4
<TITLE>G.2 Why does individualist anarchism imply socialism? </TITLE>
9
<H1>G.2 Why does individualist anarchism imply socialism? </h1>
11
Here we present a short summary of why individualist anarchism implies
12
socialism and not capitalism. While it is true that people like Tucker
13
and Warren placed "property" at the heart of their vision of anarchy,
14
this does not make them supporters of capitalism (see sections
15
<a href="secG2.html#secg21">G.2.1</a>
16
and <a href="secG2.html#secg22">G.2.2</a>). Unlike capitalists, the individualist anarchists identified
17
"property" with simple "possession," or <i>"occupancy and use"</i> and considered
18
profit, rent and interest as exploitation. Indeed, Tucker explicitly stated
19
that <i>"all property rests on a labour title, and no other property do I
20
favour."</i> [<b>Instead of a Book</b>, p. 400] Because of this and their explicit
21
opposition to usury (profits, rent and interest) and capitalist property,
22
they could and did consider themselves as part of the wider socialist
23
movement, the libertarian wing as opposed to the statist Marxist wing.
25
Individualist anarchists like Tucker strongly believed that a truly free
26
(i.e. non-capitalist) market would ensure that the worker would receive
27
the <i>"full product"</i> of his or her labour. Nevertheless, in order to claim
28
Tucker as a proto-"anarcho"-capitalist, "anarcho"-capitalists may argue
29
that capitalism pays the "market price" of labour power, and that this
30
price <b>does</b> reflect the <i>"full product"</i> (or value) of the worker's
33
As Tucker supported the Labour Theory of Value we doubt that he would
34
have agreed with the "anarcho"-capitalist argument that market price
35
of labour reflected the value it produced (see <a href="secCcon.html">
36
Section C</a>). He, like
37
the other individualist anarchists, was well aware that labour produces
38
the "surplus wealth" which was appropriated in the name of interest,
39
rent and profit. In other words, he very forcible rejected the idea
40
that the market price of labour reflects the value of that labour,
41
considering <i>"the natural wage of labour is its product"</i> and <i>"that
42
this wage, or product, is the only just source of income."</i> [<b>Instead
45
However, assuming that we accept the capitalist economic apologetics
46
at their face value, such an argument fails to place Individualist
47
Anarchism in the capitalist tradition. This is because the argument
48
ignores the need to replace and improve upon existing capital. In
49
the context of a market economy, the replacement and improvement of
50
capital is important, as accumulation allows the reduction of labour
51
costs (either directly or indirectly) by investing in new machinery
52
or processes and so improving market position. In addition, capital
53
investments are required in order to offer new services to the
54
customer (for example, in banking, a network of auto-tellers).
55
Either way, new capital is required. But new capital comes from
56
value created by labour and realised as profits. And this means that
57
in order to ensure that labour receives its due, companies <b>must</b> be
58
co-operatives so that workers will have a say in how the profits
59
they create are used, otherwise they do not get their <i>"natural
60
wage."</i> In addition, the ability to influence one's own destiny
61
by having a voice in investment decisions is certainly another
62
"value" that one's labour can produce beyond the exchange value
63
to be invested. We might call it "self-determination value," which
64
individualist anarchists certainly regarded as a benefit of the
65
artisan/co-operative labour they favoured (and their system implies).
66
But workers will not be able to realise the full self-determination
67
value of their labour nor receive its <i>"full product"</i> if investment
68
decisions are not in their hands. Logically, therefore, individualist
69
anarchism <b>must</b> tend towards co-operative, not capitalist, labour in
70
order for them to receive the full value of their labour.
72
In addition, while it is true that in an economy with a very low
73
degree of monopoly within industries prices <b>do</b> tend towards
74
the production cost of a commodity, this cannot be said to occur
75
instantaneously. This means that in an economy without oligopolies
76
and without interest or rent, prices would tend, in the long run,
77
towards Tucker's their <i>"labour cost of production"</i> this cannot be
78
said to occur in the short run. Given that in the long run <i>"we are
79
all dead"</i> (to use Keynes' words) -- i.e. that we may never see it --
80
any form of wage labour can lead to usury being recreated as workers
81
would not receive their entire product back. That is, due to short
82
term changes in price workers market wage may not equal what they
83
produce. They <b>only</b> solution to this problem is workers' ownership
84
and control as this ensures workers remain control of the product
85
of their labour at all times (as well as the labour itself). <b>If,</b>
86
as Tucker argued, <i>"the object of Anarchism . . . [is] to let every
87
man [or woman] 'control self and the results of self-exertion'"</i> then
88
this is only possible under workers' self-management and ownership.
89
[<b>Occupancy and Use versus the Single Tax</b>] This, we must note, was
90
Proudhon's argument and part of the reason he supported workers'
91
co-operatives (we will discuss the problem of natural barriers to
92
competition in <a href="secG4.html">section G.4</a> along with the dangers associated with a
93
lack of workers' control in a free society).
95
More importantly, wage labour violates two key aspects of Individualist
96
Anarchist thought, namely its support for <i>"occupancy and use"</i> and
97
its opposition to the state. We will discuss each in turn.
99
Obviously wage labour violates the idea that those who use something
100
automatically own it. In the case of land and housing, the
101
Individualist Anarchists argued that the person who lives or
102
works on it (even under lease) would be regarded <i>"as the occupant
103
and user of the land on which the house stands, and as the owner of
104
the house itself,"</i> that is they become <i>"the owner of both land and
105
house as soon as he becomes the occupant."</i> [<b>Ibid.</b>] Now, to take a
106
concrete example from Tucker's time, the 3 800 workers locked out
107
by Carnegie at Homestead in 1892 definitely occupied and used the
108
works from which they were barred entry by the owners. The owners,
109
obviously, did not use the workplace themselves -- they hired
110
<b>others</b> to occupy and use it <b>for</b> them. Now, why should <i>"occupancy
111
and use"</i> be acceptable for land and housing but not for workplaces?
112
There is no reason and so wage labour, logically, violates <i>"occupancy
113
and use"</i> -- for under wage labour, those who occupy and use a
114
workplace do not own or control it. Hence <i>"occupancy and use"</i>
115
logically implies workers' control and ownership.
117
The reason why wage labour violates Individualist Anarchist opposition
118
to the state for a related reason. If the workers who use a workplace
119
do not own it, then someone else will (i.e. the owner). This in
120
turn means that the owner can tell those who use the resource what
121
to do, how to do it and when. That is, they are the sole authority
122
over the workplace and those who use it. However, according to
123
Tucker, the state can be defined (in part) as <i>"the assumption of
124
sole authority over a given area and all within it."</i> Tucker considered
125
this element as <i>"common to all States."</i> [<b>The Individualist Anarchists</b>.
126
p. 24] Thus wage labour creates a situation which is similar to the
127
state, namely the assumption of sole authority over a given area and
128
those who use it. Hence opposition to the state logically implies
129
support for workers' control and ownership for only in this case
130
can people govern themselves during the working day.
132
Therefore, as far as the employer/employee social relationship
133
goes, it does not fit in well with Tucker's statement that <i>"if the
134
individual has the right to govern himself, all external government
135
is tyranny."</i> [<b>The Anarchist Reader</b>, p. 151] As we have argued in
136
Section B.4 (<a href="secB4.html">How does capitalism affect liberty?</a>), wage labour produces
137
a very specific form of <i>"external government"</i> in the workplace, namely
138
hierarchical management structures. Therefore, logically, Individualist
139
Anarchism (like Social Anarchism) must oppose all forms of wage
140
labour in favour of self-government in production (i.e. co-operative,
143
That this the case can be seen from Proudhon's argument in <b>The
144
General Idea of the Revolution in the Nineteenth Century</b>. There
145
he argues that employees are <i>"subordinated, exploited"</i> and their
146
<i>"permanent condition is one of obedience,"</i> a <i>"slave."</i> [p. 216]
147
Indeed, capitalist companies <i>"plunder the bodies and souls of
148
wage workers"</i> and they are <i>"an outrage upon human dignity and
149
personality."</i> [p. 218] However, in a co-operative the situation
150
changes and the worker is an <i>"associate"</i> and <i>"forms a part of
151
the producing organisation . . . [and] forms a part of the
152
sovereign power, of which he was before but the subject."</i>
153
[p. 216] Without co-operation and association, <i>"the workers . . .
154
would remain related as subordinates and superiors, and there
155
would ensue two industrial castes of masters and wage-workers,
156
which is repugnant to a free and democratic society."</i> [p. 216]
157
As Robert Graham notes, <i>"Proudhon's market socialism is
158
indissolubly linked to his notions of industry democracy and
159
workers' self-management."</i> [<i>"Introduction"</i>, <b>General Idea of
160
the Revolution</b>, p. xxxii]
162
And we must add that John Stuart Mill (who agreed with the Warrenite
163
slogan <i>"Individual Sovereignty"</i>) faced with the same problem that
164
wage labour made a mockery of individual liberty came to the same
165
conclusion. He thought that if <i>"mankind is to continue to improve"</i>
166
(and it can only improve within liberty, we must add) then in the
167
end one form of association will predominate, <i>"not that which can
168
exist between a capitalist as chief, and workpeople without a voice
169
in management, but the association of the labourers themselves on
170
terms of equality, collectively owning the capital with which they
171
carry on their operations, and working under managers elected and
172
removable by themselves."</i> [quoted by Carole Pateman, <b>Participation
173
and Democratic Theory</b>, p. 34]
175
Therefore, logically, individualist anarchism must support
176
co-operatives and self-employment in order to ensure the maximum
177
individual self-government and labour's <i>"natural wage."</i> That this
178
is the case can be seen from Tucker's quoting Ernest Lesigne that
179
anarchistic socialism aims for <i>"The land to the cultivator. The mine
180
to the miner. The tool to the labourer. The product to the producer."</i>
182
It can also be seen from Tucker's description of what would replace the
183
current system of statism (and note he calls it <i>"scientific socialism"</i>
184
thus squarely placing his ideas in the anti-capitalist camp):
186
<i>"we have something very tangible to offer , . . We offer non-compulsive
187
organisation. We offer associative combination. We offer every possible
188
method of voluntary social union by which men and women may act together
189
for the furtherance of well-being. In short, we offer voluntary scientific
190
socialism in place of the present compulsory, unscientific organisation
191
which characterises the State and all of its ramifications. . ."</i> [quoted
192
in Martin, <b>Op. Cit.</b>, p. 218]
194
Tucker himself pointed out that <i>"the essence of government is control. . .
195
He who attempts to control another is a governor, an aggressor, an
196
invader."</i> [<b>Instead of a Book</b>, p. 23] However, in places in <b>Instead
197
of a Book</b> Tucker suggests that (non-exploitative, and so non-capitalist)
198
wage labour could exist in individualist anarchy. Unlike wage labour
199
under capitalism, workers would employ other workers and all workers
200
would receive the full product of their labour. As such, this relationship
201
is <b>non-capitalist</b> as it does not involve usury. Be that as it may, such
202
relationships are not libertarian and so contradict Tucker's own theories
203
on individual liberty (as Proudhon and Mill recognised with their own,
204
similar, positions). Wage labour is based on the control of the worker
205
by the employer; hence Tucker's contract theory can lead to a form of
206
"voluntary" and "private" government within the workplace. This means
207
that, while outside of a contract an individual is free, within it he
208
or she is governed. This violates Tucker's concept of <i>"equality of liberty,"</i>
209
since the boss has obviously more liberty than the worker during working
212
This result, as noted in <a href="secA3.html">section A.3</a>,
213
could <b>only</b> be avoided by workers'
214
control, which is in fact the logical implication of Tucker's and other
215
individualists' proposals (as we have proven above, and can be seen from
216
Tucker's famous essay <i>"State Socialism and Anarchism"</i> for example). This
217
is hardly a surprising implication, since as we've seen, artisan production
218
was commonplace in 19th-century America and its benefits were extolled by
219
the individualists. Without workers' control, individualist anarchism
220
would soon become a form of capitalism and so statism -- a highly unlikely
221
intention of individualists like Tucker, who hated both.
223
Therefore, given the assumptions of individualist anarchism in both
224
their economic and political aspects, it is forced along the path of
225
co-operative, not wage, labour. In other words, individualist anarchism
226
is a form of socialism as workers receive the full product of their
227
labour (i.e. there is no non-labour income) and this, in turn, logically
228
implies a society in which self-managed firms compete against each
229
other on the free market, with workers selling the product of their
230
labour and not the labour itself. As this unites workers with the
231
means of production they use, it is <b>not</b> capitalism and instead a
232
form of socialism based upon worker ownership and control of the
235
For individualist anarchists not to support co-operatives results in
236
a contradiction, namely that the individualist anarchism which aims
237
to secure the worker's <i>"natural wage"</i> cannot in fact do so, while
238
dividing society into a class of order givers and order takers (which
239
violates individual self-government). It is this contradiction within
240
Tucker's thought which the self-styled "anarcho"-capitalists take
241
advantage of in order to maintain that individualist anarchism in fact
242
implies capitalism (and so private-statism), not workers' control. In order
243
to reach this implausible conclusion, a few individualist anarchist ideas
244
are ripped from their social context and applied in a way that makes a
245
mockery of them. That it was never Tucker's intention to deny workers'
246
control can be inferred from his argument that mutualism would give
247
workers the bargaining power to obtain equality in the workplace,
248
which clearly points to the end of capitalist authority relations,
249
as will be explained further in <a href="secG5.html">section G.5</a>.
251
However, due to problems inherent in the nature of a market economy, even
252
the assumption of workers' control may not be enough to ensure that
253
individualistic anarchism does not become a new form of archy, as will be
254
discussed in section G.4 (<a href="secG4.html">"Why do social anarchists reject individualist
255
anarchism ideas?"</a>).
257
<a name="secg21"><h2>G.2.1 What about their support of the free market?</h2>
259
Many, particularly on the libertarian right, would dismiss claims
260
that the Individualist Anarchists were socialists. By their support
261
of the "free market" the Individualist Anarchists, they would claim,
262
show them as really supporters of capitalism. Most, if not all,
263
anarchists would reject this claim. Why is this the case?
265
This because such claims show an amazing ignorance of socialist
266
ideas and history. The socialist movement has had a many schools,
267
many of which, but not all, opposed the market and private property.
268
Given that the right-libertarians who make such claims are not
269
well informed of the ideas they oppose (i.e. of socialism,
270
particularly <b>libertarian</b> socialism) it is unsurprising they
271
claim that the Individualist Anarchists are not socialists (of
272
course the fact that many Individualist Anarchists argued they
273
<b>were</b> socialists is ignored). Coming from a different tradition,
274
it is unsurprising they are not aware of the fact that socialism
275
is not monolithic. Hence we discover right-libertarian guru
276
von Mises claiming that the <i>"essence of socialism is the entire
277
elimination of the market."</i> [<b>Human Action</b>, p. 702] This would
278
have come as something of a surprise to, say, Proudhon, who
279
argued that <i>"[t]o suppress competition is to suppress liberty
280
itself."</i> [<b>The General Idea of the Revolution</b>, p. 50] Similarly,
281
it would have surprised Tucker, who called himself a socialist
282
while supporting a freer market than von Mises ever dreamt of.
284
Part of the problem, of course, is that the same word often means
285
different things to different people. Both Kropotkin and Lenin
286
said they were "communists" and aimed for "communism." However,
287
it does not mean that the society Kropotkin aimed for was the
288
same as that desired by Lenin. Kropotkin's communism was
289
decentralised, created and run from the bottom-up while Lenin's
290
was fundamentally centralised. Similarly, both Tucker and
291
the Social-Democrat (and leading Marxist) Karl Kautsky called
292
themselves a "socialist" yet their ideas on what a socialist
293
society would be like were extremely different. As J.W. Baker
294
notes, <i>"Tucker considered himself a socialist . . . as the result
295
of his struggle against 'usury and capitalism,' but anything that
296
smelled of 'state socialism' was thoroughly rejected."</i> [<i>"Native
297
American Anarchism,"</i> <b>The Raven</b>, pp. 43-62, vol. 10, no. 1, p. 60]
298
This, of course, does not stop many "anarcho"-capitalists talking
299
about "socialist" goals as if all socialists were Stalinists (or,
300
at best, social democrats). In fact, "socialist anarchism" has
301
included (and continues to include) advocates of truly free markets
302
as well as advocates of a non-market socialism which has absolutely
303
nothing in common with the state capitalist tyranny of Stalinism.
304
Similarly, they accept a completely ahistorical definition of
305
"capitalism," so ignoring the massive state violence and support
306
by which that system was created and is maintained.
308
The same with terms like "property" and the "free market," which
309
by the "anarcho"-capitalist assumes the individualist anarchist
310
means the same thing as they do. We can take land as an example.
311
The individualist anarchists argued for an <i><b>"occupancy and use"</b></i>
312
system of "property" (see <a href="secG2.html#secg22">section G.2.2</a>). Thus in their "free
313
market," land would not be a commodity as it is under capitalism.
314
Thus, under individualist anarchism, absentee landlords would
315
be considered as aggressors (and under capitalism, using state
316
coercion to back up their collection of rent against the actual
317
occupiers of property). Tucker argued that local defence
318
associations should treat the occupier and user as the rightful
319
owner, and defend them against the aggression of an absentee
320
landlord who attempted to collect rent. An "anarcho"-capitalist
321
would consider this as aggression <b>against</b> the landlord and a
322
violation of "free market" principles. Similarly, if we apply
323
the mutualist understanding of land to the workplace, we would
324
treat the workers in a factory as the rightful owners, on the
325
basis of occupation and use; at the same time, we could treat
326
the share owners and capitalists as aggressors for attempting
327
to force their representatives as managers on those actually
328
occupying and using the premises. Again, such a system of
329
"occupancy and use" would involve massive violations of what
330
is considered normal in a capitalist "free market."
332
In other words, an individualist anarchist would consider an
333
"anarcho"-capitalist "free market" as nothing of the kind and
334
vice versa. For the "anarcho"-capitalist, the individualist
335
anarchist position on "property" would be considered as forms
336
of regulation and restrictions on private property and so
337
the "free market." The individualist anarchist would consider
338
the "anarcho"-capitalist "free market" as another system of
339
legally maintained privilege, with the free market distorted
340
in favour of the wealthy.
342
Therefore it should be remembered that "anarcho"-capitalists
343
at best agree with Tucker, Spooner, et al on fairly vague
344
notions like the "free market." They do not bother to find out
345
what the individualist anarchists meant by that term. Indeed,
346
the "anarcho"-capitalist embrace of different economic theories
347
means that they actually reject the reasoning that leads up to
348
these nominal "agreements." It is the "anarcho"-capitalists who,
349
by rejecting the underlying economics of the mutualists, are forced
350
to take any "agreements" out of context. It also means that when
351
faced with obviously anti-capitalist arguments and conclusions of
352
the individualist anarchists, the "anarcho"-capitalist cannot
353
explain them and are reduced to arguing that the anti-capitalist
354
concepts and opinions expressed by the likes of Tucker are
355
somehow "out of context." In contrast, the anarchist can explain
356
these so-called "out of context" concepts by placing them into
357
the context of the ideas of the individualist anarchists and
358
the society which shaped them.
360
The "anarcho"-capitalist usually admits that they totally disagree
361
with many of the essential premises of Spooner's and Tucker's analyses.
362
The most basic difference is that the individualist anarchists rooted
363
their ideas in the labour theory of value while the "anarcho"-capitalists
364
favour the subjective theory. It does not take much thought to realise
365
that advocates of labour theories and those of subjective theories of
366
value will naturally develop differing notions of what is and what
367
should be happening within a given economic system. One difference
368
that <b>has</b> in fact arisen is that the notion of what constitutes a
369
"free market" has differed according to the theory of value applied.
370
Many things can be attributed to the workings of a "free" market under
371
a subjective analysis that would be considered symptoms of economic
372
unfreedom under most labour-theory driven analyses.
374
This can be seen if you look closely at the case of Tucker's comments
375
that anarchism was simply "consistent Manchesterianism." If this is
376
done then a simple example of this potential confusion can be found.
377
Tucker argued that anarchists <i>"accused"</i> the Manchester men
379
inconsistent,"</i> that while being in favour of laissez faire for <i>"the
380
labourer in order to reduce his wages"</i> they did not believe <i>"in liberty
381
to compete with the capitalist in order to reduce his usury."</i> [<b>The
382
Individualist Anarchists</b>, p. 83] To be consistent in this case is
383
to be something other -- and more demanding in terms of what is
384
accepted as "freedom" -- than the average Manchesterian (i.e. a
385
supporter of "free market" capitalism). Partisans of the subjective
386
theory see things differently, of course, feeling justified in calling
387
many things "free" that anarchists would not accept, and seeing
388
"constraint" in what they simply thought of as "consistency."
390
Therefore it should be pretty clear that a "free market" will
391
look somewhat different depending on your economic presuppositions.
392
Ironically, therefore, "anarcho"-capitalists admit they do not agree
393
with the likes of Spooner and Tucker on key premises, but then claim
394
Moreover, the "anarcho"-capitalist simply dismisses all the reasoning
395
that got Tucker there -- that is like trying to justify a law citing
396
Leviticus but then saying "but of course all that God stuff is just
397
absurd." You cannot have it both ways. And, of course, the
398
"anarcho"-capitalist support for non-labour based economics
399
allow them to side-step (and so ignore) much of what anarchists
400
syndicalists alike -- consider authoritarian and coercive about
401
"actually existing" capitalism. But the difference in value
402
theories is critical. No matter what they are called, it is
403
pretty clear that individualist anarchist standards for the
404
freedom of markets are far more demanding than those associated
405
with even the freest capitalist market system.
407
In summary, the "free market" as sought by (say) Tucker
408
would not be classed as a "free market" by right-wing
409
"libertarians." So the term "free market" (and, of
410
course, "socialism") can mean different things to different
411
people. As such, it would be correct to state that <b>all</b>
412
anarchists oppose the "free market" by definition as all
413
anarchists oppose the <b>capitalist</b> "free market." And,
414
just as correctly, "anarcho"-capitalists would oppose the
415
mutualist "free market," arguing that it would be no such
416
thing as it would be restrictive of property rights
417
(<b>capitalist</b> property rights of course). For example,
418
the question of resource use in a mutualist society is
419
totally different than in a capitalist "free market" as
420
landlordism would not exist. This is a restriction on
421
capitalist property rights and a violation of a capitalist
422
"free market." So a mutualist "free market" would not be
423
considered so by right-wing "libertarians" due to the
424
substantial differences in the rights on which it would
425
be based (with no right to capitalist private property
426
being the most important).
428
All this means that to go on and on about Tucker's (or Spooner's
429
et al) feelings about a free market simply misses the point. No
430
one denies that Tucker (or Spooner) was in favour of the "free
431
market" but he did not mean the same kind of "free market"
432
desired by "anarcho"-capitalism or that has existed under
433
capitalism. For example, as we note in <a href="secG4.html">section G.4</a>,
434
Tucker was well aware of the impact of inequalities in wealth in the
435
economy. In 1911 he argued that economic inequality was so large
436
that it meant individualist anarchism was impossible. If, as
437
"anarcho"-capitalists claim, Tucker supported the "free market"
438
above all else then he would not have argued this point. Clearly,
439
then, Tucker's support for the "free market" cannot be abstracted
440
from his fundamental principles nor can it be equated with a
441
"free market" based on capitalist property rights and massive
442
inequalities in wealth (and so economic power). Thus individualist
443
anarchist support for the free market does not mean support for
444
a <b>capitalist</b> "free market."
446
Little wonder, then, that the likes
447
of Tucker considered themselves socialists and stated numerous
448
times that they were.
450
It could be argued that these self-proclaimed socialists did not,
451
in fact, understand what socialism "really meant." For this to
452
be the case, <b>other</b>, more obviously socialist, writers and
453
thinkers would dismiss them as socialists. This, however, is not
454
the case. Thus we find Karl Marx, for example, writing of <i>"the
455
socialism of Proudhon."</i> [<b>Capital</b>, vol. 1, p. 161f] Engels
456
talked about Proudhon being <i>"the Socialist of the small peasant
457
and master-craftsman"</i> and of <i>"the Proudhon school of Socialism."</i>
458
[Marx and Engels, <b>Selected Works</b>, p. 254 and p. 255] Bakunin
459
talked about Proudhon's <i>"socialism, based on individual and
460
collective liberty and upon the spontaneous action of free
461
associations."</i> [<b>Michael Bakunin: Selected Writings</b>, p. 100]
462
These renown socialists did not consider Proudhon's position
463
to be in any way anti-socialist.
465
Looking at Tucker and the Individualist anarchists we discover
466
that other socialists considered them socialists. Looking at
467
Rudolf Rocker we discover him arguing that <i>"it is not difficult
468
to discover certain fundamental principles which are common
469
to all of them and which divide them from all other varieties
470
of socialism. They all agree on the point that man be given
471
the full reward of his labour and recognise in this right the
472
economic basis of all personal liberty. They all regard the
473
free competition of individual and social forces as something
474
inherent in human nature . . . They answered the socialists
475
of other schools who saw in <b>free competition</b> one of the
476
destructive elements of capitalist society that the evil lies
477
in the fact we have too little rather than too much competition,
478
since the power of monopoly has made competition impossible."</i>
479
[<b>Pioneers of American Freedom</b>, p. 160]
481
Adolph Fischer, one of the Haymarket Martyrs and contemporary
482
of Tucker, argued that <i>"every anarchist is a socialist, but
483
every socialist is not necessarily an anarchist. The anarchists
484
are divided into two factions: the communistic anarchists and
485
the Proudhon or middle-class anarchists . . ."</i> The former
486
<i>"advocate the communistic or co-operative method of production"</i>
487
while the latter <i>"do not advocate the co-operative system of
488
production [i.e. communism], and the common ownership of the
489
means of production, the products and the land."</i> [<b>The
490
Autobiographies of the Haymarket Martyrs</b>, p. 81] However,
491
while not being communists (i.e. aiming to eliminate the
492
market), he obviously recognised the Individualists Anarchists
493
as fellow socialists (we should point out that Proudhon <b>did</b>
494
support co-operatives, as did the Individualist Anarchists,
495
but they did not carry this to communism as do most social
496
anarchists -- as is clear, Fischer means communism by the term
497
<i>"co-operative system of production"</i> rather than co-operatives
498
as they exist today and Proudhon supported).
500
Thus claims that the Individualist Anarchists were not "really"
501
socialists because they support competition are false. The simple
502
fact is that those who make this claim are ignorant of the socialist
503
movement, its ideas and its history (or desire, like many Marxists,
504
to write out of history competing socialist theories). As Tucker
505
argued, <i>"the fact that State Socialism . . . has overshadowed other
506
forms of Socialism gives it no right to a monopoly of the Socialistic
507
idea."</i> [<b>Instead of a Book</b>, pp. 363-4] It is no surprise that
508
the authoritarian left and "libertarian" right have united to
509
define socialism in such a way as to eliminate anarchism from
510
its ranks -- they both have an interest in removing a theory
511
which exposes the inadequacies of their dogmas, which explains
512
how we can have both liberty <b>and</b> equality, have freedom in
513
work <b>and</b> outside it and have a decent, free and just society.
515
So why is Individualist Anarchism and Proudhon's mutualism socialist?
516
Simply because they opposed the exploitation of labour by capital
517
and proposed a means of ending it. Therefore, if socialism is, to
518
quote Kropotkin, <i>"understood in its wide, generic, and true sense"</i>
519
as <i>"an effort to <b>abolish</b> the exploitation of labour by capital"</i>
520
[<b>Kropotkin's Revolutionary Pamphlets</b>, p. 169] then the Individualist
521
Anarchists and Proudhon must be considered socialists (of course
522
<b>libertarian</b> socialists) due to their opposition to usury. It
523
is for this reason we discover Rudolf Rocker arguing that Stephan
524
P. Andrews was <i>"one of the most versatile and significant exponents
525
of libertarian socialism"</i> in the USA in spite of his belief that
526
<i>"the specific cause of the economic evil [of capitalism] is
527
founded not on the existence of the wage system"</i> but, rather,
528
on the exploitation of labour, <i>"on the unjust compensation of
529
the worker"</i> and the usury that <i>"deprives him of a part of his
530
labour."</i> [<b>Pioneers of American Freedom</b>, p. 85 and pp. 77-8]
531
His opposition to exploitation meant he was a socialist, an
532
opposition which individualist anarchism was rooted in from its
533
earliest days and the ideas of Josiah Warren:
535
<i>"The aim was to circumvent the exploitation inherent in capitalism,
536
which Warren characterised as a sort of 'civilised cannibalism,'
537
by exchanging goods on co-operative rather than supply and
538
demand principles."</i> [J.W. Baker, <i>"Native American Anarchism,"</i>
539
<b>The Raven</b>, pp. 43-62, vol. 10, no. 1, p. 51]
541
The individualist anarchists considered it as a truism that
542
in their society the exploitation of labour could not exist. Thus
543
even if some workers did sell their liberty, they would still
544
receive the full product of their labour. Thus accumulation of
545
capital would be non-existent, so a general equality would
546
prevail and so economic power would not undermine liberty.
547
Remove this underlying assumption, assume that profits could
548
be made and capital accumulated, assume that land can be
549
monopolised by landlords (as the "anarcho"-capitalists do)
550
and a radically different society is produced. One in which
551
economic power means that the vast majority have to sell
552
themselves to get access to the means of life. A condition of
553
"free markets" may exist, but as Tucker argued in 1911, it
554
would not be anarchism. The <b><i>deus ex machina</i></b> of
555
invisible hands takes a beating in the age of monopolies.
557
<a name="secg22"><h2>G.2.2 What about their support of "private property"?</h2>
559
The notion that because the Individualist Anarchists supported
560
"property" they supported capitalism is distinctly wrong. This
561
is for two reasons. Firstly, private property is not the distinctive
562
aspect of capitalism -- exploitation and wage labour is. Thus
563
support of private property does not indicate a support for
564
capitalism. Even use of John Locke's arguments in favour of
565
private property could be used against capitalism. As Murray
566
Bookchin makes clear regarding early American society:
568
<i>"Unknown in the 1640s, the non-bourgeois aspects of Locke's
569
theories were very much in the air a century and a half
570
later . . . [In an artisan/peasant society] a Lockean argument
571
could be used as effectively against the merchants . . .to
572
whom the farmers were indebted, as it could against the King
573
[or the State]. Nor did the small proprietors of America
574
ever quite lose sight of the view that attempts to seize their
575
farmsteads and possessions for unpaid debts were a violation
576
of their 'natural rights,' and from the 1770s until as late
577
as the 1930s they took up arms to keep merchants and bankers
578
from dispossessing them from land they or their ancestors
579
had wrestled from 'nature' by virtue of their own labour. The
580
notion that property was sacred was thus highly elastic: it
581
could be used as effectively by pre-capitalist strata to hold
582
on to their property as it could by capitalists strata to
583
expand their holdings."</i> [<b>The Third Revolution</b>, vol. 1,
586
What right-libertarians do is to confuse two very different
587
kinds of "property," one of which rests on the labour of the
588
producer themselves and the other on the exploitation of the
589
labour of others. They do not analyse the social relationships
590
between people which the property generates and, instead,
591
concentrate on <b>things</b> (i.e. property). Thus, rather than
592
being interested in people and the relationships they create
593
between themselves, the right-libertarian focuses on property
594
(and, more often than not, just the word rather than what the
595
word describes). This is a strange position for someone seeking
596
liberty to take, as liberty is a product of social interaction
597
(i.e. the relations we have and create with others) and not a
598
product of things (property is not freedom as freedom is a
599
relationship between people, not things). In effect, they
600
confuse property with possession (and vice versa).
602
And if quoting Karl Marx is not <b>too</b> out of place, we discover
603
that he did not consider property as being identical with
604
capitalism. <i>"The historical conditions of [Capital's] existence
605
are by no means given with the mere circulation of money and
606
commodities. It arises only when the owner of the means of
607
production and subsistence finds the free worker available
608
on the market, as the seller of his own labour-power."</i> This
609
wage-labour is the necessary pre-condition for capitalism,
610
<b>not</b> "private property" as such. Thus artisan/peasant
611
production is not capitalism as <i>"the means of production
612
and subsistence, while they remain the property of the
613
immediate producer, are not capital. They only become capital
614
under circumstances in which they serve at the same time as
615
means of exploitation of, and domination over, the worker."</i>
616
[<b>Capital</b>, vol. 1, p. 264 and p. 938] We quote Marx simply
617
because as authorities on socialism go, he is one that
618
right-libertarians (or Marxists, for that matter) cannot
619
ignore or dismiss. Needless to say, he is essentially
620
repeating Proudhon's distinction between property and
621
possession. The former is theft and despotism, the latter
622
is liberty. In other words, for anarchists, "property" is
623
a <i><b>social relation</b></i> and that a key element of anarchist
624
thinking (both social and individualist) was the need to
625
redefine that relation in accord with standards of liberty
628
Thus artisan production is not capitalist. It does not generate
629
relationships of exploitation and domination as the worker
630
owns and controls their own means of production. It is, in
631
effect, a form of socialism (a <i>"petit bourgeois"</i> form of
632
socialism, to use the typical Marxist phrase). Thus support
633
for "private property" need not mean support for capitalism
634
(as shown, for example, by the Individualist Anarchists). To
635
claim otherwise is to ignore the essential insight of socialism
636
and totally distort the socialist case against capitalism.
638
Secondly, and more importantly, what the Individualist Anarchists
639
meant by "private property" (or "property") was distinctly different
640
than what is meant by theorists on the libertarian right. Basically,
641
the libertarian right exploit, for their own ends, the confusion
642
generated by the use of the word "property" by the likes of Tucker
643
to describe a situation of "possession." Proudhon recognised this
644
danger. He argued that <i>"it is proper to call different things by
645
different names, if we keep the name 'property' for the former
646
[individual possession], we must call the latter [the domain of
647
property] robbery, repine, brigandage. If, on the contrary, we
648
reserve the name 'property' for the latter, we must designate the
649
former by the term <b>possession</b> or some other equivalent; otherwise
650
we should be troubled with an unpleasant synonym."</i> [<b>What is
651
Property?</b>, p. 373] Unfortunately Tucker, who translated this
652
work, did not heed Proudhon's words of wisdom and called possession
653
in an anarchist society by the word "property."
655
Looking at Tucker's arguments, it is clear that the last thing
656
Tucker supported was capitalist property rights. For example,
657
he argued that <i>"property, in the sense of individual possession,
658
is liberty"</i> and contrasted this with capitalist property.
659
[<b>Instead of a Book</b>, p. 394] That his ideas on "property"
660
were somewhat different than that associated with right-libertarian
661
thinkers is most clearly seen with regards to land. Here we
662
discover him advocating <i>"occupancy and use"</i> and rejecting the
663
"right" of land owners to bar the landless from any land they
664
owned but did not <b>personally</b> use. Rent was <i>"due to that denial
665
of liberty which takes the shape of land monopoly, vesting titles
666
to land in individuals and associations which do not use it,
667
and thereby compelling the non-owning users to pay tribute to the
668
non-using owners as a condition of admission to the competitive
669
market."</i> Anarchist opposition of rent did <i>"not mean simply the
670
freeing of unoccupied land. It means the freeing of all land not
671
occupied <b>by the owner.</b> In other words, it means land ownership
672
limited by occupancy and use."</i> [Tucker, <b>The Individualist
673
Anarchists</b>, p. 130 and p. 155] This would result in a <i>"system
674
of occupying ownership . . . accompanied by no legal power to
675
collect rent."</i> [<b>Instead of a Book</b>, p. 325]
677
A similar position was held by John Beverley Robinson. He argued
678
that there <i>"are two kinds of land ownership, proprietorship or
679
property, by which the owner is absolute lord of the land, to use
680
it or to hold it out of use, as it may please him; and possession,
681
by which he is secure in the tenure of land which he uses and
682
occupies, but has no claim upon it at all of he ceases to use
683
it."</i> Moreover, <i>"[a]ll that is necessary to do away with Rent
684
is to away with absolute property in land."</i> [<b>Patterns of Anarchy</b>,
687
Thus the Individualist Anarchists definition of "property" differed
688
considerably from that of the capitalist definition. As they
689
themselves acknowledge. Robinson argued that <i>"the only real
690
remedy is a change of heart, through which land using will be
691
recognised as proper and legitimate, but land holding will be
692
regarded as robbery and piracy."</i> [<b>Op. Cit.</b>, p. 273] Tucker,
693
likewise, indicated that his ideas on "property" were not the
694
same as existing ones when he argued that <i>"the present system of
695
land tenure should be changed to one of occupancy and use"</i> and
696
that <i>"no advocate of occupancy-and-use tenure of land believes
697
that it can be put in force, until as a theory it has been as
698
generally . . . seen and accepted as is the prevailing theory of
699
ordinary private property."</i> [<b>Occupancy and Use verses the Single
700
Tax</b>] Thus, for Tucker, anarchism is dependent on <i>"the Anarchistic
701
view that occupancy and use should condition and limit landholding
702
becom[ing] the prevailing view."</i> [<b>The Individualist Anarchists</b>,
705
Hence to claim that the Individualist Anarchists supported capitalist
706
property rights is false. As can be seen, they advocated a system
707
which differed significantly to the current system, indeed they
708
urged the restriction of property rights to a form of possession.
709
Unfortunately, by generally using the term "property" to describe
710
this new system of possession they generated exactly the confusion
711
that Proudhon foretold. Sadly, right-libertarians use this confusion
712
to promote the idea that the likes of Tucker supported capitalist
713
property rights and so capitalism.
715
For these two reasons it is clear that just because the Individualist
716
Anarchists supported (a form of) "property" does not mean they
717
are capitalists. Indeed, Kropotkin argued that a communist-anarchist
718
revolution would <b>not</b> expropriate the tools of self-employed workers
719
who exploited no-one (see his <b>Act for Yourselves</b> pp. 104-5).
720
Malatesta argued that in a free society <i>"the peasant [is free] to
721
cultivate his piece of land, alone if he wishes; free is the shoe
722
maker to remain at his last or the blacksmith in his small forge."</i>
723
Thus these two very famous communist-anarchists also "supported"
724
"property" but they are recognised as obviously socialists. This
725
apparent contradiction is resolved when it is understood that for
726
communist-anarchists (like all anarchists) the abolition of property
727
does not mean the end of possession and so <i>"would not harm the
728
independent worker whose real title is possession and the work
729
done"</i> unlike capitalist property. [Malatesta, <b>Life and Ideas</b>,
730
p. 103] In other words, <b>all</b> anarchists (as we argue in
731
<a href="secB3.html">section
732
B.3</a>) oppose private property but support possession.
734
That many of the Individualist Anarchists used the term "property"
735
to describe a system of possession (or <i>"occupancy-and-use"</i>) should
736
not blind us to the anti-capitalist nature of that "property." Once
737
we move beyond looking at the words they used to want they meant by
738
those words we clearly see that their ideas are distinctly different
739
from those of supporters of capitalism.
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