As teachers, educators, facilitators, and learners, we want to create educational environments that are inclusive and directly democratic. We want to promote ideas such as freedom, self-organisation, and mutual aid. We want to help individuals and communities learn and through direct action develop together to create better, more sustainable, and more caring societies for everyone, now and in the future.

We believe, as Lucy Parsons said, that “Anarchists know that a long period of education must precede any great fundamental change in society”. With the Anarchist Pedagogies Network, we want to create a space to learn about educational anarchist ideas and practices, to share experiences and knowledge, and to support local struggles to implement and develop these ideas and practices.

Some of us are involved in formal education; others are involved in informal or nonformal education. We work within and across different knowledge systems or traditions, and across different age groups and abilities. The challenges we face in these learning spaces may differ, but we think it’s important to learn from and support each other. We need to create community beyond borders and liberate ourselves through revolutionary lifelong learning.

The aims and principles of the network are as follows.

  • The Anarchist Pedagogies Network (APN) promotes anarchist pedagogical practices based on the principles of freedom, collective self-organization, and mutual aid.
  • APN provides a digital meeting place for exchanging experiences and ideas, sharing articles, books, videos, and other material, and promoting local and online events associated with anarchist pedagogical practices across borders and languages.
  • APN encourages participants to practise local collective self-organization and individual self-learning through direct and mediated exchanges of experience.
  • APN is an organized alternative to globalized neoliberalism and free-market capitalism within education systems and informal learning spaces.

If you’d like to join the APN, please write to anarchapednet@riseup.net. You can also follow us on social media (Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube).

With love and solidarity,

APN