Classical Anarchist

Anarchism is the political philosophy which holds ruling classes and the state to be undesirable, unnecessary and harmful, The following sources cite anarchism as a political philosophy: Slevin, Carl. "Anarchism." ''The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics''. Ed. Iain McLean and Alistair McMillan. Oxford University Press, 2003. or alternatively as opposing authority and hierarchical organization in the conduct of human relations.

Proponents of anarchism, known as anarchists, advocate stateless societies based on non-hierarchical voluntary associations. However, anarchist schools of thought can differ fundamentally, supporting anything from extreme individualism to complete collectivism to more syncretic tendencies (such as Insurrectionary anarchism). Strains of anarchism have often been divided into the categories of social anarchism and individualist anarchism or similar dual classifications, also including green anarchism and post-left anarchism. Ostergaard, Geoffrey. "Anarchism". ''The Blackwell Dictionary of Modern Social Thought''. Blackwell Publishing. p. 14.

Anarchism is usually considered a radical left-wing or far-left ideology. and much of anarchist economics and legal philosophy reflect anti-authoritarian, anti-statist and libertarian interpretations of radical left-wing and socialist politics such as communism, collectivism, the free-market, individualism, mutualism, parecon and syndicalism, among other libertarian socialist philosophies. At some point, "the collectivist, communist, and liberal and individualist strands of thought from which anarchists drew their inspiration began to assume an increasingly distinctive quality, supporting the rise of a number of anarchist schools".

Anthropologist David Graeber has noted that while the major Marxist schools of thought always have founders (e.g. Leninism, Trotskyism and Maoism), schools of anarchism "almost invariably emerge from some kind of organizational principle or form of practice", citing anarcho-syndicalism, individualist anarchism and platformism as examples.David Graeber and Andrej Grubacic,
Anarchism, Or The Revolutionary Movement Of The Twenty-first Century
, ZNet. Retrieved 13 December 2007.

Classical anarchism

The decades of the late 19th and the early 20th centuries constitute the belle époque of anarchist history.Levy, Carl (2004). "Anarchism, Internationalism and Nationalism in Europe, 1860–1939". ''Australian Journal of Politics and History''. 50 (3): 337–338. In this classical era, roughly defined as the 1840s or the 1860s to 1939, anarchism played a prominent role in working-class struggles alongside Marxism in Europe as well as North and Latin America, Asia and Australia. Modernism, mass migration, railroads and access to printing all helped anarchists to advance their causes.

Mutualism

Mutualism began in 18th-century English and French labor movements, then took an anarchist form associated with Pierre-Joseph Proudhon in France and others in the United States. This influenced individualist anarchists in the United States such as Benjamin Tucker and William B. Greene. Josiah Warren proposed similar ideas in 1833 after participating in a failed Owenite experiment. In the 1840s and 1850s, Charles A. Dana and William Batchelder Greene introduced Proudhon's works to the United States. Greene adapted Proudhon's mutualism to American conditions and introduced it to Benjamin Tucker.

Mutualist anarchism is concerned with reciprocity, free association, voluntary contract, federation and credit and currency reform. Many mutualists believe a market without government intervention drives prices down to labor-costs, eliminating profit, rent and interest according to the labor theory of value. Firms would be forced to compete over workers just as workers compete over firms, raising wages.

Some see mutualism as between individualist and collectivist anarchism. In ''What Is Property?'', Proudhon develops a concept of "liberty", equivalent to "anarchy", which is the dialectical "synthesis of communism and property". Greene, influenced by Pierre Leroux, sought mutualism in the synthesis of three philosophies—communism, capitalism and socialism. Later individualist anarchists used the term mutualism, but retained little emphasis on synthesis while social anarchists such as the authors of ''An Anarchist FAQ'' claim mutualism as a subset of their philosophical tradition.Are there different types of social anarchism?
", An Anarchist FAQ. Retrieved 13 December 2007.

Social anarchism

Social anarchism is a broad category of anarchism independent of individualist anarchism. Where individualist forms of anarchism emphasize personal autonomy and the rational nature of human beings, social anarchism sees "individual freedom as conceptually connected with social equality and emphasize community and mutual aid". Social anarchism is used to specifically describe anarchist tendencies within anarchism that have an emphasis on the communitarian and cooperative aspects of anarchist theory and practice. Social anarchism includes (but is not limited to) collectivist anarchism, anarcho-communism, libertarian socialism, anarcho-syndicalism and social ecology.

Collectivist anarchism

Collectivist anarchism is a revolutionaryPatsouras, Louis. 2005. Marx in Context. iUniverse. p. 54 form of anarchism most commonly associated with Mikhail Bakunin, Johann Most and the anti-authoritarian section of the First International. Unlike mutualists, collectivist anarchists oppose all private ownership of the means of production, instead advocating that ownership be collectivized. This was to be initiated by small cohesive elite group through acts of violence, or "propaganda by the deed", which would inspire the workers to revolt and forcibly collectivize the means of production. Workers would be compensated for their work on the basis of the amount of time they contributed to production, rather than goods being distributed "according to need" as in anarcho-communism. Although the collectivist anarchists advocated compensation for labor, some held out the possibility of a post-revolutionary transition to a communist system of distribution according to need. Collective anarchism arose contemporaneously with Marxism, but it opposed the Marxist dictatorship of the proletariat despite Marxism striving for a collectivist stateless society.

Some collectivist anarchists do not oppose the use of currency. Some support workers being paid based on the amount of time they contributed to production. These salaries would be used to purchase commodities in a communal market. This contrasts with anarcho-communism where wages would be abolished and where individuals would take freely from a storehouse of goods "to each according to his need". Many modern-day collectivist anarchists hold their form of anarchism as a permanent society rather than a carryover to anarcho-communism or a gift economy. Some collectivist anarchists such as proponents of participatory economics believe in remuneration and a form of credit but do not believe in money or markets.

Although collectivist anarchism shares many similarities with anarchist communism, there are several key differences between them. For example, collectivist anarchists believe that the economy and most or all property should be collectively owned by society while anarchist communists by contrast believe that the concept of ownership should be rejected by society and replaced with the concept of usage. In addition, collectivist anarchists often favor using a form of currency to compensate workers according to the amount of time spent contributing to society and production while anarcho-communists believe that currency and wages should be abolished all together and goods should be distributed " to each according to his or her need".

Anarcho-communism

Anarcho-communism is a theory of anarchism which advocates the abolition of the state, markets, money, private property (while retaining respect for personal property) and capitalism in favor of common ownership of the means of production, direct democracy and a horizontal network of voluntary associations and workers' councils with production and consumption based on the guiding principle: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need".

Some forms of anarchist communism such as insurrectionary anarchism are strongly influenced by egoism and radical individualism, believing anarcho-communism is the best social system for the realization of individual freedom. "Towards the creative Nothing" by Renzo Novatore
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