Anarchy 1
Contents of No. 1
March 1961
Paul Eltzbacher
The seven thinkers studied are william godwin, the ‘father of anarchism’, whose Political Justice published in 1793 was the first systematic exposition of anarchist thought; pierre-joseph proudhon, the first man to describe himself as an anarchist; michael bakunin, the Russian revolutionary, whose disputes with Marx in the First International marked a turning-point in socialist history; peter kropotkin, the most influential of anarchist thinkers, author of the sociological classic Mutual Aid, and founder of the anarchist paper “Freedom”; benjamin r. tucker, a representative of the 19th century American school of individualist anarchism; and leo tolstoy, whom many would be surprised to see classified as an anarchist, but whose philosophy of non-violent resistance to authority qualifies him for inclusion. The writings of some of these thinkers are so inaccessible today that Eltzbacher’s comparative study is invaluable to the student simply as an anthology of verbatim quotations of their ideas. Those who seek a statement of modern anarchist views in the fields of the family, education, sexual, social and industrial relations, will not find it in Eltzbacher. But what they will find, in a period which calls for radical re-thinking and re-appraisal in political philosophy, is an objective analysis of a point of view which runs counter to every school of contemporary political thought. The book was written at a time when the popular stereotype of an anarchist waas that of a bomb-thrower. Half a century later, in the century of the total state, when the bomb and its possession is the determinant of the politics of the modern state, this study of seven thinkers whose common factor is opposition to the state as an institution, is more timely and more important than when it first appeared.
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ANARCHY 2 will appear by the end of March Readers in industry |
COVER DRAWING by Michael Foreman, by kind permission of the artist and the publishers of “AMBIT”, a magazine of poems, drawings, short stories and criticism. (180 Regents Park Road, NW1).