Theory and Practice2. The Proletariat and the Beginning of the Modern Labor Movement The era of machine production and modern Capitalism; The rise of the Proletariat; The first labor unions and their struggle for existence; Luddism; Trade Unionism pure and simple; Political radicalism and labor; The Chartist movement; Socialism and the labor movement. Modern Socialism was at first only a profounder understanding of the interconnections in social life, an attempt to solve the contradictions implicit in the present social order and to give a new content to man's relations with his social environment. Its influence was, therefore, for a time confined to a little circle of intellectuals, who for the most part came from the privileged classes. Inspired with a profound and noble sympathy for the intellectual and material needs of great masses they sought a way out of the labyrinth of social antagonisms in order to open to mankind new outlooks for its future development. For...
Many Anarchists and thinkers in general, whilst recognizing the immense advantages which Communism may offer to society, yet consider this form of social organization a danger to the liberty and free development of the individual. This danger is also recognized by many Communists, and, taken as a whole, the question is merged in that other vast problem which our century has laid bare to its fullest extent: the relation of the individual to society. The importance of this question need hardly be insisted upon. The problem became obscured in various ways. When speaking of Communism, most people think of the more or less Christian and monastic and always authoritarian Communism advocated in the first half of this century and practiced in certa... (From : Anarchy Archives.)
THE CONQUEST OF BREAD by P. Kropotkin CHAPTER V Food I IF the coming Revolution is to be a Social Revo lution it will be distinguished from all former uprisings not only by its aim, but also by its methods. To attain a new end, new means are required. The three great popular movements which we have seen in France during the last hundred years differ from each other in many ways, but they have one common feature. In each case the people strove to overturn the old regime, and spent their heart's blood for the cause. Then, after having borne the brunt of the battle, they sank again into obscurity. A Government, composed of men more or less honest, was formed and undertook to organize--the Republic in 1793, Labor in 1848, and the Free Commune in 1871. Imbued with Jacobin ideas, this Gover...
THE MODERN DRAMA A POWERFUL DISSEMINATOR OF RADICAL THOUGHT SO LONG as discontent and unrest make themselves but dumbly felt within a limited social class, the powers of reaction may often succeed in suppressing such manifestations. But when the dumb unrest grows into conscious expression and becomes almost universal, it necessarily affects all phases of human thought and action, and seeks its individual and social expression in the gradual transvaluation of existing values. An adequate appreciation of the tremendous spread of the modern, conscious social unrest cannot be gained from merely propagandistic literature. Rather must we become conversant with the larger phases of human expression manifest in art, literature, and, above all, the ... (From : Anarchy Archives.)
Modern Science and Anarchism Peter Kropotkin Translated by David A. Modell and published by The Social Science Club of Philadelphia in 1903. I. Anarchism, like Socialism in general, and like every other social movement, has not, of course, developed out of science or out of some philosophical school. The social sciences are still very far removed from the time when they shall be as exact as are physics and chemistry. Even in meteorology we cannot yet predict the weather a month, or even one week, in advance. It would be unreasonable, therefore, to expect of the young social sciences, which are concerned with phenomena much more complex than winds and rain, that they should foretell social events with any approach to certainty. Besides, it must not be forgotten that men of science, too, are but human, and that most of them either belong by descent to the possessing classes, and are steeped in the pr...
PIONEERS OF AMERICAN FREEDOM ORIGIN OF LIBERAL AND RADICAL THOUGHT IN AMERICA BY RUDOLF ROCKER Translated from the German by Arthur E. Briggs ROCKER PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE (A Non-Profit Organization) 2101 south gramercy place los angeles 7, california copyright, 1949, by rudolf rocker All rights reserved—no part of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in a review to be printed in a magazine or newspaper. PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA BY J. J. LITTLE & IVES COMPANY, NEW YORK Introduction xiii PART ONE american liberals Thomas Paine I Thomas Jefferson 12 Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry D. Thoreau 20 William Lloyd Garr... (From : AgainstAllAuthority.org, Formatting by RevoltLib.c....)
Letter to the Workers of Western Europe
Dmitrov, Russia, April 28, 1919 I have been asked if I did not have a message for the workers of the western world. Certainly there is plenty to say and learn of the actual events in Russia. As the message would have to be long to cover all, I will indicate only the principal points. First, the workers of the civilized world and their friend in other classes ought to prevail on their governments to abandon entirely the idea of armed intervention in Russia whether openly or secretly. Russia is undergoing now a revolution of the same extent and importance as England under went in 1639 to '48, and France in 1789 to '94. Every nation should refuse to play the shameful role played by England, Prussia, Austria and Russia during the French Revolut... (From : Marxists.org.)