If the path of opposition and struggle against CPTs that we tried to undertake in Salento can communicate anything, it is that the search for and the identification of the enemy pays off. A constant, stubborn, and meticulous search for information is the first step to free oneself from fear and move to action.

Roughly twelve years have passed since we wrote these words. Why are we reproposing them today? Because they contain the essence of a way of acting that, for about three years, animated the struggle against a detention center for undocumented immigrants: the Regina Pacis in San Foca, a short distance from Lecce. The first center to be established in 1998 under the Turco-Napolitano law, it closed its doors in March 2005.

The choice to focus our attention on a migrant detention center was dictated by a simple consideration: as anarchists, we believed—and still believe—that the existence of places that segregate and deprive living beings of their freedom is intolerable. Starting from this fundamental assumption, we began to study the question of migratory flows and their containment, and we tried to equip ourselves with theoretical and practical instruments in order to address it, ransacking the writings of academics and discussing in-depth texts by other comrades who had begun to analyze the question better than us. To this, we added determination and imagination. As we progressed, our ideas became clearer and the horizon of perspectives became distinctly visible. From the initial efforts against what we called a concentration camp, we came to the realization that it not only should, but could be closed down, and we tried to pursue the paths, which were multifarious, that could lead us to achieve this result. Multifarious but not contradictory, as they were guided by those convictions that served to light our way: self-management of the struggle, permanent conflictuality, and direct attack.

Being aware that we were not alone in the world, we tried to extend the struggle and hostility towards concentration camps in general, and the San Foca camp in particular, but always holding firm to our method which constituted the rudder of our approach. The fact we didn’t succeed did not prevent us from continuing on our path alone, even if we were few, sometimes very few, but aware that what would impact the struggle was exclusively its qualitative aspect, and not the quantitative one. This is a detail that should always be kept in mind, because what can make a difference is not the number of opponents, but their ideas, which generate their practices.

Another aspect, which is very prominent today in the struggles against migrant detention centers, was not central for us at the time, and that is the relationship with those who are inflicted by imprisonment. For us, the opposition to the detention center did not originate from the terrible living conditions that prevailed within it or from the violence of those who managed it—conditions that, inevitably, also carried their weight—but from the very nature of that place. Yet, despite the lack of relations, except for sporadic ones, between us on the outside and them on the inside, this did not prevent a common struggle from developing. A common struggle, not a struggle together, because there is no doubt that the disturbances planned and carried out outside inevitably were in dialogue with the revolts and escapes that were taking place inside. In an unarranged dialogue from a distance, the threads of the struggles became intertwined—and, in forming a singular and only broader opposition to the center.

This booklet contains most of the texts—leaflets, posters and various writings—that were produced during those years and that reflect what we, too, believed back then. Today, we probably wouldn’t write some things anymore, and others we would write differently, but so be it… We don’t want to testify to or commemorate a non-existent victory against anything; we simply think that reprinting these texts might represent a potential, possible starting point for future struggles.

(Some) Enemies of All Borders, 2019
from the Introduction to the first Italian edition

Printed 2026, 192p, €7,50