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On the eve of the 100th anniversary of the ';October Revolution', where the Bolsheviks seized control of a popular uprising, there can still be found those who celebrate the events as a victory of ';workers control'. Ida Mett's account was among the first to expose such illusions. The sailors of Kronstadt had been instrumental in aiding the Bolsheviks to power, but by 1921 they had become disillusioned with the direction that events were taking. Frustrated by worsening economic conditions and by the Bolsheviks increasingly brutal attempts at centralising power, the sailors and soldiers of Kronstadt put forward a series of demands designed to win back the control and autonomy that had been promised.The Kronstadt uprising of 1921 was one of the most important yet often overlooked events of the Russian civil war. The bloody suppression of the rebels by the ';government of the workers and peasants' marked the final blow to any hopes of a genuine popular revolution based on democratic self-management. Ida Mett dispels the myths of the Bolsheviks and provides a dramatic and engaging account of the events that made clear the true nature of the ';proletarian' dictatorship.Originally published in French in 1938, and in English by the libertarian socialist group Solidarity in 1967, this contemporary account which includes documents from the actual participants has been restored and revived for the next generation of social revolutionaries.

In 1936, the people of Spain rose up, overthrew their masters and took power into their own hands. In the villages and small towns of Aragon, they began to live in a way never seen before in modern Europe. Their ideal – libertarian communism.  This detailed eyewitness account of the collectives in the heartland of the revolution shows how ordinary people, inspired by the anarchist principles of equality and solidarity, organised freely to build a new world, whilst resisting a bloodthirsty fascist uprising.  It is a document of extraordinary importance; not only for the facts presented but because it informs the reader of today how, and in what circumstances, an idea regarded as purely utopian can become a reality.

In this book Ken Knabb presents a series of observations on the problems and possibilities of a global anti-hierarchical revolution. Beginning with a brief overview of the failure of Bolshevism and the inadequacy of reformism, he examines the pros and cons of a wide range of radical tactics, then concludes with some speculations on what a liberated society might be like.The aim throughout is to bring the real choices into the open and to incite people to make their own radical experiments.“The Joy of Revolution, is a simple, but not simplistic, outline of why and how a non-hierarchical, non-statist society might be possible...  I’d especially recommend the book for people who are vaguely sympathetic to the idea of a non-hierarchical, non-statist society but who are skeptical of how, in practice, it could ever happen. There are some pointers given and some common bugbears demolished along the way. And it is all written with that rare combination of readability and logicality and elan.”Eugenia Lovelace - Red and Black