Jura Collective Meeting
Held 440 Parramatta Rd, 6 pm.
Present: James, Nienke, Eddie, Jeremy, Sid.
Apologies: Andrew, Trini

Agenda:
1.Report Back:
a) Safer Spaces Agreement – six members and a visitor attended last night for a 3hr discussion. The Agreement was improved, and a draft made for futher discussion. This will be made available by Fez soon via email. A good discussion & good outcome.- Nienke & Jeremy
b) Poster Collection archieving project offer from UTS students. 30 posters to be attended to firstly. Jeremy.
2.New shelves & suggestion from Eddie for reorganising the Jura space. Much discussion about options.
a) re shelves: no one feeling strongly for shelves in shop or library, but some preference for either option. There are problems with moving the shelves upstairs – can't go up stairs & problems with going through the window.
Decision: that the new shelves stay downstairs and become bookshop shelving. Old bookshop shelves that can be moved upstairs will be moved to the library space for its use and then consideration made about how many, if any, new shelves are needed for the library. The old bookshop shelves that can't be moved upstairs will be moved out of the building and given away, this includes the tall metal shelf. This work will be done at the next working bee on the 18-19th Sept.
b) Reorganising the Jura space: Eddie suggesting making the middle room upstairs the RW + Oral History radio + office space. The library going to the organising space downstairs. Much discussion. FNB can still use the table/desk facility of the library space (upstairs) as this library space will be like before, the library shelves against the walls, and desk and alternate meeting space in the whole centre of the room.
Decision: We will still have the current arrangement, but Eddie's suggestion is to be kept on hold for the future.
3.Jura MySpace: report from Nienke about the Jura My Space site. Discussion about what to do about it.
Decision: SACT will send an invitation to Jura for a My Space email address and be clear to Tony about who controls the site.
4.Poster display in the shop & moving the front desk area to the other side of the stairs. Discussion: too many posters are on the walls. How else to display the posters for sale? Should the desk area be moved to the other side of the stairs, as the space is smaller and this would leave more wall space for book shelves.
Decision: archieval posters (in frames) will be moved upstairs and this will leave more bare wall room. The decision about the desk being moved will be left to those at the working bee to decide, as this is best left to then for practical reasons.
5.The joint Black Rose – Jura benefit gig: Eddie is for it as the shelving working bee should have resolved the space issue. Jeremy says this is too much at this time as we have a lot on our plate at the moment. Good idea tho'.
Decision: Eddie will contact BR to say that the gig is on, but we will not be able to do as much as we would like to to organise & poster for it. We agree to use the Jura space.
6.Book Launch tomorrow. Jeremy gives a report: Andrew & Rachel will do the tech work and we should get here early to set up.
7.Fridge for kitchen: New fridge is here and someone will volunteer to fix it.
8.Food Coop: difficulties still in getting the fruit & vegies here. Both past weeks has been filled in by Sid, and we now have an agrement with a local organic shop to get a 15% discount if we get at least $100 each time. More households still needed in the coop.
9.Poster competition. Two entries so far. More needed and asked for.
Decision: James will do a poster & Jeremy will do a leaflet.
10.Power to the People Rally: Afed invite people to join in for the demonstration, which has been called for Noon, Town Hall, Sydney, 20th September.
11.There is a new place for the safe key.
12.Finances: Problem with Eddie getting to the bank as he works at this time.
Decision: Jeremy will help out.
13.Next meeting: 2pm, Sat 4th Oct

Jura Collective Meeting 16th July 2008.

Present: Ash, Eddie, Jason, Fez, Jeremy (facilitated), Phil (minutes), Ash#2, James (brief visit).

1. New members

Ashwyn has finished 3 training sessions and has chosen to be a member. He's interested in one shift a week, and is happy to commit to Wednesday arvos, from 3pm->7pm. He's also interested in helping with the cataloguing project.
Fez is working with Nienke to figure out Thursday shift.
General agreement that opening another day would be great.
Ash#2 is in sydney for at least a few more months and is willing to be involved with the collective. And the collective very happy to have him!!

2. SACT report
SACT has written up its aims and principles document. Also it is organising next Federation meeting, for Sat 30th July. SACT is thinking of compiling an Anarchist-Communist Reader. Mail request: SACT wants to receive mail through Jura, Collective is fine with this.

3. FNB
Going good! Without the Thaw at last cookup a few little things were forgotten but other than that it was great. Procured four free elements from Freecycle to fix stove, working on getitng them installed. Jas: fridge was leaking and making funny noise, then he found a ladder stored behind it which once removed seemed to help the problem; we need to make sure it doesn't go back there. FNB thinking about what to do with funds re: the kitchen, and maybe a new fridge? Jeremy to double-check whether an older one might become available, and Ash will keep an eye on freecycle to see if one turns up. Need for a compost bin, for Jura and FNB, cos there's too much food waste. Fez + Jas working on guerilla compost. Idea for a compost bin at Jura, maybe a tumbling one? FNB will do some planning+thinking, and bring it back to next Jura meeting. Everyone to keep an eye out for freebies. FNB to check which councils do free bins. FNB keen to know a week in advance so they can do servings at Jura events where possible.

4. Library news
Jeremy: shelves are coming! $100/each. Need to that this week, either Thurs or Fri. Jeremy to hire truck to take to Annandale. Perhaps 15-20 shelves total. Some questions over where to put them, general preference to put most/all in the library, but maybe use a couple to replace the shittest couple in the bookstore. Plan to sell off cheaply any excess shelves. Further discussion and decision once we see the shelves in the store. Meet Friday 2pm at Jura or 3pm Friday at the warehouse.

5. Vegie co-op/dumspter co-op
Jas + Fez no longer able to buy and pick up food, but hope the co-op can continue, and still happy to sort. Phil to check out whether he can do it, and hopefully share with someone else. But even better to go wholesale, maybe with someone like Alphalpha House. Idea: growing kit, with members growing and bringing produce back. Fez+Jas+2 Ashes planning to start dumpster co-op, focussing on different areas of Sydney for sourcing and sorting. Also, awesome poster design for the poster comp which features the vegie co-op has arrived, and looks fantastic! Phil to take on co-ordinating pick-ups under current EcoFarm arrangement, and will talk to Jeremy and Sid about potential to share rostering some rostering. Pickups either Thursday arvos or Sat mornings would be good.

6. Regional Anarchist Federation meeting.
Meeting at 2pm Saturday 30th August at Jura, hosted by SACT. “To increase synergy and mutual aid between groups and seek ways to work together on common projects and causes. FNB day off, but they'll cook! Nice colour flyer arrived with James!

7. Licencing
Phil has read new Liquor Act 2007 and has started on related regulations. Has identified lots of cause for optimism and interest but also many potential conflicts with his understanding of anarchist theory and practice, eg. Issues with under18s, potential for police visits, etc. Will report back in detail on everything for the collective to discuss and decide, aiming to finish before next Collective meeting. Fez will chase up the dude who wanted to put on monthly gigs and talk to him about potential+issues etc.

8. Anarchist Oral History
General goal to record, in an ethical way, the histories and stories of anarchist/activist people who came from various movements in Australia. People involved now, but all invited to join in: Sid, Jas, Fez, Drew, Stuart, Phil. Potential for group interviews to be public meetings at Jura. Diversity in terms of the people interviewed, and the struggles they were part of. Results should be a great resource for Jura. Important to communicate to the older activists that Jura still values them and feel like they have a lot to learn from their experiences. Ethics are really important. Jeremy: perhaps the group interview idea could tie in really well with the poster competition/exhibition?

9. Poster comp
Jeremy: everyone should do designs!! The first one arrived from Josh JustSeeds and it looks awesome!!

10. Public art ideas
An idea: on one day, perhaps in late Sep, organise a bunch of people to do lovely public art one day coordinated in one area. Many legal issues but this is a great idea! Possibly a website, but Ash is organising through word-of-mouth. Discussion over whether to hold over one day or have a kind of month. Everyone's keen, but perhaps something to organise with Jura people rather than a 'Jura event'.

11. Organising space
Fez: untapped potential! Ashwyn has donated a monitor. How can we better use this area? Paper cutter belongs to Jim, and maybe could be moved around for the risograph peeps who are keen to use it? Other ideas: possibly move the posters somewhere? Move/clear the table in front of poster blue 'Sparx' table? Paint the Organising room? Heaps of wheelie chairs for free in the area, could use to replace our crappier ones in the room now? Collective to revisit whole space topic once library is set up and smaller room upstairs. Collective to ask Sid to communicate to Mark that we'll be using space in front poster draw. Eddie to ask Jim about key to paper cutter when he sees him.

[Note, this history was written in 2005, and needs some updating.]

Jura books began in 1977 in a building with a shopfront at 417 King Street Newtown, we moved to 110 Crystal St Petersham, then to 438 Parramatta Road for a short time, then to the present location at 440 Parramatta Road Petersham. To be quite accurate, though, Jura began in another form about a year earlier – this is explained a little further on. But rather than just give an historical dateline of what has happened over the past years, this will be more of an account of the processes involved in establishing and maintaining a voluntary, anti-profit, collectively run bookshop.

The first thing is to explain, only because everyone asks, why we called the place ‘Jura Books’. Well, it’s named after the federation of workers of the ‘Jura’ region of France and Switzerland that associated with Michael Bakunin in the First International – one of the first large organised groups of workers who organised along anarchist lines. In about the 1870s, the Jura Federation, as it was called, consisted of 20-30,000 workers – largely, though not only, watchmakers and building workers. Peter Kropotkin, another very famous anarchist of his time, journeyed to this region and learned a great deal of his ‘formal’ anarchism among the Jura watchmakers. I say ‘formal’ because, without knowing much of the writings of anarchism, he formulated the basic concepts for himself during his youth and in his 20s, from his personal experiences, discussions and thoughts, when in the Russian military exploring the vast wilderness of Siberia. This story about Kropotkin shows the nature of anarchism itself, that is, anarchism is not an artificial theory that was formulated by some bearded guy while studying in a library for 24 years …or by a guru on a mountain. It reflects the notion that many anarchists hold, that anarchism is all around us. It is in the way ordinary people interact and help each other out, especially when various imposed authoritarian concepts and structures are absent, or, as Kropotkin would eventually put it, even in Nature itself. Anarchism is not a theory to be artificially applied, but an ethic that can be (re) discovered in our own experiences, as a way of resolving our needs. So it’s not an artificially constructed end point or some sort of  an imposed ‘utopia’, but a utopic process or journey of life, living and work.

Although Jura Books adopted a consciously collective form of organisation, its origins were actually of a different sort – a split. During the 1970s, a series of anarchist conferences were held in Sydney and Melblourne. At the last of these, a split occurred between the ‘organisationals’ and the ‘anti-organisationalists’ Or, as a later Spanish member would have said “A clarification occurred”. At the conference with something like 150 - 200 people, a heated debate developed between those who wanted a chairperson and those who declared  it an anti-anarchist practice. Most organisationalists left the conference to meet elsewhere and decided to set up an anarchist book importing and distributing service. This ‘Jura Book Service’ coordinated the joint buying and distribution of material for the three or four groups from different cities around the continent. At the time, very few anarchist titles were available in the country, mostly they were found in Marxist bookshops and all from overseas. In Sydney, that original group, with a couple of additions would begin the first anarchist bookshop in Australia for perhaps 60 or more years – since the Andrade shop in Melbourne.

So, even though we began out of a split, Jura was established on collectivist lines, as derived from the 1920s-30s Spanish anarchist affinity groups via two filters - one of the 1960s popular radical cultural, feminist, environmental and anti-war movements. The  second was the Spanish anarchist principles as transmitted from mostly post-war European migrants who re-awakened the anarchist/syndicalist project in Australia. These great characters included Antonio and Victoria, Jose and Louise, George and Mary, Jack, Gonzalas, John the Macodonian, Pat the American Wobblie, and many more who acted as mentors to the young ones of the day who came out of the 1960s.

We were not the only ones to set out on this path as many diverse organisations at the time adopted the collective form of organising. This approach was consciously taken up as opposed to the (Marxist) Party structure, and was often heatedly debated and fought over. Some examples of these included the newly emerging feminist groups (women’s refuges, discussion and publication groups), some artistic groups (Tin Sheds poster collective, poetry groups), industrial groups (building industry, metal workers, postal, nursing) and militant political groups (anti-uranium, other green groups, prisoner’s action).

Some of the ideas that have been our guiding principles over the years have included, although not all at one time, nor in exactly the same way:

• Jura Books is an anarchist and anarcho-syndicalist bookshop.
• We operate on a volunteer basis.
• Any increase on the cost price of a title will be minimal, originally intended to cover inflation, and was originally 10%.
• All book takings were to stay for expansion of stock – this has changed over time.
• We would operate as much as possible in an environmentally friendly way.
• All overhead costs to be covered by donations from within the collective, and from regular donors, and fundraising outside the collective, (now some of the books-takings goes to help with the bills).
• All decisions are made at regular (originally weekly) meetings of the collective, with delegated authority to members to carry out tasks.
• Membership of the collective is by decision of the established group. Expulsion from the collective is possible.
• Tasks, such as the ordering of title, banking, accounts, fundraising…are shared on a volunteer basis and on a mechanism established for regular opportunities to rotate jobs. Cleaning tasks are attached to the daily shop-staffing roster.
• An easily accessible shop-front premises to be maintained.
• Wherever possible, the building is to be an activist centre for like-minded groups – as accepted by the collective.

The above is a compilation of concepts that have underscored the way Jura has operated for the last, nearly, three decades. Just to repeat: not all ideas have been in practice all the time. Also the balance between us as a staid book-selling outfit and as militant activists has changed depending on who has been involved and their interests and energies.

What collectivity has meant has changed over the years depending on the membership, in terms of personalities, differing levels of commitment to the notion of collectivity, and the numbers of people involved. For example, the greater the number of members, the greater the need for systems to be in place so that everyone has ‘stewardship’ of the project – or a sense of belonging and control. This is something that the current collective is re-developing.

Our time in King St saw our stock increase about 10,000% - that wasn’t hard as we started with only a few books. Placing requests for donations on our noticeboard to help us move into a new publisher or distributor, saw us end up with, perhaps, 5-10,000 books, maybe more. Not all were on the shop shelves, as we had about an equal number in the store room. At one stage we almost had more stock out on consignment to anarchist groups across Australia than we had in the shop.

Jura and various Jurans were involved in various activists campaigns, Close Katingal (prison), Stop Uranium Mining, women’s refuge (Marrickville) support, “Everything” anarcha-feminist collective, Jura Silk-screen Printing Collective, the Industrial Workers of the World, Vitamin C Distribution Fund, Black Cat Printers, among many other causes, projects and campaigns. Jura also held a major conference, the first since the ones of the 1970s – “1984 and Social Control Conference” that was held in the Merewhether Building at Sydney University. It attracted, maybe, 800 - 1,000 different people over three days. The initial plenary session just about filled the main theatre that had seating for 600. There was a very successful dance on the Saturday night too.   

In terms of numbers, Jura started out with about eight members, went to about 12 within six months, and to about 15-16 over the next two years. Then it was down to eight again due to a split over differing ideas of collectivity. Membership rose again to 10-12 over the next few years until about our 10th anniversary. At that time we were forced to move out of the first shop, a rented premises because the owner wanted to sell the building without tennants, and we could not afford the asking price. Having raised about $78,000, (in about 18 months) we put down a deposit on the building in Crystal St.  That was a huge effort which is a story in itself.

That effort and the move saw the collective soon reduce to five. But this only happened after another big effort of saying ‘thanks’ to those who supported us in the move to establish a permanent home for the Jura project. That ‘thankyou’ was the 1988 “Beyond Social Control Conference” . This time the event was held in the University of Technology Law Courts Building – the old ‘Markets” building. It was, again, a great success and attracted several hundred people over two days. However the new location for the bookshop turned out to be not so good in terms of attracting patrons, and sales dived, as did the collective. Over the next five years Jura reached a very low point in many ways and the following five saw a slow, though not full, recovery. There were some notable exceptions, though.

Renewed energy among a few key players had Jura join with Black Rose and other anarchists to help organise the 1995 “Goals and Visions” Conference. Besides the many sessions of the conference that was held over the weekend, the highlight of that event was the lecture by Noam Chomsky in the Sydney Town Hall. Three thousand people turned up to an event that was advertised as anarchist, with 2-300 turned away because we were not allowed to fit any more in the hall, due to fire-safety restrictions.

Unfortunately, about this time, a major conflict as to the direction of Jura arose. This was about 12-18 months after the Goals and Visions conference – what should have been a time to build. Once the dispute was settled, not without some more membership losses for the collective, we set out on a more positive path once again.

We made moves to secure a new building in a better location. We sold the Crystal St place and moved to out current address at Parramatta Road. Not far away in distance, after all it’s in the same suburb, but back again on a main street and a ‘million miles’ closer to where people were. Once more, the move was only accomplished with great effort and at a cost to the membership. We should have had enough to pay off the new building, as it cost less than we sold the Crystal St building, but another matter changed that. Termites! We had successful tackled the problem at Crystal St on three major occasions, with the help of the ‘Termite Retirement Fund’ (thanks to Alison for the great title for that fundraising campaign – it raised about $2-3,000 for environmentally friendly termite treatment and a new floor for the shop).

Unfortunately, the termites at the new place were well hidden and we did not find them until we moved in. It cost us $30,000 to have the front of the building reconstructed. Much of the refurbishment work we did ourselves, but the major engineering work at the front we could not do. It also delayed our move into the building and so we rented a shop at 438 Parramatta Road, a fortunate two doors down from our own place for a year, which, of course, also cost a lot. We sold the old place for more than the new one cost, but with the mentioned problems, the move saw us continue with a mortgage – that we still have.

At 440 things are looking up. Besides sales increasing for the bookshop, the current building is used by Black Cat Printers, the Anarcho-Syndicalist Network, the Media Room, the Fanya Baron Workers Library, and is a meeting place for the anarchist-feminist group AWOL, the Industrial Workers of the World, and CAT Media. Much work has been done over the past few years by several new people who have joined the collective. The Library is now out of its boxes, and is beginning to resemble a library, we have held several major events at Jura including a major poster exhibition, and have organised a very successful Workers Control Conference, besides having book stalls at many other events. There have also been several popular film nights and discussion evenings at Jura. Much has been done, there is still much to do.

Welcome to Jura's ORGANIC FOOD CO-OP!
We offer weekly boxes of mixed, seasonal organic fruit and vegies at $10, $20, and $30 per box. Recommendation: most people settle into $10 boxes which suits small-medium households.

HOW TO ORDER
email: jurafoodcoop@riseup.net by wednesday evening.
phone: Jura Books during open hours (02) 9550 9931
in person: drop by 440 parramatta Rd, PETERSHAM

Orders are to be made by WEDNESDAY EVENING. We suggest customers make new orders when they collect their boxes to save them from re-ordering over email or phone. We appreciate folks paying in advance if possible, but we are very flexible!

TO COLLECT
Pick up your box from the shop between 2pm-7pm Friday and 12-2pm Saturday. Boxes not collected will be donated to Sydney Food Not Bombs.
If you have trouble collecting your box, please let us know.

GET INVOLVED
Let us know if you would like to assist in ordering, sorting, delivering boxes or publicising the co-op. Spread the word to friends, family and workmates, as more clients means greater variety in produce.
Also, please feel free to make suggestions as to what items you would like to receive in the weekly boxes. We will try our best to satisfy those.

Peace & Health