Overview

Arguably the most impactful anarchist organisation globally in the Cold War era, the FAU viewed everyday people as revolutionary protagonists and sought to develop a popular counter-subjectivity through accumulating experiences directly challenging the market and the state. The FAU argued that everyday people transformed into revolutionary subjects through the regular practice of collective direct action in labour unions, student organisations, and neighbourhood councils. Their slogan was 'create popular power,' and their praxis differed from nationalist strains of Marxism at the time. The strategies and tactics promoted by FAU, ones in which everyday people took on roles as historical protagonists, offered the largest threat to maintaining social order in Uruguay and thus spawned a military takeover of the state to dismantle and deflate their vibrant popular revolt.

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9781849355001

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Reviews

This is an exciting book that adds to the rich history of anarchism. An English-language history of the FAU is long overdue and Troy Andreas Araiza Kokinis's work does not disappoint. Thoroughly and sensitively researched, it places the FAU in their political and cultural context, presenting us with an understanding of a complex and flexible organization that could both work with others but still maintain its own anarchist autonomy. Books like this make one realize how much there is to learn and reflect on. Essential reading. --Barry Pateman, Kate Sharpley Library and associate editor of Emma Goldman: A Documentary History of the American Years Troy's book is an important contribution to think about the ways in which anarchism, scarcely studied in the second half of the century, was also part of the turn of the sixties` New Left in Latin America. The so-called specifism of the FAU shows how that anarchist tradition, very influential in the Uruguay of the first half of the century, managed to rethink itself and actively influence the new cycles of social and political struggles. --Aldo Marchesi, author of Latin America's Radical Left: Rebellion and Cold War in the Global 1960s

This is an exciting book that adds to the rich history of anarchism. An English-language history of the FAU is long overdue and Troy Andreas Araiza Kokinis's work does not disappoint. Thoroughly and sensitively researched, it places the FAU in their political and cultural context, presenting us with an understanding of a complex and flexible organization that could both work with others but still maintain its own anarchist autonomy. Books like this make one realize how much there is to learn and reflect on. Essential reading. --Barry Pateman, Kate Sharpley Library and associate editor of Emma Goldman: A Documentary History of the American Years Troy's book is an important contribution to think about the ways in which anarchism, scarcely studied in the second half of the century, was also part of the turn of the sixties` New Left in Latin America. The so-called specifism of the FAU shows how that anarchist tradition, very influential in the Uruguay of the first half of the century, managed to rethink itself and actively influence the new cycles of social and political struggles. --Aldo Marchesi, author of Latin America's Radical Left: Rebellion and Cold War in the Global 1960s When trying to understand a period as intense as the late 1960s in Uruguay, it is greatly important to illuminate the struggles waged by so-called 'minority' political organizations. Although they were never hegemonic among the organized popular sectors, studying groups like the FAU is essential for understanding what happened beyond the scale of that which was visible because they pushed for the types of collective actions that had a broad impact both in majority parties and popular sectors of the Left, as well as other groups who organized from below. --Raul Zibechi, author of Territories in Resistance

Author Information

Troy Andreas Araiza Kokinis grew up in LA's Pomona Valley. His family's participation in the Chicano movement grew his interest in Cold War-era Latin American social movements. Araiza Kokinis is a lecturer at the University of California, San Diego and also a sign painter, rock climber, and Dodger baseball fanatic.

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