bureaucratic problems, but big enough to be strong in the face of hardship, or any attempt to take over the assets or subvert the group.

Although I still call myself an anarchist, the idea of the practical commune offers a way out of the dead end of politics and the labels that go with it. It is not ideology that unites us but our non-negotiable human needs. Although I value the working relationships I have with other political people, the forty hours a week that I spend working with non-political people has often been smoother and more satisfying. Trust born out of close contact and a shared goal is a thing that can cross wide ideological gaps and is the only thing that can really challenge a poisonous, back-biting culture.

Of course it’s perfectly natural to want to be with people who share your values and culture. In the bolo universe we’re presented with a patchwork of mini-towns, each with it’s own identity. All sorts of tendencies would be catered for; the right system has to work for everyone after all. The point is that no group has anything to gain by coming into conflict with another one, because each will be offering something and needing something from the wider network. The bolo world seems painfully optimistic, but still; once things are working on the commune level, a regional or even global community of co-operating groups does become conceivable.

It should be obvious by now that no political party or mass organisation is going to save us. The sort of change we need to see won't take the form of a government take over. It will be more like a phase transition in which the efforts of small groups and shifts in individual human consciousness take us past a murky threshold into a new sort of reality. In these cynical times the anonymity of such a 'movement' may actually be its greatest strength. Whether it's a school girl with learning difficulties, a political party or a more democratic organisation like Extinction Rebellion, anyone or thing which seeks to make the world a better place is going to be ruthlessly attacked by a well oiled media industry and an army of lonely internet trolls. Communes can take us beyond the divisive politics and can circumvent attacks by making themselves useful before they are even noticed.

"Inside the bolos there can’t be any rules" B.B.

If you’ve lost faith in the current system you’ll need to ask yourself; do you want to work within the legal framework, or try to simply take what you believe is yours? I’ve tried squatting and it was a lot of work for not much retutn. I want to build and grow things and not lie awake worrying about the bailiffs ripping it up again. Opportunities for taking over land will come up (think of the autonomous zone at the proposed - and defeated - airport site near Nantes and other ZADs that cropped up afterwards; also the unique communities that formed at anti-fracking camps in England). For the time being the security of your project might depend on it's legality. Having said that I wouldn't want to pay rent. Land is power and converting cash (if you can get it) into land that's yours makes sense for the future, especially if that land is a good 70 metres above sea level.

Setting up housing and workers co-ops, community enterprises, or just getting permission to use a small piece of council owned land can be a massive strain on your time and energy. I might not have it in me to jump through that many hoops and it doesn't set a very good example if you believe in anarchy. However, if you can actually imagine a before and after scenario and see a way to get something out of the system while it still exists, then good luck to you. Under the Boris government it might still be possible to get a grant for something and when the economy tanks again it will make more sense to be a borrower than a saver.

If the commune does accept, temporarily, some legalism, then it shouldn't be infiltrated by it. A group of the right size shouldn't need rules. If you need to put up a sign saying 'don't be sexist', then something is wrong and maybe it's just your faith in human beings. It's true that some people are lazy, unable to work or have any one of a million mental health problems. Dealing with these issues will no longer be the task of a big, cold beaurocracy. Each commune will have a certain capacity to support people who can't work or be nice all the time, while also having the opportunity to discover the value in these people. Without laws there are no criminals, just people who need help (and a few actual sociopaths).

"Lying within each of us is a dormant truth, something so terrible, so revolutionary, than it threatens to demolish everything that makes the 21st century such a miserable epoch: life is not merely something to get through." T.L.

Perhaps most importantly, what you do has to be fun. In the future we will all be more like pirates and watching the Eastenders omnibus together just won't cut it for weekend entertainment. We will keep the fires burning and we will struggle because we're animals and because we love life. This could be a situation in which having children doesn’t seem like such a bad idea, but if you’re not sure you can simply play with and help educate the neighbours kids.

Finally, the commune / bolo world might bring a resurgence of strange, hand made little magazines. You wouldn’t have to buy them; they’d be gifts from people who know they don’t need to worry about paying the rent. And be assured, there’ll be plenty of interesting stuff going down to write about.

* * *

I publish a once a year 'magazine of creative anarchy' in Liverpool, UK. It has a small, physical circulation but I particularly wanted to put this article about. The slogan on the front of the mag is 'Sod Protest, Make Plans'. Anarchists continue to put a lot of time into reacting to world events, when in fact they should be ahead of the curve in making plans for the future and living out their own practical solutions. Hence the article Commune or Die. I can be contacted at bannedinbraille [at] outlook [dot] com

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"Anarchists continue to put a lot of time into reacting to world events, when in fact they should be ahead of the curve in making plans for the future and living out their own practical solutions. Hence the article Commune or Die. I can be contacted at bannedinbraille [at] outlook [dot] com"

1- stop generalizing on people you don't know shit about (concerning the first words of that quote). I really wanna give zero fucks about things like the current geopol mess over Ukraine.

2- the Commune ain't always the alternative to those big worldly spectacular externalities.

3- Microsoft Outlook. Wtf. lol.

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