Getting Free, Information

Getting Free
Creating an Association of Democratic Autonomous Neighborhoods

by James Herod

You can view the HTML Version here.
This version is in pretty small type on screen, but you can enlarge with "control = ", at least on my computer. This prints out in small type (10 pt.) in letter-size pages on 69 sheets.

The PDF Version is available here.
This version is easy to read on screen, with shorter line lengths. It is also easily enlarged. These pages match the printed edition. It prints out on 176 sheets.

Ordering Information
The printed edition of the book can be ordered from:
AK Press Distribution, 674-A 23rd Street, Oakland, CA 94612, USA
2007, 164 pages, Price: $14, plus shipping
< http://www.akpress.org>

Getting Free is a study of anarchist revolutionary strategy. Since it is obvious that we cannot discuss strategy without first deciding what it is that we are trying to achieve, I begin (after a short critique of capitalism) with a two-page sketch of the basic structure of an anarchist society (a free society, one based on direct democracy). It's beautifully simple and elegant, in my humble opinion. Next I consider obstacles to be overcome, and then review strategies that have failed so far. Then I map out an anarchist revolutionary strategy, first abstractly and then in concrete detail. Finally, I discuss some of the issues in more detail and bounce the whole thing off relevant literature. I try to completely reconceptualize the fight against capitalists, by shifting the focus away from seizing the state or the means of production, to seizing decision making.

Here is the blurb I wrote about the book from its back cover (adapted from the Introduction):

The main purpose of this book is to try to persuade revolutionaries to shift the sites of the anticapitalist struggle and to select new battlefields. I identify three strategic sites for fighting -- neighborhoods, workplaces, and households -- that I believe will not only enable us to defeat capitalists but also to build a new society in the process. The advantage of this shift is that if offers an offensive strategy, not merely a defensive one. That is, it is not merely about resisting what they are doing to us, but rather about defending what we are doing to them through our new social creations. It means that we would begin to take the initiative to build the life we want, and then fight to defend this life from attacks by the ruling class.

In listing all the strategies that have failed, I merely mean to argue that these forms of resistance, although they have accomplished a lot, haven't gotten us very far toward our ultimate goal of destroying capitalism. Some of them -- like the leninist vanguard party, social democracy, dropping out, and guerrilla warfare -- should be abandoned completely. The others should be subordinated to the main task of building free associations in neighborhoods, workplaces, and households. Strategies like strikes, civil disobedience, or insurrections are not wrong in themselves, but they are not enough, and by themselves cannot defeat capitalists. To win we must add another whole dimension.

Table of Contents
Acknowledgments....................................................... vii

A Note on Terminology................................................ ix

Introduction.................................................................. 1
1. An Awareness of How We Do Not Want to Live...... 7
2. A Notion of How We Might Want to Live............... 11

3. Basic Agreements of the Association....................... 17

4. Obstacles.............................................................. 19

5. Strategies That Have Failed.................................... 24

6. The Strategy Described Abstractly....................... .. 38

7. Ways to Begin Gutting Capitalism........................... 42

8. General Comments on the Strategy...................... ... 82

9. Ways to Finish Gutting Capitalism........................... 85
10. Further Discussion of Topics Relevant
to the Proposed Strategy...................................... 86
11. Some Comments on the Literature...........................121
Postscript -- March 2007............................................. 139
Appendix: Draft General Agreement for an

Association of Democratic Autonomous
Neighborhoods......... ............................................. 145
Recommended Reading............................................... 150

First Printing -- May 2007 -- 378 copies

First edition 1998 (80 copies)
Second (Internet) edition 2000
Third (Internet) edition 2002
Fourth (Internet) edition 2004

Getting Free is mirror posted at:
<http://site.www.umb.edu/faculty/salzman_g/Strate/GetFre/index.htm>

A Portuguese translation of the second
Internet edition is available at:
<http://www.geocities.com/projetoperiferia/gettingfreept.htm>

A Spanish translation of this edition,
in preparation, will be available at:
<http://www.jamesherod.info>

The first edition was translated into Farsi by Payman Piedar
and published in three installments in the Persian journal of
anarcho‑communism, Nakhdar, issues #2 (2001), #3 (2003), and
#4 (2005), P.O. Box 380473, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139.

Published by the Lucy Parsons Center, 549 Columbus Avenue, Boston, Massachusetts 02118

Distributed by AK Press Distribution, 674-A 23rd Street, Oakland, California 94612

Printed and bound by BookMobile, 5120 Cedar Lake Road, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55416