Anti-authoritarians

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Anti-authoritarians is a Marxist term for anti-authoritarians , i.e. the anarchists or anti-authoritarian socialists of the Bakunin faction from 1872 onwards. The term can be found in the article “ From the Authority ” by Friedrich Engels , in which he sharply criticizes the anti-authoritarians.

In educational work on anti-authoritarian upbringing , this article is cited in the - then in vain - search for the origin of the word anti-authoritarian (probably for the first time in a footnote by Johannes Classen ).

In the historical-critical commentary on this article (in the Marx-Engels complete edition MEGA) one learns that this article has only been preserved in Italian in an Italian magazine. The (awkward) word anti-authoritarian could possibly come from a later translator rather than from Engels himself. Whether this translation is simply linguistically incorrect or correctly reproduces a polemical, incorrect designation by Engels can only be checked on the Italian original. However, this is unimportant for the meaning of the term. The so-called group of people described themselves as anti-authoritarian or anti-authoritarian socialists and founded the Anti-Authoritarian International .

Engel's article is a sharp polemic against the anti-authoritarians ( i.e. anti-authoritarians ) who had been excluded from the International Workers' Association by Karl Marx shortly before (1872) because of fundamental political differences .

In the book “Von der Autorität” Friedrich Engels deduces that in the social production and reproduction of life, people must also subordinate themselves to authoritarian principles of order, and not just to autonomous ones . Authority arises where it is necessary to ensure a smooth process. He justifies this need for authority on the one hand with the division of labor , which has intensified more and more in the course of the development of societies ( industrialization ) and reached its climax in capitalism . In order to be able to continue to produce the wealth of goods that capitalism has produced in a socialist society, very specific forms of metabolism with the environment (hence concrete work) must be entered into, as in capitalism. Engels illustrates this compulsion by working in a cotton mill (one could also imagine the production process in a modern factory) or in the case of the railroad: “What would happen to the first outgoing train if the authority of the railroad employees over the travelers were abolished? But the need for an authority, and a commanding authority, is most clearly evident in a ship on the high seas. Here, in the moment of danger, everyone's life depends on everyone obeying the will of an individual immediately and absolutely. "

“So we have seen that on the one hand a certain authority transferred in whatever way and on the other hand a certain subordination are things that impose themselves on us independently of all social organization, together with the material conditions under which we produce and the products circulate to let."

- Friedrich Engels : On Authority, 1873

Friedrich Engels comes to the conclusion:

“So one of two things: either the anti-authoritarians don't know what they are saying, and in this case they only sow confusion; or they know, and in which case they are betraying the movement of the proletariat. In one case as in the other, they serve the reaction. "

See also

Jura Federation

literature

  • Brupbacher , Fritz: Marx and Bakunin . A contribution to the history of the International Workers' Association. Berlin: Karin Kramer Verlag and Hausen am Albis: Book and Information Cooperative 1996. ISBN 3-87956-006-4 .
  • Mehring: The Lessing Legend (the same from a Marxist point of view)
  • Nettlau , Max: History of Anarchy. Volume 2: The anarchism from Proudhon to Kropotkin. Its historical development in the years 1859-1880. , Library Thélème 1996 (first Berlin 1927); Chapter XII: Marx versus Bakunin; the London Conference and the Hague Congress; the Jurassic Circular and the Anti-Authoritarian Congress of St. Imier; the years 1871-73 and Chapter XIII: The Anti-Authoritarian International 1873-75; César DePaepe and James Guillaume.