I have been to conferences —mostly in the United States, and in the sixties —which, in deference to a badly distorted notion of participation, turned out to be exercises in group-grope and encountering. I was somewhat afraid that the Venice Gathering, being after ail an anarchist affair, might go a similar route. In fact, the problem that st suffered from was exactly the opposite: apparently the convenors, perhaps fearing the same thing, gave the conference a structure which far outdid in its conventional approach and formal structure many professional meetings that i have attended

i speak here only of the sessions where papers were read, in the School oi Architecture. The happenings in the piazzas were imaginative and far more in the spirit of communal gatherings. But the forma! sessions were as stultifying as i have seen. The three rooms in which they were held seated — in seats bolted to the floor —several hundred people each Panelists, having such a gratifyingiy iarge captive audience, for the most part mercilessly subjected them to papers, which once read, then had to be translated into at least two other languages, in one room, simultaneous translation was possible; people wore headsets and listened to the sometimes tortured translations of panelists who seldom made any effort to simplify the language of their offerings.

Being treated to the spectacle of several hundred anarchists patiently listening while papers were read at them, with little opportunity to ask questions or respond (more on that later) was bemusing. Apparently European anarchists are socialized to accept such meetings where Americans — at least in the 60's — would probably have risen up and taken affairs into their own hands. Being rather turned off by the format, 1 attended only four sessions—two in which I was the offending party (1 kept my delivery short, and in the first session naively asked for questions, before 1 realized that was impossible), and two in which ! was one of the often-

ded- The content of the deliveries varied, but 1 thought many of them to be thoughtful and challenging. J particularly liked the session on worker management, organized by the editors of Autogestion.

While attending the sessions, I was struck by the fact that during the so-called question period what really took place was more perorations by participants who delivered themselves of their own ideas, unrelated to what had already taken place, it was only later that I found out that these were rally frustrated panelists for whom the program had no room who had been solaced by being allowed to deliver themselves under the guise of raising questions. In fact, few questions were either asked or answered, and given the size of the audience, discussion was impossible. ! found out later that a number of Italian anarchist groups had boycotted the conference as being too academic. 1 don't know what they would have liked to see. but I am sorry they were not there, perhaps they would have raised the objections that the format so richly deserved.

An&tKer deficiency of the conference was its total failure to plan politically or organizationally so as to at least leave room for some sort of ongoing activity. Here was probably the largest anarchist gathering to occur in twenty years; one would think that such a convocation could be used at least to enhance ongoing communication between different countries and different groups, if not to organize some sort of permanent liaison or working groups. But groups were not identified, and no effort was made—no space on the program given, no encouragement, no suggestions made —to see that either a continuing committee or network or working group develop as a result of the get-together. But then, the conference was not structured for this to happen. There could have been country reports, reports by different groups on their activities, or at least sessions devoted to discussion of the status of the anarchist movement. It was as if anarchism was a dead issue, a historical left over, to be dissected by a group of scholars writing academic papers.

If this is where anarchism really is, then it is hardly a relevant movement, indeed, if its praxis is limited to putting on dry academic conferences, it deserves to be consigned to the intellectual dustheap of history. In fact, I think the problem lay more with the conference organizers than with anarchism as such. They may well have bitten off more than they could chew. Looked at from one perspective, they are to be congratulated for providing food, housing, and facilities for such an extraordinarily large crowd. But there is no excuse for the format. If

anarchists cannot think up participative and liberating formats for gatherings of that size, then they should not attempt them.

What could have been done? The answer depends on how one defines the purpose of such a gathering. If anarchism is more than a historical skeleton, to be periodically dragged out and pawed over, then it should naturally lead to an anarchist practise. A gathering such as the Venice one could have been used as an opportunity to forge new bonds, to develop ongoing working groups, to encourage the further development of anarchist thought and action. How? By identifying representatives of groups at the gathering, by devoting at least part of the conference not to panels but to workshops and interest groups (meals could have been devoted to such interest groups, as they are at professional gatherings), by ensuring that panelists restricted their deliveries and that there was a time and place for genuine questions from the audience.

Are the participants to blame? Perhaps. After all, they could have taken over the conference and made it their own, changing the agenda, developing the panels, but more than that the workshops, interest groups, organizing projects that could have turned the conference into an alive and contemporary response to the social issues of the day. In the end, 1 do not know why that did not happen, any more than I know what was in the minds of the European organizers of the conference. 1 know that those of us involved in North America as co-sponsors forwarded suggestions to the European organizers, asking for workshops, for small group discussions, for time to plan something ongoing. None of our requests were heeded, and 1 can only conclude that indeed there is at least a part of anarchism that occupies itself with looking backward, and that has tost the belief, if it ever had it, that anarchism contains anything relevant to present day social reality.

1 came away from the Gathering wondering if the problem with anarchism was the fact that its day of glory indeed lay in the past—with the Spanish anarchists of the 30'$, with Emma Goldman and the Wobblies, with the Russian narodniki. Would the Greens of Germany, for instance, bother to concern themselves with Goodman, Bookchin, or Comfort, much less with Kropotkin, Bakunin or Malatesta? Where are those prime examples of anarchist practise, the affinity groups, or those wandering organizers of pre-Civit War Spain? The forms certainly exist—the feminist consciousness raising groups, indeed all manner of

support groups, afong with strong decentralist movements for worker management, bioregionalism, community autonomy. But although their anti-authoritarian orientation makes them legitmately a part of the anarchist tradition, they neither identify with it nor understnad it. The questions that this raises need to be addressed, but this is not the place for that. One thing can be said at least the Internationa! Anarchist Gathering neither addressed these questions nor provided the format where such questions could be answered.

C. Ceorge Benello