Anarchism Quotes
More Anarchism Quotes
Cleansed of its leftist residues, anarchy — anarchism minus Marxism — will be free to get better at being what it is.
bob black— Introduction
Today's terrorism is not the product of a traditional history of anarchism, nihilism, or fanaticism. It is instead the contemporary partner of globalization.
jean baudrillard— The Spirit of Terrorism (2003) "The Violence of the Global"
While we can doubtless look to some wide changes in the shapes of social relationships as a result of contemporary libertarian movements, and especially to an increase in workers' involvement in decision-making at the place of work and in the development of forms of democracy more direct and more sensitive to modern conditions, it is unlikely that the general outcome will be the wholly non-governmental society of which libertarians now and in the past have dreamed. The value of anarchism is likely to remain primarily in its force as an inspiring idea, an activating vision…
George Woodcock— Postscript (July 1973)
The religious truth of anarchism consists in this, that power over man is bound up with sin and evil , that a state of perfection is a state where there is no power of man over man, that is to say, anarchy. The Kingdom of God is freedom and the absence of such power... the Kingdom of God is anarchy.
nikolai berdyaev— Nikolai Berdyaev, Slavery and Freedom (1939), p.147
Unquestionably socialism and anarchism attract distinctly different types, who are in many ways alien to each other. Their mental processes differ.
— p.92 (Violence and the Labor Movement (1914))
There is absolute truth in anarchism and it is to be seen in its attitude to the sovereignty of the state and to every form of state absolutism . … The religious truth of anarchism consists in this, that power over man is bound up with sin and evil, that a state of perfection is a state where there is no power of man over man, that is to say, anarchy. The Kingdom of God is freedom and the absence of such power... the Kingdom of God is anarchy.
nikolai berdyaev— Nikolai Berdyaev, Slavery and Freedom (1939), p. 147
Largely due to the path breaking work of Murray Rothbard, 20th century individualist anarchism is no longer inherently suspicious of profit-making practices, such as charging interest. Indeed, it embraces the free market as the voluntary vehicle of economic exchange. But as individualist anarchism draws increasingly upon the work of Austrian economists such as Mises and Hayek, it draws increasingly farther away from left anarchism.
— McElroy, Wendy. Anarchism: Two Kinds (Presenting as being a form of, or related to, individualist anarchism)
Workers are propertyless and forced to wage labor because they cannot finance their self-employment: the state monopoly over money is the problem. Let the people issue their own private, fiduciary moneys and the choice between working for an employer or for oneself will become entirely voluntary. This is the individual anarchism (or anarco-capitalism) championed by Lysander Spooner and Benjamin Tucker in America and Gustave de Molinari in France.
— Ferrero, Manuel. A Rational Theory of Socialist Public [2]
Violence is the whole essence of authoritarianism, just as the repudiation of violence is the whole essence of anarchism.
— Errico Malatesta, "Anarchism, Authoritarian Socialism and Communism" in Fede (28 October 1923); also in What Is Anarchism? : An Introduction edited by Donald Rooum (1992, 1995) p. 59
I think the question is not about "communists" and "individualists", but rather about anarchists and non-anarchists. And we, or at least many of us, were quite wrong in discussing a certain kind of alleged "anarchist individualism" as if it really was one of the various tendencies of anarchism, instead of fighting it as one of the many disguises of authoritarianism.
— Errico Malatesta, in "Note to the article "Individualism and Anarchism" by Adams" in Pensiero e Volontà No. 15 (1 August 1924)
"Whoever denies authority and fights against it is an anarchist," said Sebastien Faure. The definition is tempting in its simplicity, but simplicity is the first thing to guard against in writing a history of anarchism. Few doctrines or movements have been so confusedly understood in the public mind, and few have presented in their own variety of approach and action so much excuse for confusion.
— George Woodcock?, in Anarchism (1963) Prologue
I shall treat anarchism, despite its many variations: as a system of social thought, aiming at fundamental changes in the structure of society and particularly for this is the common element uniting all its forms at the replacement of the authoritarian state by some form of non-governmental cooperation between free individuals.
— George Woodcock?, in Anarchism (1963) Prologue
There is absolute truth in anarchism and it is to be seen in its attitude to the sovereignty of the state and to every form of state absolutism. ... The religious truth of anarchism consists in this, that power over man is bound up with sin and evil , that a state of perfection is a state where there is no power of man over man, that is to say, anarchy. The Kingdom of God is freedom and the absence of such power... the Kingdom of God is anarchy.
— Nikolai Berdyaev, in Slavery and Freedom (1939), p. 147
If you say that you reject violence when it exceeds the limits imposed by the needs of defense, they accuse you of pacifism , without understanding that violence is the whole essence of authoritarianism , just as the repudiation of violence is the whole essence of anarchism.
— Errico Malatesta, "Anarchism, Authoritarian Socialism and Communism" in Fede (28 October 1923); also in What Is Anarchism? : An Introduction edited by Donald Rooum (1992, 1995) p. 59
anarchism is in reality the ideal of political and social science , and also the ideal of religion . It is the ideal to which Jesus Christ looked forward. Christ founded no church , established no state, gave practically no laws , organized no government and set up no external authority , but he did seek to write on the hearts of men God 's law and make them self-legislating.
— Heber Newton, in Free Speech for Radicals (1916) by Theodore Schroeder, p. 7
anarchism does not mean bloodshed; it does not mean robbery, arson, etc. These monstrosities are, on the contrary, the characteristic features of capitalism. anarchism, or Socialism, means the re-organization of society upon scientific principles and the abolition of causes which produce vice and crime.
— Spies (1887 cited in: Lucy Eldine Parsons, August Vincent Theodore Spies (1969) Famous Speeches of the Eight Chicago Anarchists. p. 22
The killing of another, except in defense of human life, is archistic, authoritarian, and therefore, no Anarchist can commit such deeds. It is the very opposite of what anarchism stands for.
— Joseph Labadie, in "Anarchism and Crime" in Anarchism (1932)
anarchism is a manifestation of natural human urges … it is the tendency to create authoritarian institutions which is the transient aberration.
— George Woodcock?, in Anarchism (1963) The Family Tree
anarchism is founded on the observation that since few men are wise enough to rule themselves, even fewer are wise enough to rule others.
— Edward Abbey, in A Voice Crying in the Wilderness (Vox Clamantis en Deserto) : Notes from a Secret Journal (1990)
anarchism is not a romantic fable but the hardheaded realization, based on five thousand years of experience, that we cannot entrust the management of our lives to kings, priests, politicians, generals, and county commissioners.
— Edward Abbey, in A Voice Crying in the Wilderness (Vox Clamantis en Deserto) : Notes from a Secret Journal (1990)
Since the late Chicago outrages I have been patronizingly told how unfortunate it is that the Boston Anarchists, standing as they do for peace , and being the first to denounce violence , should suffer themselves to be confounded with those bloody mobbists who desecrate the true principles of anarchism through deeds which Liberty emphatically repudiates. On the whole, the term Anarchy is the proper one. It simply means opposed to the arbitrary rule of self-elected usurpers outside of the Individual .
— Henry Appleton, in The Boston Anarchists (1886) in Liberty Vol. IV, No. 3 (22 May 1886)]
anarchism is "stateless socialism ."
— Michael Bakunin, in "Stateless Socialism: Anarchism" as translated in The Political Philosophy of Bakunin (1953) by G.P. Maximoff
anarchism is voluntary cooperation for good , with the right of secession. A Christian anarchist is therefore one who turns the other cheek, overturns the tables of the moneychangers, and does not need a cop to tell him how to behave. A Christian anarchist does not depend upon bullets or ballots to achieve his ideal; he achieves that ideal daily by the One-Man Revolution with which he faces a decadent, confused, and dying world .
— Ammon Hennacy, "Christian Anarchism" in The Book of Ammon (1965)
An anarchist is someone who doesn't need a cop to make him behave. anarchism is voluntary cooperation with the right of secession. The individual or the family or the small group as a unit instead of the State.
— Ammon Hennacy, in The Book of Ammon (1965), p. 31
From my point of view the killing of another, except in defense of human life , is archistic, authoritarian , and therefore, no Anarchist can commit such deeds. It is the very opposite of what anarchism stands for.
— Joseph Labadie, in "Anarchism and Crime" in Anarchism (1932)
The nearer we come to the full military suppression of the bourgeoisie, the more dangerous becomes to us the high flood of petty-bourgeois anarchism. And the struggle against these elements cannot be waged with propaganda and agitation alone. … The struggle must also be waged by applying force and compulsion.
— Vladimir Lenin, as quoted in The Guillotine At Work : Twenty Years of Terror In Russia (1940) by Grigori? Petrovich Maksimov, p. 38
anarchism is, fundamentally, an ethical critique of authority almost an ethical duty to question and resist domination in all its forms.
— Saul Newman, in From Bakunin to Lacan ; Anti-Authoritarianism and the Dislocation of Power (2001), p. 166
anarchism is the view that a society without the state, or government, is both possible and desirable.
— The Shorter Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2005)
anarchism … may be described as the doctrine that all the affairs of men should be managed by individuals or voluntary associations, and that the State should be abolished.
— Benjamin Tucker, in State Socialism and Anarchism : How Far They Agree, and Wherein They Differ (1888)
