SELF-MANAGEMENT, SELF-PLANNING, AUTONOMY

SIGNIFICANCE AND DIFFICULTIES OF SOCIAL MOVEMENTS’ LIBERTARIAN PRACTICES

Abstract

This article has two objectives. First, to clarify the meaning of certain terms, beginning with self-management [autogestão], while stressing the diversity of meanings, a situation which on the one hand can be sometimes confusing and even be a symptom of trivialization, but on the other hand and nonetheless can also be a sign of vitality, as social movements very often rediscover and even reinvent particular ideas (principles, mottos, forms of organization) and adapt them to new contexts. However, one must minimize the problem that consists in the existence of significant tensions and contradictions, both at the level of discourse itself and at the level of concrete spatial practices in general. The task of clarifying the meaning of terms such as self-management, self-planning [autoplanejamento] and autonomy is undertaken considering not only the academic reflections about them, but also the discourses and practices of contemporary social movements. Within this framework, I pay particular attention to the fact that no only social movements’ parlance and practices often influences and inspires academics, but ideas developed by people with a scientific/academic training have been historically used and assimilated in different ways by activists. The second aim of this paper is therefore to examine, albeit briefly, the promises and inconsistencies that can be observed at the level of social movements’ self-representations, as these promises and inconsistencies indicate potentialities and obstacles regarding the diffusion of certain ideas and terms.