 Cover of the first issue of 'Green Anarchist' magazine (Summer 1984), featuring artwork by then editorRichard Hunt | |
| Founding editor | Alan Albon |
|---|---|
| Founding editor | Richard Hunt |
| Founding editor | Marcus Christo |
| Founded | 1984 |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
TheGreen Anarchist, established in 1984 in the UK, was a magazine advocatinggreen anarchism.
Founded after the 1984Stop the City protests, the magazine was launched in the summer of that year by an editorial collective consisting ofAlan Albon,Richard Hunt andMarcus Christo. Albon had been an editor ofFreedom whilst Hunt had become frustrated with the more mainstreamgreen magazineGreen Line for which he had been writing. The younger Christo had come from a moreanarcho-punk background – he was also a member of GreenCND, and had been involved in the blockade ofRonald Reagan's car at the 1984Lancaster House summit meeting.
Early issues featured a range of broadly anarchist and ecological ideas, bringing together groups and individuals as varied asClass War, veteran anarchist writerColin Ward, anarcho-punk bandCrass, as well as thePeace Convoy, anti-nuclear campaigners,animal rights activists and so on. However the diversity that many saw as the publication's greatest strength quickly led to irreconcilable arguments between the essentiallypacifist approach of Albon and Christo, and the advocacy of violent confrontation with the State favoured by Hunt.
Albon and Christo leftGreen Anarchist shortly afterwards, and the magazine saw a succession of editorial collectives, although Hunt remained in overall control. During this period he published articles which were increasingly alienating much of the magazine's readership. Matters came to a head after Hunt wrote an editorial which expressed support for British troops in theGulf War and extolled the virtues ofpatriotism. Hunt has stated that the rest of the editorial collective wished to bring toGreen Anarchist a more left-wing political approach, while Hunt wanted it to remain non-aligned.[1] Shortly afterwards he left to start another magazineAlternative Green, which continued to promote his own particular view of green anarchism, and eventually became closely linked to theNational-Anarchist movement from the mid-90s onwards.
During the 1990sGreen Anarchist came under the helm of an editorial collective that includedPaul Rogers,Steve Booth and others, during which period the publication became increasingly aligned withprimitivism, an anti-civilization philosophy advocated by writers such asJohn Zerzan,Bob Black andFredy Perlman.
During this period the magazine expressed sympathy for the criminal activities ofTed Kaczynski and published a notorious article entitled "The Irrationalists" that supported actions like theOklahoma City bombing and thesarin gas attacks carried out by theTokyo basedAum cult. This once again alienated much of the UK anarchist movement, and led to strong criticism of the magazine byStewart Home,Counter Information,[2] theAnarchist Communist Federation[3][4][5] and others.Steven Booth, the writer of the article, has since renounced the views expressed in it, as well as the primitivist movement altogether.
Starting in 1995,Hampshire Police began a series of at least 56 raids,code named 'Operation Washington', that eventually resulted in the August to November 1997Portsmouth trial of Green Anarchist editors Booth,Saxon Wood,Noel Molland and Paul Rogers, as well asAnimal Liberation Front (ALF) Press OfficerRobin Webb andAnimal Liberation Front Supporters Group (ALFSG) newsletter editor Simon Russell. The defendants organised theGANDALF Defence campaign. Three of the editors of Green Anarchist, Noel Molland, Saxon Wood and Booth were jailed for 'conspiracy to incite'. However, all three were shortly afterwards released on appeal.
In the late 1990s there was a further split amongst the GA collective, leading to the existence of two entirely separate magazines using the Green Anarchist title. These were respectively published by an editorial team that includes Paul Rogers and 'John Connor' (who subtitled their version of the paper asthe original and best), and Steve Booth, who has publicly renounced some of his earlier published views and expressed a wish to 'return to the magazine's roots'. Both versions ceased publication in the 2000s.
