Stateless Socialism: Anarchism
by Mikhail Bakunin 1814-1876
From "The Political Philosophy of Bakunin"
by G.P. Maximoff
1953, The Free Press, NY
Effect of the Great Principles Proclaimed by the French Revolution. From the time when the Revolution brought down to the masses its Gospel - not the mystic but the rational, not the heavenly but the earthly, not the divine but the human Gospel, the Gospel of the Rights of Man - ever since it proclaimed that all men are equal, that all men are entitled to liberty and equality, the masses of all European countries, of all the civilized world, awakening gradually from the sleep which had kept them in bondage ever since Christianity drugged them with its opium, began to ask them... (From: Anarchy Archives.)
Anarchism is a revolutionary method of achieving a free nonviolent society, without class divisions or imposed authority. Whether this is a “utopian” achievement or not is irrelevant; the Anarchist, on any normal definition, is a person who, having this aim in mind, proceeds to get rid of authoritarian structures, and advances towards such a society by making people independent of the State and by intensifying the class struggle so that the means of economic exploitation will be weakened and destroyed.
Confusion
There should be no confusion between anarchism and liberalism however militant the latter might be (e.g. movements towards national liberation). The liberal seeks greeter freedom within the structure of society... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
The following points of agreement are neither complete nor final. They represent, at best, where our group was at the time they were adopted.
As anarchists we fight to create a self-managed, socialist and stateless society, in which all contribute freely according to ability, and through which all have full access to the material basis for pursing their individual and collective fulfillment. In this libertarian socialist society, individual freedom is harmonized with communal obligations through cooperation, directly democratic decision making and social and economic equality. We believe such a society is both desirable and possible, and we actively work toward overcoming the hierarchies, exploitation and systems of oppression that stan... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
This past May, the Italian state began another round of repression against anarchists. The more sporadic state harassment anarchists had experienced over the past few years gave way to what is clearly a more focused attack. This reflects the growing repressive reality around the globe, the needs of the Italian state in the present circumstances and its attempts to find ways to strike the anarchist movement and all anti-institutional movements of resistance and revolt in their totality. Thus, these events demand more than news and calls for solidarity; they require an attempt to analyze the situation on several levels in order to develop meaningful and substantial forms of active solidarity.
The May arrests
Perhaps it would be most... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
The dust has settled: a total of 193 arrests took place during the G20—a great number of those being random bystanders. 17 people face felonies; one young person is being absurdly scapegoated for $20,000+ of damage, while two alleged participants in the comms group are being charged with “hindering apprehension or prosecution, criminal use of a communication facility, and possessing an instrument of crime,” presumably in hopes of setting a precedent to suppress the use of communications technology to keep demonstrators safe in the future.
Indeed, several people have been charged with “hindering apprehension,” which is a new one to us here. It sounds more like an existential condition than a crime—picture... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Probably no agitation has ever attained the magnitude, either in the number of its recruits or the area of its influence, which has been attained by Modern Socialism, and at the same time been so little understood and so misunderstood, not only by the hostile and the indifferent, but by the friendly, and even by the great mass of its adherents themselves. This unfortunate and highly dangerous state of things is due partly to the fact that the human relationships which this movement – if anything so chaotic can be called a movement – aims to transform, involve no special class or classes, but literally all mankind; partly to the fact that these relationships are infinitely more varied and complex in their nature than those with w...
In taking the State and its historic role as the subject for this study, I think I am satisfying a much felt need at the present time: that of examining in depth the very concept of the State, of studying its essence, its past role and the part it may be called upon to play in the future.
It is above all over the question of the State that socialists are divided. Two main currents can be discerned in the factions that exist among us which correspond to differences in temperament as well as in ways of thinking, but above all to the extent that one believes in the coming revolution.
There are those, on the one hand, who hope to achieve the social revolution through the State by preserving and even extending most of its powers to be used for... (From: Anarchy Archives.)
The Revolution of February raised two leading questions: one economic, the question of labor and property; the other political, the question of government or the State.
On the first of these questions the socialistic democracy is substantially in accord. They admit that it is not a question of the seizure and division of property, or even of its repurchase. Neither is it a question of dishonorably levying additional taxes on the wealthy and property-holding classes, which, while violating the principle of property recognized in the constitution, would serve only to overturn the general economy and aggravate the situation of the proletariat. The economic reform consists, on the one hand, in opening usurious credit to competition and thereby... (From: proudhonlibrary.org.)
I.
To most Americans of the classes which consider themselves significant the war brought a sense of the sanctity of the State which, if they had had time to think about it, would have seemed a sudden and surprising alteration in their habits of thought. In times of peace, we usually ignore the State in favor of partisan political controversies, or personal struggles for office, or the pursuit of party policies. It is the Government rather than the State with which the politically minded are concerned. The State is reduced to a shadowy emblem which comes to consciousness only on occasions of patriotic holiday.
Government is obviously composed of common and unsanctified men, and is thus a legitimate object of criticism and even contemp... (From: fair-use.org.)
To people living in States founded upon violence, it seems that the abolition of the power of Government will necessarily involve the greatest of disasters.
But the assertion that the degree of safety and welfare which men enjoy is ensured by State power is altogether an arbitrary one. We know those disasters and such welfare as exist among people living under State organization, but we do not know the position in which people would be were they to get clear of the State. If one takes into consideration the life of those small communities which happen to have lived and are living outside great States, such communities, whilst profiting from all the advantages of social organization, yet being free from State coercion, do not experien... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
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