If movements reject hierarchical power, what do they build in its place?

In Episode 3 of A Podcast for Radicals, we explore prefigurative politics—the principle that we create the world we want through how we organize today. The future society isn't something we build after winning; it's something we practice now.

We examine how worker cooperatives, community land trusts, consensus decision-making, and mutual aid networks embody liberation in the present.

We look at real-world movements putting this into practice: Cooperation Jackson building economic democracy in Mississippi, and Argentina's recuperated workplaces, where workers have run factories without bosses for over twenty years.

We also confront what happens when these alternatives face attack—and how radical language gets co-opted by forces working against liberation.

In this episode:

→ Prefigurative politics: what it means and why it matters

→ How specific practices embody the vision of liberation

→ Cooperation Jackson's model of interlocking cooperatives

→ Argentina's worker cooperatives and current attacks

→ The difference between genuine anarchism and "anarcho-capitalism"

→ What repression teaches us about building alternatives

This episode is part of the "Means and Ends in Radical Action" series from A Guide for Radicals.

Resources:📖 Read the full chapter: https://www.radical-guide.com/a-guide-for-radicals/

🌐 Explore more: https://www.radical-guide.com

Support our work: https://www.radical-guide.com/ways-to-support/

If this content resonates with you, consider supporting A Radical Guide. Your contributions help sustain our projects and support ongoing efforts for justice, mutual aid, and collective liberation.

And remember: Follow ideas, not people.

#RadicalPolitics #PrefigurativePolitics #WorkerCooperatives #CooperationJackson #MutualAid #MeansAndEnds

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What makes authority legitimate? And what does it mean to reject the logic of power?In this episode, we explore why radicals reject hierarchical domination, the difference between "power over" and "power with," and how movements practice horizontal organizing at a massive scale.We draw on the anarchist tradition - Bakunin, Kropotkin, Malatesta - to understand why revolutionary movements that centralize power often reproduce the domination they claimed to oppose. And we examine what legitimate authority actually looks like: mutual, temporary, and voluntary.The episode features Brazil's Landless Workers' Movement (MST), which coordinates 1.5 million participants across 23 states through collective leadership, consensus decision-making, and structural gender equity - all without a permanent leadership class.In this episode:→ The anarchist critique of hierarchy→ "All Power to the People" - what it actually means→ Power over vs. power with→ What makes authority legitimate (and illegitimate)→ The MST and Zapatistas as models of horizontal organizingThis episode is part of the "Means and Ends in Radical Action" series from A Guide for Radicals.Resources:📖 Read the full chapter: https://www.radical-guide.com/a-guide-for-radicals/🌐 Explore more: https://www.radical-guide.comSupport our work:https://www.radical-guide.com/ways-to-support/If this content resonates with you, consider supporting A Radical Guide. Your contributions help sustain our projects and support ongoing efforts for justice, mutual aid, and collective liberation.And remember: Follow ideas, not people.#RadicalPolitics #Anarchism #HorizontalOrganizing #MST #PowerToThePeople #MeansAndEndsSupport A Radical Guide: https://www.radical-guide.com/ways-to-support/

Can hierarchical methods produce liberatory outcomes? Episode 1 of Means and Ends in Radical Action explores why anarchist movements insist that how we organize must reflect what we're fighting to build.We break down four specific ways organizing methods shape what movements can create:

👉Methods develop capacities

👉Methods transform consciousness

👉Methods create precedents

👉Methods build material bases.

This episode examines the core anarchist principle: the revolution must prefigure the society it aims to create.

ABOUT THIS SERIES

Means and Ends in Radical Action is part of A Podcast for Radicals, exploring how movements navigate the relationship between organizing methods and outcomes. Based on A Guide for Radicals.

RESOURCES📖 Read the full section: https://www.radical-guide.com/a-guide-for-radicals/means-and-ends-in-radical-action/table-of-contents/

🌐 A Guide for Radicals: https://www.radical-guide.com/a-guide-for-radicals/

SUPPORT THIS WORK This project is made possible by listener support: https://www.radical-guide.com/?form=donate

SUBSCRIBE for weekly episodes exploring building collective power, transparency and accountability, direct action, and other organizing questions.

#Anarchism #MeansAndEnds #RadicalOrganizing #PoliticalTheory #Liberation