Colonel William A. Phillips

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THE ANARCHISM PORTAL

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Black flag waving
Black flag waving

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. As a historically left-wing movement, this reading of anarchism is placed on the farthest left of the political spectrum, usually described as the libertarian wing of the socialist movement (libertarian socialism).

Although traces of anarchist ideas are found all throughout history, modern anarchism emerged from the Enlightenment. During the latter half of the 19th and the first decades of the 20th century, the anarchist movement flourished in most parts of the world and had a significant role in workers' struggles for emancipation. Various anarchist schools of thought formed during this period. Anarchists have taken part in several revolutions, most notably in the Paris Commune, the Russian Civil War and the Spanish Civil War, whose end marked the end of the classical era of anarchism. In the last decades of the 20th and into the 21st century, the anarchist movement has been resurgent once more, growing in popularity and influence within anti-capitalist, anti-war and anti-globalisation movements. (Full article...)


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I once believed it's too bad that there are a lot of people who work for government who are hard-working and honest people who will get hit (by Assassination Politics) and it's a shame…Well, I don't believe that any more. They are all either crooks or they tolerate crooks or they are aware of crooks among their numbers.

Jim Bell in interview with Wired, on 2000-11-11.

Jim Bell (born James Dalton Bell, 1958) is a contemporary American crypto-anarchist theorist and activist. Bell attracted wide attention in 1996 when he authored a notorious crypto-anarchist essay called "Assassination Politics", which detailed an elaborate assassination market in which anonymous benefactors could securely order assassinations of government officials via the Internet. Bell was targeted and identified by the Federal government of the United States as a "techno-terrorist" in 1997 and following an investigation by the Internal Revenue Service, was arrested and subsequently jailed for 11 months on felony charges of harassment and using fraudulent Social Security numbers.

While he was serving his sentence, two of Bell's acolytes succeeded in partially implementing his assassination market scheme and were also swiftly charged and jailed. After his release, Bell was subjected to heavy surveillance and was rearrested for harassment and stalking of federal agents, charged with intimidation and stalking and again imprisoned, this time for a decade-long sentence. Bell protested vociferously against the conduct of the trial, going so far as to file civil lawsuits against two judges, at least two prosecutors, his former probation officers and his defense attorneys, but ultimately to no avail. Bell was hailed by Wired in 2001 as "[o]ne of the Internet's most famous essayists" and "the world's most notorious crypto-convict". (read more...)

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Portrait of Russian author and philosopher, Leo Tolstoy.
Portrait of Russian author and philosopher, Leo Tolstoy.
Credit: Ilya Repin

Portrait of Leo Tolstoy by Ilya Repin, 1887. Tolstoy was a towering figure in Russian literary and philosophical history, and one of the chief influences on Christian and pacifist anarchism.

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Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

Anniversaries for May 1

May Day - International Workers' Day

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