43 lines
2.1 KiB
Plaintext
43 lines
2.1 KiB
Plaintext
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ANARCHISM (from the Greek an- and arche, contrary to authority), the name
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given to the principle or theory of life and conduct under which society
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is conceived without government -- harmony in such a society being
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obtained, not by submission to law, or by obedience to any authority, but
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by free agreements concluded between the various groups, territorial and
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professional, freely constituted for the sake of production and
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consumption, as also for the satisfaction of the infinite variety of needs
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and aspirations of a civilized being.
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Peter Kropotkin (1842-1921)
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In common with all socialists, the anarchists hold that the
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private ownership of land, capital, and machinery has had its time;
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that it is condemned to disappear: and that all requisites for
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production must, and will, become the common property of society,
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and be managed in common by the producers of wealth. And...they
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maintain that the ideal of the political organization of society is a
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condition of things where the functions of government are reduced to
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minimum....(and) that the ultimate aim of society is the reduction of
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the functions of government to nil--that is, to a society without
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government, to an-archy.
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Baldwin, Roger N.(Ed.); Kropotkin's Revolutionary Pamphlets, N.Y:
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Benjamin Blom, 1927, p. 46.
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"But owing to our wage system, this increase of wealth -- due to
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the combined efforts of men of science, of managers, and workmen as
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well -- has resulted only in an unprecedented accumulation of
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wealth in the hands of the owners of capital; while an increase of
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misery for the great numbers, and an insecurity of life for all,
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have been the lot of the workmen; the unskilled labourers, in
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continuous search for labour, are falling into an unheard-of
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destitution. And even the best paid artisans and skilled workmen
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labour under the permanent menace of being thrown, in their turn,
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into the same conditions as the unskilled paupers, in consequence
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of some of the continuous and unavoidable fluctuations of industry
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and caprices of capital."
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