Notes on Anarchism

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Notes on Anarchism
Noam Chomsky
NoamChomsky
NotesonAnarchism
1970
RetrievedonJuly29,2009fromwww.zmag.org
ThisessayisarevisedversionoftheintroductiontoDaniel
Guérin’sAnarchism:FromTheorytoPractice.Inaslightlydifferent
version,itappearedintheNewYorkReviewofBooks,May21,
1970.TranscribedbyBillLear.
theanarchistlibrary.org 1970
• Richards, Vernon. Lessons of the Spanish Revolution (1936 —
1939).Enlargeded.London:FreedomPress,1972.
• Rocker,Rudolf.Anarchosyndicalism.London:Secker&War-
burg,1938.
• Rosenberg,Arthur.AHistoryofBolshevismfromMarxtothe
FirstFiveYears’Plan.TranslatedbyIanF.Morrow.NewYork:
Russell&Russell,1965.
• Santillan, Diego Abad de. After the Revolution. New York:
GreenbergPublishers,1937.
• Scanlon,Hugh.TheWayForwardforWorkers’Control.Insti-
tute for Workers’ Control Pamphlet Series, no. 1, Notting-
ham,England,1968.
• Tucker,RobertC.TheMarxianRevolutionaryIdea.NewYork:
W.W.Norton&Co.,1969.

27
• Daniels, Robert Vincent. “The State and Revolution: a Case
StudyintheGenesisandTransformationofCommunistIde-
ology.”AmericanSlavicandEastEuropeanReview,vol.12,no.
1(1953).
Contents
• Guérin, Daniel. Jeunesse du socialisme libertaire. Paris:
LibrairieMarcelRivière,1959.
Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
• — . Anarchism: From Theory to Practice, translated by Mary
Klopper.NewYork:MonthlyReviewPress,1970.
• —.Pourunmarxismelibertaire.Paris:RobertLaffont,1969.
• —,ed.NiDieu,niMaître.Lausanne:LaCitéEditeur,n.d.
• Jackson, J. Hampden. Marx, Proudhon and European Social-
ism.NewYork:CollierBooks,1962.
• Joll,James.TheAnarchists.Boston:Little,Brown&Co.,1964.
• Kendall,Walter.TheRevolutionaryMovementinBritain1900
—1921.London:Weidenfeld&Nicolson,1969.
• Kidron, Michael Western Capitalism Since the War. London:
Weidenfeld&Nicolson,1968.
• Mattick, Paul. Marx and Keynes: The Limits of Mixed Econ-
omy. Extending Horizons Series. Boston: Porter Sargent,
1969.
• —.“Workers’Control.”InTheNewLeft:ACollectionofEssays,
editedbyPriscillaLong.Boston:PorterSargent,1969.
• Marx,Karl.TheCivilWarinFrance,1871.NewYork:Interna-
tionalPublishers,1941.
• Pelloutier,Fernand.“L’Anarchismeetlessyndicatsouvriers.”
Les Temps nouveaux, 1895. Reprinted in Ni Dieu, ni Maître,
editedbyDanielGuérin.Lausanne:LaCitéEditeur,n.d.
26 3
headlongintoawarwhichleftonlyoneequivalentfor
theruinsitmade—thedisappearanceoftheempire.32
ThemiserableSecondEmpire“wastheonlyformofgovernment
possible at a time when the bourgeoisie had already lost, and the
workingclasshadnotyetacquired,thefacultyofrulingthenation.”
Itisnotverydifficulttorephrasetheseremarkssothattheybe-
comeappropriatetotheimperialsystemsof1970.Theproblemof
“freeing man from the curse of economic exploitation and politi-
cal and social enslavement” remains the problem of our time. As
long as this is so, the doctrines and the revolutionary practice of
libertariansocialismwillserveasaninspirationandguide.
Bibliography
• Avineri,Shlomo.TheSocialandPoliticalThoughtofKarlMarx.
London:CambridgeUniversityPress,1968.
• Bakunin, Michael. Bakunin on Anarchy. Edited and trans-
latedbySamDolgoff.NewYork:AlfredA.Knopf,1972.
• Buber,Martin.PathsinUtopia.Boston:BeaconPress,1958.
• Chomsky,Noam.CartesianLinguistics.NewYork:Harper&
Row,1966.
• —.AmericanPowerandtheNewMandarins.NewYork:Pan-
theonBooks,1969.
• —.AtWarwithAsia.NewYork:PantheonBooks,1970.
• Collectivisations:L’OeuvreconstructivedelaRévolutionespag-
nole. 2nd ed. Toulouse: Editions C.N.T., 1965. First edition,
Barcelona,1937.
32Marx,CivilWarinFrance,pp.62–3.
25
stand the world, but also to change it, this is the proper way to A French writer, sympathetic to anarchism, wrote in the 1890s
studythehistoryofanarchism. that“anarchismhasabroadback,likepaperitenduresanything”—
Guérindescribestheanarchismofthenineteenthcenturyases- including,henotedthosewhoseactsaresuchthat“amortalenemy
sentiallydoctrinal,whilethetwentiethcentury,fortheanarchists, ofanarchismcouldnothavedonebetter.”1 Therehavebeenmany
has been a time of “revolutionary practice.”30 Anarchism reflects styles of thought and action that have been referred to as “anar-
thatjudgment.Hisinterpretationofanarchismconsciouslypoints chist.”Itwouldbehopelesstotrytoencompassalloftheseconflict-
toward the future. Arthur Rosenberg once pointed out that popu- ingtendenciesinsomegeneraltheoryorideology.Andevenifwe
lar revolutions characteristically seek to replace “a feudal or cen- proceedtoextractfromthehistoryoflibertarianthoughtaliving,
tralized authority ruling by force” with some form of communal evolvingtradition,asDanielGuérindoesinAnarchism,itremains
system which “implies the destruction and disappearance of the difficulttoformulateitsdoctrinesasaspecificanddeterminatethe-
oldformofState.”Suchasystemwillbeeithersocialistoran“ex- ory of society and social change. The anarchist historian Rudolph
tremeformofdemocracy…[whichis]thepreliminaryconditionfor Rocker,whopresentsasystematicconceptionofthedevelopment
Socialism inasmuch as Socialism can only be realized in a world ofanarchistthoughttowardsanarchosyndicalism,alonglinesthat
enjoyingthehighestpossiblemeasureofindividualfreedom.”This bear comparison to Guérins work, puts the matter well when he
ideal,henotes,wascommontoMarxandtheanarchists.31Thisnat- writesthatanarchismisnot
uralstruggleforliberationrunscountertotheprevailingtendency
a fixed, self-enclosed social system but rather a def-
towardscentralizationineconomicandpoliticallife.
inite trend in the historic development of mankind,
A century ago Marx wrote that the workers of Paris “felt there
which, in contrast with the intellectual guardianship
was but one alternative — the Commune, or the empire — under
of all clerical and governmental institutions, strives
whatevernameitmightreappear.”
forthefreeunhinderedunfoldingofalltheindividual
and social forces in life. Even freedom is only a rela-
The empire had ruined them economically by the
tive,notanabsoluteconcept,sinceittendsconstantly
havoc it made of public wealth, by the wholesale
tobecomebroaderandtoaffectwidercirclesinmore
financial swindling it fostered, by the props it lent to
manifold ways. For the anarchist, freedom is not an
the artificially accelerated centralization of capital,
abstract philosophical concept, but the vital concrete
andtheconcomitantexpropriationoftheirownranks.
possibility for every human being to bring to full de-
It had suppressed them politically, it had shocked
velopmentallthepowers,capacities,andtalentswith
them morally by its orgies, it had insulted their
which nature has endowed him, and turn them to so-
Voltairianism by handing over the education of their
cialaccount.Thelessthisnaturaldevelopmentofman
childrentothefrèresIgnorantins,ithadrevoltedtheir
isinfluencedbyecclesiasticalorpoliticalguardianship,
national feeling as Frenchmen by precipitating them
themoreefficientandharmoniouswillhumanperson-
ality become, the more will it become the measure of
30Ibid.
31ArthurRosenberg,AHistoryofBolshevism,p.88. 1OctaveMirbeau,quotedinJamesJoll,TheAnarchists,pp.145–6.
24 5
the intellectual culture of the society in which it has erosion of cold-war mythology at least makes it possible to raise
grown.2 thesequestionsinfairlybroadcircles.Ifthepresentwaveofrepres-
sioncanbebeatenback,iftheleftcanovercomeitsmoresuicidal
Onemightaskwhatvaluethereisinstudyinga“definitetrend tendenciesandbuilduponwhathasbeenaccomplishedinthepast
inthehistoricdevelopmentofmankind”thatdoesnotarticulatea decade,thentheproblemofhowtoorganizeindustrialsocietyon
specificanddetailedsocialtheory.Indeed,manycommentatorsdis- truly democratic lines, with democratic control in the workplace
missanarchismasutopian,formless,primitive,orotherwiseincom- and in the community, should become a dominant intellectual is-
patiblewiththerealitiesofacomplexsociety.Onemight,however, sue for those who are alive to the problems of contemporary so-
argueratherdifferently:thatateverystageofhistoryourconcern ciety, and, as a mass movement for libertarian socialism develops,
mustbetodismantlethoseformsofauthorityandoppressionthat speculationshouldproceedtoaction.
survivefromanerawhentheymighthavebeenjustifiedinterms Inhismanifestoof1865,Bakuninpredictedthatoneelementin
oftheneedforsecurityorsurvivaloreconomicdevelopment,but thesocialrevolutionwillbe“thatintelligentandtrulynoblepartof
thatnowcontributeto—ratherthanalleviate—materialandcul- youth which, though belonging by birth to the privileged classes,
tural deficit. If so, there will be no doctrine of social change fixed initsgenerousconvictionsandardentaspirations,adoptsthecause
forthepresentandfuture,noreven,necessarily,aspecificandun- ofthepeople.”Perhapsintheriseofthestudentmovementofthe
changingconceptofthegoalstowardswhichsocialchangeshould 1960soneseesstepstowardsafulfillmentofthisprophecy.
tend.Surelyourunderstandingofthenatureofmanoroftherange Daniel Guérin has undertaken what he has described as a “pro-
ofviablesocialformsissorudimentarythatanyfar-reachingdoc- cessofrehabilitation”ofanarchism.Heargues,convincinglyIbe-
trine must be treated with great skepticism, just as skepticism is lieve,that“theconstructiveideasofanarchismretaintheirvitality,
in order when we hear that “human nature” or “the demands of that they may, when re-examined and sifted, assist contemporary
efficiency”or“thecomplexityofmodernlife”requiresthisorthat socialist thought to undertake a new departure…[and] contribute
formofoppressionandautocraticrule. to enriching Marxism.”29 From the “broad back” of anarchism he
Nevertheless, at a particular time there is every reason to de- has selected for more intensive scrutiny those ideas and actions
velop, insofar as our understanding permits, a specific realization that can be described as libertarian socialist. This is natural and
of this definite trend in the historic development of mankind, ap- proper.Thisframeworkaccommodatesthemajoranarchistspokes-
propriate to the tasks of the moment. For Rocker, “the problem men as well as the mass actions that have been animated by an-
thatissetforourtimeisthatoffreeingmanfromthecurseofeco- archist sentiments and ideals. Guérin is concerned not only with
nomic exploitation and political and social enslavement”; and the anarchist thought but also with the spontaneous actions of popu-
methodisnottheconquestandexerciseofstatepower,norstulti- lar revolutionary struggle. He is concerned with social as well as
fyingparliamentarianism,butrather“toreconstructtheeconomic intellectual creativity. Furthermore, he attempts to draw from the
lifeofthepeoplesfromthegroundupandbuilditupinthespirit constructive achievements of the past lessons that will enrich the
ofSocialism.” theoryofsocialliberation.Forthosewhowishnotonlytounder-
2RudolfRocker,Anarchosyndicalism,p.31. 29Guérin,NiDieu,niMaître,introduction.
6 23
All of this lies behind the spontaneous achievements, the con- But only the producers themselves are fitted for this
structiveworkoftheSpanishRevolution. task, since they are the only value-creating element
The ideas of libertarian socialism, in the sense described, have insocietyoutofwhichanewfuturecanarise.Theirs
beensubmergedintheindustrialsocietiesofthepasthalf-century. must be the task of freeing labor from all the fetters
The dominant ideologies have been those of state socialism or which economic exploitation has fastened on it, of
statecapitalism(ofincreasinglymilitarizedcharacterintheUnited freeingsocietyfromalltheinstitutionsandprocedure
States, for reasons that are not obscure).27 But there has been a of political power, and of opening the way to an
rekindlingofinterestinthepastfewyears.ThethesesIquotedby alliance of free groups of men and women based on
AntonPannekoekweretakenfromarecentpamphletofaradical co-operative labor and a planned administration of
French workers’ group (Informations Correspondance Ouvrière). things in the interest of the community. To prepare
TheremarksbyWilliamPaulonrevolutionarysocialismarecited the toiling masses in the city and country for this
inapaperbyWalterKendallgivenattheNationalConferenceon great goal and to bind them together as a militant
Workers’ Control in Sheffield, England, in March 1969. The work- forceistheobjectiveofmodernAnarcho-syndicalism,
ers’ control movement has become a significant force in England andinthisitswholepurposeisexhausted.[P.108]
inthepastfewyears.Ithasorganizedseveralconferencesandhas
produced a substantial pamphlet literature, and counts among its As a socialist, Rocker would take for granted “that the serious,
active adherents representatives of some of the most important final,completeliberationoftheworkersispossibleonlyuponone
tradeunions.TheAmalgamatedEngineeringandFoundryworkers’ condition: that of the appropriation of capital, that is, of raw ma-
Union, for example, has adopted, as official policy, the program terialandallthetoolsoflabor,includingland,bythewholebody
of nationalization of basic industries under “workers’ control at oftheworkers.”3 Asananarchosyndicalist,heinsists,further,that
all levels.”28 On the Continent, there are similar developments. theworkers’organizationscreate“notonlytheideas,butalsothe
May 1968 of course accelerated the growing interest in council factsofthefutureitself”intheprerevolutionaryperiod,thatthey
communismandrelatedideasinFranceandGermany,asitdidin embodyinthemselvesthestructureofthefuturesociety—andhe
England. looks forward to a social revolution that will dismantle the state
Giventhehighlyconservativecastofourhighlyideologicalsoci- apparatus as well as expropriate the expropriators. “What we put
ety,itisnottoosurprisingthattheUnitedStateshasbeenrelatively inplaceofthegovernmentisindustrialorganization.”
untouched by these developments. But that too may change. The
Anarcho-syndicalists are convinced that a Socialist
economic order cannot be created by the decrees and
27Fordiscussion,seeMattick,MarxandKeynes,andMichaelKidron,West-
statutes of a government, but only by the solidaric
ernCapitalismSincetheWar.SeealsodiscussionandreferencescitedinmyAt
WarWithAsia,chap.1,pp.23–6. collaboration of the workers with hand and brain in
28SeeHughScanlon,TheWayForwardforWorkers’Control.Scanlonisthe
presidentoftheAEF,oneofBritain’slargesttradeunions.Theinstitutewases- 3CitedbyRocker,ibid.,p.77.Thisquotationandthatinthenextsentence
tablishedasaresultofthesixthConferenceonWorkers’Control,March1968, arefromMichaelBakunin,“TheProgramoftheAlliance,”inSamDolgoff,ed.and
andservesasacenterfordisseminatinginformationandencouragingresearch. trans.,BakuninonAnarchy,p.255.
22 7
each special branch of production; that is, through theirfullest,andtheproducerwillremain“afragmentofahuman
the taking over of the management of all plants by being,” degraded, a tool in the productive process directed from
the producers themselves under such form that the above.
separate groups, plants, and branches of industry The phrase “spontaneous revolutionary action” can be mis-
are independent members of the general economic leading. The anarchosyndicalists, at least, took very seriously
organismandsystematicallycarryonproductionand Bakunin’s remark that the workers’ organizations must create
the distribution of the products in the interest of the “not only the ideas but also the facts of the future itself” in the
community on the basis of free mutual agreements. prerevolutionary period. The accomplishments of the popular
[p.94] revolution in Spain, in particular, were based on the patient work
of many years of organization and education, one component of
Rockerwaswritingatamomentwhensuchideashadbeenput a long tradition of commitment and militancy. The resolutions of
intopracticeinadramaticwayintheSpanishRevolution.Justprior the Madrid Congress of June 1931 and the Saragossa Congress in
totheoutbreakoftherevolution,theanarchosyndicalisteconomist May 1936 foreshadowed in many ways the acts of the revolution,
DiegoAbaddeSantillanhadwritten: as did the somewhat different ideas sketched by Santillan (see
note 4) in his fairly specific account of the social and economic
…in facing the problem of social transformation, the
organizationtobeinstitutedbytherevolution.Guérinwrites“The
Revolutioncannotconsiderthestateasamedium,but
Spanish revolution was relatively mature in the minds of liber-
mustdependontheorganizationofproducers.
tarian thinkers, as in the popular consciousness.” And workers’
We have followed this norm and we find no need for organizations existed with the structure, the experience, and the
the hypothesis of a superior power to organized la- understandingtoundertakethetaskofsocialreconstructionwhen,
bor, in order to establish a new order of things. We with the Franco coup, the turmoil of early 1936 exploded into
wouldthankanyonetopointouttouswhatfunction, socialrevolution.Inhisintroductiontoacollectionofdocuments
if any, the State can have in an economic organiza- oncollectivizationinSpain,theanarchistAugustinSouchywrites:
tion,whereprivatepropertyhasbeenabolishedandin
which parasitism and special privilege have no place. Formanyyears,theanarchistsandthesyndicalistsof
ThesuppressionoftheStatecannotbealanguidaffair; Spain considered their supreme task to be the social
itmustbethetaskoftheRevolutiontofinishwiththe transformation of the society. In their assemblies
State.EithertheRevolutiongivessocialwealthtothe of Syndicates and groups, in their journals, their
producersinwhichcasetheproducersorganizethem- brochures and books, the problem of the social revo-
selvesforduecollectivedistributionandtheStatehas lution was discussed incessantly and in a systematic
nothing to do; or the Revolution does not give social fashion.26
wealthtotheproducers,inwhichcasetheRevolution
hasbeenalieandtheStatewouldcontinue.
26Collectivisations:L’OeuvreconstructivedelaRévolutionespagnole,p.8.
8 21
Statethroughouthistoryhasmeantthegovernmentof Ourfederalcouncilofeconomyisnotapoliticalpower
men by ruling classes; the Republic of Socialism will butaneconomicandadministrativeregulatingpower.
bethegovernmentofindustryadministeredonbehalf It receives its orientation from below and operates in
of the whole community. The former meant the eco- accordance with the resolutions of the regional and
nomic and political subjection of the many; the latter national assemblies. It is a liaison corps and nothing
will mean the economic freedom of all — it will be, else.4
therefore,atruedemocracy.
Engels,inaletterof1883,expressedhisdisagreementwiththis
This programmatic statement appears in William Paul’s The conceptionasfollows:
State, its Origins and Functions, written in early 1917 — shortly
before Lenin’s State and Revolution, perhaps his most libertarian The anarchists put the thing upside down. They
work (see note 9). Paul was a member of the Marxist-De Leonist declare that the proletarian revolution must begin
Socialist Labor Party and later one of the founders of the British by doing away with the political organization of the
Communist Party.25 His critique of state socialism resembles state…But to destroy it at such a moment would be
the libertarian doctrine of the anarchists in its principle that to destroy the only organism by means of which the
since state ownership and management will lead to bureaucratic victorious proletariat can assert its newly-conquered
despotism, the social revolution must replace it by the industrial power, hold downits capitalist adversaries,and carry
organizationofsocietywithdirectworkers’control.Manysimilar out that economic revolution of society without
statementscanbecited. which the whole victory must end in a new defeat
What is far more important is that these ideas have been real- and a mass slaughter of the workers similar to those
izedinspontaneousrevolutionaryaction,forexampleinGermany afterthePariscommune.5
and Italy after World War I and in Spain (not only in the agricul-
tural countryside, but also in industrial Barcelona) in 1936. One
might argue that some form of council communism is the natu- 4Diego Abad de Santillan, After the Revolution, p. 86. In the last chapter,
writtenseveralmonthsaftertherevolutionhadbegun,heexpresseshisdissat-
ral form of revolutionary socialism in an industrial society. It re-
isfaction with what had so far been achieved along these lines. On the accom-
flects the intuitive understanding that democracy is severely lim-
plishmentsofthesocialrevolutioninSpain,seemyAmericanPowerandtheNew
itedwhentheindustrialsystemiscontrolledbyanyformofauto- Mandarins,chap.1,andreferencescitedthere;theimportantstudybyBrouéand
craticelite,whetherofowners,managersandtechnocrats,a“van- TémimehassincebeentranslatedintoEnglish.Severalotherimportantstudies
haveappearedsince,inparticular:FrankMintz,L’Autogestiondansl’Espagnerévo-
guard” party, or a state bureaucracy. Under these conditions of
lutionaire(Paris:EditionsBélibaste,1971);CésarM.Lorenzo,LesAnarchisteses-
authoritariandominationtheclassicallibertarianidealsdeveloped
pagnolsetlepouvoir,1868–1969(Paris:EditionsduSeuil,1969);GastonLeval,Es-
furtherbyMarxandBakuninandalltruerevolutionariescannotbe pagnelibertaire,1936–1939:L’OeuvreconstructivedelaRévolutionespagnole(Paris:
realized; man will not be free to develop his own potentialities to EditionsduCercle,1971).SeealsoVernonRichards,LessonsoftheSpanishRevo-
lution,enlarged1972edition.
25Forsomebackground,seeWalterKendall,TheRevolutionaryMovementin 5CitedbyRobertC.Tucker,TheMarxianRevolutionaryIdea,inhisdiscus-
Britain. sionofMarxismandanarchism.
20 9
Incontrast,theanarchists—mosteloquentlyBakunin—warned scientists, shop-officials in the shop…The goal of the
of the dangers of the “red bureaucracy,” which would prove to be workingclassisliberationfromexploitation.Thisgoal
“the most vile and terrible lie that our century has created.”6 The isnotreachedandcannotbereachedbyanewdirect-
anarchosyndicalistFernandPelloutierasked:“Musteventhetran- ingandgoverningclasssubstitutingitselfforthebour-
sitorystatetowhichwehavetosubmitnecessarilyandfatallybe geoisie. It is only realized by the workers themselves
acollectivistjail?Can’titconsistinafreeorganizationlimitedex- beingmasteroverproduction.
clusivelybytheneedsofproductionandconsumption,allpolitical
institutionshavingdisappeared?”7 Theseremarksaretakenfrom“FiveThesesontheClassStruggle”
I do not pretend to know the answers to this question. But it bytheleft-wingMarxistAntonPannekoek,oneoftheoutstanding
seems clear that unless there is, in some form, a positive answer, lefttheoristsofthecouncilcommunistmovement.Andinfact,rad-
the chances for a truly democratic revolution that will achieve icalMarxismmergeswithanarchistcurrents.
the humanistic ideals of the left are not great. Martin Buber put Asafurtherillustration,considerthefollowingcharacterization
theproblemsuccinctlywhenhewrote:“Onecannotinthenature of“revolutionarySocialism”:
of things expect a little tree that has been turned into a club
to put forth leaves.”8 The question of conquest or destruction The revolutionary Socialist denies that State owner-
ship can end in anything other than a bureaucratic
of state power is what Bakunin regarded as the primary issue
dividinghimfromMarx.9 Inoneformoranother,theproblemhas despotism.WehaveseenwhytheStatecannotdemo-
craticallycontrolindustry.Industrycanonlybedemo-
cratically owned and controlled by the workers elect-
ing directly from their own ranks industrial adminis-
6Bakunin,inalettertoHerzenandOgareff,1866.CitedbyDanielGuérin,
trativecommittees.Socialismwillbefundamentallyan
Jeunessedusocialismelibertaire,p.119.
7FernandPelloutier,citedinJoll,Anarchists.Thesourceis“L’Anarchisme industrialsystem;itsconstituencieswillbeofanindus-
etlessyndicatsouvriers,”LesTempsnouveaux,1895.ThefulltextappearsinDaniel trial character. Thus those carrying on the social ac-
Guérin,ed.,NiDieu,niMaître,anexcellenthistoricalanthologyofanarchism. tivitiesandindustriesofsocietywillbedirectlyrepre-
8MartinBuber,PathsinUtopia,p.127.
sentedinthelocalandcentralcouncilsofsocialadmin-
9“No state, however democratic,” Bakunin wrote, “not even the reddest
istration.Inthiswaythepowersofsuchdelegateswill
republic — can ever give the people what they really want, i.e., the free self-
organization and administration of their own affairs from the bottom upward, flow upwards from those carrying on the work and
withoutanyinterferenceorviolencefromabove,becauseeverystate,eventhe conversant with the needs of the community. When
pseudo-People’sStateconcoctedbyMr.Marx,isinessenceonlyamachineruling
thecentraladministrativeindustrialcommitteemeets
themassesfromabove,fromaprivilegedminorityofconceitedintellectuals,who
it will represent every phase of social activity. Hence
imaginethattheyknowwhatthepeopleneedandwantbetterthandothepeo-
plethemselves…”“Butthepeoplewillfeelnobetterifthestickwithwhichthey thecapitalistpoliticalorgeographicalstatewillbere-
arebeingbeatenislabeled‘thepeople’sstick’“(StatismandAnarchy[1873],in placed by the industrial administrative committee of
Dolgoff,BakuninonAnarchy,p.338)—“thepeople’sstick”beingthedemocratic
Socialism. The transition from the one social system
Republic.
totheotherwillbethesocialrevolution.Thepolitical
Marx,ofcourse,sawthematterdifferently.
10 19