Reinventing anarchy: what are anarchists thinking these days?

In this book we offer a new synthesis of anarchist ideas. We have inter twined statements of theory and action, and we have tried to present statements that are models of anarchist and intellectual inquiry. We think we have come closer than anyone, or any collection, to articulating a theory of social anarchism. The elements are almost all here. Through our synthesis we have generated a new paradigm - a new way of looking at anarchism and the world.

Anarchism is a theory of society that embodies both a moral philosophy and a guide to everyday behavior. How do we know we are right? We don't. Is there, after all, any theory of human behavior that one can declare to be true in an absolutist sense? The call for certainty is for the immature or the insecure.

As theorists, however, we are ruthlessly instrumental. Our paradigm "works' if it helps you, and us, better comprehend the world we live in. It works if it extends the range of our comprehension and the precision of our knowledge. It works, too, if it can lead us to know what is false about other claims to knowledge. Finally, our theory works if it leads us to revolutionary projects that work. If a theory cannot be implemented in practice, it is not a good theory.