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They take Ocalan seriously. Most Kurds will have never heard of Bookchin even if they're deep into PKK political theory.
On /r/anarchy101 people who adhere to Bookchin’s flavour of anarchism call to alliance with lib right
Sounds like just redd*t libshit to me, which seems to be reinforced by saying "lib-right" rather than right-libertarian.
I don't agree with Bookchin on everything, but I think he has some great ideas, is worth reading and has had a positive influence on anarchism as /u/Nagarjuna explained.
He's been incredibly influential on anarchism in ways you probably don't realize.
The definition of a anarchism as opposition to all hierarchies and not just capitalism, the state and religion is a bookchin thing.
Ocalan, the leader of the YPG based a lot of their practices on Bookchin's libertarian municipalism.
Hell, he even formalized the divide between green and red anarchy with his broadside against "lifestyle anarchy."
I have... very mixed views on him, but here's a Bookchin clip I really love:
This clip immediately made me think of cattle branding, which I'm guessing he'd find abhorrent, but still fit the bill of work as play.
He was an avid party member in the Soviet Union
Which Bookchin are you thinking of?
That said, if you're looking for anarchism to read,
Perlman's Worker Student Action Committees
And Vaneigm's The Revolution of Everyday Life are my favorites
Scott's Against the Grain and Graeber's Debt are also fantastic
I've only heard about microcolonialism in END:CIV, do you have any recs?
ISC and Bookchinites i know are 100% comrades and not weird ass redditors who think joining forces on the ancap subreddit is gonna bring about revolution of any kind.
Fuck em lmao but for real bookchin and social ecology is essential reading for an ecological socialist movement. His critiques of hierarchy and the relationship of human nature with nonhuman nature is important even if you arent someone who would identify as a communalist
Post-Scarcity Anarchism is fantastic, and very easy to read when compared with 19th century texts. I disagree with assertions of his utopianism - he describes technologies and structures that can reasonably be used to supplant manual labour in order to free people up to perform more fulfilling, creative endeavours - the spirit of communism itself.
Moreover, he's describing these things from back in the 60s, so even if they once seemed lofty, they no longer are - renewable energy, automation, etc. are all fairly commonplace nowadays, but they could have been decades ago; we could fundamentally be living a much more liberated and environmentally friendly life today had his theories been applied.
Further, he continually relates theory back to reality and to current developments and events.
His views on Marx' theories are definitely interesting - in some cases he builds upon Marx' work and extrapolates to the modern era, and in others challenges the theoretical framework with the material experiences of society after Marx. For instance, something that Marx could not have predicted was that capitalism continued to develop in such a way that it replicated the previous system of mercantilism by entrenching itself within the state - containing class struggle by "using its technological resources to assimilate the most strategic sections of the working class."
I could go on but you'd have a much better time reading Bookchin 😄 - on the topic of it being a meme, I interpret that simply as a response to the refrain of 'read Marx', 'read Lenin' or 'read Mao' - sure, but also 'read Bookchin'.
Very pertinent theory which has some interesting takes. The way he mixes ecology, urbanism, and overall local political organisation is interesting and can be very useful.
That said, he does have some blind spot. His uncompromising loyalty to an abstract concept such as liberty sometimes brings him to have some problematic views: he refuses giving critical support to any of the state driven socialist projects of the 20th. This leads him to say he'd (and those on the anar sub agree with stupidly and blindly) rather ally with right wing libertarians if communists were to take control of the state apparatus. Going as far as saying the whole of the libertarian community are the true remnants of the left in the US.
Things that people are saying that sketch you out prob come from this interview: https://reason.com/1979/10/01/interview-with-murray-bookchin/
"Let me make it very plain that if socialism, which is what I call the authoritarian version of collectivism, were to emerge, I would join your community." "That's archaic, to say the least. I regard Marxism as the most sinister and the most subtle form of totalitarianism. There are people, of course, who profess to be libertarian Marxists. I believe they mean very well, and I even write in their periodicals; but I write very militantly that I regard Marxism as a very subtle form of what I would call the totalitarian ideology—all the more subtle because it professes to advance the notions of freedom."
Still, Bookchin has some pertinent critiques and does bring about some practical ways of actualising politics. I'd read him but mantain a critical view concerning his ideological defence of absolute freedom, while paying attention to the way he presents organising politics. My biggest issue with him is that I personally think Bookchin disregarded the trend of leftist political organisations (Black Panthers) to bring about a reflection of communalism. An example of this would be Huey P Newton's theory of intercommunalism.
https://viewpointmag.com/2018/06/11/intercommunalism-the-late-theorizations-of-huey-p-newton-chief-theoretician-of-the-black-panther-party/ https://viewpointmag.com/2018/06/11/intercommunalism-1974/
