1900s Archives - The Libertarian Labyrinth

Émile Buré, “Michel Bakounine” (1901)

May 6, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur

Michel Bakounine Le docteur Nettlau, dans un important ouvrage qui a été remis aux bibliothèques, s’emploie à faire revivre Michel Bakounine, « révolutionnaire émérite, conspirateur expérimenté et grand charmeur d’hommes ». Il nous suffira, dans cette courte notice, de préciser quelques dates en nous aidant de la thèse de M. A. François : Michel Bakounine et la Philosophie de l’Anarchie. Michel Bakounine naquit dans le district de Torjok, entre Pétersbourg et Moscou, d’un père, ancien attaché à la légation russe de Florence, que ses idées libérales avaient éloigné de la Cour. En 1832, à dix-huit ans, le jeune Michel est […]

James Guillaume on “God and the State” (1908 and 1909)

March 27, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur

In 1877, the various unpublished manuscripts that Bakunin had left were sent to me so that I could, in concert with my friends from the Jura Federation of the International, see to the publication of that which appeared worthy of printing. It was not possible then to gather the financial resources necessary for the printing of a volume; and when I left Switzerland in May 1878, I passed the little case containing these manuscripts, Élisée Reclus, by way of Kraftchinsky (Stepniak), into the hands of Élisée Reclus. Four more years would pass, and finally in 1882 there appeared in Geneva, […]

Ricardo Mella, “Free Cooperation and Communities”

January 28, 2015 Shawn P. Wilbur

Things have been a little quiet on this front, while I finish the introduction to “Anarchies and Anarchisms: 1840-1920.” But part of the work on that project has allowed me to make some more progress on the Collectivism Reader for this project. I’ve been looking at collectivism in Spain, and the “anarchism without adjectives” current that emerged from the conflict between collectivist and communist anarchists, and have finally the chance to get better acquainted with the work of figures like Tarrida del Mármal and Ricardo Mella. I’ve just posted a translation of an essay by Ricardo Mella, “Free Cooperation and […]

Paul Eltzbacher, “A Synopsis of Bakunin’s Teaching” (1900)

January 17, 2013 Shawn P. Wilbur

A Synopsis of Bakunin’s Teaching[1] To escape its wretched lot the populace has three ways, two imaginary and one real. The two first are the rum-shop and the church, the third is the social revolution. A cure is possible only through the social revolution — that is, through the destruction of all institutions of inequality, and the establishment of economic and social equality. The revolution wall not be made by anybody. Revolutions are never made, neither by individuals nor yet by secret societies. They come about automatically, in a measure; the power of things, -the current of events and facts, […]

Max Nettlau, “Marx and Engels and the IWMA” (1907)

January 17, 2013 Shawn P. Wilbur

Marx and Engels and the International Working Men’s Association, 1872 to 1876. I. F. A. Sorge, a German refugee of 1849, the chief American correspondent of Marx and Engels in the seventies and eighties, a few months before his death published a volume of letters addressed to him by Marx (1868-1881), Engels (1872-1895), J. Ph. Becker, Dietzgen and others (Stuttgart, 1906, xii., pp. 422, 8vo.) We have already had glimpses of Marx’s personal life and doings in F. Lassalle’s letters addressed to him during the fifties, in Marx’s own letters to Dr. Kugelmann during the sixties, and in his letters […]