Abstract
This chapter will outline how anarchism’s anti-authoritarian and autonomous ethic has been extended to gender hierarchy and domination and sexual normativity, considering how freedom is restricted by these phenomena. Anarchists have made unique contributions to analysis of these phenomena and resistance to them that will be explored in this chapter, both applying anarchist principles to gender and sexuality in wider society and applying feminist and queer perspectives to anarchism. These include critique and analysis of the hierarchical components of gender including the public/private hierarchy; greater emphasis on the ‘personal’ terrain of politics; focus on how identity can be part of coercion and control; gendered analysis of the state; prefiguration of alternative modes of living and relating including freedom from gender hierarchy and sexual freedom; and approaches to organising that do not collapse back in to the hierarchies of gender.
I write this as a colonial settler living on stolen land never ceded by the custodians, the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation, claimed by a nation that continues to refuse sovereignty. I pay my respects to elders past, present and future.
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Notes
- 1.
L. Nicholas & C. Agius The Persistence of Global Masculinism: Discourse, Gender and Neo-Colonial Re-Articulations of Violence (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017).
- 2.
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- 3.
M.A. Gilbert, ‘Defeating Bigenderism: Changing Gender Assumptions in the Twenty-first Century’, Hypatia, 24:3 (2009), 93–112.
- 4.
B.J. Risman, Barbara J. ‘Gender as a Social Structure: Theory Wrestling with Activism’, Gender & Society, 18:4 (2004), 429–450, 430.
- 5.
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- 6.
J. Heckert ‘Sexuality/identity/politics’ in J. Purkis & J. Bowen (Eds) Changing Anarchism: Anarchist theory and practice in a global age (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2004), 101–116, 101.
- 7.
Ibid., 102.
- 8.
G. Rubin, ‘Thinking Sex: Notes for a Radical Theory of the Politics of Sexuality’ in H. Abelove, M.A. Barale, & D. Halperin (Eds) The Lesbian and Gay Studies Reader (New York: Routledge, 1993 [1984]), 3–44.
- 9.
L. Portwood-Stacer ‘Constructing anarchist sexuality: Queer identity, culture, and politics in the anarchist movement’, Sexualities 13:4 (2010), 479–493, 480.
- 10.
Butler, Gender Trouble.
- 11.
J. Butler in J. Heckert ‘On anarchism: An interview with Judith Butler’ desires’ in J. Heckert & R. Cleminson (Eds) Anarchism and Sexuality: Ethics, Relationships and Power (Routledge: Oxon, 2011), 93–100.
- 12.
Heckert ‘Sexuality’.
- 13.
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- 14.
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- 15.
Gemie, ‘Anarchism and Feminism’, 417.
- 16.
J. Greenway ‘Preface: sexual anarchy, anarchophobia and dangerous desires’ in J. Heckert & R. Cleminson (Eds) Anarchism and Sexuality: Ethics, Relationships and Power (Routledge: Oxon, 2011), xiv–xvii, xv.
- 17.
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- 18.
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- 19.
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Portwood-Stacer, ‘Constructing’, 490.
- 21.
L. Dragonowl ‘Against Identity Politics: Spectres, Joylessness and the contours of ressentiment’, Anarchy: A Journal for Desire Unarmed, no. 76 (2015), 29–51.
- 22.
A. Prichard Justice, Order and Anarchy: The International Political Theory of Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (London: Routledge, 2013), 107.
- 23.
Ibid.
- 24.
Bakunin in G. Robert Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas Vol 1 (Montreal: Black Rose Books, 2005), 237.
- 25.
Michel in ibid., 238.
- 26.
Michel in ibid., 242.
- 27.
S.D. Beauvoir The Second Sex (Trans. H.M. Parshley) (London: Vintage, 1997 [1947]).
- 28.
L. Irigaray This Sex Which Is Not One (Trans. Catherine Porter) (New York: Cornell University Press, New York, 1985).
- 29.
E. Goldman, Marriage and Love (New York: Mother Earth Publishing, 2007 [1911]), http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2162, 2.
- 30.
Bakunin in Graham, Anarchism, 236.
- 31.
Ibid.
- 32.
Goldman, Marriage, 2.
- 33.
V. De CleyreSex Slavery, The Anarchist Library, accessed from https://archive.org/stream/al_Voltairine_de_Cleyre_Sex_Slavery_a4/Voltairine_de_Cleyre__Sex_Slavery_a4_djvu.txt (2009 [1895]), 1–2.
- 34.
B. Haaland, Emma Goldman: Sexuality and the Impurity of the State (Montreal: Black Rose Books, 1993), 148.
- 35.
L.J. Marso ‘A Feminist Search for Love: Emma Goldman on the Politics of Love, Marriage, Sexuality and the Feminine’, in P.A. Weiss & L. Kensiger (Eds) Feminist Interpretations of Emma Goldman (Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2007), 71–90, 88.
- 36.
B. Haaland, Emma Goldman, 148.
- 37.
“1977 interview with anarchist ‘Emma”, Greenway, Judy & Alderson. Lynn (2014 [1977]) Anarchism and Feminism: Voices from the Seventies. www.judygreenway.org.uk. Creative Commons.
- 38.
Ibid.
- 39.
C. Ehlrich Socialism, Anarchism and Feminismhttps://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/carol-ehrlich-socialism-anarchism-and-feminism (2009 [1977]).
- 40.
Ibid.
- 41.
Nicholas & Agius, Persistence l.
- 42.
‘Emma’ in Greenway & Alderson, Anarchism and Feminism, 23.
- 43.
U. Le Guin, Ursula ‘Is Gender Necessary?’ in S.J. Anderson & V.N. McIntyre Aurora: Beyond Equality (Greenwich: Fawcett, 1976), 138–139.
- 44.
‘Susan’ in Greenway & Alderson, Anarchism and Feminism, 6.
- 45.
Ibid.
- 46.
C. Gilligan, Carol In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women’s Development (London: Harvard University Press, 1982).
- 47.
L. Nicholas Queer Post-Gender Ethics: The Shape of Selves to Come (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014).
- 48.
‘Louise’ in Greenway & Alderson, Anarchism and Feminism, 11.
- 49.
‘Olive’ in Ibid., 13.
- 50.
Indeed Rubin’s ‘The Traffic in Women: Notes on the “Political Economy” of Sex’ (1975) took its pre-colon name from Goldman’s essay 1910 essay ‘The Traffic in Women.’
- 51.
Rubin, ‘Thinking Sex’, 149.
- 52.
Ibid., 146.
- 53.
Ehlrich, Socialism.
- 54.
J. Freeman The Tyranny of Structurlesness, http://www.jofreeman.com/joreen/tyranny.htm (1971).
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L. Nicholas ‘Approaches to Gender, Power and Authority in Contemporary Anarcho-punk: Poststructuralist Anarchism?’, E-Sharp Journal, Issue 9 (Spring 2007).
- 56.
Ibid., 1.
- 57.
A. Grubacic & D. Graeber ‘Anarchism, Or The Revolutionary Movement Of The Twenty-first Century’, The Anarchist Library, http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/andrej-grubacic-david-graeber-anarchism-or-the-revolutionary-movement-of-the-twenty-first-centu.pdf (2004), 5.
- 58.
L. Nicholas ‘Anarchism, Pedagogy, Queer Theory and Poststructuralism: Towards a Positive Ethical Theory of Knowledge and the Self’ in R. Haworth (Ed), Anarchist Pedagogies: Collective Actions, Theories, and Critical Reflections on Education (Oakland: PM Press), 242–259, 245.
- 59.
Greenway, ‘Preface’, xvi.
- 60.
J. Heckert & R. Cleminson (Eds) Anarchism and Sexuality: Ethics, Relationships and Power (Routledge: Oxon, 2011), 2.
- 61.
Niecee X, in Final Straw ‘Final Straw: Black Women’s Defense League on Feminism, Anti-Blackness, and Sexism’, Final Straw, https://itsgoingdown.org/final-straw-black-womens-defense-league-feminism-anti-blackness-sexism/ (April 10 2017).
- 62.
Ibid.
- 63.
Nicholas & Agius, Persistence.
- 64.
Niecee X, ‘Final Straw’.
- 65.
D.T. Williams, ‘Boston’s Anti-Fascist Protest Was Planned by Black, Queer, Radical Women’, Telesur, 21 Aug 2017 http://www.telesurtv.net/english/analysis/Bostons-Anti-Fascist-Protest-Was-Planned-by-Black-Queer-Radical-Women-20170821-0027.html.
- 66.
L. Ben-Moshe, A.J. Nocella & A.J. Withers, ‘Queer-cripping anarchism: Intersections and reflections on anarchism, queerness and dis-ability,’ in Queering Anarchism: Addressing and Undressing Power and Desire (Oakland, CA: AK Press, 2012), 207–220, 208.
- 67.
Nicholas, Queer Post-Gender, 6.
- 68.
Butler, Gender Trouble.
- 69.
Heckert, ‘Sexuality’, 112.
- 70.
M. FoucaultHistory of Sexuality vols. 1–3 (London: Penguin, 1990 [1984]).
- 71.
Heckert, ‘Sexuality’, 112.
- 72.
Portwood-Stacer, ‘Constructing anarchist’, 480.
- 73.
For example, W.O. Matik, Redefining Our Relationships: Guidelines for Responsible Open Relationships (Oakland: Regent Press, 2001).
- 74.
Portwood-Stacer, ‘Constructing anarchist’, 9.
- 75.
Matic, Redefining.
- 76.
Portwood-Stacer ‘Constructing anarchist’, 490.
- 77.
C.B. Daring, J. Rogue, A. Volcano & D. Shannon Queering Anarchism: Addressing and Undressing Power and Desire (Edinburgh: AK Press, 2012), 13.
- 78.
L. Duggan ‘Beyond Marriage: Democracy, Equality, and Kinship for a New Century’, S&F Online, 10.1–10.2 (2012), http://sfonline.barnard.edu/a-new-queer-agenda/beyond-marriage-democracy-equality-and-kinship-for-a-new-century/.
- 79.
Butler, ‘On anarchism’, 93.
- 80.
Ibid., 94.
- 81.
Heckert, ‘Sexuality’, 115.
- 82.
Daring et al., Queering Anarchism, 11.
- 83.
For an extreme reactionary response to the fear of gender anarchy, Family Watch states that freedom of gender expression is dangerous because ‘In essence “gender identity policies that include protections for “expression” and “behavior” facilitate gender anarchy’.http://www.familywatchinternational.org/fwi/gender_anarchy.pdf but please don’t give their website more hits.
- 84.
Nicholas, Queer Post-Gender.
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M. Bookchin, Social Anarchism of Lifestyle Anarchism: An Unbridgeable Chasm (Edinburgh: AK Press, 1995).
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J.E. Muñoz Cruising Utopia: The then and There of Queer Futurity (New York: New York University Press, 2009), 220.
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N. Giffney ‘Denormatizing Queer Theory: More Than (Simply) Lesbian and Gay Studies’, Feminist Theory, 5(1) 2004, 73–78, 75.
- 90.
Daring et al., Queering Anarchism, 9.
- 91.
Nicholas, Queer Post-Gender.
- 92.
Heckert, ‘Sexuality’, 113.
- 93.
- 94.
Butler, ‘On anarchism’, 96.
- 95.
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- 96.
Dragonowl, ‘Against identity,’ 10.
- 97.
D. O’Driscol, l ‘Creating an anarchist theory of privilege’, Workers Solidarity Movement (2013) https://www.wsm.ie/c/anarchist-theory-privilege-iar8, 2.
- 98.
Dragonowl, ‘Against identity’, 10.
- 99.
J. Liesegang, ‘Tyranny of the state and trans liberation’ in C.B. Daring, J. Rogue, A. Volcano & D. Shannon Queering Anarchism, 87–99, 96.
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Nicholas, L. (2019). Gender and Sexuality. In: Levy, C., Adams, M.S. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Anarchism. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-75620-2_34
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