ABSTRACT

This chapter examines how anarchists prefer social relations that are not only anti-hierarchical in aim, but also horizontalist in practice. Horizontalism in this sense connotes the anarchist preference for acting through leaderless, autonomous, and directly democratic mobilizations. As the work of Michael Freeden suggests, the meaning of horizontalism shifts depending on its political content. From an anarchist perspective, this illustrates the value of anarchism's holistic analysis of the interrelatedness of all forms of domination and the interconnectedness of forms of self-management and their political outcomes. Certainly, horizontalism and anarchism overlap in their advocacy of federal, directly democratic, direct action-oriented, autonomous organizing. Anarchist responses to the growth of popular horizontalism have ranged from elation to disgust, with many in between. Those who have been more enthusiastic have viewed horizontalist movements as opportunities for the mass promotion of non-hierarchical politics while critics have seen them as betrayals of truly horizontal principles especially as they have ventured into electoralism.