Ruth Kinna

The big society, David Cameron says, is 'based on responsibility and respect'. It's an attack on 'Big Government built on paternalism and waste'. 'It is a guiding philosophy' to describe 'a society where the leading force for progress is social responsibility, not state control'. What could be wrong with that? With cuts in local government funding and support for charities who have for many years been filling gaps in state provision, the answer is becoming all too clear. The doublethink at the heart of current UK government's policy is perhaps best illustrated by the suggestion made by one coalition minister to her London constituents that they borrow all the books from the public library to prevent the council - now starved of central government funds and unable to support it - from shutting it down. Why a library emptied of books could not be closed remains a mystery, but the minister's attempt to identify with grassroots campaigning reflects the limits of state-sponsored localism. The promise to create an army of 5,000 neighbourhood activists, charged with picking up the pieces when local services grind to a halt, indicates that the coalition's dream is not just to roll back the state and let private corporations reap the benefits, but to channel social responsibility in particular ways. The ideal is not the minimal state but the moral night-watchman, in equal parts benevolent and efficient. While it sells off the forests, takes funding from further and higher education and privatises the NHS, it will mend 'broken Britain' by fostering both a love of duty and sense of self-reliance.

In this issue:
Debi Withers and the RAG collective reflect on anarcha-feminist working practices, the processes which shape the publication of their magazine, The Rag, and more widely on the obstacles to collective writing, drawing on the experience of the RAG. Sandra Jeppesen probes her relationship to CrimethInc. and examines its influences, sub-cultural influence and development. Her assessment focuses in particular on CrimethInc.'s treatment of gender and sexual orientation, racism and whiteness. Matt Adams discusses Kropotkin's approach to history. Reading the theory of mutual aid through this lens, he challenges readings of Kropotkin's work which emphasise his fatalism, and argues that his concept of evolutionary change was fully compatible with his anarchist politics. The issue ends with a debate between David Goodway and Allan Antliff on Herbert Read.

Correction to the last issue
The information provided by the Leeds Russian archive about the Tolstoy cover was incorrect: the woman pictured next to Tolstoy was his niece, not his daughter, and she had been adopted by his brother, not his son. The other details are correct and the photo was taken by John Kinna.