Persons [ ] The social wealth is produced only by collective labor | Mikhail Bakunin, 1814-1876

Mikhail Bakunin, 1829

“A person is strong only when he stands upon his own truth, when he speaks and acts with his deepest convictions. Then, whatever the situation he may be in, he always knows what he must say and do. He may fall, but he cannot bring shame upon himself or his cause.” *

“Human nature is so constituted that the propensity for evil is always intensified by external circumstances, and the morality of the individual depends much more on the conditions of his existence and the environment in which he lives than on his own will. ”

“The supreme law of the State is self-preservation at any cost. And since all States, ever since they came to exist upon the earth, have been condemned to perpetual struggle — a struggle against their own populations, whom they oppress and ruin, a struggle against all foreign States, every one of which can be strong only if the others are weak — and since the States cannot hold their own in this struggle unless they constantly keep on augmenting their power against their own subjects as well as against the neighborhood States — it follows that the supreme law of the State is the augmentation of its power to the detriment of internal liberty and external justice.”

“By nature mutually antagonistic and utterly irreconcilable, states can find no other grounds for joint action than the concerted enslavement of the masses who constitute the overall basis and purpose of their existence.” *

“If there is a State, there must be domination of one class by another and, as a result, slavery; the State without slavery is unthinkable – and this is why we are the enemies of the State.”

“The glory and grandeur of a nation lie only in the
development of its humanity. Its strength and inner vitality are measured by the degree of its liberty.”

“Equality and justice demand only a society so organized that every single human being will—from birth through adolescence and maturity—find therein equal means, first for maintenance and education, and later, for the exercise of all his natural capacities and aptitudes.”

“Improve working conditions, render to labor what is justly due to labor, and thereby give the people security, comfort, and leisure Then, believe me, they will educate themselves; they will create a larger, saner, higher civilization than this.”

“To organize society in such a manner that every individual, man or woman, should find, upon entering life, approximately equal means for the development of his or her diverse faculties and their utilization in his or her work. And to organize such a society that, rendering impossible the exploitation of anyone’s labor, will enable every individual to enjoy the social wealth, which in reality is produced only by collective labor, but to enjoy it only in so far as he contributes directly toward the creation of that wealth.”

“Between a monarchy and the most democratic republic there is only one essential difference: in the former, the world of officialdom oppresses and robs the people for the greater profit of the privileged and propertied classes, as well as to line its own pockets, in the name of the monarch; in the latter, it oppresses and robs the people in exactly the same way, for the benefit of the same classes and the same pockets, but in the name of the people’s will.” *

“No state, not even the most republican and democratic, not even the pseudo-popular state contemplated by Marx, in essence represents anything but government of the masses from above downward, by an educated and thereby privileged minority which supposedly understands the real interests of the people better than the people themselves.” *

“Governmental despotism is never so fierce and so powerful as when it rests on the fictitious representation of a fictitious popular will.” *

“Among the greatest geniuses to date, few have actually done anything for the people. A nation’s geniuses are highly aristocratic, and everything they have done up to now has served only to educate, strengthen, and enrich the exploiting minority. The poor masses, forsaken and abused by everyone, have had to break their own martyr’s path to freedom and light by means of an infinite number of obscure and fruitless efforts.” *

“There are times when creation can be achieved only through destruction. The urge to destroy is then a creative urge.”

“To be free means to be acknowledged and treated as such by all his fellowmen. The liberty of every individual is only the reflection of his own humanity, or his human right through the conscience of all free men, his brothers and his equals. […] I am not myself free or human until or unless I recognize the freedom and humanity of all my fellowmen.”

Mikhail Bakunin, Statism and Anarchy, 1873 * / Man, Society, and Freedom ^

Mikhail Bakunin, Selfportrait, 1838