The Socialism of to-day

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 835096955

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-28834

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Laveleye, Émile de

Title:: The Socialism of to-day

Place of publication:: London

Publisher:: Field & Tuer

Year of publication:: 1884

Scope:: 1 Online-Ressource (XLIV, 331 S.)

Collection:: Economics Books

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COLLECTIVISM AND LAND NATIONALIZATION 263 throughout all Europe, as is shown by the manifestoes and programmes occasionally published; but among Collectivists there are several degrees, and, as usually happens, those most nearly related hate each other the most cordially. According to information that I owe to the courtesy of M. B. Malón, the author of a good history of Socialism, and himself one of the leaders of the movement in Paris, the Collectivist party in France may be approximately divided as follows :—At the extreme left are the Anarchists or Nihilists, of whom Prince Krapotkine may be taken as the ideal type. Their idea of “ Anarchy ” resembles that of Proudhon, but they are more directly connected with Bakunin, who, by means of secret societies formed from the remnants of the International, has spread the ideas of Russian Nihilism throughout all Socialist circles. The Anarchists are not numerous, but they are very fanatical, and their extreme members shrink from no means petroleum, fire, bombs, dynamite, even assassination, as has recently been shown in Andalusia, Their creed does not, however, make much progress in France, because the French genius likes clear ideas and a programme carefully thought out, and containing a plan of reform easy to grasp. The Collectivists, properly so called, may be themselves divided into two groups, especially since the Congress held at St. Etienne in September, 1882 : (i) the Irreconcilable Collec tivists, who look for a revolutionary movement like the Jacobins of old; and (2) the Evolutionist-Collectivists, who are beginning to accept as a truth the doctrine of science, that changes in the social order, as in nature, are only brought about slowly and by a process of evolution. These latter are called “ Possibilists,” because they are anxious to make their claims in a legal manner, and to take part in elections, not merely as a protest, but also with the aim of making their ideas prevail in Parliament and in the Municipal Councils. In this they follow the course adopted by the German Socialists, who have thus succeeded, not only in sending representatives to the Reichstag, but also in inducing the Government—partly, no doubt, out of consideration for the large number of Socialist votes—to take up the question of social reforms.

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