Anarchist Federation

The Anarchist Federation aims at abolishing all social structures and laws that restrict personal freedom in any way - the power that comes from appropriating the means of compulsion, production and indoctrination. We judge necessary: identifying work as the property, the law of protection of life (and health of every living creature), freedom (deciding about your body and mind by yourself) or work (and its effects). Anything else shouldn't be neither ordered nor banned, and decisions about actions should be made only by people involved and interested in the action, not by some people from the outside, especially from institutions. Organizing life on social scale shouldn't be based on authority from above but on solidarity and workers', local councils etc. people have the right to make mistakes on their own account.

The Anarchist Federation is a federation of groups and individuals that undertake actions towards liberty, peace, self-governing, social justice and solidarity amongst humans. The Anarchist Federation (formerly Anarchist Intercity Agreement) exists since 1988.

It unites a dozen or so groups from all over the country. The principal of the cooperation is taking actions together to execute certain tasks. In the AF different ideological platforms co-exist. The activity of AF is based on task groups that undertake actions on e.g. social-political level or cultural one, making the AF's principles come true.

Activity of Poznan's section of AF has a really wide range of actions. On the one hand these are various forms of protest and agitation. This kind of activity could be called as temporary. It is characteristic with the "outer" message of our group. This activity gives an opportunity to voice our opinion, it is a form of pressure on authority and other institutions and it also constitutes a factor of propaganda for us. In this range of activities, there are such actions as both spectacular ones like demonstrations, happenings, direct actions and those less spectacular like petitions, posters, zines and so on.

For centuries anarchists have always had the same attitude toward all forms of authority, exploitation and any harm done to any person. In today's world there is far too much of such injustice. A part of it are open actions of the system of authority. That is why in some cases our activities have been in form of campaigns.

But on the other hand we are trying to build our reality through creating consciousness in every-day life. We are creating a community of liberation, that is taking up some actions towards life created from below, that is independent and self-organized. This activity is based on Rozbrat that gives he group a stable character.

The idea

Anarchist Federation aims at the abolition of all the social structures and laws that limit personal freedom, it stands against the structures of power that arise from mastering of means of production and compulsion mingled with indoctrination. We think it is necessary to identify ownership with work and we accept the law that protects life (and health of all the creatures), freedom (of having at one's disposal one's body and mind) and work (and its fruits). All other issues should not be either required or forbidden; only the agreements between the interested parties should decide about their actions, and not the will of the third party, especially not the institutions. Therefore the organization of life in a social scale should be based on solidarity and local and workers' self-governments and autonomies. It ought to come from the grassroots, not from the top. People have a right to stumble on their own account.

Anarchist Federation is a federation of individuals and groups who undertake actions for the benefit of freedom, peace, self- governing, social justice and human solidarity.
Anarchist Federation (former Interurban Anarchists) has existed since 1988. It organizes people from a dozen or so centers from all over Poland; they work together to realize specific tasks. There are different ideological planes coexisting within AF. Its activity is grounded on the tasks' groups working on the precise levels, for example on the socio-political level or the cultural one. Each of them accomplishes the Federation's foundations in a given range.

The activities

The activity of Poznan's section of Anarchist Federation includes a lot of different forms of protest and agitation. One of them can be called "summary activity", which is about "external" message of our group, expressing our point of view and exerting a pressure on the authorities and institutions. This is the propaganda factor- demonstrations, happenings, direct actions, petitions, posters, papers and so forth.
The anarchists have always had the same attitude towards any forms of power, exploitation and injustice being done to a human being. In today's world we have got too much of that unfair treatment of people and partly it is the apparent system of rule which is responsible for this situation. That is why we have decided to lead campaigns concerning some issues; one should mention here the most important ones like:

- Anti military Campaigns
- Anti repression Campaigns
- Anti racist Campaigns
- Ecological Campaigns
- Campaigns against the war in Chechenya
- Antiglobalist Campaigns
- Social Agreement "Poznan - the city for people"
- Workers' Initiative

On the other hand we try to form our reality being 'conscious' in every day life. We are independent community which works for the proceeding from the ranks, autonomous life. Our activity is focused around Rozbrat which gives our group a firm character.

In 1997 the Anarchist Federation opened the Liberation Library and in 2000 it started the Anarchist Club and the office of Poznan's AF branch.

Anarchist Library, open almost seven days a week, is a very special place. More or less 700 people use it and on the shelves you can find fairy- tales as well as philosophical books. The archive is very extended, composed of well filed stationery concerning the antiauthoritarian movement worldwide. Our library is the biggest Polish public collection of documents, posters and publications of this environment; thanks to its assemblage a lot of papers and thesis have been written, from minor ones to PhD dissertations.

Everyone can take part in creating the library, for instance giving away his or her books, and everyone who fulfils a duty can belong to the librarians' collective. The library's sources are both gifts and books bought from a special fund. There is a press distribution joined with the library.

Anarchist Club acts as our direct place. It is a quite big place with a homely atmosphere and it is used in many ways; all the meetings are organized here and it is also a night's lodging space for our guests.

Thanks to the fact that we have our own place we can widen and disseminate our activity. Here we create fundamental elements of a society's structure - but it is completely different from the "official" world's one. We are interested in the independent, free thinking and views and building conscious society. In oder to achieve this goal we have set up the Free University. This scheme includes discussions in small and big groups as Independent Debate Club, where we invite guests who are specialists in their field so that one can always ask them about the issues he or she wants to get know about.

In the framework of the Free University we also organize workshops where you can master the specific skills mainly connected with the maintenance of squat (for example glazing the windows, designing and making complex constructions) and learn how to work in a group and think pragmatically.

Whats more, we organize excursions and we show films; after projection there is always time for discussion about the movie.

As members of Free University we are often invited by other groups to give lectures or to run workshops.

One could write much more about our activity which is facilitated by squat - first of all it gives us the possibility of direct and easy contact among the people. At Rozbrat you can meet persons who share the same attitude towards the world, you can talk to them and together you can help the others, for example the ones who don't want to fulfill the military service (which is compulsory in Poland) - there is Anti military Emergency Department "Szwejk" where you can get the info how to flee it.

General All-Polish web of Polish Anarchist Federation: www.fa.most.org.pl

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