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Anarchism in Australia arrived within a few years ofanarchism developing as a distinct tendency in the wake of the 1871Paris Commune. Although a minor school of thought and politics, composed primarily ofcampaigners andintellectuals, Australian anarchism has formed a significant current throughout the history and literature of the colonies and nation. Anarchism's influence has been industrial and cultural, though its influence has waned from its high point in the early 20th century where anarchist techniques and ideas deeply influenced the officialAustralian union movement. In the mid 20th century anarchism's influence was primarily restricted tourban bohemian cultural movements. In the late 20th century and early 21st century Australian anarchism has been an element in Australia'ssocial justice andprotest movements.
The Melbourne Anarchist Club was officially founded on 1 May 1886 byDavid Andrade and others breaking away from the AustralasianSecular Association of Joseph Symes, the journalHonesty being the anarchist club's official organ; andanarchism became a significant minor current on the Australian left. The current included a diversity of views on economics, ranging from anindividualism influenced byBenjamin Tucker to theanarchist communism ofJA Andrews. All regarded themselves as broadly "socialist" however.[1][2] The Anarchists mixed with the seminal literary figuresHenry Lawson andMary Gilmore and the labour journalist and utopian socialistWilliam Lane. The most dramatic event associated with this early Australian anarchism was perhaps the bombing of the "non-union" ship SSAramac on 27 July 1893 by Australian anarchist and union organiser Larrie Petrie.[3] This incident occurred in the highly charged atmosphere following the defeat of the1890 Australian maritime dispute and the1891 Australian shearers' strike, an atmosphere which also produced the Sydney-based direct action group the "Active Service Brigade"[4]
A major challenge to the principles of these early Australian anarchists was the virulentanti-Chineseracism of the time, of which racism William Lane himself was a leading exponent. On a political level the anarchists opposed the anti-Chinese agitation. "The Chinese, like ourselves, are the victims ofmonopoly and exploitation" editorialisedHonesty "We had far better set to and make our own position better instead of, like a parcel of blind babies, trying to make theirs worse."[5] The anarchists were sometimes more ambivalent on the subject than this statement of principle might suggest; anti-Chinese racism was entrenched in the labour movement of which they were a part, and challenged by few others.[6]
Monty Miller, a veteran of theEureka uprising, belonged to the Melbourne Anarchist Club. He would later become a well-known militant of theAustralian branch of theIndustrial Workers of the World (IWW) and was arrested and imprisoned in 1916. His friend the social activist and literary figureWillem Siebenhaar was among those who campaigned for his release.[7]
The anarchist tradition was kept alive in Australia by, among others, the prominent agitator and street speakerChummy Fleming who died in Melbourne in 1950 and by Italian Anarchists active in Melbourne's Matteotti Club and the North Queensland canefields.[8] William Andrade (1863–1939),David Andrade's brother and fellow anarchist, became a successful bookseller in Sydney and Melbourne and while he retired from active politics in about 1920 he continued to influence events by allowing various radical groups to use his premises throughout the 1920s and 1930s.[9]
After World War Two theSydney Libertarians developed a distinct brand of "pessimistic" or "permanent protest" anarchism, deeplysceptical of revolution and of any grand scheme of human betterment, yet friendly to the revolutionary unionism of theIWW. PoetHarry Hooton associated with this group, and his friendGermaine Greer belonged to it in her youth. By 1972 she was calling herself an "anarchist communist"[10] and was still identifying herself as "basically" an anarchist in 1999.[11] The Sydney Libertarians were the political tendency around which the "Sydney Push" social milieu developed, a milieu which included many anarchists.[12]
The Sydney Libertarians, along with the remnant of the Australian IWW and of Italian and Spanish migrant anarchism fed into the Anarchist revival of the sixties and seventies which Australia shared with much of the developed world. Another post-war influence that fed into modern Australian anarchism was the arrival of anarchist refugees from Bulgaria.[13]
The last years of Australian involvement in the Vietnam war was an active period for Australian anarchists, the high-profile draft resisterMichael Matteson in particular became something of a folk hero. The prolific anarchist poetPi O began to write. The Brisbane Self-Management Group was formed in 1971,[14] heavily influenced by the councillist writings of theSocialisme ou Barbarie group and its offshoots. The Anarchist Bookshop in Adelaide began publishing the monthlyBlack Growth. Anarchists active in inner-city Melbourne played a major part in creating the Fitzroy Legal Service (FLS) in 1972.[15]
In 1974 after successfully campaigning against the1971 South Africa rugby union tour of AustraliaAnti-apartheid movement activistPeter McGregor was one of several people who involved themselves in resurrecting the Sydney Anarchist Group to organise an Australian Anarchist conference in Sydney in January 1975. At the time anarchist theory was being intensely debated.[16] A diverse Federation of Australian Anarchists (FAA) was formed at a conference in Sydney in 1975. A walkout from the second conference in Melbourne in 1976 led to the founding of the Libertarian Socialist Federation (LSF), which in 1977 led to the founding ofJura Books in Sydney.[17]
The end of the 1970s saw the development of aChristian anarchistCatholic Worker tendency inBrisbane, the most prominent person in the group beingCiaron O'Reilly. This tendency exploded into prominence in 1982 because of its part along with other anarchists and assorted radicals in the Brisbanefree speech fights during the Queensland premiership ofJoh Bjelke-Petersen.[18]
The Melbourne Anarchist Club celebrated its centennial in 1986 with a march of around 400 people that culminated inBourke Street Mall with speakers.[19]
The Australian section of theInternational Workers' Association (IWA), called the Anarcho-Syndicalist Federation (ASF), was active among Melbourne's public transport workers, influencing the 1990 Melbourne tram dispute.[20]
On January 19 2025, following a successful public forum the previous day, the Melbourne Anarchist Communist Group, Anarchist Communists Meanjin, and Geelong Anarchist Communists agreed to reconstitute themselves as branches of the Anarchist Communist Federation. On May 1 of the same year the Anarchist Communist Federation was officially launched.[21]
I am much more political now than I was then – I'm an anarchist still, but I'd say now I am an anarchist communist which I wasn't then .....The libertarians may have a good deal of intellectual prestige in Sydney, but seeing that they speak in self-evident truths andtautologies most of the time it's not difficult for them to get intellectual recognition. What disappoints me most about all the radical groups in Australia is that they have not yet managed to make theMarxist dialogue a part of the cultural life of the country as a whole, which it is say for example in India – it's something you expect to see discussed in the daily papers.
"I'm an anarchist basically. I don't think the future lies in constraining people into doing stuff they are not good at and don't want to do.
