bakunin for beginners - louisville books to...
TRANSCRIPT
All these shocking things happening now are carefully orchestrated to confuse, disorient, demoralize, and generally make us more emotionally and psychologically vulnerable to what is yet to come. Anyone who isn't taking this really fucking seriously is on the wrong side of history and humanity. I really wish I had prescriptions for how to build, organize, prepare, and fight. But I think the two most important things right now are to do whatever we each feel most moved to do—fight however you can as hard as you can as smart and strategically as you can. And however it is that you choose to fight, do not undercut or sabotage or denounce the fight that others are also waging.
This struggle is going to take all of us, all our creativity, anger, passion, ferocity, and even then I'm not sure it will be enough. But if you think that you can be part of the resistance while denouncing the tactics and ideologies and efforts of others, prescribing the "one to path" for resistance, and collaborating with the state either actively or passively in repressing other resisters, you are dead wrong, and no comrade of mine. And if you think that we can win this fight without welcoming new people into the resistance and patiently helping them build their capacities then you are also mistaken.
And if you can't be bothered to join this resistance somehow, get out of the fucking way.
March 2017
He was born Mikhail Alexandrovic Bakunin in 1814 to a cultured and distinguished land-‐owning family. The eldest of 10 children, he proved to be rebellious and defiant, often leading his brothers and sisters against their father—at one point even locking “Da” in the cellar for two days and presenting him with a manifesto of liberation. At the age of 14, Bakunin is enrolled at a military school in
St. Petersburg; he chafes at the arbitrary discipline and the narrow curriculum. In short order, he is expelled, ostensibly for poor grades, and is assigned to barracks on the Polish frontier. Eventually, he is commissioned as a junior officer with the Russian Imperial Guard in Lithuania, but in 1835, when he is 21, objecting to the way Russians were treating the Polish people, he quits. From that thereon, the fate of Slavic national liberation struggles became a constant interest. Bakunin makes his way to Moscow with the intention of preparing himself for a professorship in philosophy or history; he moves to Berlin to continue his studies, and there, is introduced to the “fertile content of German metaphysics”—Kant, Schelling, Fichte, and Hegel, the most influential thinker among German intellectuals at the time. He becomes enthralled with the work of Karl Marx and Pierre-‐Joseph Proudhon, and in 1844 travels to Paris, establishing contact with both political philosophers. He abandons his academic career and devotes more and more time to speaking, writing, and organizing opposition to imperialism in east and central Europe by Russia and other powers. In December 1844, Emperor Nicholas, informed of Bakunin’s work, issues a decree that strips Bakunin of his privileges as a noble, confiscates his land in Russia, and condemns him to lifelong exile in Siberia. He responds with a long letter to La Réforme, denouncing the Emperor as a despot and calls for democracy in Russia and Poland. As a result, he’s expelled from France.
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Bakunin and Violence At the end of the 19th century, the strategy of the Left was spread along a spectrum on the question of: a) tempo, i.e., revolution now or later, and b) means. At at one end of the means spectrum were those concerned with the degree of force or violence to be applied and to what targets: edifices, symbols or property and/or people, e.g., despots, monarchs, dictators, industrial barons or fill-‐in-‐the-‐blank, and at the other end of the spectrum were those who prioritized the open and progressive education of the masses. As members of the latter group were subject to increasing repression, the pendulum swung in favor of violence, namely, terror and assassination, a strategy of which some claim Bakunin was the arch-‐apostle. This repute (and the stereotype which emerged is exemplified in the cartoon below) was likely do to Bakunin’s brief acquaintance with the ruthless nihilist Nechaev who was the most extreme exponent of this philosophy (and whose ill-‐fated activities inspired Dostoyevsky’s novel The Possessed). There is no doubt that Bakunin regarded force as the indispensible midwife of social regeneration, but in reality he was neither a nihilist nor a demon. His goal was to deliver people from the oppressive institutions of government and ill-‐compensated labor, to create a society that would be collectivist in economic structure. Unfortunately, the coups with which he was associated between 1848 and 1876 failed.
Revolutionary terrorism was carried on and perpetuated in Russia by relatively large, organized groups; in France and southern Europe, it was typically the work of individuals or small circles, and in a few notorious cases was inflicted on random civilians by rogue anarchists who had lost patience with the masses whose apathy and servility they felt rendered them accomplices of the tyrannical social system—a state Bakunin once
described as an “immense cemetery where all the real aspirations and living forces of a country generously and blissfully allow themselves to be . . . buried in the name of that abstraction.” But in general violence was largely directed against symbols of state power. The record was statistically impressive: several Russian governors were shot in the late 1870s, the Tsar assassinated in 1881, the French President in 1894, the Empress of Austria in 1898, the King of Italy in 1900, and the President of the U.S. in 1901. 6
There is no doubt that Bakunin was a superb speaker, writer, and tireless revolutionary propagandist. The power of Bakunin’s personality and intellect was legendary. He did more than any other revolutionary in the mid 19th century to reveal how the state is an anti-‐social machine that controls society though political repression and violence for the benefit elites. He had a major influence on labor, peasant and leftwing movements of his time; and although these movements were overshadowed in the 1920s by the rise of Marxist regimes, the collapse of those regimes just decades later, and the growing awareness of how closely those regimes corresponded to the one-‐party dictatorships Bakunin predicted, exhibited the perils of Marxist doctrine. Bakunin’s ideas had a significant influence on later activists and thinkers, ranging from Peter Kropotkin, Errico Malatesta, and Emma Goldman to the Wobblies and anarchists in the Spanish Civil War. Also inspired by Bakunin were Herbert Marcuse, E.P. Thompson, Neil Postman, A.S. Neill, Noam Chomsky, the anarchists gathered under the banner of ‘anti-‐globalization’, the unrest in Greece, the Occupy movements, and . . . . the future is uncertain.
FURTHER READING There are two main compilations of Bakunin’s works: Bakunin on Anarchy edited by S. Dolgoff The Political Philosophy of Bakunin edited by G.P. Maximoff Also worth looking at are: The Basic Bakunin – Writings 1869-‐1871 edited by R.M. Cutler Mikhail Bakunin –From Out of the Dustbin edited by R. M. Cutler For an understanding of the potentiality of Bakunin’s ideas there is nothing to match The Social and Political Thought of Michael Bakunin by R.B. Saltman.
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Between 1846 and 1849 Bakunin travels around Europe (with one set of clothes, three trunks of books and other propaganda). He works to build alliances, becomes embroiled in at least six attempted revolutions in east and central Europe, and collects a number of death sentences from at least 3 nations. Saxon authorities finally catch up with him in 1849. He spends the next few years imprisoned in the most oppressive states in Eastern Europe: Saxony, Prussia, Austria, and finally, in 1851
is handed over to Russian authorities. After three years in the underground dungeons of the Fortress of St Peter and St Paul, he spends another four years in the infamous fortress of Shlisselburg (9 months of which he is kept chained to a wall). By this time, he suffers from scurvy, his teeth have fallen out, and he has lost a left testicle (crushed with a hammer). In February 1857, his mother's pleas to the Tsar are finally heeded and he is allowed to go into permanent exile in the western Siberian city of Tomsk. There he meets the love of his life, a young Polish working girl and fellow revolutionary, Antonia Kwiatkowski; they are married within a year. In 1861, Bakunin makes a daring escape from Siberia by stowing away on a ship to Japan, then working his way to San Francisco, New York (via Panama), and finally, arriving in London. Bakunin immediately immerses himself in insurrectionary work. In 1863, he leaves to join an uprising in Poland, but fails to reach his destination. He continues south to Switzerland, Italy and then north to Stockholm (where he is reunited with his wife), west to London, finally settling in Italy in 1864.
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Bakunin spends the next years of his life continuing to expand an underground organization of revolutionaries in Europe to carry on propaganda work and direct actions.* Bakunin publishes hundreds of pamphlets—he speaks and writes in 6 languages fluently—and eventually, writes three books on socialism, authoritarianism, class, and revolution. In 1868, Bakunin joins a 4-‐year-‐old initiative of French and British trade unionists, the International Working Men’s Association (aka the First International). Bakunin is instrumental in establishing branches of the International in Italy and Spain. He remains very active in the organization until he is expelled by Karl Marx and his followers in 1872 at the Hague Congress of the International, a conference Bakunin was unable to attend. Ideological differences within the labor movement had been apparent from the foundation of the First International; its members included Marxists, collectivists, reformists, anarchists, and mutualists. In 1872, the Congress was dominated by a struggle between Marx and his followers, who argued for the use of the state and dictatorship to bring about socialism, and the Bakunin/anarchist faction, which argued for the swift replacement of the state by federations of self-‐governing workplaces and communes. Although Bakunin accepted elements of Marx’s class analysis and theories regarding capitalism, he thought that Marx's methods, which advocated the seizure of political power by the working class, the so-‐called “Dictatorship of the Proletariat”, was misguided, if not dangerous—that it was a prelude to a form of communist authoritarianism that would inevitably take power over working people. “If you took the most ardent revolutionary,” Bakunin wrote, “vested him in absolute power, within a year he would be worse than the Tsar himself.” “They [the Marxists] maintain that only a dictatorship—their dictatorship, of course—can create the will of the people, while our answer to this is: No dictatorship can have any other aim but that of self-‐perpetuation, and it can beget only slavery in the people tolerating it; freedom can be created only by freedom, that is, by a universal rebellion on the part of the people and free organization of the toiling masses from the bottom up.” -‐ Mikhail Bakunin, Statism and Anarchism. -‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐-‐ *By 1868, the Brotherhood has members in England, France, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Belgium, Spain, Italy, Poland and Russia.
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In summary, the fundamental contradiction for Bakunin was that while Marxists accepted that the creation of a free, egalitarian society without social classes and government, i.e., anarchism, was the objective, they believed a dictatorship/state provided the means to achieve that end. To Bakunin, this translated into the absurdity that “in order to free the masses, they have first to be enslaved." In response to Bakunin’s expulsion from the First International, in 1872, the anti-‐authoritarian majority created their own International, advocating for direct revolutionary action by workers and peasants to abolish capitalism and the state. Bakunin’s position was that the revolution must be led by the people directly and any "enlightened elite" must only exert influence by remaining "invisible. . . not imposed on anyone . . . [and] deprived of all official rights and significance. . . . It is the spontaneous revolt against authority by the people which is of the greatest importance. The anarchist revolutionary organization must not attempt to take over and lead an uprising but has the responsibility of clarifying goals, putting forward revolutionary propaganda. To go beyond this would undermine the whole self-‐liberatory purpose of the revolution.” Ultimately, Bakunin rejected all systems of power in every name and shape, from the idea of God downward as well as every form of hierarchical authority, whether emanating from the will of a sovereign or even from a state that allowed universal suffrage. “The liberty of man consists solely in this, that he obeys the laws of nature because he has himself recognized them as such, and not because they have been imposed upon him externally by any foreign will whatsoever, human or divine, collective or individual.” -‐ Bakunin, God and the State. Bakunin retired to Lugano in 1873 and died 3 years later. Though his great revolution was unaccomplished, the shadow of his influence had passed over most of Europe and the ideals lived on. In Italy, by 1874, ten anarchist federations claiming over 26,000 members existed. At the same time, in Spain, Bakunin disciples succeeded in inspiring an anarchist movement that had over 50,000 supporters. Leaders adopted Bakunin’s revolutionary technique of propaganda by the deed, drawing attention to the iniquitous nature of the economic and political system by direct action on the public stage. Although the insurrections attempted in the 1870s were all dismal failures, anarchist revolutionary spirit and doctrine had taken root, its most significant expression emerging in Spain in the 20th century in the form of the
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