Abstract
Furthering the critical analysis of the governors–governed divide, this chapter interrogates the sundry history of anarchist thought, its emblematic defiance of governance, and its diverse relations to democracy. The chapter outlines an anarchist critique of democracy, a composition targeted against governmental authority, representation, and majority rule. That compound critique translates, in post-classical anarchist thought, into an anarchist reclamation; notions of direct, participatory democracy become equivalent to, or perceived as a step toward, anarchy. But a divergent tendency has also developed in contemporary anarchist thought, again dissociating democracy from anarchy. By examining this reclaimed critique, in relation to non-human life and radical democracy, the chapter revisits anarchism’s classical critique of governance and the crux of The Impossible Argument.
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Notes
- 1.
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, 1969 [1851], General Idea of the Revolution in the Nineteenth Century (New York: Haskell Hous Publishers), 294.
- 2.
Kanno Sugako, 1988 [1911], “Kanno Sugako,” in Reflections on the Way to the Gallows: Rebel Women in Prewar Japan, ed. Mikiso Hane (Berkeley: University of California Press), 67–68.
- 3.
Federica Montseny, 1931, quoted in J. G. Casas, 1986, Anarchist Organisation: The History of the F.A.I (Montréal: Black Rose Books), 157.
- 4.
Charlotte Wilson, 2012 [1886], “Anarchism,” in Quiet Rumours: An Anarcha-Feminist Reader. Third Edition, ed. Dark Star Collective (Edinburgh: AK Press), 90.
- 5.
Voltairine De Cleyre, 2004 [1903], “The Making of an Anarchist,” in The Voltairine De Cleyre Reader, ed. A. J. Brigati (London: AK Press), 106.
- 6.
Emma Goldman, 2003 [1900], “Some More Observations (Published in Free Society, 29 April 1900),” in Emma Goldman: A Documentary History of the American Years. Volume 1: Made for America, 1890–1901, ed. Candace Falk (Berkeley: University of California Press), 402.
- 7.
2003 [1893], “The Law’s Limit (Published in New York World, 17 October 1893),” in Emma Goldman: A Documentary History of the American Years. Volume 1: Made for America, 1890–1901, ed. Candace Falk (Berkeley: University of California Press), 182.
- 8.
Paul Avrich and Karen Avrich, 2012, Sasha and Emma: The Anarchist Odyssey of Alexander Berkman and Emma Goldman (Cambridge: Harvard University Press), 156–62; Candace Falk, 2003, “Forging Her Place: An Introduction,” in Emma Goldman: A Documentary History of the American Years. Volume 1: Made for America, 1890–1901, ed. Candace Falk (Berkeley: University of California Press), 73–81.
- 9.
As observed by Kathy Ferguson, the label launched by President J. Edgar Hoover in fact displayed Goldman, along with Alexander Berkman, as “two of the most dangerous anarchists in America.” Ferguson argues that the shift from “anarchist” to “woman,” in the public image of dangerous individuals, served not only to downplay Goldman’s political affiliation, but also to dislocate the severe violence against laborers in the USA. Kathy Ferguson, 2011, Emma Goldman: Political Thinking in the Streets (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers), 21–29, 44–57.
- 10.
Falk, 2003, 6–7; see also Sharon Presley and Crispin Sartwell, 2005, Exquisite Rebel: The Essays of Voltairine De Cleyre--Anarchist, Feminist, Genius (New York: SUNY Press), 47; Vivian Gornick, 2011, Emma Goldman: Revolution as a Way of Life (New Haven: Yale University Press), 14–17.
- 11.
See Paul Avrich, 1984, The Haymarket Tragedy (Princeton: Princeton University Press), 181–215.
- 12.
Ferguson, 2011, 133–38.
- 13.
Maia Ramnath, 2011, Decolonizing Anarchism: An Antiauthoritarian History of India’s Liberation Struggle (London: AK Press), 6.
- 14.
Benedict Anderson, 2005, Under Three Flags: Anarchism and the Anti-Colonial Imagination (London: Verso), 2.
- 15.
Ferguson, 2011, 229–37.
- 16.
Paul Eltzbacher, 1960 [1911], Anarchism: Seven Exponents of the Anarchist Philosophy (London: Freedom Press); Max Nettlau, 2000 [1932], A Short History of Anarchism, trans. Ida Pilat Isca (London: Freedom Press); George Woodcock, 1962, Anarchism: A History of Libertarian Ideas and Movements (Cleveland: The World Publishing Company); Peter Marshall, 2008 [1992], Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism (London: Harper Perennial).
- 17.
See for instance Penny Weiss and Loretta Kensinger, 2007, Feminist Interpretations of Emma Goldman (Pennsylvania: Penn State Press). The content of Goldman’s contribution is, however, still debated. Some of Goldman’s readers would agree with Vivian Gornick (2011, p. 140) in that “Emma Goldman was not a thinker; she was an incarnation. It was not her gift for theory or even strategy that made her memorable; it was the extraordinary force of life in her that burned, without rest or respite, on behalf of human integrity.” Other readers, myself included, rather stress Goldman’s innovative ability to synthesize different strands of anarchist—and extra-anarchist—thought into her own political thinking, what Kathy Ferguson (2011, pp. 5–6) conceptualizes as “a located register: it is situated, event-based and concrete.” In addition to Ferguson’s observation that Goldman breached the theory/practice dualism, I would argue that her open acknowledgment of individualist thought fueled the anarchist critique, not only of the state communism to come, but of the democratic state itself.
- 18.
Ferguson, 2011, 268.
- 19.
For an intriguing, critical discussion on this precise theme, see Ruth Kinna and Süreyyya Evren, 2013, Blasting the Canon (New York: Punctum books), and especially Michelle Campbell’s (2013, 75–77) advocacy for canonizing Voltairine de Cleyre, due to her pioneering urge for “anarchism without adjectives.”
- 20.
For an introductory overview of this scholarly field, see Randall Amster et al., 2009, Contemporary Anarchist Studies: An Introductory Anthology of Anarchy in the Academy (London: Routledge).
- 21.
Vernon Richards, 1965, “Notes for a Biography,” in Errico Malatesta: His Life and Ideas, ed. Vernon Richards (London: Freedom Press), 237–40; Marshall, 2008 [1992], 346–50.
- 22.
Historian Robert Graham makes a similar note about Goldman and Malatesta, though also including Herbert Read, as bridging classical and post-classical anarchism. Robert Graham, 2005, “Preface,” in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 1, from Anarchy to Anarchism (300ce to 1939), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books), xiii.
- 23.
Errico Malatesta, 2014 [1897], “From a Matter of Tactics to a Matter of Principle,” in The Method of Freedom: An Errico Malatesta Reader, ed. Davide Turcato (London: AK Press), 216.
- 24.
1995 [1926], “Neither Democrats, nor Dictators: Anarchists,” in The Anarchist Revolution: Polemical Articles 1924–1931, ed. Vernon Richards (London: Freedom Press), 76.
- 25.
Malatesta defines gendarme as “any armed force, any material force in the service of a man or of a class, to oblige others to do what they would otherwise not do voluntarily.” 1965 [1920], “Article Excerpt from Umanità Nova, July 25, 1920,” in Errico Malatesta: His Life and Ideas, ed. Vernon Richards (London: Freedom Press), 26.
- 26.
1995 [1926], “Neither Democrats, nor Dictators: Anarchists,” 74.
- 27.
2014 [1891], “Anarchy,” 113.
- 28.
Élisée Reclus, 2013 [1905], “The Modern State,” in Anarchy, Geography, Modernity: Selected Writings of Elisée Reclus, ed. John Clark and Camille Martin (Oakland: PM Press), 189.
- 29.
Proudhon, 1969 [1851], 294.
- 30.
1970 [1840], What Is Property?: An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government (New York: Dover Publications), 271–72.
- 31.
Ibid., 277. Proudhon’s understanding of anarchism in the sense of order, (in)famously portrayed as a circled A, was very much indebted to the pre-Marxian socialism of Charles Fourier and Henri de Saint-Simon. See for instance George Woodcock, 1987 [1956], Pierre-Joseph Proudhon: A Biography (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 40–41.
- 32.
Mikhail Bakunin, 2013 [1867], “Federalism, Socialism, Anti-Theologism,” in Bakunin on Anarchy: Selected Works by the Activist-Founder of World Anarchism, ed. Sam Dolgoff (London: Routledge), 133.
- 33.
2016 [1870], “The Illusion of Universal Suffrage,” in Democracy: A Reader, ed. Ricardo Blaug and John Schwarzmantel (New York: Columbia University Press), 167–69.
- 34.
Malatesta, 1965 [1926], “Article Excerpt from Pensiero E Volantà, July 1, 1926,” 209.
- 35.
2014 [1899], “An Anarchist Programme,” 289.
- 36.
Wilson, 2012 [1886], “The Principles and Aims of Anarchists,” 91.
- 37.
2012 [1886], “Social Democracy and Anarchism,” 84.
- 38.
Mikhail Bakunin, 2005 [1869], “What Is the State,” in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 1, from Anarchy to Anarchism (300ce to 1939), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 86–87.
- 39.
2013 [1873], “Statism and Anarchy,” 328, 38.
- 40.
Reclus, 2013 [1894], “Anarchy,” 121.
- 41.
Proudhon, 1970 [1840], 33.
- 42.
1969 [1851], 126.
- 43.
Luigi Fabbri, 2005 [1921], “Fascism: The Preventive Counter-Revolution,” in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 1, from Anarchy to Anarchism (300ce to 1939), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 414.
- 44.
A few additional people of the international anarchist movement became involved in this alliance, among them Giuseppe Fanelli and Alberto Tucci. See Josep Termes, 2000 [1977], Anarquismo y sindicalismo en España: La Primera Internacional (1864–1881) (Barcelona: Crítica), 14; Nettlau, 2000 [1932], 115–16.
- 45.
Bakunin, 2013 [1866], “Revolutionary Catechism,” 96.
- 46.
As does Robert Cutler in his introduction to Bakunin’s thought. Robert Cutler, 1985, “Introduction,” in Mikhail Bakunin: From out of the Dustbin. Bakunin’s Basic Writings 1869–1871, ed. Robert Cutler (Ann Arbor: Ardis), 27–28.
- 47.
Robert Graham, “Democracy and Anarchy”, Robert Graham’s Anarchism Weblog: https://robertgraham.wordpress.com/2017/06/03/robert-graham-anarchy-and-democracy/, accessed 2017-08-18.
- 48.
Mikhail Bakunin, 2005 [1872], “Letter to the Internationalists of the Romagna,” in Colin Ward: The Anarchist Contribution. Book Chapter in Participatory Democracy: Prospects for Democratizing Democracy, ed. Dimitrios Roussopoulos and George Benello (Montreal: Black rose books), 247–48.
- 49.
2013 [1871], “The Program of the Alliance,” 257. It should be noted here that radical-democratic theorist Miguel Abensour (2011 [1997], xxxii–xxxiii) clearly subscribes to the Bakunist logic, by arguing that “democracy can only exist inasmuch as it rises against the state ”; yet Abensour extracts that political line of thought from Bakunin’s very adversary: Karl Marx .
- 50.
Proudhon, 1969 [1851], 128.
- 51.
Ibid., 135.
- 52.
For an informative, in-depth analysis of the intertwined biography of these prominent anarchist figures, see Avrich and Avrich, 2012.
- 53.
Alexander Berkman, “Apropos,” Mother Earth Bulletin October 1917 (1917).
- 54.
Bakunin, 2013 [1871], “God and the State,” 231.
- 55.
Nettlau, 2000 [1932], 18–21.
- 56.
Marshall, 2008 [1992], 191.
- 57.
Woodcock, 1962, 60.
- 58.
William Godwin, 2017 [1793], “Enquiry Concerning Political Justice and Its Influence on Morals and Happiness,” in Romantic Rationalist: A William Godwin Reader, ed. Peter Marshall (Oakland: PM Press), 68, 70.
- 59.
George Woodcock, 2005 [1970], “Democracy, Heretical and Radical,” in Participatory Democracy: Prospects for Democratizing Democracy, ed. Dimitrios Roussopoulos and George Benello (Montreal: Black rose books), 19–20.
- 60.
Wilson, 2012 [1886], “Social Democracy and Anarchism,” 83–84.
- 61.
Bakunin, 2013 [1873], “Statism and Anarchy,” 330–31.
- 62.
2013 [1870], “On Representative Government and Universal Suffrage,” 220–21.
- 63.
Malatesta, 2014 [1897], “The Socialists and the Elections: A Letter from E. Malatesta,” 210.
- 64.
Pyotr Kropotkin, 1912, Modern Science and Anarchism (London: Freedom Press), 68.
- 65.
James Guilluame, 2013 [1907], “Michael Bakunin: A Biographical Sketch,” in Bakunin on Anarchy: Selected Works by the Activist-Founder of World Anarchism, ed. Sam Dolgoff (London: Routledge), 50–51.
- 66.
Carlo Cafiero, 2005 [1880], “Anarchy and Communism,” in No Gods No Masters: An Anthology of Anarchism, ed. Daniel Guérin (Edinburgh: AK Press), 294.
- 67.
Lucy Parsons, 2004 [1905], “The Ballot Humbug. A Delusion and a Snare; a Mere Veil Behind Which Politics Is Played,” in Lucy Parsons: Freedom, Equality & Solidarity: Writings & Speeches, 1878–1937, ed. Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz (Chicago: Charles H. Kerr), 95.
- 68.
He Zhen, 2005 [1907], “Problems of Women’s Liberation,” in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 1, from Anarchy to Anarchism (300ce to 1939), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 340–41.
- 69.
Peter Zarrow, 1990, Anarchism and Chinese Political Culture (New York: Columbia University Press), 130, 49–55; “He Zhen and Anarcho-Feminism in China,” The Journal of Asian Studies 47, no. 4 (1988): 808–11.
- 70.
Malatesta, 1995 [1924], “Democracy and Anarchy,” 78.
- 71.
Emma Goldman, 2011 [1919], “Letter to Stella Ballantine,” in Emma Goldman: Political Thinking in the Streets, ed. Kathy Ferguson (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers), 257.
- 72.
Gornick, 2011, 75.
- 73.
Voltairine De Cleyre, 2005 [1894], “The Political Equality of Woman,” in Exquisite Rebel: The Essays of Voltairine De Cleyre: Feminist, Anarchist, Genius, ed. Sharon Presley and Crispin Sartwell (New York: SUNY Press), 241–43.
- 74.
See Andrea Pakieser, 2014, I Belong Only to Myself: The Life and Writings of Leda Rafanelli (Edinburgh: AK Press), Chapter 4.
- 75.
See Martha Ackelsberg, 2005 [1991], Free Women of Spain: Anarchism and the Struggle for the Emancipation of Women (Oakland: AK Press), 115–20, 226–27.
- 76.
Federica Montseny, 1924, quoted in Shirley Fredricks, 1981, “Feminism: The Essential Ingredient in Federica Montseny’s Anarchist Theory,” in European Women on the Left: Socialism, Feminism, and the Problems Faced by Political Women, 1880 to the Present, ed. Jane Slaughter and Robert Kern (Westport: Greenwood Press), 133.
- 77.
Emma Goldman, 1998 [1911], “Woman Suffrage,” in Red Emma Speaks, ed. Alix Kates Schulman (Amherst: Humanity Books), 190, 92.
- 78.
Ibid., 192–93, 202.
- 79.
Quoted in Fredricks, 1981, 130.
- 80.
Parsons, 2004 [1905], 96–97.
- 81.
For an ever-topical introduction to classical and contemporary anarcha-feminist texts, see Dark Star Collective, 2012, Quiet Rumours: An Anarcha-Feminist Reader. Third Edition (Edinburgh: AK Press).
- 82.
Goldman, 1998 [1940], “The Individual, Society and the State,” 121.
- 83.
1998 [1911], “Minorities Versus Majorities,” 83, 85.
- 84.
See for instance 2011 [1931], Living My Life: Two Volumes in One (New York: Cosimo), 191–93.
- 85.
Falk, 2003, 10–11; Kathy Ferguson, 2011, “Why Anarchists Need Stirner,” in Max Stirner, ed. Saul Newman (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan), 172–73.
- 86.
See David Leopold, ibid., “A Solitary Life,” 36.
- 87.
Saul Newman, ibid., “Introduction: Re-Encountering Stirner’s Ghosts,” 1–10.
- 88.
Max Stirner, 1995 [1844], The Ego and Its Own (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 198–99.
- 89.
Ferguson, 2011, 161–62.
- 90.
Goldman, 1998 [1915], “Jealousy: Causes and a Possible Cure,” 215.
- 91.
Woodcock, 1962, 33.
- 92.
Luigi Galleani, 2005 [1907], “The End of Anarchism,” excerpted in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 1, from Anarchy to Anarchism (300ce to 1939), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 122.
- 93.
Émile Armand, ibid. [1911], “Mini-Manual of the Anarchist Individualist,” 146.
- 94.
Errico Malatesta, 2016 [1897], “Individualism in Anarchism,” in The Complete Works of Malatesta, Vol. 3. A Long and Patient Work: The Anarchist Socialism of L’agitazione, 1897–1898, ed. Davide Turcato (Edinburgh: AK Press), 80.
- 95.
2014 [1924], “Individualism and Anarchism,” 461.
- 96.
1995 [1926], “Communism and Individualism (Comment on an Article by Max Nettlau),” 16.
- 97.
2014 [1891], “Anarchy,” 143.
- 98.
2014 [1889], “Our Plans: Union between Communists and Collectivists,” 99.
- 99.
2014 [1899], “An Anarchist Programme,” 287.
- 100.
1965 [1921], “Article Excerpt from Umanità Nova, October 6, 1921,” 73.
- 101.
2016 [1897], “Collectivism, Communism, Socialist Democracy and Anarchism,” 237. It should be noted that Malatesta follows a most common understanding of democracy: “government of the people ruling through their freely elected representatives. ” 1995 [1924], “Republic and Revolution,” 37.
- 102.
2005 [1895], “Violence as a Social Factor,” in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 1, from Anarchy to Anarchism (300ce to 1939), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 163.
- 103.
Bakunin, 2013 [1871], “God and the State,” 237.
- 104.
Pyotr Kropotkin, 2002 [1890], “Anarchist Morality,” in Anarchism: A Collection of Revolutionary Writings, ed. Roger Baldwin (Mineola: Dover Publications), 106.
- 105.
Along with Malatesta, several influential anarchists, such as Emma Goldman, Alexander Berkman, Rudolf Rocker, and Gustav Landauer, were also explicitly critical of Kropotkin’s engagement in the War. See Paul Avrich, 1988, Anarchist Portraits (Princeton: Princeton University Press), 69, 194.
- 106.
Pyotr Kropotkin, 2005 [1881], “The Paris Commune,” in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 1, from Anarchy to Anarchism (300ce to 1939), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 107.
- 107.
Emma Goldman, 2012 [1911], “Anarchism: What It Really Stands For,” in Emma Goldman: A Documentary History of the American Years. Volume 3: Light and Shadows. 1910–1916, ed. Candace Falk (Stanford: Stanford University Press), 285, 78.
- 108.
2011 [1931], 402.
- 109.
1998 [1940], “The Individual, Society and the State,” 110.
- 110.
Paul Preston, 2006, The Spanish Civil War: Reaction, Revolution and Revenge (London: Harper perennial), 14; Robert Alexander, 1999, The Anarchists in the Spanish Civil War: Vol. 1–2 (London: Janus), 1088–89.
- 111.
Paul Preston, 1993 [1984], “War of Words: The Spanish Civil War and the Historians,” in Revolution and War in Spain 1931–1939, ed. Paul Preston (London: Routledge), 10.
- 112.
See Alexander, 1999, 235–36, 490–91, 679–80.
- 113.
Preston, 2006, 246–48.
- 114.
Woodcock, 2005 [1970], “Democracy, Heretical and Radical,” 24.
- 115.
Herbert Read, 1938, Poetry and Anarchism (New York: Books for Libraries Press), 92.
- 116.
Gaston Laval, 2005 [1971], “Collectives in the Spanish Revolution,” in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 1, from Anarchy to Anarchism (300ce to 1939), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 478, 80.
- 117.
Noam Chomsky, 1982 [1978], “Intellectuals and the State,” in Towards a New Cold War: Essays on the Current Crisis and How We Got There, ed. Noam Chomsky (New York: Pantheon Books), 66.
- 118.
Bakunin, 2013 [1873], “Statism and Anarchy,” 336–37.
- 119.
Alexander Berkman, 2005 [1917], “To the Youth of America,” in Life of an Anarchist: The Alexander Berkman Reader, ed. Gene Fellner (New York: Seven Stories Press), 146.
- 120.
Noam Chomsky, 1991, Deterring Democracy (London: Verso), 375.
- 121.
“Democracy is a Threat to any Power System: Noam Chomsky Interviewed by John Nichols at Tucson Festival of Books”, Chomsky.info: https://chomsky.info/03132017/, accessed 2017-09-15.
- 122.
1989, “Bill Moyers’ Conversation with Noam Chomsky,” in A World of Ideas: Conversations with Thoughtful Men and Women About American Life Today and the Ideas Shaping Our Future, ed. Bill Moyers (New York: Doubleday Books), 47, 53.
- 123.
Nettlau, 2000 [1932], 187–88.
- 124.
Paul Goodman, 2011 [1945], “What Must Be the Revolutionary Program?,” in The Paul Goodman Reader, ed. Taylor Stoehr (Oakland: PM Press), 43.
- 125.
Maurice Joyeux, 2009 [1973], “Self-Management, Syndicalism and Factory Councils,” in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 2, the Emergence of the New Anarchism (1939–1977), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 247.
- 126.
Murray Bookchin, “The Greening of Politics: Toward a New Kind of Political Practice,” Green perspectives: Newsletter of the Green Program Project 1, no. January (1986): 5.
- 127.
Amedeo Bertolo, “Democracy and Beyond,” Democracy & Nature 5, no. 2 (1999).
- 128.
Graeber’s periodization here differs from Colin Ward’s, who associates the anarchist re-emergence with the counter-cultural movement of the late 1960s. David Graeber, “The New Anarchists,” New left review 13 (2002): 61–62, 69; 2013, The Democracy Project: A History, a Crisis, a Movement (New York: Spiegel & Grau), 192; Colin Ward, 2005 [1970], “The Anarchist Contribution,” in Participatory Democracy: Prospects for Democratizing Democracy, ed. Dimitrios Roussopoulos and George Benello (Montreal: Black rose books), 255.
- 129.
Cindy Milstein, 2010 [2000], “Democracy Is Direct,” in Anarchism and Its Aspirations, ed. Cindy Milstein (Oakland: AK Press), 101, 07.
- 130.
David Graeber, 2009, Direct Action: An Ethnography (Edinburgh: AK Press), 228–37.
- 131.
Murray Bookchin, 1982, The Ecology of Freedom: The Emergence and Dissolution of Hierarchy (Plano Alto: Cheshire Books), 339.
- 132.
Uri Gordon, “Democracy: The Patriotic Temptation. Uri Gordon on the Difference between Anarchy and Democracy”, CrimethInc.: https://crimethinc.com/2016/05/26/democracy-the-patriotic-temptation, accessed 2017-10-11.
- 133.
Bookchin, 1982, 336.
- 134.
1986 [1971], Post-Scarcity Anarchism, Second ed. (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 180, 77–85.
- 135.
“Thoughts on Libertarian Municipalism,” Left Green Perspectives 41 (2000).
- 136.
1995, Social Anarchism or Lifestyle Anarchism: An Unbridgeable Chasm (Edinburgh: AK Press), 16–19, 56–61.
- 137.
Graeber is himself a key figure in this movement, not least as the founder of the epic Occupy slogan “We are the 99%. ” See Graeber, 2013, 40–41.
- 138.
Ibid., 192–96, 210–32. Graeber does, it should be noted, clearly distinguish himself from what he reads as Bookchin’s eventual embracement of majority rule (ibid., 195.)
- 139.
Ibid., 193.
- 140.
Ibid., 186.
- 141.
Ibid., 224–25.
- 142.
Ibid., 211.
- 143.
Ibid., 154.
- 144.
Ibid., 169–70, 87.
- 145.
See for instance Andrew Flood, 2013 [2011], “Assemblies Are the Revolution,” in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 3, the New Anarchism (1974–2012), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books).
- 146.
Eduardo Colombo, 2006, La voluntad del pueblo: Democracia y anarquía (Buenos Aires: Tupac Ediciones), 92–93.
- 147.
2013 [2006], “On Voting,” in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 3, the New Anarchism (1974–2012), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 50.
- 148.
Mark Mattern, 2016, Anarchism and Art: Democracy in the Cracks and on the Margins (Albany: SUNY Press), 18.
- 149.
George Benello, 1992 [1967], “We Are Caught in a Wasteland Culture,” in From the Ground Up: Essays on Grassroots and Workplace Democracy by George Benello, ed. Len Krimerman, et al. (Montréal: Black Rose Books), 27.
- 150.
Dimitrios Roussopoulos and George Benello, 2005, “Preface & Introduction,” in Participatory Democracy: Prospects for Democratizing Democracy, ed. Dimitrios Roussopoulos and George Benello (Montreal: Black rose books), 4, x-xi.
- 151.
Ibid., 8.
- 152.
Sam Dolgoff, 2001 [1977], The Relevance of Anarchism to Modern Society (Tucson: Sharp Press), 13.
- 153.
For a brief introduction to the anarchist sentiments of the Sarvodaya movement, see Ramnath, 2011, 188–203.
- 154.
Vinoba Bhave, 2005 [1952], “Sarvodaya: Freedom from Government,” in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 1, from Anarchy to Anarchism (300ce to 1939), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 183. It should be noted, however, that Jayaprakash Narayan, the most influential Gandhian theorist alongside Bhave, came to advocate what he called “democratic socialism,” a type of libertarian socialist state contrasted against the dominant state communism of China and the USSR. See Ramnath, 2011, 195–98.
- 155.
Robert Graham’s blog/archive being one, important, exception. See https://robertgraham.wordpress.com/anarchy-democracy-bookchin-malatesta-fabbri/, accessed 2017-06-16.
- 156.
Luce Fabbri, 1983 [1982], “Respuesta a la revista “A” ¿Defender La Democracia? – Aclacación de Luce Fabbri, en carta publicada en la revista N°98, de febrero 1982,” in El anarquismo: Mas alla de la democracia, ed. Luce Fabbri (Brasil: Editorial Reconstruir), 36. My translation.
- 157.
2012 [1983], “From Democracy to Anarchy,” Robert Graham’s Anarchism Weblog: https://robertgraham.wordpress.com/anarchy-democracy-bookchin-malatesta-fabbri/, accessed 2017-06-16.
- 158.
Luce Fabbri, 1983, quoted in ibid.
- 159.
James Scott, 2012, Two Cheers for Anarchism: Six Easy Pieces on Autonomy, Dignity, and Meaningful Work and Play (Princeton: Princeton University Press), xvi.
- 160.
Colin Ward, 1996 [1973], Anarchy in Action (London: Freedom press), 26.
- 161.
Robert Paul Wolff, 1998 [1970], In Defense of Anarchism (Berkeley: University of California Press), 18.
- 162.
Graeber, 2013, 302.
- 163.
Malatesta, 2014 [1899], “Toward Anarchy,” 300.
- 164.
1965 [1925], “Article Excerpt from Pensiero E Volantà, May 16, 1925,” 23.
- 165.
2014 [1930], “The Anarchists in the Present Time,” 504; See also Malatesta’s defense of gradualism in 2014 [1925], “Gradualism.”
- 166.
1965 [1926], “Article Excerpt from Pensiero E Volantà, August 1, 1926,” 150.
- 167.
Lucien Van der Walt and Michael Schmidt, 2009, Black Flame: The Revolutionary Class Politics of Anarchism & Syndicalism. Counter-Power Vol. 1 (Edinburgh: AK Press), 70.
- 168.
It should be noted that Michael Schmidt has recently become affiliated with the radical-nationalist milieu. And this is not, we must remember, the first time influential anarchist thinkers have failed to translate anarchism into feminist and anti-racist stances; Proudhon (in)famously embraces both misogynous and anti-Semitic sentiments; Bakunin’s notion of Pan-Slavism contains distinct nationalist elements. For a critical discussion on this important theme, see Luther Blissett, 1997, Anarchist Integralism: Aesthetics, Politics and the Après-Garde (London: Sabotage Editions).
- 169.
CrimethInc. Ex-Workers Collective, 2017, From Democracy to Freedom: The Difference between Government and Self-Determination (Salem: CrimethInc. Far East), 42.
- 170.
Ibid., 36.
- 171.
Ibid., 42.
- 172.
Malatesta, 1995 [1926], “Neither Domocrats, nor Dictators: Anarchists,” 73–74.
- 173.
The Provos, 2009 [1965], “‘Provo’ Magazine Leaflet,” in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 2, the Emergence of the New Anarchism (1939–1977), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 283.
- 174.
Peter Gelderloos, “What Is Democracy?”, The Anarchist Library: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/peter-gelderloos-what-is-democracy, accessed 2017-10-12.
- 175.
2016, Worshiping Power: An Anarchist View of Early State Formation (Oakland: AK Press), 1, 237.
- 176.
Uri Gordon, 2008, Anarchy Alive!: An Anti-Authoritarian Politics from Practice to Theory (London: Pluto press), 70.
- 177.
2016, “Democracy: The Patriotic Temptation. Uri Gordon on the Difference between Anarchy and Democracy”, CrimethInc.: https://crimethinc.com/2016/05/26/democracy-the-patriotic-temptation, accessed 2017-10-11.
- 178.
Mick Smith, 2011, Against Ecological Sovereignty: Ethics, Biopolitics, and Saving the Natural World (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press), xii.
- 179.
Ibid., xiii.
- 180.
Ibid., 77.
- 181.
Henry David Thoreau, 2011 [1862], “Walking,” in The Natural History Essays, ed. Henry David Thoreau (Layton: Gibbs Smith), 93.
- 182.
John Zerzan, 2008, Twilight of the Machines (Los Angeles: Feral House), viii.
- 183.
Ibid., 24.
- 184.
Ibid., 95.
- 185.
Moxie Marlinspike and Windy Hart, “An Anarchist Critique of Democracy: Audio Anarchy Radio Show on Democracy, 2005-01-11”, The Anarchist Library: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/moxie-marlinspike-and-windy-hart-audio-anarchy-radio-an-anarchist-critique-of-democracy, accessed 2017-10-12.
- 186.
Corin Bruce, 2014, Green Anarchism: Towards the Abolition of Hierarchy, The Anarchist Library: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/corin-bruce-green-anarchism-towards-the-abolition-of-hierarchy, accessed 2017-10-10.
- 187.
Zerzan, 2008, 62.
- 188.
Reclus, 2013 [1901], “On Vegetarianism,” 161.
- 189.
One brief exception being Aragorn Eloff, 2015, “Do Anarchists Dream of Emancipated Sheep? Contemporary Anarchism, Animal Liberation and the Implications of New Philosophy,” in Anarchism and Animal Liberation: Essays on Complementary Elements of Total Liberation, ed. Erika Cudworth, Richard White, and Anthony Nocella (Jefferson: McFarland & Company Inc.), 196–98.
- 190.
See Édith Thomas, 1980, Louise Michel (Montréal: Black rose books), 96–99, 395–97.
- 191.
Louise Michel, 1981 [1886], “Memoirs of Louise Michel,” in The Red Virgin: Memoirs of Louise Michel, ed. Bullitt Lowry and Elizabeth Gunter (Alabama: University of Alabama Press), 24.
- 192.
Ibid., 139.
- 193.
Ibid., 141.
- 194.
Voltairine de Cleyre seems to have shared a similar political approach. Emma Goldman reports that de Cleyre expressed “poignant agony at the sight of suffering whether of children or dumb [sic] animals (she was obsessed by love for the latter and would give shelter and nourishment to every stray cat and dog).” See Emma Goldman, 2005 [1932], “Voltairine De Cleyre,” in Exquisite Rebel: The Essays of Voltairine De Cleyre: Anarchist, Feminist, Genius, ed. Sharon Presley and Crispin Sartwell (New York: State University of New York), 41–42.
- 195.
Layla AbdelRahim, 2015, Children’s Literature, Domestication, and Social Foundation: Narratives of Civilization and Wilderness (New York: Routledge), 3, 9.
- 196.
Bob Torres, 2007, Making a Killing: The Political Economy of Animal Rights (Edinburgh: AK Press), 126, 30.
- 197.
Brian Dominick, 2015, “Anarcho-Veganism Revisited: Twenty Years of “Veganarchy”,” in Anarchism and Animal Liberation: Essays on Complementary Elements of Total Liberation, ed. Erika Cudworth, Richard White, and Anthony Nocella (Jefferson: McFarland & Company Inc.), 24.
- 198.
Erika Cudworth, Richard White, and Anthony Nocella, 2015, “Introduction: The Intersections of Critical Animal Studies and Anarchist Studies for Total Liberation,” in Anarchism and Animal Liberation: Essays on Complementary Elements of Total Liberation, ed. Erika Cudworth, Richard White, and Anthony Nocella (Jefferson: McFarland & Company Inc.), 8.
- 199.
The intersectional theme of critical animal studies has in turn redefined the boundaries of the revolutionary subject itself. For an explorative report on exemplified resistance from animals in captivity, see Jason Hribal, 2010, Fear of the Animal Planet: The Hidden History of Animal Resistance (Edinburgh: AK Press).
- 200.
Dimitrios Roussopoulos, 2005, “Introduction: The Participatory Tradition and the Ironies of History,” in Participatory Democracy: Prospects for Democratizing Democracy, ed. Dimitrios Roussopoulos and George Benello (Montreal: Black rose books), 261.
- 201.
This debate played out at the 2017 online symposium on Anarchy and Democracy, hosted by the Center for a Stateless Society, https://c4ss.org/content/49206, accessed 2017-08-18.
- 202.
Shawn Wilbur, “Anarchy and Democracy: Examining the Divide”, Center for a Stateless Society: https://c4ss.org/content/49277, accessed 2017-08-18.
- 203.
Wayne Price, “Democracy, Anarchism, & Freedom”, Center for a Stateless Society: https://c4ss.org/content/49237, accessed 2017-08-18.
- 204.
Ibid.
- 205.
For a contextualizing account of Abdullah Öcalan’s theory of democratic confederalism (forged with clear reference to Murray Bookchin), see Michael Knapp et al., 2016, Revolution in Rojava: Democratic Autonomy and Women’s Liberation in Syrian Kurdistan (London: Pluto Press), 36–46.
- 206.
Gordon, 2016.
- 207.
The Invisible Committee, 2007, “Get Going!,” in The Coming Insurrection, The Anarchist Library: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/comite-invisible-the-coming-insurrection, accessed, 2017-10-10.
- 208.
Ruth Kinna, 2005, Anarchism: A Beginner’s Guide (Oxford: Oneworld), 115.
- 209.
CrimethInc. Ex-Workers Collective, 2017, 113, 34–46.
- 210.
See Nestor Makhno and “Delo Truda”, “The Organizational Platform of the General Union of Anarchists”, Nestormakhno.info: http://www.nestormakhno.info/english/newplatform/org_plat.htm, accessed 2017-10-03.
- 211.
See for instance Paul Avrich, 1973, “Introduction,” in The Anarchists in the Russian Revolution, ed. Paul Avrich (London: Thames and Hudson), 23–28.
- 212.
Gregory Maksimov, ibid. [1917], “The Soviets of the Workers’, Soldiers’ and Peasants’ Deputies,” 103.
- 213.
2015 [1927], The Program of Anarcho-Syndicalism (Guillotine Press), 38.
- 214.
See Avrich and Avrich, 2012, 349–50.
- 215.
Malatesta, 1995 [1929], “Malatesta’s Reply to Nestor Makhno,” 110.
- 216.
2014 [1927], “A Project of Anarchist Organization,” 488, 90.
- 217.
Voline, 1974 [1947], “Book 2, Part 1, Chapter 2: Causes and Consequences of the Bolshevik Conception,” in The Unknown Revolution, ed. Voline (Detroit: Black & Red), 198.
- 218.
Malatesta, 1995 [1926], “Communism and Individualism (Comment on an Article by Max Nettlau),” 14.
- 219.
1995 [1925], “Note on Hz’s Article, ‘Science and Anarchy’,” 52.
- 220.
2014 [1899], “Toward Anarchy,” 299.
- 221.
2014 [1930], “Against the Constituent Assembly as against the Dictatorship,” 509.
- 222.
Marshall, 2008 [1992].
- 223.
Jacques Rancière, 2012, Proletarian Nights: The Workers’ Dream in Nineteenth-Century France (London: Verso), ix.
- 224.
Goodman, 2011 [1972], “Freedom and Autonomy,” 31–32.
- 225.
CrimethInc. Ex-Workers Collective, 2017, 70, 42.
- 226.
Malatesta, 1995 [1924], “Democracy and Anarchy,” 79.
- 227.
1995 [1924], “Anarchism and Reforms,” 80.
- 228.
2016 [1897], “Anarchism and Socialism: The Parliamentary Socialists’ Refrain,” 252.
- 229.
1965 [1922], “Article Excerpt from Umanità Nova, October 7, 1922,” 171.
- 230.
1965 [1921], “Article Excerpt from Umanità Nova, September 6, 1921,” 165.
- 231.
1995 [1925], “Note on Hz’s Article, ‘Science and Anarchy’,” 38.
- 232.
2014 [1899], “An Anarchist Programme,” 292.
- 233.
2014 [1922], “Revolution in Practice,” 421.
- 234.
Quoted in Sam Dolgoff, 2013 [1973], “Introduction,” in Bakunin on Anarchy, ed. Sam Dolgoff (London: Routledge), 10.
- 235.
Bakunin, 2013 [1869], “The Program of the International Brotherhood,” 148–55. For a critical evaluation of this particular strand in Bakunin’s thought, see Marshall, 2008 [1992], 271–77.
- 236.
Malatesta, 2014 [1926], “Let’s Demolish – and Then?,” 478.
- 237.
1965 [1924], “Article excerpt from Pensiero e Volantà, June 15, 1924,” 153.
- 238.
I here use the movement-circulating quote, from James Guilluame’s well-known biography on Bakunin, though Sam Dolgoff’s direct translation reads “the passion for destruction is a constructive passion, too!” See Guilluame, 2013 [1907], 24; Mikhail Bakunin, ibid. [1842], “The Reaction in Germany,” 75.
- 239.
Malatesta, 2014 [1925], “Gradualism,” 473.
- 240.
2014 [1926], “Let’s Demolish – and then?,” 479.
- 241.
2014 [1899], “An Anarchist Programme,” 284.
- 242.
Pyotr Kropotkin, 2002 [1896], “Anarchism: Its Philosophy and Ideal,” in Anarchism: A Collection of Revolutionary Writings, ed. Roger Baldwin (Mineola: Dover publications), 136.
- 243.
See Dongyoun Hwang, 2017, Anarchism in Korea: Independence, Transnationalism, and the Question of National Development, 1919–1984 (Albany: State University of New York Press), 23, 95.
- 244.
Shin Chaeho, 2005 [1923], “Declaration of the Korean Revolution,” in Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Vol. 1, from Anarchy to Anarchism (300ce to 1939), ed. Robert Graham (Montreal: Black Rose Books), 374–76.
- 245.
Carol Ehrlich, 1996 [1977], “Socialism, Anarchism and Feminism,” in Reinventing Anarchy, Again, ed. Howard Ehrlich (London: AK Press), 185.
- 246.
Gustav Landauer, 2010 [1910], “Weak Statesmen, Weaker People!,” in Revolution and Other Writings: A Political Reader, ed. Gabriel Kuhn (Oakland: PM Press), 214.
- 247.
Richard Day, 2005, Gramsci Is Dead: Anarchist Currents in the Newest Social Movements (London: Pluto Press), 123–26.
- 248.
Alexandre Christoyannopoulos and Matthew Adams, 2017, “Anarchism and Religion: Mapping an Increasingly Fruitful Landscape,” in Essays in Anarchism and Religion: Volume 1, ed. Alexandre Christoyannopoulos and Matthew Adams (Stockholm: Stockholm University Press), 1–2.
- 249.
Bart de Ligt, 1989 [1937], The Conquest of Violence: An Essay on War and Revolution (London: Pluto Press), 75, 167–68.
- 250.
It should be noted that, like Godwin, Stirner, Thoreau, and Gandhi, Tolstoy did not affiliate himself with the anarchist movement (which he associated with violence). Nevertheless, Tolstoy’s was indeed a prominent and influential voice against the notion of government, which has made him imperative for anarchist thought. Following Paul Eltzbacher’s list of key anarchist thinkers (1960 [1911]), Max Nettlau (2000 [1932], 250–54) locates Tolstoy alongside Bakunin and Kropotkin, just as Woodcock (1962, 398, 474) and Marshall (2008 [1992], 362–83) recognize Tolstoy’s profound contribution to the anarchist tradition.
- 251.
Lev Tolstoy, 1990 [1900], “On Anarchy,” in Government Is Violence: Essays on Anarchism and Pacifism, ed. David Stephens (London: Phoenix Press), 68.
- 252.
1990 [1900], “Patriotism and Government,” 86–87.
- 253.
1990 [1900], “The Slavery of Our Times,” 145.
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Lundström, M. (2018). Democracy and Anarchy. In: Anarchist Critique of Radical Democracy. The Theories, Concepts and Practices of Democracy. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-76977-6_3
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