Lenin On Anarchism

[Rakhmetov]

"Anarchism is a product of despair. The psychology of the unsettled intellectual or the vagabond and not of the proletarian."


5. What has anarchism, at one time dominant in the Romance countries, contributed in recent European history?

– No doctrine, revolutionary teaching, or theory.

– Fragmentation of the working-class movement.

– Complete fiasco in the experiments of the revolutionary movement (Proudhonism, 1871; Bakuninism, 1873).

– Subordination of the working class to bourgeois politics in the guise of negation of politics.


http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1901/dec/31.htm


http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1931/unions/index.htm

http://www.socialist.net/marxism-and-anarchism.htm

http://www.socialist.net/educate-yourself.htm

[costello1977]

"Anarchism is a product of despair. The psychology of the unsettled intellectual or the vagabond and not of the proletarian."


5. What has anarchism, at one time dominant in the Romance countries, contributed in recent European history?

– No doctrine, revolutionary teaching, or theory.

– Fragmentation of the working-class movement.

– Complete fiasco in the experiments of the revolutionary movement (Proudhonism, 1871; Bakuninism, 1873).

– Subordination of the working class to bourgeois politics in the guise of negation of politics.


http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1901/dec/31.htm


http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1931/unions/index.htm

http://www.socialist.net/marxism-and-anarchism.htm

http://www.socialist.net/educate-yourself.htm

Have to say I agree with the initial statement and moreover, on me travles, I've never met to many anarchists that were properly working class. I mean Ive met anarchist students, anarchist trade union leaders, but generally the working man on the streets wouldn't even profess to be socialist, but would support the idea without overtly expressing support.

I do know one balloon that thinks anarchism is the natural outcome of communism,but he'll be reading this lol

[ed miliband]

http://www.eslkidstuff.com/images/ladle.gif

http://shingadia.com/yahoo_site_admin/assets/images/BarrelL_home_2.92132141.gif

[Jimmie Higgins]

"Anarchism is a product of despair. The psychology of the unsettled intellectual or the vagabond and not of the proletarian."


5. What has anarchism, at one time dominant in the Romance countries, contributed in recent European history?

– No doctrine, revolutionary teaching, or theory.

– Fragmentation of the working-class movement.

– Complete fiasco in the experiments of the revolutionary movement (Proudhonism, 1871; Bakuninism, 1873).

– Subordination of the working class to bourgeois politics in the guise of negation of politics.


http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1901/dec/31.htm


http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1931/unions/index.htm

http://www.socialist.net/marxism-and-anarchism.htm

http://www.socialist.net/educate-yourself.htmAre you trying to say that this describes contemporary anarchism? I don't know what your point about this quote is; I think, without any context from you about why you posted this, it comes across as overly divisive.

Here - in 1901 - it seems Lenin is being very polemical - how out of character for his writing. I think "State and Revolution" is a much more interesting take on Lenin's views of the differences and overlap between anarchism and Marxism.

[Crux]

http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1919/aug/28.htm
"Very many anarchist workers are now becoming sincere supporters of Soviet power, and that being so, it proves them to be our best comrades and friends, the best of revolutionaries, who have been enemies of Marxism only through misunderstanding, or, more correctly, not through misunderstanding but because the official socialism prevailing in the epoch of the Second International (1889-1914) betrayed Marxism, lapsed into opportunism, perverted Marx’s revolutionary teachings in general and his teachings on the lessons of the Paris Commune of 1871 in particular."

[Enragé]

Though i often self-describe as anarchist there is alot of truth in that statement by lenin. Anarchism is a product of despair, but in what way that's un-proletarian i fail to grasp. The only people who never despair under capitalism are the bourgeois.

And, being a product of despair, as in the despair this society causes, it is exactly anarchism which is the theory and praxis which is a natural phenomenon of capitalist society yet at the same time works against it. Capitalism bringing about the seeds of its own destruction, anyone? Negation!

All leninism/kautsky-ism is, are pipe-dreams by post-enlightenment intellectuals convinced by the surpreme truth of their 'science' coupled with some perhaps interesting insights (like anarchism as, i would say among other things, the product of despair).

[Black Sheep]

"Anarchism is a product of despair. The psychology of the unsettled intellectual or the vagabond and not of the proletarian."


5. What has anarchism, at one time dominant in the Romance countries, contributed in recent European history?
Cool early 20th century story bro.



– No doctrine, revolutionary teaching, or theory.
Triple wrong!


– Fragmentation of the working-class movement.
That's right!Because leninists worldwide never split!


– Complete fiasco in the experiments of the revolutionary movement (Proudhonism, 1871; Bakuninism, 1873).
Stalinism! Juche!


– Subordination of the working class to bourgeois politics in the guise of negation of politics.
Bolshevik nationalism! Comintern's stance to european powers!
Call non participation in parliament a negation of politics!

Lenin, you suck from time to time.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

I live in an anarchist collective-house, with six roommates, and I am the only one who wasn't raised working-class: however, I work for $10.25 an hour, and support myself, so, recognizing the relative privilege of having a middle-class home to go back to if my life falls apart financially, I'm not exactly distant from the day-to-day experience of working shit jobs to survive.
If you can't find working class anarchists, maybe you're not looking in the right places.

[revolution inaction]

this should be in chit chat

[Princess Luna]

– Fragmentation of the working-class movement.
to be fair this really didn't apply to Lenin during his life , but now days the authoratarian communist movement is split into sooooooooooooo many fractions its not even funny and each one tries to convince the working class it has the right way and the others are wrong :laugh:

[Crux]

to be fair this really didn't apply to Lenin during his life , but now days the authoratarian communist movement is split into sooooooooooooo many fractions its not even funny and each one tries to convince the working class it has the right way and the others are wrong :laugh:Well true, anarchism was created splintered.

[Redstar226]

Who gives a fuck what Lenin had to say about Anarchism? Look, if you think Anarchists aren't working class (which is just nonsense) then maybe you should look where Lenin came from. Lived a life of privelage from start to finish. Just like Marx. Neither lived out their ideals. And frankly that's nonsense historically too...were the CNT supporters in Spain during the Revolution all bourgeouis? Are all the CGT supporters today? Class War? WAG? I mean...who are you trying to kid here. This whole "we're more working class than you" argument of legitimacy is non-sensical.

[Os Cangaceiros]

K7A2acBVENA

I knew there was a reason I liked that song!

[Jose Gracchus]

Is this nothing but low-rent trolling? Surely you could post some analysis or commentary, rather than quoting some of the Received Wisdom of the Great Prophet, tossing as sectarian grenade, and then leaving?

Discourse has dropped in quality, even in the last month or two, here, I've noticed. And I'm new.

Of course, it is easy to point out that the Paris Commune's Communal Council was manned by Proudhonists, and the RSDLP(b) moved to dissociate itself from the April Theses; one major Bolshevik said Lenin was heir to Bakunin in his new politics.

[Enragé]

Well true, anarchism was created splintered.

because it was, being among other things the product of the specific despair of specific persons instead also the product of specific situations, instead of the grand narrative of one or more Great Persons in some situation super-imposed upon other situations.

This is why leninism as revolutionary theory/praxis is dead (some forms more than others depending mostly on orthodoxy), while anarchism continues to evolve.

Anarchism's splintered because society IS splintered, atomised. Leninism is splintered because you try to super-impose a unified whole on splintered fragments. What results can be visualised by thinking of a centrifuge, all is pushed away from the core, with the exception that the fragments pushed away try to establish their own core who want to be THE core. Hence all the different shitty little parties and the in-fighting between them.

tho i level this critique at leninism this can, perhaps to a lesser extent, be leveled at formal organisation as such.

[Obs]

Haven't we had this thread a couple of times already?

[Os Cangaceiros]

Yes.

Somehow the OP thinks it significant to post Lenin's groundbreaking arguments against anarchism yet again, though.

[KurtFF8]

This is obviously just an attempt to spark up a sectarian fight on RevLeft. Threads like this should be ignored by Marxists and Anarchists alike.

[mykittyhasaboner]

This is obviously just an attempt to spark up a sectarian fight on RevLeft. Threads like this should be ignored by Marxists and Anarchists alike.

Or perhaps merely trashed.

[KurtFF8]

Or perhaps merely trashed.

Well that's up to the moderation/administration team.

[ed miliband]

God damn Bakuninite-Proudhonists, trying to get a thread revealing the eternal wisdom of Lenin removed. Bloody typical.

[KurtFF8]

God damn Bakuninite-Proudhonists, trying to get a thread revealing the eternal wisdom of Lenin removed. Bloody typical.

I'm a Leninist and I want it removed.

[Crux]

Lived a life of privelage from start to finish. Just like Marx. Neither lived out their ideals.
Actually both spent considerable time as political refugees and Marx had to go into permanent exile because of his ideas and actions as both an organizer and a theorist. So, no, you are wrong.

[Magón]

My interpretation of what goes through the OP's head when posting these threads. And others like it.

http://images2.fanpop.com/images/photos/7000000/Yawn-legend-of-the-seeker-7029335-750-600.jpg

[Amphictyonis]

My communism beats your anarchism in a thumb war! Tic tac toe? Sectarian battleship? I'll sink your battleship.

PrHs8CWDzmc

Then I'll drink your milkshake

RKQ3LXHKB34

[DuracellBunny97]

Anarchism is a product of despair? and I'm sure Lenin was positively giddy under the rule of Nicholas II, the October Revolution was probably just for fun.

[Redstar226]

Actually both spent considerable time as political refugees and Marx had to go into permanent exile because of his ideas and actions as both an organizer and a theorist. So, no, you are wrong.

He still continued to have a servant throughout his life. He certainly did not follow Socialist ideals.

EDIT: I'm not saying Marx didn't believe in Communism, however he certainly did not live his life by Socialist principals:

"As a theoretician of capitalism, he did not have very much to say about the nature of a socialist society." - Chomsky on Marx.

[Obs]

"As a theoretician of capitalism, he did not have very much to say about the nature of a socialist society." - Chomsky on Marx.
That might be because there's no blueprint for socialism. Then again, Chomsky is a fucking hack, so it's no surprise he'd make this idiotic critique of Marx.

[Redstar226]

That might be because there's no blueprint for socialism. Then again, Chomsky is a fucking hack, so it's no surprise he'd make this idiotic critique of Marx.

Exactly! There is no blueprint for Socialism. So its odd to call yourself a Marxist at all, considering you're not really following his ideas. Its also odd to call yourself a Leninist, this particular tendancy has been tried and failed (partially on its own merits and partially because of foreign capitalist intervention, admittedly)

[Jose Gracchus]

That might be because there's no blueprint for socialism. Then again, Chomsky is a fucking hack, so it's no surprise he'd make this idiotic critique of Marx.

Chomsky wasn't 'critiquing' Marx when he said that, I have no idea what Red Star is talking about.

How is he a 'hack'?

[Redstar226]

Chomsky wasn't 'critiquing' Marx when he said that, I have no idea what Red Star is talking about.

How is he a 'hack'?

The point Chomsky was making is that quoting Marx doesn't make you right.

[Nanatsu Yoru]

He still continued to have a servant throughout his life. He certainly did not follow Socialist ideals.

EDIT: I'm not saying Marx didn't believe in Communism, however he certainly did not live his life by Socialist principals:

"As a theoretician of capitalism, he did not have very much to say about the nature of a socialist society." - Chomsky on Marx.
Permission to point out he's done a hell of a lot more than you in the fight for socialism? :rolleyes:

Honestly, this thread needs to be trashed.

[nuisance]

Actually both spent considerable time as political refugees and Marx had to go into permanent exile because of his ideas and actions as both an organizer and a theorist. So, no, you are wrong.
Sucked compared to Bakunin, though.

[Misanthrope]

OP- I have never seen a post of just your personal opinion, just links slamming anarchism.

[Paulappaul]

Cause he's a coward. And a moron, who's opinion consists in his fetish of a dead man.

[human strike]

"Anarchism is a product of despair. The psychology of the unsettled intellectual or the vagabond and not of the proletarian."


5. What has anarchism, at one time dominant in the Romance countries, contributed in recent European history?

– No doctrine, revolutionary teaching, or theory.

– Fragmentation of the working-class movement.

– Complete fiasco in the experiments of the revolutionary movement (Proudhonism, 1871; Bakuninism, 1873).

– Subordination of the working class to bourgeois politics in the guise of negation of politics.


http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1901/dec/31.htm


http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1931/unions/index.htm

http://www.socialist.net/marxism-and-anarchism.htm

http://www.socialist.net/educate-yourself.htm

Don't hold back now, eh. And to think people accuse RAAN of being sectarian.

From the off I should point out I am a Marxist and not an Anarchist, just to make that absolutely clear and highlight that what I am about to say isn't so much a defence on Anarchism but a criticism of Leninism.

Leninism is a product of reaction. The psychology of the unsettled petty bourgeois or intellectual and not of the proletarian. It is the preachings of the coward, the elitist and ultimately the counterrevolutionary.

That is the problem with Leninism - it's a doctrine of power and hierarchy, not of revolution.

I call for this thread to be locked. ;)