Proudhon aroused the wrath of Marx who wrote his Poverty of Philosophy
(1847) against Proudhon’s Philosophy of Poverty (1846). Marx objected to
Proudhon’s opposition to political involvement and trade unionism, and regarded
his principles of justice and equality as woefully unhistorical. Proudhon’s rejection
of liberal principles of government meant that he regarded all forms of the state as
anathema. He was also strongly nationalistic, patriarchal and for a period supported
the autocratic Emperor Napoleon III who suspended parliamentary politics.
Proudhon popularised the view that anarchy stood for order – despite the frequent
use of the word as a synonym for chaos – and he is widely regarded as the father
of anarchism.
Influenced by Proudhon but strongly collectivist in orientation was the Russian
anarchist, Bakunin (1814–76). Bakunin declares with an anti-Hobbesian fervour
that ‘man is born into society, just as ant is born into an ant-hill and bee into its
hive’ (Marshall, 1993: 291). The analogy with nature is important for Bakunin,
since he takes the view that sociability and the desire to revolt is instinctive. It is
both universal, and stronger among some rather than others. Bakunin took the view
that the instinct for revolt was particularly strong among the Latins and the Slavs,
and particularly weak among Germanic peoples. He saw revolution as a violent
process, and what Marshall calls his ‘apocalyptic fantasies’ (1993: 306) manifest
themselves in his belief that to create is to destroy. This slogan reappears during
the May events – the student rebellion – in 1968 in Paris, and Berki notes that
Bakunin’s ideas became very fashionable in the 1970s in Western libertarian socialist
circles (1974: 84).
Bakunin clashed with Marx in the First International and he was expelled in- Nevertheless, although he and the ‘authoritarian’ Marx disagreed over
strategy, he greatly admired Marx’s critique of capital, and he was opposed not
simply to the repressive hierarchy of the state, but to the inequalities and exploitation
identified with capitalism. He was, however, passionately opposed to Marx’s notion
of the workers becoming a ruling class and having to control a transitional state.
The workers’ state, he insisted, would be nothing but a barracks; a regime where
working men and women are regimented. We will have ‘despotic rule over the toiling
masses by a new, numerically small aristocracy of genuine or sham scientists. The
people... will be wholly regimented into one common herd of governed people.
Emancipation indeed!’ (Maximoff, 1953: 287). Not only was Bakunin sceptical
about the ‘authority’ of science, but he regarded religion and the notion of God as
inherently statist and authoritarian.
Yet Bakunin argued the case for a secret association in which a revolutionary
general staff would serve as intermediaries ‘between the revolutionary idea and the
instincts of the people’, and this presumably accounts for his temporary attraction
to the notorious Nechaev, a nihilist, terrorist and a man of no scruples. Against
one’s will, declared Bakunin, one is obliged to use ‘force, cunning and deception’
(Marshall, 1993: 282–4). Bakunin was hugely influential. Not only did he make an
enormous impact upon French labour, Italian revolutionaries and, as we shall see,
the socialist movement in Spain, but his anti-capitalism attracted support among
those who espoused what was called anarcho-syndicalism.
Bertrand Russell has referred to syndicalism as ‘the anarchism of the market
place’ (Berki, 1974: 87) and it focuses on the role of industrial workers who are to
organise themselves into revolutionary syndicates, making ‘war on the bosses’ and
244 Part 2 Classical ideologies