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Title: Joining the WSM
Author: Chekov Feeney
Date: November 7, 2014
Language: en
Topics: Workers Solidarity Movement
Source: Retrieved on 11th December 2021 from http://www.chekov.org/joining-the-wsm/

Chekov Feeney

Joining the WSM

June, 1998. I’m sitting on my own in the corner of the upstairs lounge

of the Bachelors Inn, feeling slightly foolish. Five minutes ago, I had

stood up and announced to a meeting of a half-dozen members of the

Workers Solidarity Movement, in the dark and dingy back room of the pub

below, that I wished to join the group. I did not know what response I

expected, but whatever it was, it was substantially more rousing than

the awkward silence that greeted my declaration. I stood there, feeling

like an idiot, awaiting a response, for what seemed like an age.

Eventually, one of the group, Conor McLoughlin, mumbled that I should

now leave the room to allow the meeting to consider my application. I

fumbled my way out the door, crestfallen, into the dark stairwell and up

to the lounge where I ordered a pint of Guinness to occupy me while I

waited nervously for the group’s response.

Five minutes later, the WSM members entered the lounge, pausing to order

drinks at the bar before taking seats in the corner near where I was

sitting. Two members, Conor and Andrew Flood, sat next to me. Andrew

told me that they needed to go through the membership requirements with

me. I had indicated to Andrew in advance of the meeting that I was

interested in joining and he had prepared by printing out several

documents from the WSM’s website. Aided by these print-outs, he led me

methodically through the membership requirements, described in seven

numbered sections and fifteen subsections of the WSM’s recruitment

policy paper.

“Subs”

The first requirement was relatively simple and came from the

organisation’s constitution. It specified that I would be required to

pay at least 5% of my gross income as a membership subscription – known

as ‘subs’ – to the organisation each month. This did not phase me and I

readily agreed. I had read the constitution on the WSM’s website and had

noted the monetary requirement. Furthermore, I had just got my first

proper computer-programming job. In comparison to what I had been used

to as a student, I considered myself to now be fabulously wealthy. I was

happy to be able to contribute the sixty pounds or so per month that was

asked of me and was even a little proud that it was a substantial sum

compared to many of the existing members’ contributions.

Reading List

The second requirement was that I should complete a reading list,

containing material that introduced the basics of the strand of

anarchism with which the WSM aligned itself – “platformism”. The list

consisted of four books, all classic anarchist and platformist treatises

that had been first published between 1926 and 1953; two pamphlets

written by WSM members in the mid-1980s; one article published in the

WSM’s newspaper, Workers Solidarity, in 1991; and the entire collection

of position papers and policy statements of the WSM, some thirty-five

documents in total, each formally laid out in numbered paragraphs. This

reading list was not entirely mandatory – it was described as a

“recommendation” of what an applicant was “encouraged” to read before

being admitted as a member. In the case of one of the ‘recommended’

books, however, the applicant could choose between two different

options, suggesting that the list itself was somehow less than optional.

In the year leading up to my decision to apply for membership, I had

spent a considerable amount of time browsing the WSM website and, while

doing so, I had come across the reading list. However, I had paid little

attention to its contents, as I had been voraciously reading anarchist

literature for the previous three years and was blithely confident that

I would have read far more than whatever basic material the WSM required

to ensure that their members were reasonably well informed about

anarchist politics before joining.

Now, looking through the list in detail for the first time, it dawned on

me that I had actually read almost none of the specified material. I had

read one of the WSM pamphlets and a few of the position papers, but none

of the books. However, I still considered myself to be well-read on

anarchist theory and history and felt that I really did not need to go

over the basics again. I was keen to join and did not want to have to

face a delay of several weeks while I read my way through the pile.

Moreover, the prospect of ploughing my way through these archaic

treatises of political theory was singularly unappealing to me.

I have always found books of anarchist political theory from the early

20^(th) century to be insufferably boring and, even after many years

within the WSM, I never did get around to reading more than one of the

books on that list, and even that was fragmentary. In later years, other

long-standing members of the WSM admitted to me that they had also

failed to read any of that material, due to its unappealing nature. I

thus argued forcefully that, although I had only partially read the

material on the list, I was familiar with all of the basic ideas

presented in it. In doing so, I confess to having created a greatly

exaggerated impression of the proportion of the material that I had

read.

Happily, Andrew’s examination of my understanding of the contents of the

literature was far from inquisitorial. I knew enough to be able to make

reasonable guesses at the contents of the various books and pamphlets

and, where I couldn’t, it was easy enough to put it down to a failing of

memory. Most importantly, it was probably eminently clear to Andrew that

I understood the basic political ideas and that was what he was mostly

interested in. Within ten or fifteen minutes, the scrutiny was

completed, I promised to fill myself in on some of the fragments that I

had missed. It seemed that I had passed the test.

Participation in WSM activity

The third requirement was that the applicant would be “encouraged” to

participate in “all WSM activities […] for a period of six months (or

less where possible)” at which point the aspiring member would “outline

any differences she/he has with [the WSM] policy documents” at a

national meeting of the WSM. The application would then be considered in

a session from which the applicant was specifically excluded. In my

case, as I had been in contact with the WSM for several months and was

in broad agreement with the organisation’s politics, my application was

fast-tracked to the next national meeting, due to take place in a couple

of months. Although I had been active within the anarchist movement for

the previous three years, I had generally considered myself to have been

little more than a dilettante observer of a cultural scene rather than a

political participant, which I wanted to become. Finally I was on track

to becoming a real anarchist militant. All that I needed to do was to

take part in the organisation’s activities for a few months and I would

be accepted as a fully signed up member of the WSM.

I had never before joined a political organisation, or indeed, with the

exception of college societies, a formal group or club of any kind, and

I had no real idea of what their membership procedures tended to be.

Consumed as I was with the desire to become a real militant, I barely

reflected on the membership procedure. In retrospect, however, it is

clear that it was an extremely unusual process for recruitment.

To the individual applicant, the basic proposition looked like this:

first you will be examined on political theory by a world-expert. If you

pass that test, you must go through a six month probationary period

during which you will be expected to devote large quantities of time and

energy to the organisation, at least as much as if you were a member. At

the end of this period, you will be expected to deliver a critique of

the organisation’s political theory to the entire organisation. Then

your character will be openly critiqued at a large meeting from which

you are excluded. If you are deemed to have passed this review, you will

be accepted for membership and 5% of your gross income will be taken

from you.

To a very large majority of people, this process contains several

elements that would make it a stressful ordeal. Examinations strike

terror into many people, as does the idea of their potential

short-comings being openly discussed in a group, especially when

political theory is the focus. Moreover, submitting oneself to a period

of scrutinised probation is something that few people would choose. “one

might design such a process if one wanted to ensure that the membership

was exclusively made up of extremely committed, intellectually capable,

highly ideological anarchists”

It was almost as if the process was designed to discourage anybody who

was vaguely considering joining. Only somebody who was extremely

committed to the idea of becoming a member of an anarchist organisation

would put themselves voluntarily through such an ordeal. Furthermore,

those who were less well educated, or less intellectually confident,

would be much more likely to be intimidated by the emphasis on political

theory in the process. One might design such a process if one wanted to

ensure that the membership was exclusively made up of extremely

committed, intellectually capable, highly ideological anarchists, and

sure enough, that is what the process produced in the WSM.

The WSM’s rationale for the arduous recruitment journey emphasised the

democratic nature of the organisation. The process was designed to

ensure that all members properly understood the organisation’s politics,

while also providing them with an explicit opportunity to express their

political differences before joining, to enable them to fully

participate in the organisation once they became members. However,

whatever the organisation’s explicit rationale was, there were deeper

reasons, rooted in the organisation’s traumatic early history, which

made the WSM excessively cautious about recruitment and content to deter

those who were less than committed ideologues, but it took me some time

before I understood this history properly. In the meantime, however, the

process turned out to be much more stringent on paper than in practice.

The organisation went through the motions of obeying the rigorous

process, but the individual members who oversaw it were uniformly

willing and eager to give the applicant the benefit of the doubt and

interpret the regulations in as flexible a manner as possible.

Nevertheless, I was determined to demonstrate my dedication to the cause

by throwing myself into activity in advance of the national meeting that

would rule on my membership. This meant stepping far outside my

comfort-zone and embracing my new role as a foot-soldier in the

movement. Along the way, I learned an awful lot about how political

action works in practice, which turned out to be far removed from the

intellectual world of political theory.