The Tyranny of Structurelessness

"The Tyranny of Structurelessness" is an influential essay by American feminist Jo Freeman that concerns power relations within radical feminist collectives. The essay, inspired by Freeman's experiences in a 1960s women's liberation group, reflected on the feminist movement's experiments in resisting leadership hierarchy and structured division of labor. This lack of structure, Freeman writes, disguised an informal, unacknowledged, and unaccountable leadership, and in this way ensured its malefaction by denying its existence. As a solution, Freeman suggests formalizing the existing hierarchies in the group and subjecting them to democratic control.

The phrase has been used to describe one problem in organizing (the other being "rigidity of structure", according to ecofeminist Starhawk).

In 2008 ''Community Development Journal'' reviewed the article as a "classic text" which editors felt had influenced the practice of community development. That year a John F. Kennedy School of Government course used the paper in a course on leadership.

Publication history

The essay originated as a speech given to the Southern Female Rights Union at a conference in Beulah, Mississippi in May 1970. Freeman has stated that it was transcribed in 1971 for the feminist magazine ''Notes from the Third Year'' (whose editors chose not to publish it) and submitted to several women's liberation movement publications, only one of which sought her permission to publish it.

Other outlets published it without asking for permission. It was first officially published in the journal ''The Second Wave'' in 1972. ''Agitprop'' issued the essay pamphlet form in 1972. The Organisation of Revolutionary Anarchists, Leeds Group, United Kingdom, later distributed it as well. In 1973 the author published different versions in the ''Berkeley Journal of Sociology'' and in ''Ms.'' magazine. It was also published in ''Radical Feminism'' by Anne Koedt, Ellen Levine, and Anita Rapone. Later printings included that of the Anarchist Workers' Association (Kingston Group), and in 1984 in a pamphlet called ''Untying the Knot: Feminism, Anarchism & Organisation'' jointly published by Dark Star Press and Rebel Press (printed by Aldgate Press).

Criticism

The essay's concept, as a phrase, haunts contemporary anarchist organizing, according to Uri Gordon, especially as her solution—to formalize existing hierarchy for democratic regulation—does not align with anarchism. Anarcha-feminist Cathy Levine disagreed with Freeman's recommendation, which Levine considered patriarchal and regressive. Anarchist Jason McQuinn wrote that organizations with formal structures fare similarly if not worse. Other anarchists have cited the essay in their preference for formal federations in lieu of distributed networks. Howard J. Ehrlich discussed the negative impact of the article on anarchist organizing in ''Reinventing Anarchy, Again.''Howard J. Ehrlich
''Reinventing Anarchy, Again''
, AK Press, 1996, 178-179 ,

See also

*Democratic structuring
*Leaderless resistance

References

External links

Full text
from the author

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tyranny of Structurelessness
1971 essays
Anarchist works
Feminist essays
Radical feminist literature
Works originally published in American magazines
Works originally published in political magazines
Organizational structure
Organizational behavior
Group processes