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A BRIEF NOTE ON GAIA
This is the official website of the Green Anarchist International Associaton, GAIA - a section of the Anarchist International (AI). The Confederation is a loose network of libertarians related to environmental political economy broadly defined, human & social ecology included.
The network is historically mainly rooted back to the 1960s and 1970s in Europe and America, and was officially confirmed as a section of the Anarchist International at the IFA-congress in Oslo 1982, deciding a.o.t. the following: "Political, economic and cultural co-operation was mentioned, in unions, co-operative and collective movement, ecology and environmental protection, feminism, youth movement... The aim should be an organizational integration of all anarchists ...To promote such a development the congress decided uninamously to establish a nordic IFA secretariate.... This is a.o.t. documented in the Bulletin C.R.I.F.A. no 42 novembre 1982 p. 5. and Folkebladet No 4/1983 and IFA-Solidaritet No 8/1983. The Anarchist Manifesto ISBN 82-90468-09-1 of the Northern sections of IFA published in 1983, confirms the branch of "anarcho-ecologists (environmental and resource-movement)" within the general program.
The eco-anarchist section was later expanded universally when the Anarchist International world wide was officially confirmed at the International Anarchist Congress in Oslo medio December 1998 and later. The eco-anarchists sometimes change the red part of the anarchist flag (se above) with green, Green anarchist youths sometimes may use a green flag with a black @-logo, or a black flag with a green @-logo, and the Green Grass movement, sometimes including other groups, say, semilibertarians, in a broad based eco-political front, has used a circled logo with a green, a black and a red segment. The Green Grass Confederation is mainly rooted back to 1972 in Scandinavia.
In Norway, in the spring 1972, the Green Grass - Grønt Gras - appeared in the student and environmental politics. The program was "Grønt Gras står for en antikapitalistisk og antiautoritær politikk, basert på en økologisk forståelse av menneskesamfunnet", som det sto i formålsparagrafen, i.e. an anticapitalist and antiauthoritarian policy, based on an ecological understanding of the human society. At first the Norwegian Student Society, Det Norske Studentersamfunn (DNS) was the place of action. Both in Oslo and Trondheim Grønt Gras won the elections to the managerial councils of DNS. In the autumn 1972 the commies', mainly maoist, Red Front (Rød Front) took over again, but Grønt Gras continued as a green activist and student organization for several years.
At the IFA-congress in Oslo 1982, where the green section of the Anarchist International was officially confirmed, several activists of Grønt Gras participated. In the mid 1980s the active engagement at the DNS declined, but the eco-anarchists' actions continued in the green section of the Anarchist international. In 1984 at the Anarchist Gathering in Venice, the Nordic green anarchist delegation participated in the eco-anarchist discussions with Murray Bookchin and several other green activists, and presented interesting points of view. The eco-anarchist section continued to work both within the Anarchist International and the green networks world wide in the 1980-90s and later, also functioning as a junction between the anarchist and the green movement in general. At the 20th anniversary of the Green Anarchist International Association in 2002, a.o.t. the updated Ecoanarchist Manifesto was presented internationally for environmental actions and further discussion and research (see link below).
The eco-anarchist movement must not be mixed up with neo-luddist, primitivist, anti-civilization and similar groups and policies, i.e. authoritarian and eccentric ideas and practice and far from anarchist, although sometimes posing as 'libertarian green' to provoke. The eco-anarchist movement has a rational, libertarian socialist basis for its policy, and rejects principally marxian and other dialectical type ideology, "new-age" and/or "Skippy&Disney" utopian based "animal liberation", vegetarian fanatism, irrational environmentalism, and similar authoritarian tendencies. The eco-anarchist movement is clearly opposed to and in general denounces the sometimes fanatical and irrational tendencies and guru-hierarchies we have seen within the ecology and green movement in general, as well as terrorism and ochlarchy tendencies, sometimes wrongly called "anarchist" in the media. Some oclarchists falsely posing as green anarchists have got expelling Brown Cards from IAT-APT, and are thus expulsed from the anarchist movement, see http://www.anarchy.no/apt.html .
GAIA means it is possible to have environmentally sustainable economic growth in the society, if we do the right things. This means development of new environmentally friendly technology and substitution of old and polluting etc. industry towards more environmentally friendly industry. Thus GAIA opposes certain technological advances which are contributing to ecological and environmental decay.
GAIA is engaged in all kinds of environmental issues, also, say, work-place environment included problems with ochlarchy (mob rule) and bad physical environment. This item may be closely related to the anarchist principle of autogestion. Sometimes there may be conflicting interests between GAIA and the environmental issues on the one hand, and on the other the anarcho-syndicalist and other sections of the Anarchist International, primarily interested in market goods and services in public and private sector, and not the environmental factors in general. The Anarchist International has several ways to deal with such conflicts based on fairness, efficiency, social justice and other anarchist principles.
Green anarchist policy is based on a) general, ecological and environmental scientifical knowledge, b) decent treatment of animals for food, c) a "leave the world in better shape to our children than we got it from our parents", "live and let live", "ecological variety" & "polluting units are responsible for cleaning up", etc. policy, d) a general skepticism vis-a-vis genetical manipulations, especially in a world based to a large extent on statism and plutarchy, as such research may, in worst case scenaria, be the basis for authoritarian, dystopian hell-societies much more authoritarian and worse than Orwell's "1984", e) optimal resource, ecological and environmental management as a part of the general political-economy, f) as mentioned - a rational, libertarian socialism, the anarchist principles in general.
Several libertarian writers have made contributions to eco-anarchism throughout the years, however the book "Post-scarcity Anarchism" (1971) by Murray Bookchin* gave the movement a major boost. The left-hegelian type dialectical tendencies in some of his works are however pseudoscience, and are thus principally rejected as not valid anarchism. Later on Murray Bookchin left the anarchist movement and the research front of green anarchism has been developed further, without the dialectical framework, by other libertarian researchers. The Eco-Anarchist Manifesto (see link below) presents a brief summary of the research front of green anarchism.
GAIA is an abbreviation for the Green Anarchist International Association, but also the Greek word for the Latin term Tellus, the name of the planet Earth used in astronomy. Gaia and Tellus are also used as names for the Earth thought of as a god, a divine "mother earth", in ancient mythology, but this interpretation has of course no interest in eco-anarchist perspective and organization, i.e. a secular project. The eco-anarchists and the GAIA confederation are however naturally interested in making "mother earth", our material planet, a better place to live for the people of the world, especially environmentally and ecologically, sustainable, now and in the future.
The eco-anarchists were and are in the frontline in the fight against acid rain and holes in the ozon-layer. The fight against the man-made global warming is now at the top of the agenda for anarchist direct actions, to save the global environment. Regarding the struggle against man-made global warming, the eco-anarchists are in the forefront, and demand joint international cooperation to solve the problem.
GAIA is a part of the Anarchist International: "The Anarchist International is a global, undogmatic, free thinking, nonsectarian modern anarchist international, with sections for anarchoindividualist, anarchocollectivist, social individualist and mutualist anarchist and anarchocommunist as well as green/ecoanarchist , anarchosyndicalist and anarchafeminist anarchists. The about 2000 networkmembers/subscribers and the about 50 000 persons loosely associated to the AI-IFA-IAF-network are, unless otherways explicitely said, members of all the organizations of the Anarchist International." "We are commune or communist anarchists regarding the long term aim, the anarchist ideal. We are individualist anarchists in individual matters and collectivist anarchists in collective matters and social-individualist, including mutualist, anarchists in practical libertarian policy of today. We are anarcho-syndicalists in industrial and work matters, green/eco-anarchists regarding environmental questions, and anarcha-feminists in gender matters. We support the Libertarian Association of Teetotallers, LAT, at least practically, we organize in community actions (CAN), ), do solidaric support via the Anarchist Black Cross (ABC) and do research work via the FICEDL - IFCLSD." [Resolution from the International Anarchist Congress, i.e. the 5th Anarchist Biennial, arranged by the NAC/IFA/AI in Oslo medio December 1998]. From http://www.anarchy.no/ifadok.html .
Attention should be put on chapter 19 in the Eco-Anarchist Manifesto, source see link below: "The double oppression of anarchists and the people in general, both via non-ecological and environmental factors demands a double fight and double organizing: on the one hand in green movement in general, on the other hand in the organizations of anarchists. The eco-anarchists form a junction in this double organizing. An essential point in eco-anarchism is that the changes must begin today, not tomorrow or after a mega-revolution. The revolution shall be permanent. We must start today by seeing through the oppression and negative environmental situation in the daily life and do something to break the pattern here and now. We must act autonomously, without delegating to any leaders significant the right to decide what we wish and what we shall do: we must make decisions all by ourselves in personal matters, together with other green activists in pure environmental matters, and together with the other people in common ecological and other matters." - Thus regarding literature the knowledge about ecology and the green movement in general is relevant as well as the literature of anarchism in general. The same is valid regarding actions.
More information is available via "contact GAIA" below.
20th
Anniversary of GAIA 1982-2002.
Celebrated a.o.t. on Internet Saturday 16.11.2002 - Proudly
presenting:
THE ECOANARCHIST MANIFESTO
Click on: http://www.anarchy.no/eam.html
The Ecoanarchist Manifesto will be updated and revised regularly, dependent on feedback and new research. If you have any comments, feel free to post it to GAIA by using the mailform below.
A crude translation from English to Spanish etc. and the other way around may be done at URL: http://www.freetranslation.com/ or http://www.worldlingo.com/wl/Translate
THE GREEN ANARCHIST INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION - GAIA
PRESS RELEASE 17.08.2009 UPDATED
Copenhagen December 2009
UNITED NATIONS CLIMATE CHANGE CONFERENCE DEC 7 - 18 2009
GAIA says an agreement dealing with climate change must be reached in Copenhagen in December 2009. This is a global issue requiring global action through global solidarity; it's not an issue of developed or developing countries. First of all, considering their historical responsability, developed countries must go in the forefront of this; they should agree on an ambitious and bold mid-term target by 2020, and also at least a 50% cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Then they should provide the necessary and sufficient financial support and technical support to developing countries so that those countries who do not have the capacity to address these consequences should be able to adapt themselves and also take mitigation actions. There have been wide-ranging discussions; GAIA has urged very bold and ambitious targets. This is an issue affecting the whole of humanity, even the whole planet Earth. We must seal the deal in Copenhagen in December for a global agreement which can address the climate change issues in accordance with the recommendations by the main stream scientists on climate change. Do away with manmade global warming, a top - down approach, exploiting and repression of future generations, state = archy, for anarchy, i.e. green! Update 18.12.2009. GAIA calls on all countries joining the Copenhagen summit to show responsibilty, especially USA and China, and to achieve a binding agreement to do away with the manmade global warning. GAIA calls for deeds - not words - in this matter! Update 19.12.2009. After an all-night negotiating marathon, the 193-nation two-week conference ended at 14.26 GMT on Saturday. GAIA brands the deal toothless and mostly a failure. The conference decided to "take note of " the "Copenhagen Accord of December 18, 2009". The results were:
GAIA declares: "It's certainly not everything we hoped for, but it's not too late to save the planet and its people. Therefore we have got to drive forward as hard as we can towards a legally binding treaty."
Update 10.04.2010. Diplomats from over 180 countries are meeting in Bonn to revive the UN's faltering plans to tackle climate change
Protesters dumped broken glass outside urging delegates to make real commitments four months after similar talks in Copenhagen. That produced a politcal agreement to limit global warming to 2 degrees celsius by 2020. But with the pledges only voluntary, those in the developing world say it is doomed to fail. "The small islands don't feel as if anything has changed. It has gotten worse, in fact. Because when you look at the targets that have been put on the table under the Copenhagen Accord, they are pointing to an increase of between 3.5 to four degrees Celsius, so if anything, it's become worse.” Poorer nations want a legally-binding treaty introduced by the end of the year. GAIA and the anarchists at large, EU and others, back that call, and also say Copenhagen does not go far enough. But other industrialized countries are less keen with the head of US delegation on Friday praising the deal in Denmark as a signifcant milestone.
WE CALL FOR ACTION - ANARCHIST ACTION - DEMONSTRATE WITH DIGNITY - NOT OCHLARCHY
More information see (click on):
http://www.anarchy.no/apt.html
THE GREEN ANARCHIST INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION - GAIA
PRESS RELEASE 19.11.2002
Stricken oil tanker 'Prestige' sinks. Eco-anarchists and other libertarians call for new rules and more inspections in the Anarchy of the Oceans
Oil has been washing up on beaches in Galicia. The stricken tanker which has been leaking oil off the north-west coast of Spain has sunk after breaking apart, taking thousands of tons of fuel with it: 'Prestige', Built: 1976, Weight: 42,000 tons, Cargo: 77,000 tons of oil, Owners: Mare Shipping, Registered: Bahamas, Vulnerable vessel. - Almost everything was wrong with this heavy fuel-oil transport. The ship was too old. Bahamas has not sufficient quality control on the registered ships. The vessel was too vulnerable, etc..
The bow of the Prestige was the first to go under water, followed a few hours later by the rear of the vessel, which had been carrying at least 70,000 metric tons of heavy fuel oil. There are fears of a massive ecological disaster if all the oil escapes from the Bahamas-registered tanker, which was about 250 kilometres (150 miles) from the Spanish coast when it started to break up. A spokesman for the Dutch salvage company Smit Salvage said at least some of the compartments containing oil would go to the sea bed intact, lessening the impact of the spill, but that it was impossible to say how many. However several thousand tons of oil have already leaked from the Prestige since its hull cracked during a storm last Wednesday, much of which has washed up on the coast of Galicia.
GAIA, the Green Anarchist International Association warns that if the entire cargo spills, the resulting damage could be something like that caused in the Exxon Valdez disaster off the coast of Alaska in 1989 - one of the worst ever.
The Spanish authorities have suspended fishing along the 100-kilometre stretch of coastline from Roncudo to Cape Tourinan, and financial compensation has been promised to local fishermen. Whole communities depend on fishing in the area, which is famous for its shellfish, octopus and crabs. As local residents pushed ahead with an emergency clean-up operation, other European countries offered assistance in response to a Spanish appeal. Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar - under fire from environmentalists, ecoanarchists included, for what they consider to be a timid response to the disaster - has vowed to make whoever is responsible pay for Spain's worst shipping disaster in 10 years. To the south, Portugal is bracing for the possibility that oil could foul its Atlantic beaches and rich fishing grounds. It had rejected the possibility of the crippled tanker entering one of its ports.
This is just a new accident among several: Jan 1993: 85,000 tons off the Shetland Islands, Dec 1992: 80,000 tons near La Coruna port in Spain, March 1989: 38,800 tons off Alaskan coast, 1979: 160,000 tons off Tobago, March 1967: 119,000 tons off the UK.
A diplomatic row has also erupted between Spain and Britain over responsibility for the maritime safety of the tanker. GAIA and other organizations say the catastrophe could have been averted if the United Nations had enforced new rules which oblige international inspections of all ships carrying problematic cargo before leaving the ports, and thus stop dangerous transport. The international UN legislation should target ships like the Prestige, an older, single-hulled vessel suspected of carrying a so-called flag of convenience. The break-up of the Bahamas-registered Prestige has also raised further questions over the issue of registering a vessel in a country with which it does not necessarily have any connection. It allows ship-owners to avoid certain taxes on their profits and avoid international regulations on matters like crew qualifications. Most of the tanker's crew were airlifted off the vessel last week. Companies make money by hiding behind flags of convenience in the event of trouble. The Greek captain of the vessel, Apostolos Mangouras, has been remanded in custody, accused of failing to co-operate with salvage crews and harming the environment. Spain's north-west coastline is known as the "coast of death" because of the many shipwrecks that have occurred there. The worst in recent years was in 1992, when the Greek tanker Aegean Sea lost 80,000 tonnes of crude oil when it ran aground near La Coruna.
The situation calls for new and better international rules and more inspections in the Anarchy of the Oceans with respect to transport of environmentally dangerous cargo, a job for the United Nations. The anarchists will also have a say in this question.
WE CALL FOR ACTION - ANARCHIST ACTION - DEMONSTRATE WITH DIGNITY - NOT OCHLARCHY
More information see (click on):
http://www.anarchy.no/apt.html
MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE ANARCHY OF THE OCEANS AT URL:
http://www.anarchy.no/ocean.html
*) Similar to Michael Bakunin, Sam Dolgoff, Daniel Guerin and other more or less anarchist or semilibertarian thinkers sometimes using left-Hegelian type dialectics, Murray Bookchin's dialectical ideas in itself and the arguments and writings related to these ideas must principally be rejected as pseudoscience, and thus not anarchism or anarchist, i.e. scientifical. These dialectical ideas may a) at best be irrelevant to anarchism or b) at worst be marxian dialectical ideas and semilibertarian or athoritarian. In case b) the general principle is to reject the whole thing as marxian, as marxian ideas are incompatible with anarchism, and mixes of marxian ideas and anarchist rhetorics are marxism, not anarchism. In case a) the dialectical ideas and framework should be omitted in anarchist perspective, or the hypothesis be reformulated in a non-dialectical, anarchist way if possible and reasonable. When this is done, what is left of the work and corrected, may be seen as anarchist, and the writer may also be seen as anarchist if what is omitted or corrected in general of important works is not the essential or significant, and the rest, the valid part of the works intending to be anarchist, are of major interest as anarchism.Thus several of Bakunin's and Sam Dolgoff's works may be considered as anarchist, and they may both be accounted for as anarchists for a part of their lives.
"Dialectical anarchism" and "anarcho-marxism" are however contradictive concepts, i.e. not allowed for in scientifical, libertarian context. If the dialectical framework is basical to an essay or book, i.e. it cannot easily be omitted or corrected in a reasonable way, the work in general must be seen as non-anarchist, and then if significant socialist, a form of marxism, and at least in this context, the writer is not anarchist but marxian. In this perspective Daniel Guerin may hardly be accounted for as anarchist at all, because he principally uses a dialectical framework, and rejects the anarchist scientifical method related to Kropotkin, falelsy calling it pseudoscience, see "L'anarchisme" (1965). This book by Guerin points to a certain amount of confusion in his own thought. It is rather surprising to find the beginning devoted to the preanarchist individualist, Max Stirner, without rejecting his dialectical ideas. At the point in time when the book was written, Guerin was under the influence of the oppositional Marxism that had influenced his early life and which he never entirely shook off. In his foreword to the last book he wrote "A La Recherche d'un communisme libertaire", a rather semilibertarian marxist work, he acknowledged his mistake and noted having distanced himself from basic anarchism.
Daniel Guerin's Trotskyite tendency may also be accounted for, say, Nils Kaare Dahl mentions in "Norwegian Trotskyism": "Guerin came to Norway the day after war (1940) broke out, together with three Frenchmen from Pivert's group. Guerin belonged to my group in Oslo. He was very well informed, and his book about Nazism, Fascism and Big Business..." may be mentioned as a typical Trotskyite marxian work. He spent nearly the whole war in Norway. Although his books on anarchism may be interesting, say, because he is quoting anarchists a lot and discusses anarchism in several ways, these books have a more or less biased, marxian type approach. Guerin's "Ni dieu ni maitre, histoire et anthologie de l'anarchie - 4 vol. Petite Collection Maspero," Paris 1970, must be seen as a falsification of history, say, ommitting the basic that Anarchism is an updated research front, the accumulated knowledge of still valid and not rejected libertarian hypothesis developed by the methodology of natural sciences.
Guerin instead is presenting anarchism wrongly as ideas of different prophets, even twisting these ideas in a marxian direction within a left-hegelian dialectical framework, i.e. not compatible with the anarchist method. Furthermore the wrong presentation of the libertarian has a tendency towards Lenin's travesty of anarchism "som en av sosialismens barnesykdommer", as an "infantile disorder of socialism" or left communism. Other leftist authors followed in Guerin's footsteeps, and this has made a lot of errors in people's opinion and understanding of anarchism. The dialectical framework and arguments in his books discussing anarchism are of course not seen as valid anarchism in any way. Guerin is more of a marxian falsely posing as an anarchist, and thus not anarchist, but a trotskyite and later a semilibertarian marxist. The dialectical framework in Murray Bookchin's works from the 1960s toward the mid 1980s is however probably less significant and principal than Guerin's, and thus, similar to Bakunin and Dolgoff, when the dialectical arguments are omitted or corrected, Bookchin in those days may be considered an anarchist, i.e. having a significant anarchist tendency.
In his writings from the mid 1980s and later the marxian tendency is more clear, and he may then be accounted for as a semilibertaran marxian with a communalist and ecological tendency, but not anarchist. As mentioned Murray Bookchin also has stopped calling himself anarchist. And as mentioned, the dialectical tendencies in Murray Bookchin's writings, also in his most libertarian works, are not, an have never been, valid anarchism. To be accounted for as anarchism all of Bookchin's dialectical arguments and framework in the relevant works must be omitted or corrected, i.e. relevant dialectical phrases must be reformulated in an anarchist way toward testable working hypothesis, if possible and reasonable, to be discussed and tested in a libertarian, scientifical way with the methods of modern natural sciences.
In the 1990s the dialectical, irrational, pseudoscientifical Hegelian tendency of Bookchin became very significant, bringing a principal neo-Hegelian approach to the ecological thinking, in order to "naturalize" the dialectical tradition. His "dialectical naturalism" contrasts with Hegel's dialectical idealism and Marx and Engels's relatively mechanistic "dialectical materialism," but is anyway typically marxian, opposed to the scientifical methodology of anarchism. These "dialectical naturalist" ideas are elucidated in considerable detail in The Philosophy of Social Ecology: Essays on Dialectical Naturalism (Black Rose Books, 1990, revised and expanded ed. 1994). Bookchin's ideas on politics, philosophy, history, and anthropology are summarized succinctly in Remaking Society (Black Rose Books and South End Press, 1989). An up-to-date survey of his outlook may be found in the collection of excerpts in The Murray Bookchin Reader (Cassell, 1997). In his early eighties, Bookchin lived in semi-retirement in Burlington, Vermont, with his colleague and companion, Janet Biehl. Poor health restricted his ability to travel and lecture, but he lectured each summer at the Institute for Social Ecology (in Plainfield, Vermont). Bookchin died from a heart attack Sunday, July 30th 2006 in his home in Burlington. A mix of anarchist rhetoric and marxian, neo-Hegelian "natural" dialectics, is marxism and not anarchism. Thus, from anarchist point of view Bookchin left the movement and became a semilibertarian marxian guru in the late 1980s and 1990s. Murray Bookchin developed from a traditional marxist (a more or less trotskyite tendency) in the 1930s, to a left-libertarian and later returned to marxism with a semilibertarian tendency. Bookchin is now using the term "Communalism" of his ideology, and it is marxian, semilibertarian, and thus not anarchism, despite of some anarchist rhetoric.
Murray Bookchin was born in New York City , USA, on January 14, 1921, to immigrant parents who had been active in the Russian revolutionary movement of tsarist times. Very early in the 1930s he entered the Communist youth movement but by the late 1930s had become disillusioned with its authoritarian character. Deeply involved in organizing activities around the Spanish Civil War (he was too young to participate directly, although two of his older friends died on the Madrid front), he remained with the Communists until the Stalin-Hitler pact of September 1939, when he was expelled for "Trotskyist-anarchist deviations," a typically stalinist dialectical Orwellian "1984" newspeak and doublethinking concept of no scientifical and logical value, because Trotsky with his "militarization of the production" theory is even more authoritarian and leftist than Stalin and Lenin, while the anarchists have their place far from trotskyism, in the middle above the marxian quadrant on the Economical-Polititical Map. As a foundryman in New Jersey for four years, he entered the workers' movement and became active in union organizing in northern New Jersey (a heavily industrialized area at that time) in the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO). He became sympathetic to and active with the American Trotskyists while Trotsky was still alive, but after several years was disappointed by their traditional Bolshevist authoritarianism, especially after Trotsky's death.
After returning from service in the U.S. Army during the 1940s, he was an autoworker and became deeply involved in the United Auto Workers (UAW), a somewhat libertarian or semilibertarian union before Walter Reuther came to power in it. After participating in the great General Motors strike of 1948, he began to question all his traditional conceptions about the "hegemonic" or "vanguard" role of the industrial working class, writing extensively on this subject in later years. In time, he became a semilibertarian socialist and worked closely with German exiles in New York who were dissident Marxists and who moved increasingly toward a semilibertarian perspective (International Kommunisten Deutschlands). Many of his articles in the early 1950s were published in DINGE DER ZEIT as well as its English-language sister publication, CONTEMPORARY ISSUES, under his pen names of M. S. Shiloh, Lewis Herber, Robert Keller, and Harry Ludd. His earliest book, which was based on a very large article "The Problem of Chemicals in Food" (CONTEMPORARY ISSUES, 1952), was published in Germany in collaboration with Gotz Ohly (Herber and Ohly, LEBENS-GEFÄHRLICHE LEBENSMITTEL [Krailling bei München: Hanns Georg Müller Verlag, 1955]). He pioneered writing on ecological issues in the United States and West Germany, and according to reports from German friends, his writings contributed somewhat to reforms in German food and drug legislation.
In the 1960s he was deeply involved in countercultural and New Left movements almost from their inception, and he pioneered the ideas of social ecology in the United States. His first American book, OUR SYNTHETIC ENVIRONMENT (pseud. Lewis Herber) was published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1962, preceding Rachel Carson's SILENT SPRING by nearly half a year. It received warm reviews from such outstanding members of the scientific community as René Dubos and William Vogt. He then wrote CRISIS IN OUR CITIES (Prentice Hall, 1965). The collection titled POST-SCARCITY ANARCHISM (Ramparts Books, 1971; Black Rose Books, 1977) comprised such pioneering essays as "Ecology and Revolutionary Thought" (1964) and "Towards a Liberatory Technology" (1965), both of which advanced the radical significance of the ecology issue and of alternative technologies for progressive movements of all kinds. At least 100,000 copies of "Listen, Marxist!" (1969), his critique of traditional Marxism, circulated in the United States and Great Britain, profoundly influencing the American New Left at the end of the 1960s. A Norwegian abridged translation published by the PAX/Socialist Left (SF) was also availiable a little later on, popular in Scandinavia. However some of Bookchin's ideas about anarchists are according to the marxian and trostkyite's travesty of anarchism and anarchists, i.e. some kind of extreme "children of Marx" with "infantile disorder of socialism", and have thus nothing to do with anarchism. It is clear from his books that he has never really understood Anarchism fully, i.e. an updated research front of libertarian social scientifical research based on the methodology of natural sciences, without dialectics at all..
In the late 1960s, Bookchin taught at the Alternative University in New York, one of the largest "free universities" in the United States, then at City University of New York in Staten Island. In 1974, he co-founded and directed the Institute for Social Ecology in Plainfield, Vermont, which went on to acquire an international reputation for its advanced courses in ecophilosophy, social theory, and alternative technologies that reflect his ideas. In 1974, he also began teaching at Ramapo College of New Jersey, becoming full professor of social theory entering and retiring in 1983 in an emeritus status.
His subsequent works -- THE LIMITS OF THE CITY (Harper and Row, 1974), THE SPANISH ANARCHISTS (Harper & Row, 1977), and TOWARD AN ECOLOGICAL SOCIETY (Black Rose Books, 1981) -- were very well received and stand as preludes to THE ECOLOGY OF FREEDOM (Cheshire Books, 1982; republished by Black Rose Books, 1991). This major work received considerable acclaim in major reviews not only in THE VILLAGE VOICE (one of New York's largest newsweeklies) but also in such scholarly journals as AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. His articles have appeared in many periodicals since the 1950s, such as WIN, LIBERATION, RAMPARTS, CO-EVOLUTION QUARTERLY, RAIN, TELOS, NEW POLITICS, OUR GENERATION, and ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS, among others. His book THE RISE OF URBANIZATION AND THE DECLINE OF CITIZENSHIP (Sierra Club Books, 1986; republished in Canada as URBANIZATION WITHOUT CITIES [Black Rose Books, 1992]) is a historical exploration of civic self-management and confederalism. His most recent books are REMAKING SOCIETY (Black Rose Books, 1989) and THE PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL ECOLOGY (Black Rose Books, 1990, revised 1994). But as mentioned, without doing away with the left-hegelian dialectical framework in a proper way, his works have no liberterian scientifical value, but are pseudoscientifical, and thus not anarchism. Bookchin has however inspired several eco-anarchists' writings, and some of Bookchin's thoughts are also included in the updated ECOANARCHIST MANIFESTO, but of course the dialectical ideas are omitted in the manifesto.
To see the note MURRAY BOOKCHIN (1921-2006) IN MEMORIAN by IIFOR click on http://www.anarchy.no/bookchin.html .