Post-Scarcity Anarchism

First published in 1970, this collection of nine essays by Bookchin (co-founder of the Institute for Social Ecology, Canada) was to become relatively influential amongst a new generation of anarchist thinkers and activists. In the essays, he considers the connections between ecological and revolutionary thought, presents arguments that the world had newly arrived at conditions of post-scarcity and technological efficiency that offer liberatory potentials for industrial and agricultural workers to institute self-management, criticizes Marxism and the Soviet Union, and analyzes the events of the May 1968 Paris Uprising. In a new introduction, Bookchin backs away from the term "anarchism," now preferring "libertarian socialism." Although he makes no reference to it in the text, this is perhaps a reaction to theoretical battles in the 1990s between him and those he termed "lifestyle anarchists." Annotation c2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)