2
Freedom and Association

Because . Food is a RIGHT not a privilege!

Because there is enough food for everyone to eat!

Because SCARCITY is a patriarchal LIE!

Because a woman should not have to USE HER BODY to get a meal or have a place to sleep!

Because when we are hungry or homeless we have the RIGHT to get what we need by panning, busking or squatting!

Because POVERTY is a form of VIOLENCE not necessary or natural!

Because capitalism makes food a source of profit not a source of nutrition!

BECAUSE FOOD GROWS ON TREES.

Because we need COMMUNITY CONTROL.

Because we need HOMES NOT JAILS!

Because we need . FOOD NOT BOMBS.

Food Not Bombs1

Introduction

Anarchism is frequently misunderstood as a principled commitment to confrontation, rule breaking and unregulated, uncoordinated personal licence. In fact, as we shall see, anarchist movements like Food Not Bombs stress the importance of relational dynamics like 'reliability', 'trust' and mutual interdependence.2 This chapter will focus on the Food Not Bombs (FNB) network as an example of anarchist theory in action, particularly highlighting the centrality of relationship and interconnection to the anarchist approach to freedom, as articulated in Bakunin's counsel to 'multiply your associations and be free'.

Food not Bombs is an all-volunteer global food-sharing movement dedicated to non-violent direct action, and one of the fastest growing radical social movement organizations in the world, with autonomous chapters sharing food throughout North, Central and South America, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Australia. The principles of the movement are stated in their literature as follows: (1) 'The food is always vegan or vegetarian and free to everyone, without restriction, rich or poor, stoned or sober'; (2) 'Food Not Bombs has no formal leaders or headquarters, and every group is autonomous and makes decisions using the consensus process'; and (3) 'Food Not Bombs is dedicated to nonviolent direct action and works for nonviolent social change.' The work of Food Not Bombs activists highlights the extent to which, in a contemporary context, anarchist theory and practice is particularly focused on resisting the political economy of neoliberalism.3

The Food Not Bombs movement has its roots in anti-military protests that sought to expose the cruelty of public-spending policies that prioritize spending on nuclear weapons over food security. Figures suggest that if current annual expenditures for nuclear weapons were instead invested into global lifesaving measures, the resources would be enough to cover the elimination of starvation and malnutrition, basic shelter for every family, universal health care, the control of AIDS, relief for displaced refugees and the removal of landmines.4 Food Not Bombs literature also highlights the contradiction between plentiful global food supplies and widespread malnutrition and hunger. Contemporary agriculture does produce a plentiful and sometimes inexpensive supply of food for supermarkets. However, with distribution driven by the criteria of profitability, much of the world's population does not see this food. According to researchers in the field, 'There is more food, more waste, and more hunger now than ever before.'5

The idea that resources should be distributed, without conditions, according to need has remained stable throughout the history of anarchism. Whose needs (for food, shelter, safety, space, belonging, etc.) get met and whose needs do not get met are understood to be products of relationships of domination in the everyday lives of living things. Eating and not eating, for example, are understood to be produced through uneven global power relations, particularly of class, race, gender and geography. Food Not Bombs groups share food with people who want to eat in more than a thousand cities around the world, providing food to homeless people, political protestors, strikers and their families, survivors of natural disasters, relief workers, people displaced by war and economic crises, and people unable to access food supplies during pandemic shutdown. Each group or chapter of the movement collects or recovers food that would otherwise be thrown away and cooks large collective meals that are shared with anyone in public spaces. In this way, Food Not Bombs volunteers provided food for rescue workers in New York on 9/11, for public protestors for 100 days during the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, for striking car workers in South Korea, at anti-globalization protests, for activists and Aboriginal people seeking to stop gold mines in the Australian bush, and FNB volunteers helped organize the food relief for the survivors of Hurricane Katrina.

Increasingly, activists find that they come into conflict with local authorities and new forms of legislation that limit or prohibit free food distribution in these spaces. Volunteers engaged in preparing or distributing food at these gatherings are often arrested, accused of 'making a political statement' or engaging in 'terrorist activities'. There are a number of volunteers currently serving time in prison. Amnesty International has raised concerns about the policing and rates of incarceration of Food Not Bombs activists.6 As San Francisco police captain Dennis Martel argued in defence of the arrests of FNB volunteers, 'They don't want to feed the hungry, they just want to make an anarchist-type statement and we aren't going to allow it.'7 He's right - the volunteers involved in this movement do have an explicit anarchist agenda, but Martel is wrong when he claims that the distribution of food is separate from this agenda for radical social change. Not least among the connections between sharing food and changing the world is the radical way that these activists understand the potential of everyday, or small-scale, activities to effect important social change, especially when these quotidian initiatives are focused on survival, shared needs and building relationships. As FNB organizer Keith McHenry states, 'Often, the simplest activities, organized in a consistent, regular manner, can be the most effective way to encourage political, economic and social change.'8

Food Not Bombs is about food and relationships and anarchist politics: 'We are searching for a way to reach a public unfamiliar with alternative ways of organizing society and of relating to our fellow animal and human beings. Every bowl of free food that a Food Not Bombs volunteer shares with their community is a step in that direction.'9 The 'direction' that activists orient themselves towards is 'transition to a self-governed community' in the anarchist mode, 'filling the power vacuum created by natural, economic or political crisis with a compassionate, community-based system where everyone participates and no one goes hungry or lives in poverty'. 'This', concedes McHenry, 'is one reason why we are considered a threat.' And, as he elaborates on behalf of the Food Not Bombs network of activists, 'Communities freed from corporate domination will need to eat and the skills required to collect and share food can be translated into the growing of food, providing safe fresh water, providing shelter, health care, education, entertainment and all the things a healthy, free community would desire.'10

Despite these revolutionary aspirations, the focus of the public food sharing practised by Food Not Bombs groups is not primarily the fuelling of activists. The wider goal is to engage in a politics of survival and thereby launch anarchist resistance to contemporary neoliberal economic and political policies by decommodifying food and politicizing hunger (and other needs). Beyond even this objective is a commitment to a distinctively interrelational anarchist model of freedom, one that also depends on connection to animals and the natural world. Anarchist writers and activists clearly agree that if we are concerned about freedom, then we must focus on needs like hunger. What may not be so immediately visible to onlookers of anarchist practices is the importance of building relationships (collaboration, care, friendship, solidarity, affinity and commensality), through the meeting of needs, for the very realization of freedom. This chapter will focus on the Food Not Bombs network as an example of anarchist theory in action, particularly highlighting the centrality of needs (and of relationships of attention, care and interdependence across species and ecosystems) to the anarchist approach to freedom and the building of a sustainable commons.

'Fuck neoliberalism'11

Neoliberalism is the name given to the historical trajectory of capitalism since the late 1970s. As a set of beliefs and policy objectives, it has gained a kind of unquestioned status within party politics and public policy. Neoliberalism reconstructed nations, communities and individuals as competitive beings engaged in the endless pursuit of wealth, material goods and consumption, which would somehow lead to an increase in affluence and happiness. This political project began in the United States and the United Kingdom with moves to deregulate the market, financialize the economy and privatize public assets. The model of neoliberal economic development is a story that political and economic...