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ANARCHISM AND SOCIALISM
by
GEORGE PLECHANOFF
Translated with the permission of the author by
Eleanor Marx Aveling
Chicago
Charles H. Kerr & Company
CONTENTS.
PUBLISHERS' NOTE 7
PREFACE 13
I. THE POINT OF VIEW OF THE UTOPIAN SOCIALISTS 17
II. THE POINT OF VIEW OF SCIENTIFIC SOCIALISM 30
III. THE HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT OF THE ANARCHIST DOCTRINE 38
IV. PROUDHON 53
V. BAKOUNINE 78
VI. BAKOUNINE--(CONCLUDED) 89
VII. THE SMALLER FRY 103
VIII. THE SO-CALLED ANARCHIST TACTICS. THEIR MORALITY 127
IX. THE BOURGEOISIE, ANARCHISM, AND SOCIALISM 143
PUBLISHERS' NOTE
In reprinting _Anarchism and Socialism_, by George Plechanoff, we
realize that there is not the same need for assailing and exposing
anarchism at present as there has been at different times in the past.
Yet the book is valuable, not merely because of its historic interest
but also to workers coming into contact with the revolutionary movement
for the first time. The general conception of anarchism that a beginner
often gets is that it is something extremely advanced. It is often
expressed somewhat as follows: "After capitalism comes socialism and
then comes anarchism." Plechanoff very ably explodes such notions.
Within the pages of this work the author shows not only the reactionary
character of anarchism, but he exposes its class bias and its empty
philosophic idealism and utopian program. He shows anarchism to be just
the opposite of scientific socialism or communism. It aims at a society
dominated by individualism, which is simply a capitalist ideal. Such
ideals as "liberty," "equality," "fraternity," first sprang from the
ranks of the petty property owners of early capitalism, as Plechanoff
shows. He also points out that while Proudhon is usually credited with
being "the father of anarchism" that actually Max Stirner comes closer
to being its "father." Stirner's "League of Egoists," he says, "is only
the utopia of a petty bourgeois in revolt. In this sense one may say he
has spoken the last word of bourgeois individualism."
Bakounine and Kropotkine, the famous Russian anarchists, are exposed as
confused idealists, who have not aided but rather hindered the
development of the working-class movement. Lenin speaks highly of the
book in this relation, but takes Plechanoff severely to task for his
failure properly to set forth the Marxian concepts of the State, and for
his total evasion of the form the State must take during the time it is
in the hands of the workers. When writing on the "Vulgarisation of Marx
by the Opportunists," in his _State and Revolution_, Lenin said:
"Plechanoff devoted a special pamphlet to the question of the relation
of socialism to anarchism entitled _Anarchism and Socialism_, published
in German in 1894. He managed somehow to treat the question without
touching on the most vital, controversial point, the essential point
_politically_, in the struggle with the anarchists: the relation of the
revolution to State, and the question of the State in general. His
pamphlet may be divided into two parts: one, historico-literary,
containing valuable material for the history of the ideas of Stirner,
Proudhon, and others; the second, ignorant and narrow-minded, containing
a clumsy disquisition on the theme 'that an anarchist cannot be
distinguished from a bandit,' an amusing combination of subjects and
most characteristic of the entire activity of Plechanoff on the eve of
revolution and during the revolutionary period in Russia. Indeed, in the
years 1908 to 1917 Plechanoff showed himself to be half doctrinaire and
half philistine, walking, politically, in the wake of the bourgeoisie.
"We saw how Marx and Engels, in their polemics against the anarchists,
explained most thoroughly their views on the relation of the revolution
to the State. Engels, when editing in 1891, Marx's _Criticism of the
Gotha Program_, wrote that 'we'--that is, Engels and Marx--'were then in
the fiercest phase of our battle with Bakounine and his anarchists;
hardly two years had then passed since the Hague Congress of the
International' (the First). The anarchists had tried to claim the Paris
Commune as their 'own,' as a confirmation of their teachings, thus
showing that they had not in the least understood the lessons of the
Commune or the analysis of those lessons by Marx. Anarchism has given
nothing approaching a true solution of the concrete political problems:
are we to _break_ up the old State machine, and what shall we put in its
place?
"But to speak of _Anarchism and Socialism_, leaving the whole question
of the State out of account and taking no notice at all of the whole
development of Marxism before and after the Commune--that meant an
inevitable fall into the pit of opportunism. For that is just what
opportunism wants--to keep these two questions in abeyance. To secure
this is, in itself, a victory of opportunism."
The anarchist desire to abolish the State at one blow, and to abolish
money, etc., in much the same way, springs from their inability to
understand the institutions of capitalist society. To many of them the
State is simply the result of people having faith in authority. Give up
this belief and the State will cease to exist. It is a myth like God and
rests entirely on faith. The anarchist's desire for the abolition of the
State arises from entirely different concepts to that of the communists.
To these anarchist anti-authoritarians the State is simply bad. It is
the most authoritarian thing in sight. It interferes with individual
freedom and consequently is the greatest obstruction to "absolute
liberty" and other utopian desires of the champions of individualism.
Communists also want a society without a State but realize that such can
only come about when society is without classes. The aim of the
communist movement is to destroy the capitalist form of the State and
substitute a proletarian form during the time in which society is
undergoing its classless transformation. When all property is
centralized into the hands of this working-class "State" and when the
administration of things has taken the place of political dominance, the
State, in its final form, will have withered away. Therefore, the
communist realizes that the State cannot be abolished in the manner
visualized by anarchists, but that it must be used, that is, the
proletariat must be raised "to the position of ruling class," for the
purpose of expropriating the capitalists and putting an end to the
exploitation of the producing class. The State is not abolished. Only
its capitalist form is abolished. The State dies out in the hands of the
workers when there is no longer an opposing class to coerce.
PREFACE.
The work of my friend George Plechanoff, "Anarchism and Socialism," was
written originally in French. It was then translated into German by Mrs.
Bernstein, and issued in pamphlet form by the German Social-Democratic
Publishing Office "Vorwärts." It was next translated by myself into
English, and so much of the translation as exigencies of space would
permit, published in the _Weekly Times and Echo_. The original French
version is now appearing in the _Jeunesse Socialiste_, and will be
issued in book form shortly. The complete English translation is now
given to English readers through the Twentieth Century Press. I have to
thank the Editor of the _Weekly Times and Echo_, Mr. Kibblewhite, for
his kindness in allowing me to use those portions of the work that
appeared in his paper.
As to the book itself. There are those who think that the precious time
of so remarkable a writer, and profound a thinker as George Plechanoff
is simply wasted in pricking Anarchist wind-bags. But, unfortunately,
there are many of the younger, or of the more ignorant sort, who are
inclined to take words for deeds, high-sounding phrases for acts, mere
sound and fury for revolutionary activity, and who are too young or too
ignorant to know that such sound and fury signify nothing. It is for the
sake of these younger, or for the sake of the more ignorant, folk, that
men like Plechanoff deal seriously with this matter of Anarchism, and do
not feel their time lost if they can, as this work must, help readers to
see the true meaning of what is called "Anarchism."
And a work like this one of Plechanoff's is doubly necessary in England,
where the Socialist movement is still largely disorganised, where there
is still such ignorance and confusion on all economic and political
subjects; where, with the exception, among the larger Socialist
organisations, of the Social-Democratic Federation (and even among the
younger S.D.F. members there is a vague sort of idea that Anarchism is
something fine and revolutionary), there has been no little coquetting
with Anarchism under an impression that it was very "advanced," and
where the Old Unionist cry of "No politics!" has unconsciously played
the reactionary Anarchist game. We cannot afford to overlook the fact
that the Socialist League became in time--when some of us had left
it--an Anarchist organisation, and that since then its leaders have
been, or still are, more or less avowed Anarchists. While quite recently
the leader of a "new party"--and that a would-be political one!--did not
hesitate to declare his Anarchist sympathies or to state that "The
methods of the Anarchists might differ from those of the Socialists, but
that might only prove that the former were more zealous than the
latter."
It is also necessary to point out once again that Anarchism and
Nihilism have no more in common than Anarchism and Socialism. As
Plechanoff said at the Zürich International Congress: "We (_i.e._, the
Russians) have had to endure every form of persecution, every thinkable
misery; but we have been spared one disgrace, one humiliation; we, at
least, have no Anarchists." A statement endorsed and emphasised by other
Russian revolutionists, and notably by the American delegate, Abraham
Cahan--himself a Russian refugee. The men and women who are waging their
heroic war in Russia and in Poland against Czarism have no more in
common with Anarchism than had the founders of the modern Socialist
movement--Carl Marx and Frederick Engels.
This little book of Plechanoff will assuredly convince the youngest even
that under any circumstances Anarchism is but another word for reaction;
and the more honest the men and women who play this reactionist game,
the more tragic and dangerous it becomes for the whole working class
movement.
Finally, there is a last reason why the issuing of this work at the
present moment is timely. In 1896 the next International Socialist and
Trade Union Congress meets in London. It is well that those who may
attend this great Congress as delegates, and that the thousands of
workers who will watch its work, should understand why the resolutions
arrived at by the Paris, Brussels, and Zürich International Congresses
with regard to the Anarchists should be enforced. The Anarchists who
cynically declare Workers' Congresses "absurd, motiveless, and
senseless" must be taught once and for all, that they cannot be allowed
to make the Congresses of the Revolutionary Socialists of the whole
world a playground for reaction and international spydom.
ELEANOR MARX AVELING.
Green Street Green, Orpington, Kent.
August, 1895.
ANARCHISM AND SOCIALISM
CHAPTER I
THE POINT OF VIEW OF THE UTOPIAN SOCIALISTS
The French Materialists of the 18th century while waging relentless war
against all the "_infâmes_" whose yoke weighed upon the French of this
period, by no means scorned the search after what they called "perfect
legislation," _i.e._, the best of all possible legislations, such
legislation as should secure to "human beings" the greatest sum of
happiness, and could be alike applicable to all existing societies, for
the simple reason that it was "perfect" and therefore the most
"natural." Excursions into this domain of "perfect legislation" occupy
no small place in the works of a d'Holbach and a Helvétius. On the other
hand, the Socialists of the first half of our century threw themselves
with immense zeal, with unequalled perseverance, into the search after
the best of possible social organisations, after a perfect social
organisation. This is a striking and notable characteristic which they
have in common with the French Materialists of the last century, and it
is this characteristic which especially demands our attention in the
present work.
In order to solve the problem of a perfect social organisation, or what
comes to the same thing, of the best of all possible legislation, we
must eventually have some criterion by the help of which we may compare
the various "legislations" one with the other. And the criterion must
have a special attribute. In fact, there is no question of a
"legislation" _relatively_ the best, _i.e._, _the best legislation under
given conditions_. No, indeed! We have to find a _perfect_ legislation,
a legislation whose perfection should have nothing relative about it,
should be entirely independent of time and place, should be, in a word,
absolute. We are therefore driven to make abstraction from history,
since everything in history is relative, everything depends upon
circumstance, time, and place. But abstraction made of the history of
humanity, what is there left to guide us in our "legislative"
investigations? Humanity is left us, man in general, human nature--of
which history is but the manifestation. Here then we have our criterion
definitely settled, a perfect legislation. The best of all possible
legislation is that which best harmonises with human nature. It may be,
of course, that even when we have such a criterion we may, for want of
"light" or of logic, fail to solve this problem of the best legislation.
_Errare humanum est_, but it seems incontrovertible that this problem
_can_ be solved, that we can, by taking our stand upon an exact
knowledge of human nature, find a perfect legislation, a perfect
organisation.
Such was, in the domain of social science, the point of view of the
French Materialists. Man is a sentient and reasonable being, they said;
he avoids painful sensations and seeks pleasurable ones. He has
sufficient intelligence to recognise what is useful to him as well as
what is harmful to him. Once you admit these axioms, and you can in your
investigations into the best legislation, arrive, with the help of
reflection and good intentions, at conclusions as well founded, as
exact, as incontrovertible as those derived from a mathematical
demonstration. Thus Condorcet undertook to construct deductively all
precepts of healthy morality by starting from the truth that man is a
sentient and reasonable being.
It is hardly necessary to say that in this Condorcet was mistaken. If
the "philosophers" in this branch of their investigations arrived at
conclusions of incontestable though very relative value, they
unconsciously owed this to the fact that they constantly abandoned their
abstract standpoint of human nature in general, and took up that of a
more or less idealised nature of a man of the Third Estate. This man
"felt" and "reasoned," after a fashion very clearly defined by his
social environment. It was his "nature" to believe firmly in bourgeois
property, representative government, freedom of trade (_laissez-faire,
laissez passer!_ the "nature" of this man was always crying out), and so
on. In reality, the French philosophers always kept in view the economic
and political requirements of the Third Estate; this was their real
criterion. But they applied it unconsciously, and only after much
wandering in the field of abstraction did they arrive at it. Their
conscious method always reduced itself to abstract considerations of
"human nature," and of the social and political institutions that best
harmonise with this nature.
Their method was also that of the Socialists. A man of the 18th century,
Morelly, "to anticipate a mass of empty objections that would be
endless," lays down as an incontrovertible principle "that in morals
nature is one, constant, invariable ... that its laws never change;" and
that "everything that may be advanced as to the variety in the morals of
savage and civilised peoples, by no means proves that nature varies;"
that at the outside it only shows "that from certain accidental causes
which are foreign to it, some nations have fallen away from the laws of
nature; others have remained submissive to them, in some respects from
mere habit; finally, others are subjected to them by certain
reasoned-out laws that are not always in contradiction with nature;" in
a word, "man may abandon the True, but the True can never be
annihilated!"[1] Fourier relies upon the analysis of the human passions;
Robert Owen starts from certain considerations on the formation of human
character; Saint Simon, despite his deep comprehension of the historical
evolution of humanity, constantly returns to "human nature" in order to
explain the laws of this evolution; the Saint-Simonians declared their
philosophy was "based upon a new conception of human nature." The
Socialists of the various schools may quarrel as to the cause of their
different conceptions of human nature; all, without a single exception,
are convinced that social science has not and cannot have, any other
basis than an adequate concept of this nature. In this they in no wise
differ from the Materialists of the 18th century. Human nature is the
one criterion they invariably apply in their criticism of existing
society, and in their search after a social organisation as it should
be, after a "perfect" legislation.
Morelly, Fourier, Saint Simon, Owen--we look upon all of them to-day as
Utopian Socialists. Since we know the general point of view that is
common to them all, we can determine exactly what the Utopian point of
view is. This will be the more useful, seeing that the opponents of
Socialism use the word "Utopian" without attaching to it any, even
approximately, definite meaning.
The _Utopian is one who, starting from an abstract principle, seeks for
a perfect social organisation_.
The abstract principle which served as starting point of the Utopians
was that of human nature. Of course there have been Utopians who applied
the principle indirectly through the intermediary of concepts derived
from it. Thus, _e.g._, in seeking for "perfect legislation," for an
ideal organisation of society, one may start from the concept of the
Rights of Man. But it is evident that in its ultimate analysis this
concept derives from that of human nature.
It is equally evident that one may be a Utopian without being a
Socialist. The bourgeois tendencies of the French Materialists of the
last century are most noticeable in their investigations of a perfect
legislation. But this in no wise destroys the Utopian character of these
enquires. We have seen that the method of the Utopian Socialist does not
in the least differ from that of d'Holbach or Helvétius, those champions
of the revolutionary French bourgeoisie.
Nay, more. One may have the profoundest contempt for all "music of the
future," one may be convinced that the social world in which one has the
good fortune to live is the best possible of all social worlds, and yet
in spite of this one may look at the structure and life of the body
social from the same point of view as that from which the Utopians
regarded it.
This seems a paradox, and yet nothing could be more true. Take but one
example.
In 1753 there appeared Morelly's work, _Les Isles Flottantes ou la
Basiliade du célébre Pelpai, traduit de l'Indien_.[2] Now, note the
arguments with which a review, _La Bibliothèque Impartiale_, combated
the communistic ideas of the author:--"One knows well enough that a
distance separates the finest speculations of this kind and the
possibility of their realisation. For in theory one takes imaginary men
who lend themselves obediently to every arrangement, and who second with
equal zeal the views of the legislator; but as soon as one attempts to
put these things into practice one has to deal with men as they are,
that is to say, submissive, lazy, or else in the thraldom of some
violent passion. The scheme of equality especially is one that seems
most repugnant to the nature of man; they are born to command or to
serve, a middle term is a burden to them."
Men are born to command or to serve. We cannot wonder, therefore, if in
society we see masters and servants, since human nature wills it so. It
was all very well for _La Bibliothèque Impartiale_ to repudiate these
communist speculations. The point of view from which it itself looked
upon social phenomena, the point of view of human nature, it had in
common with the Utopian Morelly.
And it cannot be urged that this review was probably not sincere in its
arguments, and that it appealed to human nature with the single object
of saying something in favour of the exploiters, in favour of those who
"command." But sincere or hypocritical in its criticism of Morelly, the
_Bibliothèque Impartiale_ adopted the standpoint common to all the
writers of this period. They all of them appeal to human nature
conceived of in one form or another, with the sole exception of the
retrogrades who, living shadows of passed times, continued to appeal to
the will of God.
As we know, this concept of human nature has been inherited by the 19th
century from its predecessor. The Utopian Socialists had no other. But
here again it is easy to prove that it is not peculiar to the Utopians.
Even at the period of the Restoration, the eminent French historian,
Guizot, in his historical studies, arrived at the remarkable conclusion
that the political constitution of any given country depended upon the
"condition of property" in that country. This was an immense advance
upon the ideas of the last century which had almost exclusively
considered the action of the "legislator." But what in its turn did
these "conditions of property" depend on? Guizot is unable to answer
this question, and after long, vain efforts to find a solution of the
enigma in historical circumstances, he returns, falls back _nolens
volens_, upon the theory of human nature. Augustin Thierry, another
eminent historian of the Restoration, found himself in almost the same
case, or rather he would have done so if only he had tried to
investigate this question of the "condition of property" and its
historical vicissitudes. In his concept of social life, Thierry was
never able to go beyond his master Saint Simon, who, as we have seen
above, held firmly to the point of view of human nature.
The example of the brilliant Saint Simon, a man of encyclopædic
learning, demonstrates more clearly perhaps than any other, how narrow
and insufficient was this point of view, in what confusion worse
confounded of contradictions it landed those who applied it. Says Saint
Simon, with the profoundest conviction: "The future is made up of the
last terms of a series, the first of which consist of the past. When one
has thoroughly mastered the first terms of any series it is easy to put
down their successors; thus from the past carefully observed one can
easily deduce the future." This is so true that one asks oneself at the
first blush why a man who had so clear a conception of the connection
between the various phases of historical evolution, should be classed
among the Utopians. And yet, look more closely at the historical ideas
of Saint Simon, and you will find that we are not wrong in calling him a
Utopian. The future is deducible from the past, the historical evolution
of humanity is a process governed by law. But what is the impetus, the
motive power that sets in motion the human species, that makes it pass
from one phase of its evolution to another? Of what does this impetus
consist? Where are we to seek it? It is here that Saint Simon comes back
to the point of view of all the Utopians, to the point of view of human
nature. Thus, according to him, the essential fundamental cause of the
French Revolution was a change in the temporal and spiritual forces,
and, in order to direct it wisely and conclude it rightly, it "was
necessary to put into direct political activity the forces which had
become preponderant." In other words, the manufacturers and the
_savants_ ought to have been called upon to formulate a political system
corresponding to the new social conditions. This was not done, and the
Revolution which had began so well was almost immediately directed into
a false path. The lawyers and metaphysicians became the masters of the
situation. How to explain this historical fact? "It is in the nature of
man," replies Saint Simon, "to be unable to pass without some
intermediate phase from any one doctrine to another. This law applies
most stringently to the various political systems, through which the
natural advance of civilisation compels the human species to pass. Thus
the same necessity which in industry has created the element of a new
temporal power, destined to replace military power, and which in the
positive sciences, has created the element of a new spiritual power,
called upon to take the place of theological power, must have developed
and set in activity (before the change in the conditions of society had
begun to be very perceptible) a temporal or spiritual power of an
intermediary, bastard, and transitory nature, whose only mission was to
bring about the transition from one social system to another."
So we see that the "historical series" of Saint Simon really explained
nothing at all; they themselves need explanation, and for this we have
again to fall back upon this inevitable human nature. The French
Revolution was directed along a certain line, because human nature was
so and so.
One of two things. Either human nature is, as Morelly thought,
invariable, and then it explains nothing in history, which shows us
constant variations in the relations of man to society; or it does vary
according to the circumstances in which men live, and then, far from
being the _cause_, it is itself the _effect_ of historical evolution.
The French Materialists knew well enough that man is the product of his
social surroundings. "Man is all education," said Helvétius. This would
lead one to suppose that Helvétius must have abandoned the human nature
point of view in order to study the laws of the evolution of the
environment that fashion human nature, giving to socialised man such or
such an "education." And indeed Helvétius did make some efforts in this
direction. But not he, nor his contemporaries, nor the Socialists of the
first half of our century, nor any representatives of science of the
same period, succeeded in discovering a new point of view that should
permit the study of the evolution of the social environment; the cause
of the historical "education" of man, the cause of the changes which
occur in his "nature." They were thus forced back upon the human nature
point of view as the only one that seemed to supply them with a fairly
solid basis for their scientific investigations. But since human nature
in its turn varied, it became indispensable to make abstraction from its
variations, and to seek in nature only stable properties, fundamental
properties preserved in spite of all changes of its secondary
properties. And in the end all that these speculations resulted in was a
meagre abstraction, like that of the philosophers, _e.g._, "man is a
sentient and reasonable being," which seemed all the more precious a
discovery in that it left plenty of room for every gratuitous
hypothesis, and every fantastical conclusion.
A Guizot had no need to seek for the best of social organisations for a
perfect legislation. He was perfectly satisfied with the existing ones.
And assuredly the most powerful argument he could have advanced to
defend them from the attacks of the malcontents would still have been
human nature, which he would have said renders every serious change in
the social and political constitution of France impossible. The
malcontents condemned this same constitution, making use of the same
abstraction. And since this abstraction, being completely empty, left,
as we have said, full room for every gratuitous hypothesis and the
logical consequences resulting therefrom, the "scientific" mission of
these reformers assumed the appearance of a geometrical problem; given a
certain nature, find what structure of society best corresponds with it.
So Morelly complains bitterly because "our old teachers" failed to
attempt the solution of "this excellent problem"--"to find the condition
in which it should be almost impossible for men to be depraved, or
wicked, or at any rate, _minima de malis_." We have already seen that
for Morelly human nature was "one, constant, invariable."
We now know what was the "scientific" method of the Utopians. Before we
leave them let us remind the reader that in human nature, an extremely
thin and therefore not very satisfying abstraction, the Utopians really
appealed, not to human nature in general, but to the idealised nature of
the men of their own day, belonging to the class whose social tendencies
they represented. The social reality, therefore, inevitably appears in
the words of the Utopians, but the Utopians were unconscious of this.
They saw this reality only across an abstraction which, thin as it was,
was by no means translucent.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] See "Code de la Nature," Paris, 1841. Villegardelle's edition, Note
to p. 66.
[2] "The floating islands or the Basiliades of the celebrated Pelpai,
translated from the Indian."