‘We Are Everywhere’: An Ecological Analysis of Organizations in the Anarchist Yellow Pages

Abstract

The Anarchist Yellow Pages (AYP), an international directory of anarchist groupings throughout the world, listed over two thousand organizations in 2005. This paper explores the types of these anarchist organizations and their geographic clustering throughout the world, with special emphasis on the 21 countries with at least 20 such organizations. The concentrations of anarchist organizations found in the AYP suggest that the movement tends to be strongly European-centered. North Americans are greatly involved in various media organizations; Spain, France, and Sweden have strong syndicalist tendencies; Italy and Germany tend to have a high percentage of physical spaces like social centers and info shops. The theory of political opportunity is used to interpret the global anarchist movement, leading to the general conclusion that rights and democracy are related to the concentration of anarchist organizations.