While this is may be an explanation of why the origins of Anarchist symbols is elusive and inconclusive, the fact is Anarchists have used symbolism in their revolt against the State and Capital, the most famous of which are the circled-A, the black flag and the red-and-black flag. This appendix tries to show the history of these three iconic symbols and indicate why they were taken up by anarchists to represent our ideas and movement.
Ironically enough, one of the original anarchist symbols was the red flag (indeed, as anarchist historians Nicolas Walter and Heiner Becker note, "Kropotkin always preferred the red flag" [Peter Kropotkin, Act for Yourselves, p. 128]). This is unsurprising as anarchism is a form of socialism and came out of the general socialist and labour movements. Common roots would imply common imagery. However, as mainstream socialism developed in the nineteenth century into either reformist social democracy or the state socialism of the revolutionary Marxists, anarchists developed their own images of revolt, starting with the Black Flag.
We would like to point out that this appendix is partly based
on Jason Wehling's 1995 essay Anarchism and the History of
the Black Flag. Needless to say, this appendix does not cover
all anarchists symbols. For example, recently the red-and-black
flag has become complemented by the green-and-black flag of
eco-anarchism (the symbolism of the green should need no
explanation). Other libertarian popular symbols include the
IWW inspired "Wildcat" (representing, of course, the spontaneity,
direct action, solidarity and militancy of a wildcat strike), the
"Black Rose" (inspired, no doubt, by the demand of striking IWW women
workers in Lawrence, 1912, for not only bread, but for roses too)
and the ironic "little black bomb" (among others). However, we
concentrate here on the three most famous ones.
However, the anarchists' black flag originated much earlier than this.
The first known account is by Louise Michel, famous participant in the
Paris Commune of 1871. According to Anarchist historian George Woodcock, Michel flew the black
flag on March 9, 1883, during demonstration of the unemployed in Paris,
France. An open air meeting of the
unemployed was broken up by the police and around 500 demonstrators,
with Michel at the front carrying a black flag and shouting "Bread,
work, or lead!" marched off towards the Boulevard Saint-Germain.
The crowd pillaged three baker's shops before the police attacked.
Michel was arrested and sentenced to six years solitary
confinement. Public pressure soon forced the granting of an
amnesty. [George Woodcock, Anarchism, pp. 251-2] However, anarchists
had been using red-and-black flags a number of years previously (see
next section) so Michel's use of the colour black was not totally
without precedence.
Not long after, the black symbol made it's way to America. Paul
Avrich reports that on November 27, 1884, the black flag was
displayed in Chicago at an Anarchist demonstration. According to
Avrich, August Spies, one of the famous Haymarket martyrs, "noted
that this was the first occasion on which [the black flag] had
been unfurled on American soil." By January the following year,
"[s]treet parades and mass outdoor demonstrations, with red and
black banners . . . were the most dramatic form of advertisement"
for the revolutionary anarchist movement in America. April 1885
saw Lucy Parsons and Lizzie Holmes at the head of a protest
march "each bearing a flag, one black, the other read."
[The Haymarket Tragedy, p. 145, pp. 81-2 and p. 147] The Black Flag
continued to be used by anarchists, with one being seized by
police at an anarchist organised demonstration for the unemployed
in 1893 at which Emma Goldman spoke. [Emma Goldman: A
Documentary History of the American Years, vol. 1, p. 144]
Twenty one years later, Alexander Berkman reported on another
anarchist inspired unemployed march in New York which raised the
black flag in "menacing defiance in the face of parasitic
contentment and self-righteous arrogance" of the "exploiters and
well-fed idlers." ["The Movement of the Unemployed", Anarchy! An
Anthology of Emma Goldman's Mother Earth, p. 341]
It seems that black flags did not appear in Russia until the founding
of the Chernoe Znamia ("black banner") movement in 1905. With the
defeat of that year's revolution, anarchism went underground again.
The Black Flag, like anarchism in general, re-emerged during the 1917
revolution. As part of their activity, anarchists organised armed
detachments in most towns and cities called "Black Guards" to defend
themselves against counter-revolutionary attempts by the provisional
government. As noted above, the Makhnovists fought Bolshevik and White
dictatorship under Black Flags. On a more dreary note, February 1921
saw the end of black flags in Soviet Russia. That month saw Peter
Kropotkin's funeral take place in Moscow. Twenty thousand people
marched in his honour, carrying black banners that read: "Where there
is authority there is no freedom." [Paul Avrich, The Russian Anarchists,
p. 44, p. 183 and p. 227] Only two weeks after Kropotkin's funeral march,
the Kronstadt rebellion broke out and anarchism was erased from Soviet
Russia for good. With the end of Stalinism, anarchism with its Black
Flag re-emerged all across Eastern Europe, including Russia.
While the events above are fairly well known, as has been related, the
exact origin of the black flag is not. What is known is that a large
number of Anarchist groups in the early 1880s adopted titles associated
with black. In July of 1881, the Black International was founded in London.
This was an attempt to reorganise the Anarchist wing of the recently dissolved
First International. [George Woodcock, Op. Cit., pp. 212-4] In October 1881,
a meeting in Chicago lead to the International Working People's Association
being formed in North America. This organisation, also known as the Black
International, affiliated to the London organisation. [Clifford Harper,
Anarchy: A Graphic Guide, p. 76; Woodcock, Op. Cit., p. 393] These two
conferences are immediately followed by Michel's demonstration (1883) and
the black flags in Chicago (1884).
Thus it seems likely that it was around the early 1880s that anarchism
and the Black Flag became inseparably linked. Avrich, for example,
states that in 1884, the black flag "was the new anarchist emblem."
[The Haymarket Tragedy, p. 144] In agreement, Murray Bookchin
reports that "in later years, the Anarchists were to adopt the black
flag" when speaking of the Spanish Anarchist movement in 1870.
[Murray Bookchin, The Spanish Anarchists, p. 57] Walter and
Heiner also note that "it was adopted by the anarchist movement
during the 1880s." [Kropotkin, Act for Yourselves, p. 128]
However, the black flag did not instantly replace the red flag as the
main anarchist symbol. The use of the red flag continued for some
decades in anarchist circles. Thus we find Kropotkin writing in
Words of a Rebel (published
in 1885, but written between 1880 and 1882) of "anarchist groups . . .
rais[ing] the red flag of revolution." As Woodcock notes, the "black
flag was not universally accepted by anarchists at this time. Many,
like Kropotkin, still thought of themselves as socialists and of the
red flag as theirs also." [Words of a Rebel, p. 75, p. 225] In
addition, we find the Chicago anarchists using both black and red
flags all through the 1880s. Similarly, we find Louise Michel stating:
"The red banner, which has always stood for liberty, frightens
the executioners because it is so red with our blood. The
black flag, with layers of blood upon it from those who
wanted to live by working or die by fighting, frightens
those who want to live off the work of others. Those red
and black banners wave over us mourning our dead and wave
over our hopes for the dawn that is breaking." [The Red
Virgin: Memoirs of Louise Michel, pp. 193-4]
French Anarchists carried three red flags at the funeral
of Louise Michel's mother in 1885 as well as at her own
funeral in January 1905. [Op. Cit., p. 183 and p. 201]
Therefore, for
a considerable period of time anarchists used both black as
well as red flags as their symbol. Anarchist in Japan, for
example, demonstrated under red flags bearing the slogans
"Anarchy" and "Anarchist Communism" in June, 1908. [John
Crump, Hatta Shuzo and Pure Anarchism in Interwar Japan,
p. 25] Three years later, the Mexican anarchists declared
that they had "hoisted the Red Flag on Mexico's fields of action"
as part of their "war against Authority, war against Capital,
and war against the Church." They were "fighting under the Red Flag
to the famous cry of 'Land and Liberty.'" [Ricardo Flores
Magon, Land and Liberty, p. 98 and p. 100]
The general drift away from the red flag towards the black must
be placed in the historical context. During the later part of the
1870s and in the 1880s the socialist movement was changing. Marxist
social democracy was becoming the dominant socialist trend, with
libertarian socialism going into decline in many areas. Thus
the red flag was increasingly associated with the authoritarian
and statist (and increasingly reformist) side of the socialist
movement. In order to distinguish themselves from other socialists,
the use of the black flag makes perfect sense. Not only was it an
accepted symbol of working class revolt, it shared the same origins
in the 1831 Lyons revolt (see below).
After the Russian Revolution and its slide into dictatorship
(first under Lenin, then Stalin) anarchist use of the red flag
decreased as it no longer "stood for liberty." Instead, it had
become associated, at worse, with the Communist Parties or, at
best, bureaucratic, reformist and authoritarian social democracy.
This change can be seen from the Japanese movement. As noted
above, before the First World War anarchists there had happily
raised the red flag but in the 1920s they unfurled the black flag.
Organised in the Kokushoku Seinen Renmei (Black Youth League),
they published Kokushoku Seinen (Black Youth). By 1930, the
anarchist theoretical magazine Kotushoku Sensen (Black
Battlefront) had been replaced by two journals called
Kurohata (Black Flag) and Kuhusen (Black Struggle)
[John Crump, Op. Cit., pp. 69-71 and p. 88]
It seems safe to conclude that while anarchism and the black flag
had been linked, at the latest, from the early 1880s, it did not
become the definitive anarchist symbol until the 1920s. Before then,
anarchists used both it and the red flag as their symbols of choice.
After the Russian Revolution, anarchists would still use red in their
flags, but only when combined with black. In this way they would not
associate themselves with the tyranny of the USSR or the reformism
and statism of the mainstream socialist movement.
It seems that figuring out when the connection was made is easier than
finding out why, exactly, black was chosen. The Chicago "Alarm", which is
right from the horses mouth, stated that the black flag is "the fearful symbol of hunger, misery and death." [quoted by Paul Avrich, The Haymarket Tragedy,
p. 144] Bookchin asserts that anarchists were "to adopt the black flag as a symbol of the
workers misery and as an expression of their anger and bitterness."
[The Spanish Anarchists, p. 57] Historian Bruce C. Nelson also notes that the Black
Flag was considered "the emblem of hunger" when it was unfurled in
Chicago in 1884. [Beyond the Martyrs: A Social History of Chicago's
Anarchists, p. 141 and p. 150] For Berkman, it was the "symbol of
starvation and desperate misery." [Op. Cit., p. 341] Louise Michel argued that the "black flag
is the flag of strikes and the flag of those who are hungry."
[Op. Cit., p. 168]
Along these lines, Albert Meltzer maintains that the association between
the black flag and working class revolt "originated in Rheims [France] in
1831 ('Work or Death') in an unemployed demonstration." [The
Anarcho-Quiz Book, p. 49] In fact he goes on to assert that it
was Michel's action in 1883 that solidified the association. The links
from revolts in France to anarchism are even stronger. As Murray Bookchin
records, in Lyon "[i]n 1831, the silk-weaving artisans. . . rose in armed
conflict to gain a better tarif, or contract, from the merchants.
For a brief period they actually took control of the city, under
red and black flags -- which made their insurrection a memorable
event in the history of revolutionary symbols. Their use of the
word mutuelisme to denote the associative disposition of society
that they preferred made their insurrection a memorable event in
the history of anarchist thought as well, since Proudhon appears
to have picked up the word from them during his brief stay in the
city in 1843-4." [The Third Revolution, vol. 2, p. 157] Sharif
Gemie confirms this, noting that a police report sent to the Lyon
prefect that said: "The silk-weavers of the Croix-Rousse have
decided that tomorrow they will go down to Lyon, carrying a black
flag, calling for work or death." The revolt saw the Black Flag
raised:
Kropotkin himself states that its use continued in the French labour
movement after this uprising. He notes that the Paris Workers "raised
in June [1848] their black flag of 'Bread or Labour'" [Act for
Yourselves, p. 100]
The use of the black flag by anarchists, therefore, is an expression
of their roots and activity in the labour movement in Europe,
particularly in France. The anarchist adoption of the Black Flag
by the anarchist movement in the 1880s reflects its use as "the
traditional symbol of hunger, poverty and despair" and that it was
"raised during popular risings in Europe as a sign of no surrender
and no quarter." [Walter and Becker, Act for Yourselves, p. 128]
This is unsurprising given the nature of anarchist politics. Just
as anarchists base their ideas on actual working class practice,
they would also base their symbols on those created by the practice.
For example, Proudhon as well as taking the term "mutualism" from
radical workers also argued that co-operative "labour associations"
had "spontaneously, without prompting and without capital been
formed in Paris and in Lyon. . . the proof of it [mutualism, the
organisation of credit and labour]. . . lies in current practice,
revolutionary practice." He considered his ideas, in other words,
to be an expression of working class self-activity. [No Gods, No
Masters, vol. 1, pp. 59-60] Indeed, according to K. Steven Vincent,
there was "close similarity between the associational ideal of
Proudhon . . . and the program of the Lyon Mutualists" and that
there was "a remarkable convergence [between the ideas], and
it is likely that Proudhon was able to articulate his positive
program more coherently because of the example of the silk
workers of Lyon. The socialist ideal that he championed was
already being realised, to a certain extent, by such workers."
[Piere-Joseph Proudhon and the Rise of French Republican
Socialism, p. 164] Other anarchists have made similar
arguments concerning anarchism being the expression of
tendencies within society and working class struggle and so the using of a traditional
workers symbol would be a natural expression of this aspect
of anarchism.
Similarly, perhaps it is Louise Michel's comment that the Black
Flag was the "flag of strikes" which could explain the naming
of the Black International founded in 1881 (and so the
increasing use of the Black Flag in anarchist circles in the
early 1880s). Around the time of its founding congress
Kropotkin was formulating the idea that this organisation
would be a "Strikers' International" (Internationale
Greviste) -- it would be "an organisation of resistance, of
strikes." [Kropotkin, quoted by Martin A. Miller, Kropotkin,
p. 147] In December 1881 he discussed the revival of the
International Workers Association as a Strikers'
International
for to "be able to make the revolution, the mass of workers
will have to organise themselves. Resistance and strikes are
excellent methods of organisation for doing this." He stressed
that the "strike develops the sentiment of solidarity" and
argued that the First International "was born of strikes;
it was fundamentally a strikers' organisation." [quoted by
Caroline Cahm, Kropotkin and the Rise of Revolutionary
Anarchism, 1872-1886, p. 255 and p. 256] A "Strikers
International" would need the strikers flag and so,
perhaps, the Black International got its name.
While the idea of the "Strikers' International" was, like the
Black International itself, somewhat stillborn, anarchists
did encourage and support strikes during this period. It
seems possible, although not totally proven, that the Black
International and use of the Black Flag came about, in part,
because of Kropotkin's ideas and articles. This, of course,
fits perfectly with the use of the Black Flag as a symbol
of workers' resistance by anarchism, a political expression
of that resistance.
But there are other possibilities.
Historically black has been associated with blood -- dried
blood specifically -- like the red flag (as Louise Michel
put it, in 1871 "Lyon, Marseille, Narbonne, all had
their own Communes, and like ours [in Paris], theirs
too were drowned in the blood of revolutionaries. That
is why our flags are red. Why our red banners so terribly
frightening to those persons who have caused them to be
stained that colour?" [Louise Michel, Op. Cit., p. 65]).
So while it is tied to working class rebellion, it was
also a symbol of the nihilism of the period (a nihilism
generated by the mass slaughter of Communards by the
French ruling class after the fall of the Paris Commune
of 1871).
It is this slaughter of the Communards which may also point to
the use of the Black Flag by anarchists. Black "is the colour of
mourning [at least in Western cultures], it symbolises our mourning
for dead comrades, those whose lives were taken by war, on the
battlefield (between states) or in the streets and on the
picket lines (between classes)." [Chico, "letters", Freedom,
vol. 48, No. 12, p. 10] Given the 25 000 dead in the Commune,
many of them anarchists and libertarian socialists, the use of
the Black Flag by anarchists after this event would make sense.
Sandino, the Nicaraguan libertarian socialist (whose use of the
red-and-black colours we discuss
below) also
said that black stood for mourning ("Red for liberty; black
for mourning; and the skull for a struggle to the death"
[Donald C. Hodges, Sandino's Communism, p. 24]).
There is a possible philosophical rationale behind the use
the colour black. Another reason why anarchists turned to
the black flag could be because of its nature as a sign of
"negation". Many of the writers on the Black Flag have
mentioned this aspect, for example Howard J. Ehrlich
argues that black "is a shade of negation. The black
flag is the negation of all flags." [Reinventing Anarchy,
Again, p. 31] As a symbol of negation, the black flag
fits nicely in with some of Bakunin's ideas -- particularly
his ideas on progress. Being influenced by Hegel, Bakunin
accepted Hegel's dialectical method but always stressed
that the negative side was motive force within it (see
Robert M. Culter's introduction to The Basic Bakunin for
details). Thus he defines progress as the negation of the
initial position (for example, in God and the State, he
argues that "[e]very development . . . implies the negation
of its point of departure" [p. 48]). What better sign to
signify the anarchist movement than one which is the
negation of all other flags, this negation signifying
the movement into a higher form of social life? Thus the
black flag could symbolise the negation of existing society,
of all existing states, and so paves the way for a new
society, a free one. However, whether this was a factor
in the adoption of the black flag or just a coincidence
we cannot tell at this moment.
Then there is the connection between the black flag and
pirates. Pirates were seen as rebels, as free spirits, and
often ruthless killers. While pirates varied a great deal, many
had an elected Captain of the pirate ship. In some cases the
captain wasn't even male, which was very unusual for the time.
He or she was "subject to instant recall", and life on board a
pirate ship was certainly more democratic than life on board
ships of the British, American or French Navies -- let alone a
merchant ship. For pirates, the black flag was a symbol of death:
the give-away being a skull and bones on black. A sign equivalent
with "surrender or die!" It was intended to scare their victims
into submitting without a fight. It operated in much the same
way as Ghengis Khan's armies.
Many others also adopted the black flag as a sign of "surrender or die!".
A Confederate officer named Quantrill in during the American Civil War
fought under the black flag. He was known as unwilling to show mercy to
his opponents and he did not expect any mercy in return. Also, General
Santa Anna of Mexico was a notorious flyer of the black flag. He even
flew them at the Alamo. Accompanying the black banner, he had his buglers
play a call named "The Deguello," which was a call that meant "no quarter
will be given" (Take No Prisoners). This use of the black flag was
echoed by the American section of the Black International. While
it "was interpreted in anarchist circles as the symbol of death, hunger
and misery" it was "also said to be the 'emblem of retribution'" and in
a labour procession in Cincinnati in January 1885, "it was further
acknowledged to be the banner of working-class intransigence, as
demonstrated by the words 'No Quarter' inscribed on it." [Donald C.
Hodges, Sandino's Communism, p. 21 -- see also Avrich, Op. Cit.,
p. 82]
While Khan, Quantrill and General Santa Anna are not connected to
anarchism in the slightest -- pirates, on the other hand, are more
complicated. They were seen as rebels. Rebels without a state, owing
allegiance to no code of law except whatever makeshift rules they
improvised amongst themselves. Certainly pirates were not consciously
anarchist, and often acted no better than barbarians. But what is
important is how they were seen. Their symbol was the embodiment of
lawlessness and the spirit of rebellion. They were hated by the ruling class.
This may have been enough for the starving and unemployed to pick up the
black flag in revolt. In fact, one could quickly get a hold of a piece of
red or black cloth in a riot. Getting hold of the material was easy.
Painting a complicated symbol on it took time. So an improvised rebel
flag raised in a riot was likely to be of just one colour. Hence it
follows nicely that the black flag flew without the skull and bones
because it was necessarily make-shift for a riot or other revolt.
To this question of the black flag, Howard Ehrlich has a great passage in
his book Reinventing Anarchy, Again. It is worth quoting at length:
"But black is also beautiful. It is a colour of determination, of resolve,
of strength, a colour by which all others are clarified and defined.
Black is the mysterious surrounding of germination, of fertility, the
breeding ground of new life which always evolves, renews, refreshes, and
reproduces itself in darkness. The seed hidden in the earth, the strange
journey of the sperm, the secret growth of the embryo in the womb all
these the blackness surrounds and protects.
"So black is negation, is anger, is outrage, is mourning, is beauty, is
hope, is the fostering and sheltering of new forms of human life and
relationship on and with this earth. The black flag means all these
things. We are proud to carry it, sorry we have to, and look forward to
the day when such a symbol will no longer be necessary." ["Why the
Black Flag?", Howard Ehrlich (ed.), Reinventing Anarchy, Again, pp. 31-2]
However, there is plenty of evidence to suggest that the red-and-black
flag spread across to other countries, particularly those with strong
links to Spain (such as other Latin countries). For example, during the
"Two Red Years" in Italy which culminated in the factory occupations of
1920 (see section A.5.5) the red-and-black flag was raised by workers
in revolt [Gwyn A. Williams, Proletarian Order, p. 241] Similarly,
Augusto Sandino, the radical Nicaraguan national liberation fighter
was so inspired by the example of the Mexican anarcho-syndicalists
during the Mexican revolution that he based his movement's flag on their red-and-black ones (the Sandinista's flag is divided horizontally,
rather than diagonally). As historian Donald C. Hodges notes, Sandino's
"red and black flag had an anarcho-syndicalist origin, having been
introduced into Mexico by Spanish immigrants." Unsurprisingly, his
flag was considered a "workers' flag symbolising their struggle for
liberation." (Hodges refers to Sandino's "peculiar brand of
anarcho-communism" suggesting that his appropriation of the flag
indicated a strong libertarian theme to his politics). [Intellectual
Foundations of the Nicaraguan Revolution, p. 49, p. 137, p. 19]
In the English speaking world, the use of the red-and-black flag by
anarchists seems to spring from the world-wide publicity generated
by the Spanish Revolution and Civil War in 1936. With CNT-FAI related
information spreading across the world, the familiarity of the
CNT inspired red-and-black flag also spread until it became a
common anarchist and anarcho-syndicalist symbol in all countries.
For some, the red-and-black flag is associated with anarcho-syndicalism
more than anarchism. As Albert Meltzer puts it, "[t]he flag of the
labour movement (not necessarily only of socialism) is red. The
CNT of Spain originated the red-and-black of anarchosyndicalism
(anarchism plus the labour movement)." [Anarcho-Quiz Book, p. 50]
Donald C. Hodges makes a similar point, when he states that "[o]n
the insignia of the Mexico's House of the World Worker [the Mexican
anarcho-syndicalist union], the red band stood for the economic
struggle of workers against the proprietary classes, and the
black for their insurrectionary struggle." [Sandino's Communism,
p. 22]
George Woodcock also stresses the Spanish origin of the flag:
However, there are earlier recorded uses of the red-and-black
flag, suggesting it was, perhaps, rediscovered by the Spanish
Anarchists rather than invented by them. The earliest use of
the red-and-black colours is during the attempted Italian
insurrection of August 1874. While a failure, some of those
involved were "sporting the anarchists' red and black cockade."
In April 1877, a similar attempt at provoking rebellion saw
anarchists enter the small Italian town of Letino "wearing
red and black cockades" and carrying a "red and black
banner." These actions helped to "captur[e] national
attention" and "draw considerable notice to the International
and its socialist programme." [Nunzio Pernicone, Italian
Anarchism, 1864-1892, p. 93, pp. 124-5 and pp. 126-7] Both
T. R. Ravindranathan [Bakunin and the Italians, p. 228]
and George Woodcock record the same event and the same flag
being used. [Anarchism, p. 285]
There is also a report of the red-and-black flag being used
by anarchists a few years later in Mexico. At an anarchist
protest meeting on December 14th, 1879, at Columbus Park in
Mexico City "[s]ome five thousand persons gathered replete
with numerous red-and-black flags, some of which bore the
inscription 'La Social, Liga International del Jura.' A
large black banner bearing the inscription 'La Social, Gran
Liga International' covered the front of the speaker's
platform." The links between the Mexican and European
anarchist movements were strong, as the "nineteenth-century
Mexican urban labour-movement maintained direct contact with
the Jura branch of the . . . European-based First International
Workingmen's Association and at one stage openly affiliated
with it." [John M. Hart, Anarchism and the Mexican Working
Class, 1860-1931, p. 58 and p. 17]
Therefore, it is not surprising we find movements in Mexico
and Italy using the same flags. Both were in the same
anti-authoritarian International as the Jura federation and
had close links with it. Both the Italian and Mexican anarchist
movements were involved in the First International and its
anti-authoritarian off-spring. Both, like the Jura Federation
in Switzerland, were heavily involved in union organising and
strikes. Given the clear links and similarities between the
collectivist anarchism of the First International (the most
famous advocate of which was Bakunin) and anarcho-syndicalism,
it is not surprising that they used similar symbols. As Kropotkin
argued, "Syndicalism is nothing other than the rebirth of
the International -- federalist, worker, Latin." [quoted
by Martin A. Miller, Kropotkin, p. 176] So a rebirth of
symbols would not be a co-incidence.
Two other factors suggest that the combination of red and
black flags was a logical development. Given that the black
and red flags were associated with the Lyon's uprising of
1831, perhaps the development of the red-and-black flag is not
too unusual. Similarly, given that the Black Flag was the
"flag of strikes" (to quote Louise Michel -- see
above)
its use with the red flag of the labour movement seems a
natural development for a movement with anarchism and
anarcho-syndicalism which bases itself on direct action
and the importance of strikes in the class struggle.
However, in spite of these uses of the red-and-black flag in
the late 1870s, it seems to have fallen into disuse and it was
only with the founding of the CNT over 30 years later in Spain
that it was used again on a wide scale.
Over time association with anarcho-syndicalism has become less
noted, with many non-syndicalist anarchists happy to use the
red-and-black flag (many anarcho-communists use the red-and-black
flag, for example). It would be a good generalisation to state that
social anarchists are more inclined to use the red-and-black flag
than individualist anarchists just as social anarchists are usually
more willing to align themselves with the wider socialist and
labour movements than individualists (in modern times at least).
Thus the red-and-black flag comes from the experience of anarchists
in the labour movement and is particularly associated with
anarcho-syndicalism. The black represents libertarian ideas and
strikes (i.e. direct action), the red represents the labour movement.
However, it has become a standard anarchist symbol as the years have
gone by, with the black still representing anarchy and the red,
social co-operation or solidarity. Thus the red-and-black flag
more than any one symbol symbolises the aim of anarchism ("Liberty
of the individual and social co-operation of the whole community"
[Peter Kropotkin, Act for Yourselves, p. 102]) as well as its
means ("[t]o make the revolution, the mass of workers will
have to organise themselves. Resistance and the strike are
excellent means of organisation for doing this" and "the
strike develops the sentiment of solidarity." [Peter
Kropotkin, quoted by Caroline Cahm, Kropotkin and the
Rise of Revolutionary Anarchism: 1872-1186, p. 255 and
p. 256]).
However, the origin of the "circled-A" as an anarchist symbol is less clear.
Many think that it started in the 1970s punk movement, but it goes back to
a much earlier period. According to Peter Marshall, "[i]n 1964 a French
group, Jeunesse Libertaire, gave new impetus to Proudhon's slogan
'Anarchy is Order' by creating the circled-A a symbol which quickly
proliferated throughout the world." [Op. Cit., p. 445] This is not the
earliest sighting of this symbol. On November 25 1956, at its foundation
in Brussels, the Alliance Ouvriere Anarchiste (AOA) adopted this symbol.
Going even further, a BBC documentary on the Spanish Civil War shows
an anarchist militia member with a "circled-A" clearly on the back of
his helmet. Other than this, there is little know about the "circled-A"s
origin.
Today the circled-A is one of the most successful images in the whole
field of political symbolising. Its "incredible simplicity and directness
led [it] to become the accepted symbol of the restrengthened anarchist
movement after the revolt of 1968" particularly as in many, if not most,
of the world's languages the word for anarchy begins with the letter
A. [Peter Peterson, Op. Cit., p. 8]
1 What is the history of the Black Flag?
There are ample accounts of the use of black flags by anarchists.
Probably the most famous was Nestor Makhno's partisans during the Russia
Revolution. Under the black banner, his army routed a dozen armies and
kept a large portion of the Ukraine free from concentrated power for a
good couple of years (see Peter Arshinov's History of the Makhnovist
Movement for details of this important movement). On the black flag
was embroidered "Liberty or Death" and "The Land to the Peasant, The
Factories to the Workers." In 1925, the Japanese anarchists formed
the Black Youth League and, in 1945, when the anarchist federation
reformed, their journal was named Kurohata (Black Flag). [Peter
Marshall, Demanding the Impossible, p. 475 and pp. 525-6] In 1968,
students carried black (and red) flags during the massive General
Strike in France, bringing the resurgence of anarchism in the 1960s
into the view of the general public. The same year saw the Black Flag
being raised at the American Students for a Democratic Society
national convention. Two years later the British based magazine
Black Flag was started and is still going strong. At the turn
of the 21st century, the Black Flag was at the front of the
so-called anti-globalisation protests. Today, if you go to any
sizeable demonstration you will usually see the Black Flag raised
by the anarchists present.
"How many wrathful people, young people, will be with us
when the red and black banners wave in the wind of anger!
What a tidal wave it will be when the red and black banners
rise around the old wreck [of capitalist society]!
"At eleven a.m. the silk-weavers' columns descended the slops of
the Croix-Rousse. Some carried black flags, the colour of mourning
and a reminder of their economic distress. Others pushed loaves of
bread on the bayonets of their guns and held them aloft. The
symbolic force of this action was reinforced by a repeatedly-shouted
slogan: 'bread or lead!': in other words, if they were not given
bread which they could afford, then they were prepared to face
bullets. At some point during the rebellion, a more eloquent
expression was devised: 'Vivre en travaillant ou mourir en
combattant!' - 'Live working or die by fighting!'. Some witnesses
report seeing this painted on a black flag." [Sharif Gemie,
French Revolutions, 1815-1914, pp. 52-53]
"Why is our flag black? Black is a shade of negation. The black flag is
the negation of all flags. It is a negation of nationhood which puts the
human race against itself and denies the unity of all humankind. Black is
a mood of anger and outrage at all the hideous crimes against humanity
perpetrated in the name of allegiance to one state or another. It is
anger and outrage at the insult to human intelligence implied in the
pretences, hypocrisies, and cheap chicaneries of governments . . .
Black is also a colour of mourning; the black flag which cancels out the
nation also mourns its victims the countless millions murdered in wars,
external and internal, to the greater glory and stability of some bloody
state. It mourns for those whose labour is robbed (taxed) to pay for the
slaughter and oppression of other human beings. It mourns not only the
death of the body but the crippling of the spirit under authoritarian and
hierarchic systems; it mourns the millions of brain cells blacked out
with never a chance to light up the world. It is a colour of inconsolable
grief.
2 Why the red-and-black flag?
The red-and-black flag has been associated with anarchism for some time.
Murray Bookchin places the creation of this flag in Spain:
"The presence of black flags together with red ones became a feature of
Anarchist demonstrations throughout Europe and the Americas. With the
establishment of the CNT [in 1910], a single flag on which black and
red were separated diagonally, was adopted and used mainly in Spain."
[The Spanish Anarchists, p. 57]
"The anarcho-syndicalist flag in Spain was black and red,
divided diagonally. In the days of the [First] International
the anarchists, like other socialist sects, carried the red
flag, but later they tended to substitute for it the black
flag. The black-and-red flag symbolised an attempt to unite
the spirit of later anarchism with the mass appeal of the
International." [Anarchism, p. 325f]
3 Where does the circled-A come from?
The circled-A is even more famous than the Black and Red-and-Black flags
as an anarchist symbol (probably because it lends itself so well to
graffiti). According to Peter Marshall the "circled-A" represents
Proudhon's maxim "Anarchy is Order." [Demanding the Impossible
p. 558] Peter Peterson also adds that the circle is "a symbol of
unity and determination" which "lends support to the off-proclaimed
idea of international anarchist solidarity." ["Flag, Torch, and Fist:
The Symbols of Anarchism", Freedom, vol. 48, No. 11, pp. 8]