Here's my thoughts about Post Left Anarchy:
Someone else on the list made the comment that the publish-or-perish system drove social scientists and other analysts to come up with a "new, revolutionary" idea about class composition etc every other year whether social circumstances merited this or not. This is similar to how I feel about Post Left Anarchism.
Post Left Anarchy seems, to me, to be the product of a few people wanting to position themselves as founders of a "seminal, new idea" and thus as "important" analysts, whether or not their analysis reflects anything really existing. All the things that are supposed to be hallmarks of "post leftism" - autonomism, direct action, anti-auhtoritarianism - have been notable, major strands of the left since well into the early 19th century. It has existed side by side along with the auhtoritarian or statist tendencies. It is not "post"-anything. The fetish for everything being "post"-this or "post"-that taken to its logically absurd conclusion is exactly what "post-left" anarchy is.
As Sam Dolgoff, the late anarcho-syndicalist organizer stated, "the principles of mutual aid, direct economic action, autonomy, federalism, and class strugglr are all deeply rooted in American labor tradition." This also seems to be what post-leftists say "post-leftism" is, despite the fact that it's actually nothing new. By this criteria, the radical labor movement of the Red Scare era is more post-leftist than anything today.
Brian Oliver Sheppard