Hey guys. This is an English translation of a script for a video our long time friend Eisen made on Anarchism. You can watch it in Italian here:
INTRODUCTION
Working on and bringing this topic to you is something I have been waiting for a long time. At the beginning I decided that this video should be something light-hearted, a video that was right on the mark, 20 minutes? And then see you next time. Despite this, with writing and the constant desire to find out more and more on this topic, I fell into a rather large "rabbit hole" which had the effect of fueling even more my desire to understand and research even more. That leads me to other results and this is how this ouroboros bites its own tail and begins this infinite circle dedicated to this word called "Anarchy".
Now, I know this may sound very Mortebianca, or Luca Vassalli as a concept. But fortunately for me I have decided to commit myself in my life to something that is quite close to the world of research and which is also connected to Theoretical Philosophy, ergo: we will not just focus on some Wikipedia page and on the memes made by someone on some "-Chan." But, taking away these jokes will only lead to swarms of "historians" and "philosophers" as pissed off as the average user. Because apparently just naming the name of their sacred figure makes them appear. But, useless dramas aside, let's finally move into what this world is that I define as magical.
The origin and principles of Anarchy
To talk about the ideals of anarchy we need to start from the boring part, ergo the historical and philosophical bases first of all.
The birth of the use of the term Anarchy has roots in Ancient Greece, where "αναρχία" represented that period or moment where within the polis there was no longer arché (i.e. rules or government per se), bringing a period of enormous imbalance and crisis within these, originally the meaning of "αναρχία" was not only linked to a concept that represented only the political or social sphere, but was also a metaphysical state that fell within the Greek mentality of the concepts of "Χάος" and of "ἁρμονία". But the connection between the ancient world and Proto-Anarchy does not end here, indeed, during the 2nd Century BC the writings of the Chinese philosopher 莊子 (Zhuāngzǐ/Chuang-tsu) speak of something very theoretically close to the concept of Anarchy:
Horses have hooves to walk on ice and snow: a hide to protect them from wind and cold. They eat and drink water and gallop freely over the open country; such is the true nature of horses. Big buildings are of no use to them.
One day, Po Lo came to say: "I understand how horses should be handled."
So he took them and branded them, shaved them, trimmed their hooves and haltered them, tying them by the head and binding them by the feet, and placed them in the stables, with the result that two or three of every ten died. Then, he made them starve and thirsty, he made them trot and gallop, he made them clean and harness themselves, he subjected them to the unhappiness of the tasseled bridle on the front and the fear of the knotted whip from behind, so much so that more than half of the horses died.
The Potter says: "With the clay I can do what I want. If I want it round I use the compass; if rectangular, a square."
The Carpenter says: "I can do what I want with the wood. If I want it curved, I use a bow; if straight, a straightedge."
But what justification do we have for thinking that the nature of clay and wood desires this application of the compass and the square, the bow and the straightedge? And yet, every era exalts Po Lo for his skill in dealing with horses, and potters and carpenters for their skill in dealing with clay and wood. With them ruling the empire they make the same mistake.
Now, I look at the government of the empire from a completely different point of view.
People certainly have natural instincts: weaving cloth and covering it, cultivating the land and feeding themselves. These instincts are common to all humanity, and all are in agreement as far as they are concerned. These instincts are said to be "heaven-sent."
And so in the times when natural instincts prevailed, men moved around calmly and looked at the world with a sure eye. At that time, there were no roads in the mountains, no boats, no bridges over the water. All things were produced, and each for its appropriate sphere. The birds and other animals multiplied; trees and shrubs grew. The former could be led by hand; you could climb a tree and go and have a look at the crow's nest. For then man cohabited with birds and beasts, and all creation was one. There was no distinction between nobles and plebeians. Since they were all equally devoid of knowledge, their virtue could not deviate from the right path. All being equally free from evil desires, he was in a state of natural wholeness, which is the perfection of human existence.
But when the Wise men appeared and began to trap people with charity and to bridle them with the discourse of duty towards others, doubt entered the world. And then, by dint of getting excited about music and making a big deal of ceremonial, the empire ended up dividing itself against itself.
Another moment of Proto-Anarchy still far from modern history, but not so far away this time we find it in the formation of the English Diggers who formed the Cobham Community in 1649, during the Dictatorship of the Lord Protector of England Oliver Cromwell.
The ideals of the community were extremely linked to the religious sphere, it is no coincidence that its formation was born after a moment of trance of the founder Gerrard Winstanley where he heard the Lord tell him "Work Together, Eat Together". In this revelation the community is born and all its ideals are inspired by biblical passages or quotes. Once formed, the community drew up the manifesto "True Levellers Standards Advanced", the manifesto pushed hard towards the promotion of concepts such as egalitarianism between men and the abolition of private property which was seen by the Diggers as a dishonor to Creation of God by proposing the redistribution of lands and the collective use of the woods to all the men of England (called the commons) so that anyone can realize the divine truth about how all men are created equal in the eyes of God.
But, the connotation of the term anarchy in the Western world will maintain its almost negative definition until reaching the Post-Napoleonic era, more precisely towards the 1840s thanks to the works of the French philosopher Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, who created the very first modern anarchist current under the name of "Mutualism", his doctrine in particular can be found through his essays: "What is Property? Or an Inquiry into the Principle of Law and Government" and "System of Contradictions economics or the Philosophy of Poverty". These writings of his help us to understand a good part of Proudhon's thoughts. Focusing on issues such as private property, criticism of the capitalist economic system and the regulated economy, and a solution to workplace and workers' rights and conditions. To quote some passages from "What is Property?":
《However, I do not build a system, I call for an end to privilege, the abolition of slavery, equal rights and the reign of laws.
Justice, nothing else; these are the Alpha and Omega of my topics: to others I leave the hustle and bustle of ruling the world》.
《Naming something is easy: the complicated part lies in discerning it before its appearance. In giving expression to the latter stages of an idea — an idea permeating all minds which may tomorrow be proclaimed by others if I fail to announce it today — I claim no merit except priority of expression. Should we praise the man who first sensed the dawn?
Yes: all men believe and repeat that equality of condition is identical with equality of rights; that Property and Theft are synonymous terms; that every social advantage granted, or rather usurped in the name of a talent or service, is unfair and extortionate. I say, all men in their hearts are witnesses to these truths; they just have to make sure they are understood》
Proudhon decides to base his writings and ideas heavily on the fundamental and (according to him) misunderstood concepts of Freedom, Equality and Fraternity, also touching on concepts such as: Fair wages, the taking of the means of production by communities between workers or by the individuals themselves, and finally arriving at theorizing a concept where within a society where a socialist-like system exists in itself with the exception that within it there is a market where the individual is independent in trading and being part of the market within their community.
If I were to give you a very simplistic version of Proudhon's ideals to help you understand it better: it is practically the "centrist" version of anarchy, being a middle ground between the philosophy based on the concept of "Common" and the philosophy based on "Individualistic" current. It could be defined as an anarchist version quite close to the concepts of Distributism but without all the fuss about Catholic social ethics or, well, the right to one's share of the land. But sharing its sense of a community (in this case of individuals) who live and govern themselves each for the goods and needs of the community in a free way.
Everything clear so far? Good, because unfortunately for you the heaviness doesn't end here, in fact, I'd say we've barely started as we now have to focus on an individual loved by many and who certainly people throughout history have managed not to take too literally and make him a kind of socio-philosophical-economic cult; I'm obviously talking about Karl Marx. More precisely, his best-known works "Das Kapital" and "The Communist Manifesto".
The Manifesto and Das Kapital (or “Capital” as it is commonly called among us) are texts that I assume many of you on this channel already know the slightest idea of what they are about. Given that not only are they the most important political and economic writings in the world of modern philosophy, Das Kapital first and foremost, the latter being a text present in many if not all philosophy programs present in high schools and even within university faculties based on humanities and economics.
Both essays as well as marking the beginning of the "Communist" ideology where Il Manifesto gives a very general imprint to the idea and with Das Kapital functioning as the much more complete version. Das Kapital especially will be the gear that will give an important development within the anarchist world.
And you would rightly exclaim at this with gusto - Eisen, but Das Kapital is not an anarchist book - And in theory you would be right in the technical sense, but on a theoretical level it is a gigantic "Circa". This is because in the part relating to the transition of power posthumously to the revolution there is indeed the affirmation of a Dictatorship of the Proletariat, but that it gradually dissolves and then arrives at the dissolution of the State and leaving only "the Commune" to govern itself which can pin this categorization on him. And it is precisely on this part relating to the transition of power and the dissolution of the state that brings to the fore the true, or rather, the true subjects to talk about, namely Mikhail Aleksandrovich Bakunin and Pyotr Alekseevič Kropotkin.
Starting with Bakunin; he will mainly focus his criticism of Ferdinand Lassalle's Theory of Marx and Social Democracy through one of his most famous works; "State and Anarchy."
Now, for State and Anarchy we would need a video in itself, given that the essay as a whole, in addition to being - allow me the term - fucking enormous, focuses not only on the Philosophical side but also on a Geopolitical analysis of the period in which he lives, focusing and talking about three states and societies that could have been "game changers" on the European scene: Russia, Germany and Italy. Analyzing the latter's companies and their state which was certainly not the most stable at the time.
But, we are not here for a complete analysis, we are here for the part that actually interests us; that is, the criticism of Marx and Lasalle. And in fact we can find Bakunin himself writing:
《We have already expressed thousands of times our profound aversion towards the Theory of Lasalle and Marx, who recommend to workers, if not as the ultimate ideal, but at least as the main and immediate objective, the creation of the Volksstaat. As they explained it, this will be nothing more than "the proletarian class ascending to the ruling class."
If the proletariat will be the ruling class, one wonders, who will govern it? There will have to be a new proletarian class that will have to be subject to this change, this new state.
It could be the peasant offspring, for example, who, as we know, do not enjoy the favor of the Marxists, and who, are at a lower cultural level, which will be governed by the urban and factory proletarians. Or, if we look at it from the national point of view, then, presumably, as long as the Germans are worried about the Slavs who, for some reason, continue to have a submissive attitude towards the victorious German Proletariat that they themselves have for the their own bourgeoisie.
If there is a State, then necessarily there is domination and consequently slavery. A state without slavery, open or disguised is inconceivable – this is the reason why we are enemies of the state.
What does "The Proletarian ascended to a ruling class" mean? will the entire Proletariat govern? The German ones are around 40 million. Will each of those 40 million be members of the government? The entire nation would rule but no one will be ruled. Then there will be no government, there will be no state; but if there is a state, there will be rulers and there will be slaves.
In Marxist theory this dilemma is answered in a simplistic way. By popular government he means a government of the people which elects a certain number of magistrates elected by the people. These so-called popular representatives are state rulers elected by the national population based on universal suffrage - the last word of the Marxists, and even that of the democratic school - they are a lie behind which there is nothing but the despotism of a small ruling class concentrates, a lie that represents something much more dangerous by masquerading behind the expression of popular will.
So, from whatever point of view we view the situation, it always dilutes towards the same result: The government of a vast majority of the population by a privileged minority. But this minority, at least the Marxists say, will be made up of workers. Yes, or rather, of former workers, who, the moment they become rulers or representatives of the people, will stop being workers and will begin to look at the world of workers from the state pedestal. They no longer represent the people except themselves and their pretentiousness in wanting to govern the people. Whoever doubts this then is not familiar with the nature of us humans.
But those who have been elected will be passionately committed as Enlightened Socialists. The term "Enlightened Socialist" and "Scientific Socialism" which constantly appears in the writings and speeches of Lasallians and Marxists are proof that their pseudo-popular state is nothing more than the highly despotic government of the masses by a new and small aristocracy of scholars or those who pretend to be such. The people are not educated, therefore they will be freed entirely from the attentions of the government and totally included in the government flock. What a beautiful liberation!
Marxists note this contradiction, and recognize that a government of schoolchildren, the most oppressive, lowest and most derogatory that there is in this world is a dictatorship despite its Democratic forms, offering the consoling thought that this dictatorship is temporary and brief. They declare that their concern and goal is to educate the population and make it grow economically and politically to such a high level that any type of government is no longer necessary together with the state, losing its political and governing role, it will transform in an organization free from economic and community interests.
There is a fragrant contradiction here. If this state really has to be the Volksstaat, why abolish it? But if this abolition is essential to the effective freedom of the people, why call it "Volksstaat" in the first place? Our polemics against them have forced them to recognize that freedom or anarchy – which is the voluntary organization of workers going from bottom to top – is the ultimate goal of social development, and that every state, including their Volksstaat it is a scheme that gives the green light to despotism on the one hand and slavery on the other.》
And after all this papyrus of which I took a part Bakunin probably felt very proud of his criticism, and that, probably, those foolish Socialists will feel like idiots for having kicked him out of the international conference in The Hague the year before; It's a shame that Bakunin didn't take into account one individual in particular… Karl Marx himself. That after reading Bakunin's text, he writes Engels a letter where he goes against Bakunin's essay, which letter is found in the collection entitled "Critique of Anarchism" (Holy shit this thing never ends) where, in his very cordial attitude Marx wrote:
«Schoolboy nonsense! A radical social revolution is linked to certain historical conditions of economic development; these constitute the premise. It is therefore possible only where, with capitalist production, the industrial proletariat assumes at least a prominent position among the mass of the people. [...] He understands nothing of the social revolution, he only understands the political phases; for him economic conditions do not exist. Since all the economic forms that have followed until today, developed or underdeveloped, imply the enslavement of the worker (whether in the form of the wage worker, the peasant, etc.), he believes that an equally radical revolution is possible in all of them. [...] Will, not economic conditions, is the foundation of his social revolution »
And with this answer the two would continue to hate each other until one of them died. Marking not only the great gap between Anarchy and Communism... but also marking the first feud in the world of the left.
On the other hand, Kropotkin will be considered the first effective theorist of the Anarcho-Communist current, creating several works committed to defining the beliefs, actions and limits of this ideology: "Anarchist Morality", "The Conquest of Bread", " The philosophy and ideal of anarchy" and "The State and its historical role" are the cornerstone of the theoretical world when talking about concepts such as anarchy or, anarcho-communism in this case; also in this case we note not only an analysis and criticism of the exploitation of the bourgeoisie from the fruits of the industrial revolution, but we also note a very harsh criticism of the Socialists of the time:
《 In this long period of turmoil, which has lasted for thousands and thousands of years, mankind has nevertheless accumulated untold treasures. He cleared the soil, drained the swamps, penetrated the forests, laid out roads; he constructed, invented, observed, reasoned; created
of complicated instruments, he has wrested her secrets from nature, he has tamed steam; so much so that, today, at his birth, the son of civilized man finds at his disposal a capital which allows him to obtain, with nothing more than his own work combined with the work of others, riches surpassing the dreams of the Orientals in their tales of One Thousand and One Nights.
[...]On the virgin soil of the American prairies, one hundred men aided by powerful machines
in a few months they produce the grain necessary for the life of ten thousand people for an entire year. Where man wants to double, triple, hundredfold his production ratio, he only has to "form" the suitable soil, give each plant the appropriate care, and he will obtain prodigious harvests. And while in other times the hunter had to make himself master of one hundred square kilometers
of land to be able to obtain nourishment for his family, the civilized man grows, with infinitely less difficulty and with greater security, everything he needs to make his people live on a ten thousandth part of that space.
The climate is no longer an obstacle. When the sun is missing, man replaces it with heat
artificial, waiting to also create the light to develop the vegetation. With glass and hot water pipes, it collects ten times more products in a given space than it could before.
The wonders that have been accomplished in the industry are even more astonishing. With those intelligent beings, which are modern machines, - the fruit of three or four generations of inventors, most of them unknown, - one hundred men make what to clothe ten thousand men for two years. In the well-organized coal mines, one hundred men annually extract enough fuel to heat ten thousand families under a rigorous climate. And we saw lately
an entire marvelous city arose in a few months on the Champ de Mars(4), without the regular work of the French nation suffering the slightest interruption.
[...]Yes, of course, we are rich, infinitely richer than you might think. Rich for that
that we already own; even richer for what we can produce with the current mechanisms; infinitely richer for what we could obtain from our soil, our manufacturing, our science and our technical knowledge, if all this were applied to providing well-being
universal.
II
We are rich in civilized societies. So why is there this misery around us? Why this painful work of the masses, to the point of brutalization? Why this uncertainty of tomorrow, even for the best paid workers, in the midst of so much wealth handed down to us as an inheritance from the past, and despite the large and powerful means of production that would give comfort to everyone, in compensation for a few hours of daily work ?
The socialists have said it and said it a thousand times. Every day they repeat it and demonstrate it with
arguments deduced from all sciences. Because everything that is necessary for production - the soil, the mines, the machines, the means of communication, the food, the housing, the education, the science - everything, finally, has been grabbed by some in the course of this long history of looting, exoduses, wars, ignorance and oppression, which humanity experienced before having learned to tame the forces of Nature.
Because, taking advantage of the alleged rights acquired in the past, they today appropriate two thirds of the products of human labor which they then disperse in the most senseless, most scandalous waste; because, having reduced the masses to having nothing left to live on for a month or even eight days, they do not allow man to work except when he allows the lion's share to be taken away from them; because they prevent him from producing what he needs, and force him to produce not what would be necessary for others, but what ensures the greatest profits for the
exploiter.
All socialism is here.》
(The Conquest of Bread, Our riches - Page 12-13)
《The government socialists, the radicals, the misunderstood geniuses of journalism, the impressive speakers, bourgeois and ex-workers, will run to the town hall, to the ministries, to take possession of the abandoned seats. Some will proudly adorn themselves with braids, admiring themselves in the ministerial mirrors and trying to give orders with an air of gravity, befitting the new position they occupy. They need a red band, a cap threaded with braids and a masterful gesture to impose themselves on their old companions in the editorial office or in the laboratory. The others will immerse themselves in the rubbish with the best will to understand something. They will draft laws, they will promulgate decrees with high-sounding phrases, which no one will undertake to implement - precisely because we are in a revolution.
To give themselves an authority that they lack, they will seek the sanction of ancient forms of government. They will take on the name of Provisional Government, Committee of Public Health, Mayor, Commander of the Municipality, Head of Security, and so on. Elected or acclaimed, they will meet in parliaments or municipal councils. There you will meet men belonging to ten, twenty different schools, which are not personal shrines as is often said, but correspond to particular ways of conceiving the extension, the importance, the duties of the Revolution, possibilists, collectivists, radicals, Jacobins, Blanquists, gathered by force; they waste their time arguing. The honest will be confused with the ambitious, who dream only of dominion and the contempt of the crowd from which they emerged. Having all arrived with diametrically opposed ideas, they will be forced to conclude fictitious alliances, to constitute majorities that will last for a day: they will squabble, treating each other as reactionaries, authoritarians, scoundrels; unable to agree on any serious measure, they will be dragged into gossiping about nonsense; managing only to abort loud proclamations, everyone will be taken seriously, while the real strength of the movement will be in the streets.
All this can amuse those who are theater lovers. But once again: this is not the revolution, and nothing revolutionary is done yet! During this time the people suffer. The workshops go on strike, the laboratories are closed, trade stagnates. The worker no longer receives even the derisory wages he previously had, and on the other hand the price of all goods increases! With that heroic self-sacrifice that always distinguishes the people, and which reaches the sublime on great occasions, they are patient. It is the people who in 1848 exclaimed: "We put three months of misery on the services of the Republic" while the "representatives" and the gentlemen of the new government, down to the last cop, regularly collected their pay! The people suffer. In his childish trust, with the good-nature of the masses who believe in his agitators, he waits for them up there, in the Chamber, in the City Hall, in the Committee of Public Safety to take care of him. But up there they think about everything, except the suffering of the crowd. When famine tortures France in 1793 and compromises the revolution; when the people are reduced to extreme poverty, while the elegant Parisian promenade of the Champs Elysees teems with proud chariots where the ladies show off their sumptuous hairstyles, Robespierre insists on the Jacobin assembly to discuss his memory on the English Constitution ! When in 1848 the worker suffered from the general suspension of industry, the Provisional Government and the Chamber quarreled over military pensions and prison work, without asking themselves what the people lived on during these periods of crisis. And if a reproach must be made against the Paris Commune, born under the cannon of the Prussians and lived for just seventy days, it is that it did not understand that the communal revolution could not triumph without well-fed fighters, and that with thirty sous a day one cannot he can at the same time fight on the ramparts and support his family. The people suffer and
question: So what can we do to get out of this intricate situation?
III
Well! It seems to us that there is only one answer to this question: – Recognize and loudly proclaim that everyone, whatever their party, their origin or their school may have been in the past, whatever their strength or weakness may have been, his aptitudes or his inability, he possesses, first of all, "the right to live"; and that it is up to the Society to distribute among all, without exception, the means of existence at its disposal. Recognize this, proclaim it, and act accordingly!
Ensure that, from the first day of the Revolution, the worker knows that a new era is opening up before him: that no one will now be forced to sleep under bridges, near the palaces of the rich; to remain fast as long as there is food; shivering in the cold near the fur warehouses. That everything belongs to everyone, in reality as in the beginning, and that a revolution finally takes place in history that deals with the "needs" of the people, before teaching them about their "duties".
And this will not be accomplished by means of decrees, but only by coming into possession of everything that is necessary to ensure everyone's life. This is the only truly scientific way of proceeding, the only one that is understood and desired by the people.
Take possession, in the name of the rebellious people, of the grain deposits, the warehouses full of clothes, the habitable houses. Waste nothing, organize yourself immediately to reoccupy the gaps, meet all needs, satisfy all needs, produce, no longer to give profit to
whoever, but to make society live and develop.
Enough of those ambiguous formulas, such as the "right to work", with which the government has flattered itself
people in 1848 and they are still trying to flatter them! We have the courage to recognize that prosperity, now possible, must be achieved at all costs.
When, in 1848, the workers demanded the right to work, national or municipal workshops were organized, and men were sent to work in these workshops at the rate of forty sous a day! When they asked about the organization of work, they were told:
«Be patient, my friends, the government will take care of it, and for today here is forty sous.
Rest, you rough workers, who have struggled all your life! And in the meantime the cannons were aimed. Troop appeals and counter-appeals were made; the workers themselves were disorganized with the thousand means that the bourgeois know so well. And one fine day they were told: "Go and colonize Africa, or else we will machine-gun you!".
The result will be entirely different if workers demand "the right to well-being". For this reason they proclaim their right to take possession of all social wealth; to take houses and stay there, according to the needs of each family; to take the accumulated food and use it in such a way as to experience comfort after having only experienced hunger too much. They proclaim their right to all riches - the fruit of the labor of past and present generations, and use them in such a way as to enjoy the high enjoyments of art and science, which for too long were
monopoly of the bourgeois.
And, in affirming their right to wealth, they proclaim – what is even more important – their right to decide themselves what this wealth should be, what must be produced to ensure it, and what must be abandoned, because it is no longer value.
The right to wealth is the possibility of living as human beings, and of raising children to do so
of equal members of a society superior to ours, while the "right to work" is the right to always remain a wage slave, a hardworking man, governed and exploited by the bourgeois of tomorrow. The right to wealth is social equality; the right to work is at most an industrial prison.
The worker has been proclaiming his right to the common inheritance for a long time now, and it is time that
he finally takes possession of it..
(The Conquest of Bread, Comfort for all - Pages 21-23)
At the end of this long criticism, we find on the next page an entire chapter dedicated to the concept of "Anarchist Communism"; Kropotkin states in this chapter how Communism and Anarchy tend to be very close, almost synonymous. Bringing to the table the theory that not only is there a transition from "State" to "Common" but also a transition from "Collectivism" to "Individualism":
《Every society that wants to break away from private property will be forced, in our opinion, to organize itself in anarchist communism. Anarchy leads to communism, and communism to anarchy, both being the expression of the predominant tendency of modern societies, the search for equality.
There was a time when a peasant family could consider it as their own product
her own work was the wheat she matured and the woolen clothes weaved in the hut. But even then, this way of thinking was not correct at all. Since there were already roads and bridges built in common, swamps drained with collective work, as well as municipal pastures surrounded by hedges that everyone contributed to maintaining. An improvement made in the craft of weaving, or in the way of dyeing fabrics, was beneficial to everyone; in that era, a peasant family could only live on the conditions of finding support, on a thousand occasions, in the village, in the municipality.
But today, in this state of industry where everything is intertwined and mutually supported,
where each branch of production uses all the others, the claim of wanting to attribute an individualistic origin to the products does not hold up in any way. If the textile and metallurgical industries have reached a marvelous perfection in civilized countries, they owe it to the simultaneous development of a thousand other industries, large and small; they owe it to the extension of railway networks, to transatlantic navigation, to the skill of millions of workers, to a certain level of general culture of the entire working class, to work, finally, carried out from one end of the world to the other .
[...]How can we estimate each person's share of the riches that we all contribute to accumulating?
Starting from this general and synthetic point of view of production, we cannot
admit with the collectivists that remuneration proportional to the hours of work carried out by each person for the production of wealth could be an ideal, or even a step towards this ideal. Without discussing here whether the exchange value of goods is really calculated in current society by the quantity of labor necessary to produce them (as stated by Smith and Ricardo, whose traditions Marx followed and revived), it will suffice to say, except to return to it later, that the collectivist ideal seems unachievable in a society that considers the tools of production as a common heritage. Based on this principle, it would then be forced to immediately abandon all forms of wages.
We are convinced that the individualism attenuated by the collectivist system could not exist alongside the partial communism of the land and work tools owned by all. new form of possession also requires a new form of remuneration. A new form of production could not preserve the ancient form of consumption, just as it could not adapt to the ancient forms of political organization.
[...]We further argue that communism is not only desirable, but that current societies based on individualism are also "forced to continually advance towards communism." The development of individualism during the last three centuries can be explained above all by the efforts of man who wanted to protect himself against the powers of capital and the State[...]
[...]In fact, alongside this individualist current, we see throughout modern history the tendency to retain on the one hand what remains of the partial communism of antiquity, and on the other to re-establish the communist principle in thousands and thousands of manifestations of life.
Since the Communes of the tenth, eleventh and twelfth centuries managed to emancipate themselves from secular or religious lordship, they immediately gave a great extension to common work, to common consumption.》
(The Conquest of Bread, Anarchist Communism — Page 24-25)
《Even in taking "anarchy" as an ideal of political organization, we are merely formulating another decided tendency of humanity. Whenever the progress of the development of European societies allowed it, they shook off the yoke of authority and outlined a system based on the principles of individual freedom. And we observe in history that the periods during which governments were shaken, following partial or general revolts, were eras of immediate progress on the economic and intellectual terrain.
It is sometimes the emancipation of municipalities, whose monuments – the fruit of the free labor of
free associations – have never since been surpassed; now it is the peasant uprising, which created the Reformation and endangered the Papacy; now it is the Society, momentarily free, which the discontents who set sail from old Europe created on the other side of the Atlantic.
And if we observe the present development of civilized nations, we see it, without fear
to deceive us, an increasingly accentuated movement to limit the government's sphere of action, and leave ever greater freedom to the individual. Today's evolution is hampered, it is true, by the jumble of institutions and prejudices inherited from the past; like all evolutions, it only awaits the revolution to overthrow the old slums that hinder its path, to take a free impetus in the regenerated society.》
(The Conquest of Bread, Anarchist Communism — Page 42-43)
These passages make us notice the difference between Bakunin's vision and that of Kropotkin; where the first completely denounces the revolutionary vision and the post-revolutionary project of Marx's followers, promoting an action that is revolutionary and leads to an immediate result of absolute equality once finished, while in the second case we have a vision where Communism is synonymous with Anarchy, marking not only a much more "grey" vision of communist anarchy, but also marking the Syncretism of anarchy with the relationship with communism. Over time these theories will continue to be integrated with Marx's visions in a much more heterodox way, moving away from Orthodox thought leading to the creation in France of the first Anarcho-Communist movement, or also called "The Libertarians" with Joseph Déjacques, a term that will later come literally stolen by Murray Rothbard to describe and categorize the Libertarians (primarily anarcho capitalists) that we all know. But we'll talk about them shortly. Also because our historical pippo doesn't end here.
Because in all this chaos we must now focus on the second anarchist current which developed in parallel to the more "communitarian" current and which is also a fundamental element of anarchy; that is, individualistic thinking.
The individualistic current of anarchy can be traced in this case with the Mutualist thought of Proudhon himself. This form of thought, unlike the community vision which focuses on the conscience and strength of the group as a movement of revolution and achievement of anarchist society; individualists, on the other hand, tend to focus much more on the capabilities, expression and freedom of the individual which is seen as a spirit held back or repressed from its full potential by the state, or by various aspects of the society in which it lives such as traditions, taboos and in some cases the sense of personal decency.
And I think it is better to talk first of all about the elephant in the room, the most well-known character when talking about the individualist current, is certainly a man who you will have heard of at least once: Max Stirner.
Stirner is a... complicated, peculiar individual I would say. Outside of his famous "portrait", there is not much information about him, indeed, for a long time it was thought that he did not exist, like the doubt about the existence of Socrates, nothing more than a character invented by someone 'other (in this case an invention of Marx and Engels), but nowadays we have confirmation that Stirner actually existed thanks to Marx's letters and Engels' writings where they complain about the character, but also thanks to the works of Stirner himself. "The unique and its property" is the basis of Stirner's concepts, a philosophy based on the selfishness and free will of man, where everything that limits us is nothing else than what he names as "Bogeymen" , a limit that our "Geist" (The mind and/or spirit) places on us. And these bogeymen can be anything. From our conception of morality and modesty up to the institutions or even the very concept of God, the one who is the freest of all but at the same time the one who is put in the middle the most to defend his own "Geist". For Stirner, these are the elements that hold man back from expressing themselves and that develop once they have overcome their childhood, and this can be seen clearly in his writings:
《 Spirit is called the first self-discovery, the first de-divinization of the divine, that is, of the disturbing, of the ghosts, of the "superior powers". Now nothing anymore makes an impression on our fresh feeling of youth, on our awareness of ourselves: the world is despised, since we are superior to it, we are spirit. Only now do we realize that until now we have not observed the world with the eyes of the spirit at all, but have only stared at it in astonishment. We exert our first forces against natural forces. Parents impose themselves on us like a natural force; later it is a question of abandoning father and mother and considering every natural force broken. They are outdated. For the rational man, that is, for the "spiritual man", there is no family as a natural force: a rejection of parents, brothers, etc. manifests itself. If these are "reborn" as spiritual, rational forces, they are absolutely no longer what they were before. And not only parents, but men in general are defeated by the young man: they are no longer an obstacle to him and he no longer worries about them: because, as they say, more than men, one must obey God.
(Stirner.Max, The unique and its property, Adelphi, 1999 – MAN - Page 19-20)
《 If in childhood we had to overcome the resistance of the laws of the world, now we come up against, in everything that lies before us, an objection from the spirit, from reason, from one's own conscience. "This is unreasonable, anti-Christian, anti-patriotic": with these objections, or similar ones, the voice of conscience intimidates us and distracts us from what we had in mind to do. What we now fear is neither the power of the vengeful Eumenides, nor the wrath of Poseidon, nor God, although he sees even the most hidden things, nor the father's rod, but rather - conscience. We "abandon ourselves to our thoughts" and follow their commandments just as we used to follow those of parents or men. Our actions conform to our thoughts (ideas, representations, beliefs), just as they conformed, in childhood, to the orders of our parents.》
(Stirner Max, The only one and his property, Adelphi, 1999 – MAN - Page 21-22)
With ghosts we enter the realm of spirits, the realm of beings and essences.
The mysterious and "incomprehensible" presence that wanders around the cosmos is precisely the arcane phantom that we call the supreme being. For thousands of years men have set themselves the task of thoroughly investigating this phantom, of understanding it and finding a reality in it (of proving "the existence of God") and thus torment themselves with the atrocious impossibility, with the It is the Danaids' interminable work of transforming the ghost into a non-ghost, the unreal into something real, the spirit into a complete and corporeal person. Behind the existing world they looked for the "thing in itself", the essence, and behind the thing the non-thing, the absurd [das Unding].
(Stirner Max, The only one and his property, Adelphi, 1999 – MEN OF ANCIENT AND MODERN TIMES, Ghosts - Page 94)
《Be careful: your head is full of ghosts and fixations! You imagine great things and you picture a whole world of gods that would be there for you, a kingdom of spirits to which you feel called, an ideal that beckons to you. You have a fixed idea! Don't think that I am joking or speaking in images, if I consider all men who are fixated on something superior - and they are the enormous majority, almost all of humanity - completely crazy, insane.
[...] If you recognize that such a fixed idea is a symptom of madness, lock up those who are its slave in a mental hospital. And perhaps the truth of faith which cannot be doubted, the majesty, for example, of the people which cannot be attacked (whoever does so is guilty of treason), the virtue against which the censor cannot allow a single word, so that morality remains pure, etc., aren't they all "fixed ideas"? Or is all the idiotic chatter of our newspapers, for example, not the talk of madmen, of maniacs of fixed ideas of morality, legality, Christianity, etc.? If it seems that these madmen are walking free, it is only because the mental hospital in which they find themselves is as big as the world. Try to touch one of these madmen with his fixed idea, and you will immediately find yourself having to defend your back from his furious attacks.
[...]》
(Stirner Max, The unique and its property, Adelphi, 1999 – MEN OF ANCIENT AND MODERN TIMES, Fixations - Page 103-104)
《What do you want to free yourself from? From your dry bread and your straw mattress? Good: throw them away! But it seems that you are still not happy; rather, you want the freedom to enjoy those delicious dishes and those soft beds. Should men give you this "freedom", this permission? You don't hope so much from their love for others, because you know that they all think like you: others begin with themselves! How then do you want to procure the enjoyment of those foods and those beds? Certainly not in any other way than this: by making it your property! If you think about it, you don't simply want the freedom to have all those beautiful things, in fact the freedom to have them doesn't mean really having them; you, on the other hand, want to actually have them, you want to call them yours and own them as your property. What good is freedom to you if it gives you nothing? And if you were free from everything, you would have nothing left; freedom, in fact, is empty of content. For those who don't know how to use it, it has no value, because it is just a useless permission; but the way in which I use it depends on my own individuality.
I have no objection to freedom, but I wish you something more than freedom: you should not only be free from what you don't want, that is, be deprived of it, but also have what you want. You should be not only a "free man" but also a "proprietary individual." Free, and from what? How many things can be shaken off! The yoke of slavery, of supreme authority, of aristocracy and princes, the dominion of lusts and passions; indeed, the very dominion of one's own will, of one's own whim, the most complete denial of oneself is nothing other than freedom: freedom, precisely, from self-determination, from one's own ego; and so the yearning for freedom understood as something absolute, deserving of every price, has taken away our own individuality, creating self-denial. And so the more free I become, the more I am overcome by constraints in the face of which I feel more and more helpless.》
(Stirner Max, The unique and its property, Adelphi, 1999 – THE OWN INDIVIDUALITY- Page 394-396)
The "Stirnerian" Anarchy we can see from what we read that instead of being based purely on a political and social point of view of anarchy it would instead seem to focus on a more philosophical aspect. Where the individual, his desires and will are the focus. Channeling all this into a vision where the Hegelian conflict is concentrated primarily within us. Ergo the struggle and liberation of one's own "I" (also called "Ego" in this case) against all the moralities that prevent us from improving ourselves and achieving our goals. Ergo we have a union between the philosophy of Hegelian conflict combined with the spirit of determinism that we find in Nietzsche's writings. And that once the bugaboos have been overcome and everyone is free to carry out and respect their own wishes, a society of individuals can be created. Characterizing Stirnerian thought as an extreme expression of the individualist current.
Having removed the elephant in the room, individualist anarchy is mostly mobilized on French soil, moreover, as mentioned before, it is based on Proudhon's conceptions, forming various circles and even newspapers such as "l'Anarchie" by Zo d'Axa & Rirette Maîtrejean. Of this circle, one of the first thinkers and director among other things of the newspaper was Anselme Bellegarrigue, participant in the Revolution of 1848 against Louis Philippe I of Orleans, he has a quite similar vision on the same field as Stirner and he wrote in 1850 " Le Manifeste" or as it is normally referred to, "The Anarchist Manifesto", the first true political and social essay on anarchy.
The Bellegarrigue Manifesto is divided into two points: The first is the manifesto itself where anarchy is defined, its individualistic nature, and the denunciation of the state as a monopoly on violence, its manipulation of thought and collective will to shape the 'individualism, the uselessness of parties and the resulting elections ending with the announcement of civil disobedience to remove the following system.
The second point of the Manifesto delves into the process towards the revolution and the establishment of the Anarchist Commune.
The chapter "Anarchy Is Order" gives us a smattering of what anarchy is for Bellegarrigue:
《In ancient times, indeed, anarchy was civil war, not because it meant absence of governments but, rather, because it meant a multiplicity of them and competition and strife among the governing classes. The modern notion of absolute social truth or pure democracy has ushered in an entire series of discoveries or interests which have turned the terms of the traditional equation upside down. Thus anarchy, which, when contrasted with the term monarchy, means civil war, is, from the advantage point of absolute or democratic truth, nothing less than the true expression of social order.》
《Indeed:
Who says anarchy, says denial of government;
Who says denial of government says affirmation of the people;
Who says affirmation of the people, says individual liberty;
Who says individual liberty, says sovereignty of each;
Who says sovereignty of each, says equality;
Who says equality, says solidarity or fraternity;
Who says fraternity, says social order;
By contrast:
Who says government, says denial of the people;
Who says denial of the people, says affirmation of political authority;
Who says affirmation of political authority, says individual dependency;
Who says individual dependency, says class supremacy;
Who says class supremacy, says inequality;
Who says inequality, says antagonism;
Who says antagonism, says civil war,
From which it follows that who says government, says civil war.》
(Bellegarrigue Anselme, Anarchy, a Journal of Order, l'Anarchie, 1850 – Issue One, The World's First Anarchist
Poster, Anarchy Is Order – Page 8-9)
A characteristic that can be noted within the manifesto is this sense of repudiation of the revolutionary mentality, in fact shortly after the statement we read he denounces the concept of "civil war". And we find ourselves at the beginning of the chapter "Revolution" where he criticizes the revolutionary mentality and analyzes it by comparing it with his participation in the Revolution of 1848:
《A government is set up. In the very instant of its creation, it has its servants and, as a result, its supporters; and the moment that it has its supporters it has its adversaries too.That very fact alone quickens the seed of civil war, because the government, resplendent in its authority, cannot possibly act with regard to its adversaries the way it does with regard to its supporters.
There is no possibility of the former's not feeling his favour, nor of the latter's not being persecuted. From which it follows that there is likewise no possibility of conflict between the favored faction and the oppressed faction not arising from this disparity, sooner or later. In other words, once the government is in
place, the favoritism that is the basis of privilege and which provokes division, spawns antagonism and civil strife becomes inevitable.
From which it follows that government is civil war. There need only be a government supporter on the one hand and an adversary of the government on the other for strife to
erupt among the citizenry: it is plain that, outside of the love or hatred borne towards the government, civil war has no raison d'etre, which means to say that for peace to be established, the citizenry need merely refrain from being, on the one hand, supporters and, on the other, adversaries of the government.
But refraining from attacking or defending the government so as to make civil war impossible is nothing short of paying it no heed, tossing it on to the dung heap and dispensing with it in order to lay the foundations of social order.》
(Bellegarrigue Anselme, Anarchy, a Journal of Order, l'Anarchie, 1850 – Issue One, The World's First Anarchist
Poster, Anarchy Is Order – Page 9-10)
《In theory, the Revolution is the development of well-being.
In practice, it has only been the extension of malaise.
The Revolution is supposed to enrich everyone: that is the
idea.
The Revolution has ruined everyone: that is the fact.
Do you know why the revolutionary fact finds itself so strongly in dissonance with the idea?
Nothing is more simple: in theory, the revolution should make itself, and each social interest should furnish to it its part of the action; in practice, the Revolution has been made by a handful of individuals and submitted to the authority of a group of rhetoricians.
The essential genius of the Revolution is the acquisition of wealth; the dominant instinct of the revolutionaries is the hatred of riches, and this is precisely why, by becoming wealthy, the revolutionaries cease to be revolutionary. While each seeks to enrich himself by labor and industry, while everyone loudly demands the calm which multiplies transactions and constantly displaces wealth by mobilizing and
developing it; while, in that way, the true Revolution, that of individual needs and interests, struggles with vigor against the nuisances and barriers of the tyrannical regulations of the governments, the revolutionaries arrive, a fateful tribe who, to satisfy their sole, sordid desire— to offer themselves as replacements in power for men already pushed aside by the
force of things—halt the general advance, suspend the solemn manifestation of the public interests, paralyze the Revolution,
complicate the legislative details which the social facts seek to suppress, and consolidate the governmental mastery that business was in the process of subjugating.
There are, in truth, no worse counter-revolutionaries than the revolutionaries; for there are no worse citizens than the envious.》
(Bellegarrigue Anselme, Anarchy, a Journal of Order, l'Anarchie, 1850 – Issue Two, The Revolution, I – Page 58-59)
《The institution of the State can only be overthrown by the opposite institution. Now, the opposite of the State is the individual, as the opposite of fiction is fact. Let the individual constitute itself and the State perishes; let liberty be established and authority disappears.
But how, I am asking, should liberty be established? How will the individual be constituted? The individual will constitute itself by applying itself to doing itself that which, thus far, has been left to the initiative of
the State. Liberty establishes itself in labor, production, wealth, and not otherwise.
I know nothing more obscure than the demonstration from evidence. The analysis of a simple notion demands so much care that I would lose courage if I did not feel myself aided by the attention that the public gives to these questions today.
When I speak of the substitution of the individual for the State, I mean that the regulatory legislation by means of which
the State has appropriated the direction of public affairs must be repealed, and that each individual must from now on conduct their own affairs, not in conformity to the laws of the State, but by virtue of their own instinct, and directed by their own interests .
But we cannot ask the assemblies to repeal the laws. The repeal of the laws of the State cannot come from the initiative of the State. The State cannot dispossess itself. That operation comes down, as a matter of fact and right, to the initiative of the individuals who have empowered the State.》
(Bellegarrigue Anselme, Anarchy, a Journal of Order, l'Anarchie, 1850 – Issue Two, The Revolution, I – Page 80-81)
From this chapter onwards Bellegarrigue speaks focusing on his concept of revolution. A slow revolution, but not in a reformist sense, rather, a revolution based on civil disobedience and the gradual transformation of the state to eliminate itself through the lack of funds and capital to support itself. The replacement of the police with universal security, industrial capital transforming into free capital with the implementation of freedom of industry, and finally full freedom of the press, the result – states Bellegarrigue – would lead the state to shrink in its fundamental roles taking it from its internal or "domestic" role to an external or "diplomatic" role government. The last "step" of the revolution is found in the establishment of individuals' voting abstentionism, thus ending once and for all the domination of the parties and of the idealisms that could prevail over the individual will, ending both the eternal bipolarism of the parties as guarantors and pieces of the state and guaranteeing true freedom.
Together with Bellegarrigue the line of French individualism will also develop with Han Ryner through his Individualist Manual of 1903, where within Ryner will not only promote a vision through a more pacifist methodology, but in his writings one can also see the influence and promotion of Stoicism. A philosophy that Ryner believed to be fundamental, and, as the manual itself testifies, he seems to focus much more on the improvement of individuals than on a sudden change.
«Society is as inevitable as death. On the material plane, our power is weak against such limits. But the wise man destroys within himself the respect and fear of society just as he destroys within himself the fear of death. He is indifferent to the political and social form of the environment in which he lives just as he is indifferent to the type of death that awaits him [...]. The wise man knows that neither social injustice nor sea water is destroyed. But he strives to save an oppressed person from a particular injustice, just as he dives into the water in an attempt to save someone who risks drowning."
(Ryner Han, Petit manuel individualiste, 1903)
But it is certainly not all rosy in the individualist world, given that every action corresponds to an equal and opposite reaction, it would be illusory for me not to mention that the current of individualists obviously has a revolutionary strand. The majority of this group falls into the category of "Illegalists", and two names can be mentioned from this current: the French Zo d'Axa and the Italian Renzo Novatore.
Now, I won't be here to fill you with more quotations, reading and other fields since we are at the end of this historical part on how anarchy develops. So I'll explain it to you in an easy way:
According to d'Axa and Novatore the only way to achieve anarchy is not with passive disobedience or the improvement of society, but rather the key would be found in banditry and the use of illegal acts as a form of self-financing and a means to achieve Revolution. In fact, both subjects in their writings not only encourage the figure and work of banditry, but they also saw it as something artistic, something Romantic, in fact Novatore coincidentally was part of Marinetti's Futurist Movement.
« Mine is not a thought or a theory, but a state of mind, a particular way of feeling. When I feel the need to decisively release my Centaurs and my furious stallions, there will be a crazy orgy of love and blood around me, because I am, I feel, what the inhabitants of the moral swamps of society call common criminal. »
(Novatore Renzo, Above the two anarchies, on Vertice, La Spezia, 21 April 1921)
EH! I told you, "no quotations" and then, here it is. Jokes aside, these were the currents on which anarchy was born and was initially based. This historical part was exhausting, especially for myself.
But our journey doesn't end here, because unfortunately there is "everything else".
ALL THE REST
Ok then, I created this category for all those currents of thought that developed there after or during this whole story. If the first part of this video was an excursus on the developments and key characters of the anarchist world, this second part focuses on what we can call its "spin-offs". This part will not have quotations, it will not have pages or texts to show you, it will all be very quick... also because many of them do not have a literary culture, or at least not a purely stable one, so let's start:
Social Anarchy:
One of the first currents to develop from this trend around the 20th century, and coming from the most libertarian part of the socialist sphere. He believe that mainly through justice and social help between individuals can lead to true socialism. In effect proposing a "Left Individualism" in the community.
The recommended authors are: Bookchin, Luigi Galleani, Benjamin Tucker and Lysander Spooner.
Platformism:
An idea with a slightly unfamiliar name, which is ironic given that it's one of the very few that actually had the ability to be used in the field.
"Platformism" to put it in crude words was born as a response to Lenin's Vanguard Socialism by pushing class consciousness more towards Anarchy.
For this ideology the leading authors are: Errico Malatesta and Nestor Makhno.
If you don't feel like reading there's a nice video by my "colleague" CallMeEzekiel that talks about this.
Anarcho-Syndicalism:
One of the main currents of anarchy and syndicalism; Anarcho-Syndicalism sees the concepts of class struggle, workers' organizer and entity of unity of society in trade unions and workers' unions collaborating with each other in the social, economic, labor fields and so on.
Heh… decentralized in theory but not too much, ironic.
Authors who stand out here are: Rudolf Rocker, Noam Chomsky, Sam Dolgoff, and Gaston Leval.
Anarchocapitalism:
Line of thought created around the 1920s. Anarchocapitalism is essentially a branch that combines individualism combined with the methods of the Austrian School of Economics (or laissez-faire if we want to be gallant). The ideals of the Anarcho-Capitalists may vary from person to person but the main thought is the formation of a society without a state and without any taxation where individuals, collectives or companies (again, it depends on who you ask) can freely participate in the market without any restrictions.
The recommended authors are: Murray Newton Rothbard, Walter Block and Hans-Hermann Hoppe.
*Waiting for comment from libertarian movement or Liberal Institute on how I got it all wrong lmao*
Religious/Mystical Anarchy:
If you remember at the beginning of the video I talked about the English Diggers. Here you take their concepts but this time the aim is really the achievement of an anarchist society. Here I really don't have any authors to recommend since it depends a lot on your belief or philosophical current that you follow.
Anarchopacifism:
Normally known as "Gandhi's idea", anarcho-pacifists believe purely in civil disobedience as the achievement of an anarchic society. Here too, there are no authors because this is more of a method than a real ideology. So why is it counted as such? … I don't know.
Insurrectional Anarchy:
This here is its opposite; Ideology developed as a union between the individualistic current and social anarchy; insurrectional anarchy is one of the most extreme currents of anarchy.
The principle of this idea lies in the fact that the only way to eliminate the state is through insurrection and acts of banditry such as the assassination of influential figures such as politicians or journalists, the bombing of places of power in order to jam the state and so on. with the help of small groups of individuals organized to collapse the state.
The main author of this idea is: Alfredo Maria Bonanno.
Anarcho-nationalism:
Born in the United States of America in the 21st century, anarcho-nationalism believes in the idea that individuals of a certain ethnic group should organize themselves and form their own commune.
Ironically authors for this exist: Ernst Junger (who is usually identified as one of the first creators) and Dmytro Olekasandrovych Korchynsky.
Anarchomonarchism:
I don't even know how to explain this in a simple way but I'll try to do it:
Conceptually born as an internet meme to parody the individualism that is celebrated in some anarchist currents. Like Frankenstein's Monster, this idea at some point came to life in a non-ironic sense in the form of the French political movement "Le Lys Noire", now, I won't go into explaining who or what Lys Noire are, but there 'is an article from Blast that talks about it. So the risk is yours...
THOUGHTS ABOUT IT
Well, and here our great journey into the land of anarchy finally ends. I hope you found it educational, interesting, purifying or whatever emotion it gave you.
When I started this journey I expected something simple and quite "doctrinal" like many of the manifestos that led to the development of the "mainstream" ideologies that we know today, but, in this journey of mine I was able to notice the lack of a real " orthodoxy" or purely idealistic or material beliefs, more than anything I was able to admire the great fluidity and in some cases the syncretism that anarchy has developed over time. Indeed, after all this odyssey between Proudhon, Kropotkin, Stirner, d'Axa and so on, I would dare say that everything has led to the development of a vision of Anarchy in something that goes beyond just politics, beyond the philosophy in which it is narrated in his books and posters. That in reality Anarchy is nothing other than the pure expression of the state of mind, the feeling of human nature, a "State of mind" as the English would say, a true representation of that "Geist" that German philosophy speaks, which Stirner talks about in his book. That feeling that Bakunin complained about Marxism and the expression that Proudhon believed in the masses, the representation of the ardent and revolutionary spirit that the individualists spoke of. Nothing more than the expression of wanting to live free.
And all this strikes me even more personally: because in these months, in almost a year since the last video, many, many of those things have happened in the world and I too have changed politically and philosophically speaking, a different subject from that who started this channel. Which by reading, comparing, delving into these writings that I have brought to you and everything else in my private life has led me to an acceleration of that internal change that I already developed from the Mafarka video.
The understanding that in a world now gripped by extreme polarization between individuals and the growth of the latter's irrationality in favor of their own ego. Faced with the economic and social crises of different countries, faced with the creation of future generations in Western and Eastern countries who will have to live and follow the rhythms and rules of an extremely consumerist society based on brief fame, where Capitalism itself has been corrupted, among men and women around the globe, the most fundamental element of every man is being lost... his own self-determination and fulfillment.
I'm Eisen, and I'll see you in the next video.