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Anarchy and Violence Errico Malatesta
By: mistermax Date: January 17, 2016, 6:04 pm
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[center]Errico Malatesta[/center]
[center]Anarchy and Violence[/center]
From their first manifestations Anarchists have [been] nearly
unanimous as to the necessity of recourse to physical force in
order to transform existing society; and while the other
self-styled revolutionary parties have gone floundering into the
parliamentary slough, the anarchist idea has in some sort
identified itself with that of armed insurrection and violent
revolution.
But, perhaps, there has been no sufficient explanation as to the
kind and the degree of violence to be employed; and here as in
many other questions very dissimilar ideas and sentiments lurk
under our common name.
As a fact, the numerous outrages which have lately been
perpetrated by Anarchists and in the name of Anarchy, have
brought to the light of day profound differences which had
formerly been ignored, or scarcely foreseen.
Some comrades, disgusted at the atrocity and uselessness of
certain of these acts, have declared themselves opposed to all
violence whatever, except in cases of personal defence against
direct and immediate attack. Which, in my opinion, would mean
the renunciation of all revolutionary initiative, and the
reserving of our blows for the petty, and often involuntary
agents of the government, while leaving in peace the organizers
of, and those chiefly benefited by, government and capitalist
exploitation.
Other comrades, on the contrary, carried away by the excitement
of the struggle, embittered by the infamies of the ruling class,
and assuredly influenced by what has remained of the old Jacobin
ideas permeating the political education of the present
generation, have hastily accepted any and every kind of
violence, provided only that it be committed in the name of
Anarchy; and they have claimed hardly less than the right of
life and death over those who are not Anarchists, or who are not
Anarchists exactly according to their pattern.
And the mass of the public, ignoring these polemics, and
deceived by the capitalist press, see in Anarchy nothing but
bombs and daggers, and habitually regard Anarchists as wild
beasts thirsting for blood and ruin.
It is therefore needful that we explain ourselves very clearly
as regards this question of violence, and that each one of us
should take a position accordingly: needful both in the
interests of the relations of practical co-operation which may
exist among all those who profess Anarchism, as well as in the
interests of the general propaganda, and of our relations with
the public.
In my opinion, there can be no doubt that the Anarchist Idea,
denying government, is by its very nature opposed to violence,
which is the essence of every authoritarian system - the mode of
action of every government.
Anarchy is freedom in solidarity. It is only through the
harmonizing of interests, through voluntary co-operation,
through love, respect, and reciprocal tolerance, by persuasion,
by example, and by the contagion of benevolence, that it can and
ought to triumph.
We are Anarchists, because we believe that we can never achieve
the combined well-being of all - which is the aim of all our
efforts - except through a free understanding among men, and
without forcibly imposing the will of any upon any others.
In other parties there are certainly men who are as sincere and
as devoted to the interests of the people as the best of us may
be. But that which characterizes us Anarchists and distinguishes
us from all others is that we do not believe ourselves in
possession of absolute truth; we do not believe ourselves either
infallible, or omniscient, - which is the implicit pretension of
all legislators and political candidates whatever; and
consequently we do not believe ourselves called for the
direction and tutelage of the people.
We are, par excellence, the party of freedom, the party of free
development, the party of social experimentation.
But against this very freedom which we claim for all, against
the possibility of this experimental search after better forms
of society, there are erected barriers of iron. Legions of
soldiers and police are ready to massacre and imprison anyone
who will not meekly submit to the laws which a handful of
privileged persons have made in their own interests. And even if
soldiers and police did not exist, yet so long as the economic
constitution of society remains what it is, freedom would still
be impossible; because, since all the means of life are under
the control of a minority, the great mass of mankind is obliged
to labour for the others, and themselves wallow in poverty and
degradation.
The first thing to do, therefore, is to get rid of the armed
force which defends existing institutions, and by means of the
expropriation of the present holders, to place the land and the
other means of production at the disposal of everybody. And this
cannot possibly be done - in our opinion - without the
employment of physical force. Moreover, the natural development
of economic antagonisms, the waking consciousness of an
important fraction of the proletariat, the constantly increasing
number of unemployed, the blind resistance of the ruling
classes, in short contemporary evolution as a whole, is
conducting us inevitably towards the outbreak of a great
revolution, which will overthrow everything by its violence, and
the fore-running signs of which are already visible. This
revolution will happen, with us or without us; and the existence
of a revolutionary party, conscious of the end to be attained,
will serve to give a useful direction to the violence, and to
moderate its excesses by the influence of a lofty ideal.
Thus it is that we are revolutionists. In this sense, and within
these limits, violence is not a contradiction with Anarchist
principles, since it is not the result of our free choice, but
is imposed upon us by necessity in the defence of unrecognized
human rights which are thwarted by brute force.
I repeat here: as Anarchists, we cannot and we do not desire to
employ violence, except in the defence of ourselves and others
against oppression. But we claim this right of defence - entire,
real, and efficacious. That is, we wish to be able to go behind
the material instrument which wounds us, and to attack the hand
which wields the instrument, and the head which directs it. And
we wish to choose our own hour and field of battle, so as to
attack the enemy under conditions as favourable as possible:
whether it be when he is actually attacking and provoking us, or
at times when he slumbers, and relaxes his hand, counting on
popular submission. For as a fact, the bourgeoisie is in a
permanent state of war against the proletariat, since it never
for one moment ceases to exploit the latter, and grind it down.
Unfortunately, among the acts which have been committed in the
name of Anarchy, there have been some, which, though wholly
lacking in Anarchist characteristics, have been wrongly
confounded with other acts of obviously Anarchist inspiration.
For my part, I protest against this confusion between acts
wholly different in moral value, as well as in practical
effects.
Despite the excommunication and insults of certain people, I
consider it an essential point to discriminate between the
heroic act of a man who consciously sacrifices his life for that
which he believes will do good, and the almost involuntary act
of some unhappy man whom society has reduced to despair, or the
savage act of a man who has been driven astray by suffering, and
has caught the contagion of this civilised savagery which
surrounds us all; between the intelligent act of a man who,
before acting, weighs the probable good or evil that may result
for his cause, and the thoughtless act of the man who strikes at
random; between the generous act of one who exposes himself to
danger in order to spare suffering to his fellows, and the
bourgeois act of one who brings suffering upon others for his
own advantage; between the anarchist act of one who desires to
destroy the obstacles that stand in the way of the
reconstitution of society on a basis of free agreement of all,
and the authoritarian act of the man who intends to punish the
crowd for its stupidity, to terrorise it (which makes it still
more stupid) and to impose his own ideas upon it.
Most assuredly the bourgeoisie has no right to complain of the
violence of its foes, since its whole history, as a class, is a
history of bloodshed, and since the system of exploitation,
which is the law of its life, daily produces hecatombs of
innocents. Assuredly, too, it is not political parties who
should complain of violence, for these are, on and all,
red-handed with blood spilt unnecessarily, and wholly in their
own interest; these, who have brought up the young, generation
after generation, in the cult of force triumphant; these, who
when they are not actual apologists of the Inquisition, are yet
enthusiastic admirers of that Red Terror, which checked the
splendid revolutionary impulse at the end of the last century,
and prepared the way for the Empire, for the Restoration, and
the White Terror.
The fit of mildness which has come over certain of the
bourgeois, now that their lives and their purses are menaced,
is, in our opinion, extremely untrustworthy. But it is not for
us to regulate our conduct by the amount of pleasure or vexation
which it may occasion the bourgeoisie. We have to conduct
ourselves according to our principles; and the interest of our
cause, which in our view is the cause of all humanity.
Since historical antecedents have driven us to the necessity of
violence, let us employ violence; but let us never forget that
it is a case of hard necessity, and in its essence contrary to
our aspirations. Let us not forget that all history witnesses to
the distressing fact - whenever resistance to oppression has
been victorious it has always engendered new oppression, and it
warns us that it must ever be so until the bloody tradition of
the past be for ever broken with, and violence be limited to the
strictest necessity.
Violence begets violence; and authoritarianism begets oppression
and slavery. The good intentions of individuals can in no way
affect this sequence. The fanatic who tells himself that he will
save people by force, and in his own manner, is always a sincere
man, but a terrible agent of oppression and reaction.
Robespierre, with horrible good faith and his conscience pure
and cruel, was just as fatal for the Revolution as the personal
ambition of Bonaparte. The ardent zeal of Torquemada for the
salvation of souls did much more harm to freedom of thought and
to the progress of the human mind than the scepticism and
corruption of Leo X and his court.
Theories, declarations of principle, or magnanimous words can do
nothing against the natural filiation of facts. Many martyrs
have died for freedom, many battles have been fought and won in
the name of the welfare of all mankind, and yet the freedom has
turned out after all to mean nothing but the unlimited
oppression and exploitation of the poor by the rich.
The Anarchist idea is no more secured from corruption than the
Liberal idea has proved to be, yet the beginnings of corruption
may be already observed if we note the contempt for the masses
which is exhibited by certain Anarchists, their intolerance, and
their desire to spread terror around them.
Anarchists! let us save Anarchy! Our doctrine is a doctrine of
love. We cannot, and we ought not to be either avengers, nor
dispensers of justice. Our task, our ambition, our ideal is to
be deliverers.
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