This article appears courtesy of Emma Goldman Papers, Manuscripts and Archives Division, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations
Address to the International Working Men's Association Congress
by Emma Goldman
Life imposes strange situations on all of us. For forty-eight years I was considered an extremist in our ranks. One who refused to compromise our ideas or tactics for any purpose whatsoever--one who always insisted that the Anarchist aim and methods must harmonize, or the aim would never be achieved. Yet here I am trying to explain the action of our Spanish comrades to the European opponents, and the criticism of the latter to the comrades of the CNT-FAI. In other words, after a lifetime of an ext... (From : Anarchy Archives.)
From the Encyclopedia Britannica
"Anarchism", from The Encyclopedia Britannica, 1910.
Peter Kropotkin
ANARCHISM (from the Gr. ἄν, and αρχος, contrary to authority), the name given to a principle or theory of life and conduct under which society is conceived without government - harmony in such a society being obtained, not by submission to law, or by obedience to any authority, but by free agreements concluded between the various groups, territorial and professional, freely constituted for the sake of production and consumption, as also for the satisfaction of the infinite variety of needs and aspirations of a civilized being. In a society developed on these lines, the voluntary associations which already now begin to cover all ... (From : Anarchy Archives.)
Issued By The International Anarchist Publishing Committee of America, Chicago: Free Society Group, 1932.
Anarchism & American Traditions
by Voltairine de Cleyre
Introduction
"Nature has the habit of now and then producing a type of human being far in advance of the times; an ideal for us to emulate; a being devoid of sham, uncompromising, and to whom the truth is sacred; a being whose selfishness is so large that it takes the whole human race and treats self only as one of the great mass; a being keen to sense all forms of wrong, and powerful in denunciation of it; one who can reach in the future and draw it nearer. Such a being was Voltairine de Cleyre."
What could be added to this splendid ... (From : Anarchy Archives.)
ANARCHISM V. REVOLUTIONARY SOCIALISM.
Conclusion of Bruce Glasier's Letter.*
Regarding the election or appointment of directors or administrators in 9, communal society, I need say little. That such will always be necessary where society and industry, exist, I believe. That it is advisable, even if it were possible, that the persons required to direct social and industrial concerns could always be appointed on the moment, I fail to see. Nor can I understand how it is possible that in every am such appointments would meet with the approval of everybody. The same reasoning that applies to laws and majorities applies to this matter also. I heartily agree with you, however, in thinking that foremen and overseers such as we have today wi...
ANARCHIST COMMUNISM DEFINED AND DEFENDED.
[Comrade H. Davis or the Socialist League, delivered a lecture having this title, at 13 Farringdom Road, under the auspices of the Clerkenwell Branch of the Socialist League, on the 22nd of last month.]
IN all discussions on this subject, said be, whether our opponents be of the most generous or the most hostile sort, Anarchy, is, they admit, the highest form of civilization conceivable. Anarchy has been defined by an intelligent opponent as "a state of Society in which each individual is a law unto himself." A grand, but an impossible ideal, we are told, this is when looked at from the imperfections of to-day. Now opposition to most schemes for a reorganization of Society are urged from... (From : AnarchyArchives.)
Chapter 11 Levin emptied his glass, and they were silent for a while. "There’s one other thing I ought to tell you. Do you know Vronsky?" Stepan Arkadyevitch asked Levin. "No, I don’t. Why do you ask?" "Give us another bottle," Stepan Arkadyevitch directed the Tatar, who was filling up their glasses and fidgeting round them just when he was not wanted. "Why you ought to know Vronsky is that he’s one of your rivals." "Who’s Vronsky?" said Levin, and his face was suddenly transformed from the look of childlike ecstasy which Oblonsky had just been admiring to an angry and unpleasant expression. "Vronsky is one of the sons of Count Kirill Ivanovitch Vronsky, and one of the finest specimens of the gilded youth of Petersburg. I made his acquaintance in Tver when I was there on official business, and he came there...
First appeared in French, 1880. "Aux Jeunes Gens". Le Révolté, June 25; July 10; August 7, 21.
An Appeal to the Young
by Peter Kropotkin
"Peter Kropotkin...was recognized by friend and foe as one of the greatest minds...of the nineteenth century...The lucidity and brilliance of his mind combined with his warmheartedness into the harmonious whole of a fascinating and gracious personality. " -Emma Goldman
REVOLT!
Addressed to young men and women preparing to enter the professions, An Appeal to the Young was first published in 1880 in Kropotkin's paper, La Revolte, and was soon thereafter issued as a pamphlet. An American edition was brought out by Charles H. Kerr in 1899, in the wake of the great Anarchist'... (From : Anarchy Archives.)
Banning Cars from Manhattan
We propose banning private cars from Manhattan Island. Permitted motor
vehicles would be busses, small taxis, vehicles for essential services (doctor,
police, sanitation, vans, etc.), and the trucking used in light industry.
Present congestion and parking are unworkable, and other proposed solutions
are uneconomic, disruptive, unhealthy, nonurban, or impractical.
It is hardly necessary to prove that the actual situation is intolerable.
“Motor trucks average less than six miles per hour in traffic, as against
eleven miles per hour for horse drawn vehicles in 1911.” “During the ban on
nonessential vehicles during the heavy snowstorm of February 1961, air pollution
dropped 6... (From : bopsecrets.org.)
Anarchism is grounded in a rather definite proposition: that valuable behavior occurs only by the free and direct response of individuals or voluntary groups to the conditions presented by the historical environment. It claims that in most human affairs, whether political, economic, military, religious, moral, pedagogic, or cultural, more harm than good results from coercion, top-down direction, central authority, bureaucracy, jails, conscription, states, pre-ordained standardization, excessive planning, etc.
Anarchists want to increase intrinsic functioning and diminish extrinsic power. This is a social-psychological hypothesis with obvious political implications. Depending on varying historical conditions that present various threats... (From : The Stan Iverson Memorial Library, Infoshop & Arch....)
"Brain Work and Manual Work." The Nineteenth Century, March,1890, pp. 456-475. This article was made available to Anarchy Archives by The International Institute of Social History.
BRAIN WORK AND MANUAL WORK.
Peter Kropotkin.
IN olden times, men of science, and especially those who have done most to forward the growth of natural philosophy, did not despise manual work and handicraft. Galileo made his telescopes with his own hands. Newton learned in his boyhood the art of managing tools; be exercised his young mind in contriving most ingenious machines, and when he began his researches in optics he was able himself to grind the lenses for his instruments and himself to make the well known telescope which, for its time, was a fine p... (From : Anarchy Archives.)