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P.-J. Proudhon, “War and Peace,” Volume I

March 24, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

[two_third padding=”0 10px 0 10px”] WAR AND PEACE INVESTIGATIONS REGARDING THE PRINCIPLE AND CONSTITUTION OF THE RIGHTS OF NATIONS TABLE OF CONTENTS Preface BOOK ONE: PHENOMENOLOGY OF WAR Chapter One. — Of the phenomenality of war Chap. II. — War is a divine fact Chap. III. — War, religious revelation Chap. IV. — War, revelation of justice Chap. V. — War, revelation of the ideal Chap. Vl. — War, discipline of humanity Chap. VII. — The man of war is greater than nature Chap. VIII. — War and peace, correlative expressions Chap. IX. — Problem of war and peace BOOK […]

P.-J Proudhon, “The Social Revolution Demonstrated by the Coup d’Etat” (1852)

March 21, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

The Social Revolution is a radical book with a strangely reactionary reputation. Having already addressed his ideas to all the most likely audiences, during the period when revolutionary hopes were still widespread in France, he turned, during his prison sentence, to less likely audiences. For example, The General Idea of the Revolution in the Nineteenth Century, which has retained a very radical reputation, was addressed to the bourgeoisie. So it is only through an escalation of his existing strategy that his next work became a call to the newly self-proclaimed Emperor Napoleon III to recognize the inevitability of the Social […]

How does property become anarchist?

March 21, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

If we want a clear indication of the gulf between the possible (resultant) anarchism suggested by Proudhon’s mature work and the historical anarchism that emerged in the late 19th century, we probably don’t have to look beyond the almost universal suspicion that Proudhon’s final works themselves mark a retreat from the anarchist project — and the fact that the resultant anarchy that seems to occupy a central place in that work simply does not seem to register among our theoretical options.

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The Present Institutions of the International from the Point of View of the Future (1869)

March 20, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

In the Archives Bakounine, this text is attributed to César de Paepe. Les institutions actuelles de l’Internationale au point de vue de l’avenir. L’Association internationale des Travailleurs porte dans ses flancs la régénération sociale. Il en est beaucoup qui conviennent que si l’Association vient à réaliser son programme, elle aura effectivement instauré le règne de la justice, mais qui croient que certaines institutions actuelles de l’Internationale ne sont que temporaires, et destinées à disparaître. Nous voulons montrer que l’Internationale offre déjà le type de la société à venir, et que ses diverses institutions, avec les modifications voulues, formeront l’ordre social […]

Henry Seymour, “The Whereabouts of Communist Logic” (1895)

March 18, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

[one_third] Debate on Proudhon and property: [/one_third][two_third_last] THE WHEREABOUTS OF COMMUNIST LOGIC. To the Editor of Liberty. Failing a superfluity of copy, I send you a line or two in conclusion upon L. S. B.’s extraordinary effusion in the June number, such as I have gathered the patience to pen, for I am in no mood to follow her unprofitable pastime of splitting hairs. I defined the word “right” for the purpose of this discussion, as an individual limitation to appropriation, such limitation being set by an equality of opportunity. I furthermore held that this constituted the sole case for […]

L. S. Bevington, “The Whereabouts of Property Ethics” (1895)

March 18, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

[one_third] Debate on Proudhon and property: [/one_third][two_third_last] THE WHEREABOUTS OF PROPERTY ETHICS By L. S. BEVINGTON. In Mr. Seymour’s useful rejoinder (see April No.) to my recent survey of his position, he charges me with “sophistry.” Which may pass: readers will judge. The present article concludes my share in this particular controversy, and before saying farewell to my courteous opponent, it may be well to draw our mutual readers’ attention to the valuable verbal concessions we free communists have obtained from him. The preliminary questions have been answered precisely in the fashion that was to be foreseen. They were awkward […]

P. E. Tanner, “The Rules” (1914)

March 14, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

[ezcol_2third] THE RULES (With apologies to Edgar Allan Poe) I. Life is now beset with rules— Irksome rules That are framed by different bureaucratic legislative schools. How they mind us and they bind us In this regulative age, How they irritate and grind us Till it’s possible to find us In an unrestricted rage; And we curse, curse, curse, As our wrath grows worse and worse, At the fiendish machinations of the regulative fools, With their rules, rules, rules, rules, Rules, rules, rules— With their overtaxing, unrelaxing rules! II. Then those “god old-fashioned rules,” Golden rules! How successfully they’ve […]

Saverio Merlino, “Dangerous Fallacies” (1896)

March 14, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

[ezcol_2third] Dangerous Fallacies. Anarchists, whether individualistic or communistic, and even some Social Democrats, are fond of speaking of the “absolute sovereignty of the individual,” and they claim for each individual “free access to the means of production.” “Let everybody do whatever he likes,” they say, and the implication is that society will then be organized to perfection, or rather that it will do without organization, individuals will agree or disagree, groups will cooperate spontaneously, without any coercive power, without any settled plan, and without any permanent individual initiative. Every man will go to his work, will choose his own accord […]

Henry Seymour, “The Monomaniacs” (1895)

March 13, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

[ezcol_2third] THE MONOMANIACS: A FABLE IN FINANCE. Once upon a time there lived in the moon a race of people who subsisted principally by eating one another. In course of time their numbers became so diminished that they viewed with alarm the approaching extinction of their species. But the first law of nature sufficiently asserted itself to induce them to relinquish cannibalism except as a luxury, and by degrees they went to fishing, to pasturage and husbandry, ultimately developing a rude system of commodity production. By and by they found hand-labor to be excessively tiresome, and although they worked from […]

W. C. Owen, “Anarchism” (1895)

March 13, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

[ezcol_2third] ANARCHISM. 1.—Do Anarchist-Communists believe in the common ownership of land and capital? I myself do not; that is to say, I certainly do not believe in making such ownership compulsory. Whether common, or private ownership shall prevail under Anarchism, is merely a question of detail. The principle is individual freedom; equal liberty to every man, woman, and child to develop all that is in him or her, and to have access to the life-opportunities necessary for such development; i. e. freedom of production, and of distribution or exchange, which is, of course, only the final process of production. This—freedom […]