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Learn about the history, ideology, and examples of anarchist societies around the world. Find out which countries have been anarchies in the past or present, and which ones are still active today.
CountryAnarchy SocietyStatusDurationStrandzha CommunePast21 daysSouth Fujian's Constitution-upholding ...Past1 year, 346 days| 2 years, 46 daysTaboritesPast31–32 yearsFreetown ChristianiaActive52 years, 77 days (ongoing)Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is against all forms of authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including the state and capitalism. Anarchism advocates for the replacement of the state with stateless societies and voluntary free associations.
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- Foundations of anarchist thought
anarchism, cluster of doctrines and attitudes centred on the belief that government is both harmful and unnecessary. Anarchist thought developed in the West and spread throughout the world, principally in the early 20th century.
Derived from the Greek root anarchos meaning “without authority,” anarchism, anarchist, and anarchy are used to express both approval and disapproval. In early usage all these terms were pejorative: for example, during the English Civil Wars (1642–51) the radical Levelers, who called for universal manhood suffrage, were referred to by their opponents as “Switzerising anarchists,” and during the French Revolution the leader of the moderate Girondin faction of Parliament, Jacques-Pierre Brissot, accused his most extreme rivals, the Enragés, of being the advocates of “anarchy”:
Laws that are not carried into effect, authorities without force and despised, crime unpunished, property attacked, the safety of the individual violated, the morality of the people corrupted, no constitution, no government, no justice, these are the features of anarchy.
These words could serve as a model for the denunciations delivered by all opponents of anarchism. The anarchists, for their part, would admit many of Brissot’s points. They deny man-made laws, regard property as a means of tyranny, and believe that crime is merely the product of property and authority. But they would argue that their denial of constitutions and governments leads not to “no justice” but to the real justice inherent in the free development of human sociality—the natural inclination, when unfettered by laws, to live according to the principles and practice of mutual aid.
The first person to willingly call himself an anarchist was the French political writer and pioneer socialist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon. In his controversial study of the economic bases of society, Qu’est-ce que la propriété? (1840; What Is Property?), Proudhon argued that the real laws of society have nothing to do with authority but rather stem from the nature of society itself, and he foresaw the eventual dissolution of authority and the emergence of a natural social order:
As man seeks justice in equality, so society seeks order in anarchy. Anarchy—the absence of a sovereign—such is the form of government to which we are every day approximating.
The essential elements of Proudhon’s philosophy already had been developed by earlier thinkers. The rejection of political authority has a rich pedigree. It extends back to classical antiquity—to the Stoics and the Cynics—and runs through the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, as illustrated by dissenting Christian sects such as the medieval Catharists and certain factions of Anabaptists. For such groups—which are often mistakenly claimed as ancestors by modern anarchist writers—the rejection of government was merely one aspect of a retreat from the material world into a realm of spiritual grace, and, as part of the search for individual salvation, it was hardly compatible with the sociopolitical doctrine of anarchism. In all its forms, that doctrine consists of (1) an analysis of the power relations underlying existing forms of political authority and (2) a vision of an alternative libertarian society based on cooperation, as opposed to competition and coercion, and functioning without the need for government authority.
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Anarchy, in political science and the study of international relations, the absence of any authority superior to nation-states and capable of arbitrating their disputes and enforcing international law.
In 1907, the International Anarchist Congress of Amsterdam gathered delegates from most European countries, the United States, Japan and Latin America. A central debate concerned the relation between anarchism and trade unionism. Errico Malatesta and Pierre Monatte strongly disagreed on this issue.
Anarchism - Social Change, Equality, Liberty: After World War II, anarchist groups and federations reemerged in almost all countries where they had formerly flourished—the notable exceptions being Spain and the Soviet Union—but these organizations wielded little influence compared to that of the broader movement inspired by earlier ideas.
List of anarchist movements by region - Wikipedia. Contents. hide. (Top) Anarchism in Africa. Anarchism in Asia. Anarchism in Europe. Anarchism in North America. Anarchism in Oceania. Anarchism in South America. See also. List of anarchist movements by region. Part of a series on. Anarchism. History. Outline. Schools of thought. Theory. Practice.
