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Title: Toward Anarchy Author: Errico Malatesta Date: 9 December 1899 Language: en Topics: anarchy, revolution Source: The Method of Freedom: An Errico Malatesta Reader, edited by Davide Turcato, translated by Paul Sharkey. Notes: Man! (San Francisco) 1, no. 1 (April 1933). Originally published as “Verso l’anarchia,” La Questione Sociale (Paterson, NJ) 5, new series, no. 14 (9 December 1899). The actual title of Man!’s edition and all successive reprints is “Toward anarchism.” We have replaced “anarchism” with “anarchy” in the title and throughout the text to rectify a gross mistranslation. The whole article is based on the distinction between “anarchy,” the ultimate ideal, and the incessant effort to approach that ideal, which is what “anarchism” is about. Thus translating “anarchia” as “anarchism” completely obfuscates the article’s main thrust. We have also made changes in a few places where the translation was unclear or incorrect.
It is a general opinion that we, because we call ourselves
revolutionists, expect Anarchy to come with one stroke—as the immediate
result of an insurrection which violently attacks all that which exists
and which replaces it with institutions that are really new. And to say
the truth this idea is not lacking among some comrades who also conceive
the revolution in such a manner.
This prejudice explains why so many honest opponents believe Anarchy a
thing impossible; and it also explains why some comrades, disgusted with
the present moral condition of the people and seeing that Anarchy cannot
come about soon, waver between an extreme dogmatism which blinds them to
the realities of life and an opportunism which practically makes them
forget that they are Anarchists and that for Anarchy they should
struggle.
Of course the triumph of Anarchy cannot be the consequence of a miracle;
it cannot come about in contradiction to the laws of development (an
axiom of evolution that nothing occurs without sufficient cause), and
nothing can be accomplished without the adequate means.
If we should want to substitute one government for another, that is
impose our desires upon others, it would only be necessary to combine
the material forces needed to resist the actual oppressors and put
ourselves in their place.
But we do not want this; we want Anarchy which is a society based on
free and voluntary accord—a society in which no one can force his wishes
on another and in which everyone can do as he pleases and together all
will voluntarily contribute to the well-being of the community. But
because of this Anarchy will not have definitively and universally
triumphed until all men will not only not want to be commanded but will
not want to command; nor will Anarchy have succeeded unless they will
have understood the advantages of solidarity and know how to organise a
plan of social life wherein there will no longer be traces of violence
and imposition.
And as the conscience, determination, and capacity of men continuously
develop and find means of expression in the gradual modification of the
new environment and in the realization of the desires in proportion to
their being formed and becoming imperious, so it is with Anarchy;
Anarchy cannot come but little by little—slowly, but surely, growing in
intensity and extension.
Therefore, the subject is not whether we accomplish Anarchy today,
tomorrow or within ten centuries, but that we walk toward Anarchy today,
tomorrow and always.
Anarchy is the abolition of exploitation and oppression of man by man,
that is the abolition of private property and government; Anarchy is the
destruction of misery, of superstitions, of hatred. Therefore, every
blow given to the institutions of private property and to the
government, every exaltation of the conscience of man, every disruption
of the present conditions, every lie unmasked, every part of human
activity taken away from the control of the authority, every
augmentation of the spirit of solidarity and initiative, is a step
towards Anarchy.
The problem lies in knowing how to choose the road that really
approaches the realization of the ideal and in not confusing the real
progress with hypocritical reforms. For with the pretext of obtaining
immediate ameliorations these false reforms tend to distract the masses
from the struggle against authority and capitalism; they serve to
paralyze their actions and make them hope that something can be attained
through the kindness of the exploiters and governments. The problem lies
in knowing how to use the little power we have—that we go on achieving,
in the most economical way, more prestige for our goal.
There is in every country a government which, with brutal force, imposes
its laws on all; it compels all to be subjected to exploitation and to
maintain, whether they like it or not, the existing institutions. It
forbids the minority groups to actuate their ideas, and prevents the
social organizations in general from modifying themselves according to,
and with, the modifications of public opinion. The normal peaceful
course of evolution is arrested by violence, and thus with violence it
is necessary to reopen that course. It is for this reason that we want a
violent revolution today; and we shall want it always—so long as man is
subject to the imposition of things contrary to his natural desires.
Take away the governmental violence, ours would have no reason to exist.
We cannot as yet overthrow the prevailing government; perhaps tomorrow
from the ruins of the present government we cannot prevent the arising
of another similar one. But this does not hinder us, nor will it
tomorrow, from resisting whatever form of authority—refusing always to
submit to its laws whenever possible, and constantly using force to
oppose force.
Every weakening of whatever kind of authority, each accession of liberty
will be a progress toward Anarchy; always it should be conquered—never
asked for; always it should serve to give us greater strength in the
struggle; always it should make us consider the state as an enemy with
whom we should never make peace; always it should make us remember well
that the decrease of the ills produced by the government consists in the
decrease of its attributions and powers, not in increasing the number of
rulers or in having them chosen by the ruled. By government we mean any
person or group of persons in the state, country, community, or
association who has the right to make laws and inflict them upon those
who do not want them.
We cannot as yet abolish private property; we cannot regulate the means
of production which is necessary to work freely; perhaps we shall not be
able to do so in the next insurrectional movement. But this does not
prevent us now, or will it in the future, from continually opposing
capitalism. And each victory, however small, gained by the workers
against their exploiters, each decrease of profit, every bit of wealth
taken from the individual owners and put to the disposal of all, shall
be a progress—a forward step toward Anarchy. Always it should serve to
enlarge the claims of the workers and to intensify the struggle; always
it should be accepted as a victory over an enemy and not as a concession
for which we should be thankful; always we should remain firm in our
resolution to take with force, as soon as it will be possible, those
means which the private owners, protected by the government, have stolen
from the workers.
The right of force having disappeared, the means of production being
placed under the management of whomever wants to produce, the rest must
be the fruit of a peaceful evolution.
It would not be Anarchy, yet, or it would be only for those few who want
it, and only in those things they can accomplish without the cooperation
of the non-anarchists. This does not necessarily mean that the ideal of
Anarchy will make little or no progress, for little by little its ideas
will extend to more men and more things until it will have embraced all
mankind and all life’s manifestations.
Having overthrown the government and all the existing dangerous
institutions which with force it defends, having conquered complete
freedom for all and with it the right to the means of production,
without which liberty would be a lie, and while we are struggling to
arrive to this point, we do not intend to destroy those things which we
little by little will reconstruct.
For example, there functions in the present society the service of
supplying food. This is being done badly, chaotically, with great waste
of energy and material and in view of capitalist interests; but after
all, one way or another we must eat. It would be absurd to want to
disorganize the system of producing and distributing food unless we
could substitute it with something better and more just.
There exists a postal service. We have thousands of criticisms to make,
but in the meantime we use it to send our letters, and shall continue to
use it, suffering all its faults, until we shall be able to correct or
replace it.
There are schools, but how badly they function. But because of this we
do not allow our children to remain in ignorance—refusing their learning
to read and write. Meanwhile we wait and struggle for a time when we
shall be able to organise a system of model schools to accomodate all.
From this we can see that, to arrive at Anarchy, material force is not
the only thing to make a revolution; it is essential that the workers,
grouped according to the various branches of production, place
themselves in a position that will insure the proper functioning of
their social life—without the aid or need of capitalists or governments.
And we see also that the Anarchist ideals are far from being in
contradiction, as the “scientific socialists” claim, to the laws of
evolution as proved by science; they are a conception which fits these
laws perfectly; they are the experimental system brought from the field
of research to that of social realization.