 | Letter to The Bulletin De La Fédération Jurassienne : The Italian Federal Delegates to the Berne CongressBy Errico Malatesta (1876) |
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| Letter to The Bulletin De La Fédération Jurassienne : The Italian Federal Delegates to the Berne CongressBy Errico Malatesta (1876) |
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Italian, Anarchist Intellectual, Anti-Capitalist, and Anti-Fascist
: There have almost certainly been better anarchist writers, more skilled anarchist organizers, anarchists who have sacrificed more for their beliefs. Perhaps though, Malatesta is celebrated because he combined all of these so well, exemplifying thought expressed in deed... (From: Cunningham Bio.)
• "...all history shows that the law's only use is to defend, strengthen and perpetuate the interests and prejudices prevailing at the time the law is made, thus forcing mankind to move from revolution to revolution, from violence to violence." (From: "Further Thoughts on the Question of Crime," by Er....)
• "...the agelong oppression of the masses by a small privileged group has always been the result of the inability of the oppressed to agree among themselves to organize with others for production, for enjoyment and for the possible needs of defense against whoever might wish to exploit and oppress them. Anarchism exists to remedy this state of affairs..." (From: "Anarchism and Organization," Authored by Errico M....)
• "We want to make the revolution as soon as possible, taking advantage of all the opportunities that may arise." (From: "Revolution in Practice," by Errico Malatesta, fro....)
Carlo Cafiero (1 September 1846 – 17 July 1892) was an Italian anarchist, champion of Mikhail Bakunin during the second half of the 19th century and one of the main proponents of anarcho-communism and insurrectionary anarchism during the First International. (From: Wikipedia.org.)
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Letter to The Bulletin De La Fédération Jurassienne
Comrades,
In light of a number of inaccuracies and omissions in the official minutes of the Berne Congress, certain newspapers have drawn from the report presented by us on the situation and principles of the International in Italy some conclusions that do not quite match with the facts.[1] We therefore ask you to carry the following statement in your newspaper:
We never said anything that might lead one to suppose that in Italy the International was split into two branches subscribing to two different schools of thought. The vast majority of Italian socialists have rallied around the Italian Federation’s anarchist, collectivist, revolutionary program, and the few who have, thus far, as a consequence of intrigues and lies, remained outside, are now all beginning to enter our organization. We are not referring here to a tiny group that, being prompted by personal views and reactionary purposes, is out to conduct what it terms “gradual and peaceful” propaganda: these people have already been judged by the Italian socialists and represent no one but themselves.
The Italian Federation holds that the act of insurrection, designed to assert socialist principles through deeds, is the most effective method of propaganda and the only one that, without deceiving and corrupting the masses, can delve into the deepest strata of society and draw the cream of humanity into the struggle, backed by the International.[2]
The Italian Federation looks upon collective ownership of the products of labor as the necessary complement to the collectivist program, the contribution by all towards the meeting of each and everyone’s needs being the only rule of production and consumption compatible with the principle of solidarity.[3] The federal congress in Florence has eloquently expressed the Italian International’s view on this issue, as well as on the preceding one.
Greetings and solidarity.
The Italian federal delegates to the Berne Congress:
Errico Malatesta
Carlo Cafiero
[1] Malatesta and Cafiero, coauthors of this letter, had been among the delegates of the Italian Federation to the congress of the federalist branch of the International held in Berne at the end of October 1876. The letter summarizes some of the key views held by the Italian Federation at the time.
[2] Malatesta and Cafiero are expressing here the tactics that would later come to be known as “propaganda by the deed,” of which the Benevento uprising of the next year would be a notable example.
[3] This is one of the earliest statements in which the replacement of collectivism with communism—“the collective ownership of the products of labor”—is advocated. In the months preceding the Berne congress the issue had been discussed by Malatesta, Cafiero, and others during conversations in Naples. They had come to the conclusion that the traditional bakuninist formula of collectivism had to be abandoned in favor of communism. This change of perspective had been approved by the congress of the Italian Federation, held near Florence a few days before the Berne congress, and then expressed at Berne by Malatesta and Cafiero.
(Source: Translated from Bulletin de la Fédération Jurassienne, Sonvillier, Vol. 5, no. 49, 3 December 1876.)
From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org
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Letter to The Bulletin De La Fédération Jurassienne
