#LISTtitle Informal Organisation
#title The Informal Organisation
#date May 1988
#source <[[https://web.archive.org/web/20090809131002/http://325collective.com/library_informal-org.html][web.archive.org/.../www.325collective.com/library_informal-org.html]]>
#lang en
#pubdate 2025-11-11T03:45:03.574Z
#authors g.c.
#author g.c.
#topics informal organisation, 325
#notes Insurrection #4, May 1988, pages 10–11. <[[http://web.archive.org/web/20190627173134/https://325.nostate.net/library/insurrection-4.pdf][web.archive.org/.../www.325.nostate.net/library/insurrection-4.pdf]]>
<br>A list of all Insurrection magazine issues can be found here: <[[http://web.archive.org/web/20201204115930/https://325.nostate.net/2009/11/17/insurrection-pdfs-online-now-elephant-editions-classics/][web.archive.org/.../www.325.nostate.net/2009/11/17/insurrection-pdfs-online-now-elephant-editions-classics/]]>

The informal anarchist organisation has nothing to do with programmes, platforms or flags but is based on a common affinity between comrades whose objective is to intervene in struggles in an insurrectional direction. In that way it is possible to be present in and heighten the class struggle.

Anarchist groups and individuals are often spread over the territory with little contact between them and few ideas on methods and possibilities of intervention in social reality. There is a certain presence in some areas, especially of a syndicalist nature. In others there is action against nuclear installations. The widest area of intervention is that of counter-information and propaganda.

An anarchist movement that is really active and incisive needs two main factors: an agile and effective instrument and an objective that is sufficiently clear in perspective. We think the informal organisation and insurrection are the concrete possibilities that present themselves at the present time.

It has already been said that the organisation of synthesis, based on the congress and political programme, is a structure that because of its internal characteristics and the mechanisms that support it, cannot be a valid instrument for comrades wanting to move in an insurrectional perspective. Political programmes and platforms are organisational models which, from an insurrectional point of view, have seen their day.

One thing that is indispensable in the informal anarchist organisation is reciprocal knowledge between members. This and affinity among comrades is what characterises the informal form of organisation.

We have all reached anarchist positions through time, maturing certain convictions concerning social problems. We also have some idea of how to intervene in social reality and the relative strategic choices to be made. Well, let us go into these problems, ascertain whether we agree on certain points, show each other how we think.

Certainly, it is not easy. It is nevertheless indispensable to confront one another. Without this no kind of informal structure or informal relationship is possible.

The informal proposal does not mean one has to agree on every single problem that arises. Affinity does not possess a uniform level of intensity. Knowledge of another is an infinite process that reaches greater or lesser depth according to the circumstances and the objectives one is trying to reach.

The basic project of an informal anarchist organisation has, in our opinion, the objective of intervening in struggles in an insurrectional logic. This organisation does not give one area privilege over another, does not have a stable centrality. It singles out an objective which at a given moment presents a particularly acute area of social conflict and works in a perspective of insurrection.

The debate is open on this point. Criticisms that insurrection is not a valid proposal today, sometimes confuse insurrection with the old “propaganda by the deed”. On the contrary we think that the insurrectional project gives itself the aim of attacking power in each one of its manifestations by the stimulation of the anarchist informal organisation, but always with mass participation, showing in deed the possibility and validity of such attacks.

In that way it is possible to be present in the class struggle and heighten the level of it.

We see the informal organisation therefore as a number of comrades linked by a common affinity. The wider the range of problems these comrades face as a whole, the greater their affinity will be. It follows that the real organisation, the effective capacity to act together, i.e. knowing where to find each other, the study and analysis of problems together, and the passing to action, all takes place in relation to the affinity reached and has nothing to do with programmes, platforms, flags or more or less camouflaged parties. The informal anarchist organisation is therefore a specific organisation which gathers around a common affinity.

Undoubtedly it will tend towards a growth in numbers, but this is not the main aim of activity. As the organism born in this way develops it will give itself common means of intervention. First of all an instrument of debate necessary for analytical examination, such as a paper or review, capable of supplying indications on a wide range of problems and of becoming a point of reference for continually verifying affinity or divergence of opinion between groups and individual comrades.

Secondly these specific groups can also form base structures involving the exploited in specific areas of struggle, not as an element of growth in the specific movement. In this optic it becomes dispersive to give life to a permanent structure to confront specific problems.

The base structures have a single objective. When this objective has been reached, or the attempt fails, the structure either widens into a situation of generalised insurrection, or dismantles as the case may be.

It should be stressed here that although the element holding the informal organisation together is undoubtedly affinity, its propulsive element is always action. If it limits itself to the first alone, all relationships will become arid in the Byzantine perfectionism of whoever has nothing better to do that try to hide one’s will to do nothing.

The problems that have been touched on here deserve more going into and we invite all comrades to take part in a discussion of them.