Men Against The State:The Expositors of Individualist Anarchism in America, 1827-1908 The writing of a history of anarchism in the United States will run into the difficulties created by the necessity of establishing criteria for the purpose of separating anarchism from other expressions of radical social thought which may be allied to but are distinct from it. On the verbal level the most perplexing problem is that of definition of terms, beginning with the basic word itself. In one respect the obstruction may never be bridged. An almost insuperable barrier has been the matter of semantics. The use of the term as an identification for a social order characterized by the absence of the State is quite recent. As used by Pierre Joseph Proudhon in this way, it is hardly more than a century old. However, its association with reprehensibility in this country has generally greatly restricted its use for descriptive purposes. European radicals have been far less inhibited in this way; hence the study of anarchism there is relatively unimpeded by hesitancy on the part of radicals to disclose themselves. Their propaganda has been open and identified, and thus may be readily examined.
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The idea has long been prevalent that violent conduct is characteristic of anarchists, and that anarchism is a doctrine of destruction. There exists little justification for such a stand, in actuality. In addition, the rejection of one particular variety of authority in favor of its replacement by another finds continual identification with anarchism, while social philosophies which are utterly opposed to it are on occasion labeled "anarchistic." This merely adds to the already large amount of confusion existing on the subject, setting up extremely vague limitations and permitting the inclusion of many elements which are quite controversial. Mere dissatisfaction with or opposition to the existing order anywhere is gravely insufficient to serve as evidence of anarchist sentiments. Nor is a program of pure negation or obstructionism more than faintly related; anarchists are not advocates of replacing something with nothing. An example of presumption is the widespread interchangeable use of the terms "nihilism" and "anarchism." Actually, the anarchist proposes specific solutions for social problems. His occasional tendency to mask them by encouraging the greater disintegration and decay of the older order may lead to identifying him with an element which desires plan-less, cumulative revolutionary disorder. But the anarchist and those enamored with perpetual revolutionary dynamism part company long before this.
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Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
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