On Bakunin
On Bakunin
I am enjoying this little semi-autobiographical book on Bakunin by Brian Morris, the book is basically two pamphlets - the first a biography of the man and the second an overview of his theories and politics, and by overview I mean condensed and narrativised strings of quotes from Bakunin’s own documents.
Morris is I suppose the consummate modern socialist author, he spends a lot of time attacking Bakunin’s critics and leveraging the same hyperbole upon them as he accuses them of levelling against his subject, im not disappointed nor surprised, I knew what I was getting myself into when I picked up a book from the Dublin Anarchist Bookfare, hell, ill do it again, like literally, in a month or two. What really shone through was Bakunin himself, he feels like a kindred spirit, and its nice to get a biography before the theory (flying in the face of my own habit of only reading history from contemporary sources) It humanises the subject to understand how his views changed over time, from pan-Slavism to socialism to anarchism.
Bakunin was a contemporary of Marks and Kropotkin bur he only really crossed paths with Marks and the others involved in that ‘First International’ nonsense. I must say, the Conquest of Bread was hard going, and it suffices to say that it is filed in the ‘utopian nonsense’ section of my library. Kropotkin was a political theorist, endlessly practical and in an age where he could see use to providing practical instructions about how to set up this environment. Bakunin was a political philosopher, and a very clear-headed one at that.
Bakunin acknowledges that mankind is a social animal, and acknowledges that ‘society’ is the impact of social order, Bakunin says it is not possible to diverge this order from humanity, his particular point about freedom is that a man cannot realise that he is free unless another is there to measure or share the freedom. I am a little weary about what he means by social order, and how natural power structures can be so perfectly destroyed in the modern state - I think the answer to this is abstraction. Once a society grows and centralises such that the social orders pass beyond the network of a person’s known associations it is not possible for that person to act empathetically toward them. The problem with the modern state is principally that in the equation of social order, social has been removed and all that remains is suppression.
Bakunin also wants to stabilise our relationship between equality and liberty, most modern theorists acknowledge that these two quantities are in opposition, and that one can be had at the expense of the other or allowed encapsulated within the other. This is a neat simplification of the modern liberal state - within liberty is simulated equality; Likewise, within the old communist experiments of the last century: within equality is simulated liberty. Bakunin argued that equality and liberty are only opposing values when framed in the prevailing socio-economic system. The ideal person, intrinsically free and yet equal to his peers remains so until someone tries to suspend those freedoms or tip the equality. Such a balanced society is probably not possible any more but we are also blinded to it.
I have often extended the old quote ‘democracy is the worst system of government yet discovered; except all others that have been tried’ with ‘why then have we stopped trying?’ - It is not possible to imagine Bakunin’s free and equal society because we are so use to understanding values with zero-sum terminology - if I have more equality, I must have less freedom, because if a person is free then they will rise or fall. But this very concept of a person rising or falling is itself a socio-economic habit which I doubt is necessary.
The modern state will sacrifice culture or society to protect economy - it is wealth which allows freedom, and in our liberal society, we must aspire to be free from restriction. I suspect that in equalitarian states the same construct could be said - freedom must be sacrificed to protect equality. Interestingly though, thinking through to its conclusion both Libertarian and Equalitarian states will sacrifice culture to encourage freedom or equality.
I have strayed far from Bakunin at this stage so my apologies; Bakunin like myself, is profoundly anti-state, where the communists, (Leninists in particular) would require a socialist state to be implemented as a prelude to a communist state Bakunin calls this out - its trash, a socialist state is the same as a libertarian state or an equalitarian state, centralised it must concentrate its power on preserving itself - I do not envisage any way for a socialist state to disempower itself in such a way to encourage communism rather than reaction and regression. But notice how the state fails to gain leverage on the culture of a nation, its attempts to control or direct cultural discourse is only effective when implemented as punitive means, attempts to encourage the ‘correct’ culture can backfire violently - Culture then must be intrinsically free. Notice as well the barriers to access to any cultural endeavour. When we think of culture we think of a nationalised concept, a series of shared beliefs and habits, but I think this is also coloured by the socio-economic state, I know the culture I participate in is equal, it is the culture of a community - with a focus on the social side of the socio-economic binary, and it vanishes when hierarchy is imposed.
So I propose that we have the tools to create a society that is both free and equal. But our economic mind-set convinces us that the centralised state can be perfected. Bakunin says that it can’t; it is the wrong path in the wrong direction, the state must be destroyed. When I was much younger I thought that perhaps god didn’t banish Adam and Eve from Eden; perhaps he just made us unable to see it, it seems like a nice parallel to my reading of Bakunin’s socio-economic theory.
I am enjoying this little semi-autobiographical book on Bakunin by Brian Morris, the book is basically two pamphlets - the first a biography of the man and the second an overview of his theories and politics, and by overview I mean condensed and narrativised strings of quotes from Bakunin’s own documents.
Morris is I suppose the consummate modern socialist author, he spends a lot of time attacking Bakunin’s critics and leveraging the same hyperbole upon them as he accuses them of levelling against his subject, im not disappointed nor surprised, I knew what I was getting myself into when I picked up a book from the Dublin Anarchist Bookfare, hell, ill do it again, like literally, in a month or two. What really shone through was Bakunin himself, he feels like a kindred spirit, and its nice to get a biography before the theory (flying in the face of my own habit of only reading history from contemporary sources) It humanises the subject to understand how his views changed over time, from pan-Slavism to socialism to anarchism.
Bakunin was a contemporary of Marks and Kropotkin bur he only really crossed paths with Marks and the others involved in that ‘First International’ nonsense. I must say, the Conquest of Bread was hard going, and it suffices to say that it is filed in the ‘utopian nonsense’ section of my library. Kropotkin was a political theorist, endlessly practical and in an age where he could see use to providing practical instructions about how to set up this environment. Bakunin was a political philosopher, and a very clear-headed one at that.
Bakunin acknowledges that mankind is a social animal, and acknowledges that ‘society’ is the impact of social order, Bakunin says it is not possible to diverge this order from humanity, his particular point about freedom is that a man cannot realise that he is free unless another is there to measure or share the freedom. I am a little weary about what he means by social order, and how natural power structures can be so perfectly destroyed in the modern state - I think the answer to this is abstraction. Once a society grows and centralises such that the social orders pass beyond the network of a person’s known associations it is not possible for that person to act empathetically toward them. The problem with the modern state is principally that in the equation of social order, social has been removed and all that remains is suppression.
Bakunin also wants to stabilise our relationship between equality and liberty, most modern theorists acknowledge that these two quantities are in opposition, and that one can be had at the expense of the other or allowed encapsulated within the other. This is a neat simplification of the modern liberal state - within liberty is simulated equality; Likewise, within the old communist experiments of the last century: within equality is simulated liberty. Bakunin argued that equality and liberty are only opposing values when framed in the prevailing socio-economic system. The ideal person, intrinsically free and yet equal to his peers remains so until someone tries to suspend those freedoms or tip the equality. Such a balanced society is probably not possible any more but we are also blinded to it.
I have often extended the old quote ‘democracy is the worst system of government yet discovered; except all others that have been tried’ with ‘why then have we stopped trying?’ - It is not possible to imagine Bakunin’s free and equal society because we are so use to understanding values with zero-sum terminology - if I have more equality, I must have less freedom, because if a person is free then they will rise or fall. But this very concept of a person rising or falling is itself a socio-economic habit which I doubt is necessary.
The modern state will sacrifice culture or society to protect economy - it is wealth which allows freedom, and in our liberal society, we must aspire to be free from restriction. I suspect that in equalitarian states the same construct could be said - freedom must be sacrificed to protect equality. Interestingly though, thinking through to its conclusion both Libertarian and Equalitarian states will sacrifice culture to encourage freedom or equality.
I have strayed far from Bakunin at this stage so my apologies; Bakunin like myself, is profoundly anti-state, where the communists, (Leninists in particular) would require a socialist state to be implemented as a prelude to a communist state Bakunin calls this out - its trash, a socialist state is the same as a libertarian state or an equalitarian state, centralised it must concentrate its power on preserving itself - I do not envisage any way for a socialist state to disempower itself in such a way to encourage communism rather than reaction and regression. But notice how the state fails to gain leverage on the culture of a nation, its attempts to control or direct cultural discourse is only effective when implemented as punitive means, attempts to encourage the ‘correct’ culture can backfire violently - Culture then must be intrinsically free. Notice as well the barriers to access to any cultural endeavour. When we think of culture we think of a nationalised concept, a series of shared beliefs and habits, but I think this is also coloured by the socio-economic state, I know the culture I participate in is equal, it is the culture of a community - with a focus on the social side of the socio-economic binary, and it vanishes when hierarchy is imposed.
So I propose that we have the tools to create a society that is both free and equal. But our economic mind-set convinces us that the centralised state can be perfected. Bakunin says that it can’t; it is the wrong path in the wrong direction, the state must be destroyed. When I was much younger I thought that perhaps god didn’t banish Adam and Eve from Eden; perhaps he just made us unable to see it, it seems like a nice parallel to my reading of Bakunin’s socio-economic theory.