The journal Aufheben was first produced in the UK in Autumn 1992. Those involved had participated in a number of struggles together - the anti-poll tax movement, the campaign against the Gulf War - and wanted to develop theory in order to participate more effectively: to understand capital and ourselves as part of the proletariat so we could attack capital more effectively. We began this task with a reading group dedicated to Marx's Capital and Grundrisse. Our influences included the Italian autonomia movement of 1969-77, the Situationists, and others who took Marx's work as a basic starting point and used it to develop the communist project beyond the anti-proletarian dogmatisms of Leninism (in all its varieties) and to reflect the current state of the class struggle. We also recognized the moment of truth in versions of class struggle anarchism, the German and Italian lefts and other tendencies. In developing proletarian theory we needed to go beyond all these past movements at the same time as we developed them - just as they had done with previous revolutionary movements.

Aufheben comes out around once a year (see subscription details at the bottom of this page), and to date (August 2001) there have been nine issues. This site contains all of the articles from these first nine issues and also some pamphlets. Since Aufheben is a developing project, some of our own ideas have already been superseded themselves. We do not produce these ideas in the abstract, but, as we hope comes across in these articles, are involved in many of the struggles we write about, and develop our perspective through this experience.
This page contains the editorial from the first issue (Autumn 1992), which expands on some of these points.

There are important issues involved in placing texts in electronic form rather than printed form. As the web has developed, we seen that the main danger is confusion rather than simple conditioning a la television. The web is still ironically something of the last hold-out to capital's totalitarian voice. To make these text available to those who might use them as quickly as possible, we will delay fully addressing how to deal with the information system (see also article The Information Age).

ASAN has evolved considerably since it was first published. We suggest reading the most recent issue first. For that reason, we list the back-issue's last to first.

We have no particular 'party line',we only argue for the centrality of working class self-activity in any attempts to go beyond the existing social relations,and take as our starting point the recognition that:

Meaningful action, for revolutionaries, is whatever increases the confidence, the autonomy, the initiative, the participation, the solidarity, the equalitarian tendencies and the self -activity of the masses and whatever assists in their demystification. Sterile and harmful action is whatever reinforces the passivity of the masses, their apathy, their cynicism, their differentiation through hierarchy, their alienation, their reliance on others to do things for them and the degree to which they can therefore be manipulated by others - even by those allegedly acting on their behalf.

With communism the government of people gives way to the administration of things. Contrary to the illusion produced by the present society the state and its institutions are not the inevitable result of the growth and complexities of societies, but the opposite, the result of the frantic socialisation of the species without community. The necessity for distinct organs of administration, repression and assistance has its cause in the maintenance of class society. The state is the defender of the dominant class which is increasingly integrated into it. It is forced to alleviate destitution which is increased by a social life where man becomes a predator for man.

With communism the oppositional but complementary relationship between the political and economic spheres disappears, i.e. between the citizen supposedly governing society in freedom and equality, and the producer as a slave to material necessity, hierarchy and the despotism of the factory. Communist theory and struggle are a critique of economy and politics.

This site is intended to make communist, anti-capitalist and historical texts available on-line and to link to texts on other sites. The site has been organised to group some texts and links by author and subject.

Texts by and pertaining to the Situationist International have been entered into a database, and are available at the Text Library by clicking the link on the left. The library is fully searchable, and features more texts than ever before. Information on related articles are linked from each text, and biographical blurbs about the authors are just a click away.

Situationist images and related graphics are available from the Images link, which currently offers a selection of graphics, and a picturebook of posters from May 1968 in Paris.

Links to other Situationist and prositu websites are available through Links.

Past associations include freethought & atheist groups, anarchist tendencies & associations (S.D.S., Y.I.P., S.R.A.F.), point of production movements (I.W.W.), post-Situationist groups - coalescing now around Project WR, A Situationist Dictionary, and committed formal federation. The site abounds in downloadable epublications, agit-props, flyers, and an exhaustively researched network of links to groups, documents, discussions, news, and projects on a searchable and translatable site - including 85+ pages entitled Situationist, Surrealist, Anarchist, Critical Theorists, Sex-Pol, Councilists, Dadaists, Syndicalists, Libertarian Communists, Love/Play/Passion, Atheist, Cartoons, Comix, Music, Computing, Film, Suppressed Science, Alternative Health, Media Sources, and much more - depicting dreams lost, a world alienated, movements hidden, and lives to win.