"I don't think anarchism is necessarily "get rid of leadership""
No, but many anarchists simply say so. No political power for anyone. And yet there are/were many anarchists leaders. For many anarchists this is not a problem, if the leadership is voluntarily followed. For others it is a temporary solution at best. So the result is constant debates and nothing gets done. So not that surprising, why anarchism has not much mainstream appeal. It is not at all a consistent ideology. The words anarchism are anti themself - a negation of hierachy. But what is a hierachy? What is "good" leadership?
Not clear.
So some anarchistic schools of thought might have a more consistent model, of how to do things, anarcho-syndicalism seems to be one. But in the end, it gets mixed up with everything else. How can that be convincing for the masses?
Makhno's Platformism came to mind, and it was convincing enough for an armed guerrilla to:
- get rid of Germany after Lenin's betrayal
- Beat Russian loyalist, the white Army (I want to say Denikine but it could be a man with a name in -ov like Shalov), inflicting twice as Manu casualties
- kept Lenin's army (lead by Trotsky? I think, but I might have it mixed up with Kronstad) in check for years as bullets and men got rarer, until defeat.
Yes, I heard about them, but I also heard that their organisation was not at all free of hierachies, so many anarchists do not consider them anarchists.
They were people with weapons - taking what they needed for their fight. So some claim they were democratically legitimized, but the farms where they just took the horses and food from, could not really disagree - as the machnoists had the weapons. And they used it.
But most details seems to have been lost and it is hard getting accurate accounts. Those I read, were quite bloody and brutal. So all in all probably less brutal then the accounts of the white and red army, but not really up to the standards of "voluntarily" and "equality" like anarchisms wants to be.
No, but many anarchists simply say so. No political power for anyone. And yet there are/were many anarchists leaders. For many anarchists this is not a problem, if the leadership is voluntarily followed. For others it is a temporary solution at best. So the result is constant debates and nothing gets done. So not that surprising, why anarchism has not much mainstream appeal. It is not at all a consistent ideology. The words anarchism are anti themself - a negation of hierachy. But what is a hierachy? What is "good" leadership?
Not clear.
So some anarchistic schools of thought might have a more consistent model, of how to do things, anarcho-syndicalism seems to be one. But in the end, it gets mixed up with everything else. How can that be convincing for the masses?