Well, that is it — the Proudhon Reader has been sent to AK Press! Finally… In addition, the book’s webpage has been started (www.property-is-theft.org), the first extract been put on-line and the first blog posting has been done.
Well, that is it — the Proudhon Reader has been sent to AK Press! Finally… In addition, the book’s webpage has been started (www.property-is-theft.org), the first extract been put on-line and the first blog posting has been done. This book should revolutionise how we English-readers view Proudhon as well as plugging a big hole in our understanding in the evolution of anarchism.
While the anthology webpage as a top-level contents page, here is the full one:
Property is Theft!
A Pierre-Joseph Proudhon Anthology
What is Property?
Chapter I. Method Pursued In This Work — The Idea of a Revolution
Chapter II. Property Considered as a Natural Right
§1 Property as a Natural Right
§2 Occupation, as the Title to Property
§3 Civil Law as the Foundation and Sanction of Property
Chapter III. Labour As The Efficient Cause Of The Domain Of Property.
§1 The Land cannot be Appropriated
§2 Universal Consent no Justification of Property
§3 Prescription Gives No Title to Property
§4 Labour: That Labour Has No Inherent Power to Appropriate Natural Wealth
§5 That Labour leads to Equality of Property
§6 That in Society all Wages are Equal
Chapter IV. That property is impossible.
Chapter V. Psychological Exposition of the Idea of Justice
Letter to M.Blanqui on Property
Letter to Antoine Gauthier
Letter to Karl Marx
System of Economic Contradictions: Volume I
Chapter I: Of the Economic Science
Chapter II: Of Value
Chapter III: Economic Evolutions – First Period – The Division of Labour
Chapter IV: Second Period – Machinery
§I Of the function of machinery in its relations to liberty
§II Machinery’s contradiction – Origin of capital and wage-labour
§III Of preservatives against the disastrous influence of machinery
Chapter V: Third Period – Competition
§I Necessity of competition.
§II Subversive effects of competition, and the destruction of liberty thereby.
§III Remedies against competition.
Chapter VI: Fourth Period – Monopoly
§I Necessity of monopoly
§II The disasters in labour and the perversion of ideas caused by monopoly.
Chapter VII: Fifth Period – Police, Or Taxation
System of Economic Contradictions: Volume II
Chapter X: Seventh Period: Credit
§I Origin and Development of the Idea of Credit
Chapter XI: Eighth Epoch — Property
§II Causes of the establishment of property
§III How property is corrupted
Chapter XIV: Summary and Conclusion
Solution of the Social Problem
First Chapter: The Revolution in 1848
Chapter II: Democracy
Organisation of Credit and Circulation and the Solution of the Social Problem
Programme
The Bank of Exchange
Letter to Louis Blanc
Letter to Professor Chevalier
The Situation
The Reaction
The Mystification of Universal Suffrage
To Patriots
Opening Session of the National Assembly
Outline of the Social Question
Foreign Affairs
To the Editor-in-Chief of Le Représentant du Peuple
The 15th July
Address to the Constituent National Assembly
The Malthusians
Toast to the Revolution
The Constitution and the Presidency
Election Manifesto of Le Peuple
Bank of the People
Declaration
Formation of the Company
Report of the Luxembourg Delegate and Workers’ Corporation Commission
Chapter I: The People’s Bank
Chapter II: Overview of contemplated production or consumption unions
Chapter III: General Consumers’ Union and its Responsibilities
Confessions of a Revolutionary
Chapter III: Nature and Destination of Government
Chapter VI: 24th February: Provisional Government
Chapter X: June 23-26: The Cavaignac Reaction
Chapter XIV: 4th November: The Constitution
Chapter XVII: 1849, 29 January: Barrot-Falloux Reaction. Destruction of the Government
Chapter XVIII: 21st March: The Law On The Clubs; Legal Resistance
Chapter XXI: 8th July 1849: Conclusion
Resistance to the Revolution
I Of the nature of the State
II Of the end or object of the State
III Of an ulterior destiny of the State
Letter to Pierre Leroux
In Connection with Louis Blanc
Interest and Principal
First Letter: 19th November 1849
Second Letter: 3rd December 1849
Third Letter: 17th December 1849
Fourth Letter: 31st December 1849
Fifth Letter: 21st January 1850
Sixth Letter: 11th February 1850
General Idea of the Revolution in the Nineteenth Century
First Study: Reaction Causes Revolution
Second Study: Is there Sufficient Reason for Revolution in the Nineteenth Century?
1. Law of Tendency in Society – The Revolution of 1789 has done only half its work
2. Chaos of economic forces.Tendency of society toward poverty
3. Anomaly of Government. Tendency toward Tyranny and Corruption
Third Study: The Principle of Association
Fourth Study: The Principle of Authority
Fifth Study: Social Liquidation.
Sixth Study: Organisation of Economic Forces
1. Credit
2. Property
3. Division of Labour, Collective Forces, Machines, Workers Companies
4. Constitution of Value. Organisation of Low Prices
5. Foreign Commerce. Balance of Imports and Exports
Seventh Study. Absorption of Government by the Economic Organism
Epilogue
Letter to Villiaumé
Stock Exchange Speculator’s Manual
Preface
Final Considerations
3. Industrial democracy: Labour-labour partnership or universal
mutuality; end of the crisis
I. Workers’ Associations
II. Consumers’ associations
Justice In The Revolution And In The Church
Volume I: Programme
§ I: The coming of the people to philosophy
§ II: The definition of philosophy
§ III: On the quality of the philosophical mind
§ IV: The origin of ideas
§ V: That metaphysics is within the province of primary instruction
§ VI: That philosophy must be essentially practical
§ VII: The character that must be presented by the guarantee of our
judgements and the rule of our actions – Conversion from
speculative to practical reason: determination of the criterion
§ VIII: Justice, the universal reason of things – Science and conscience
§ IX: Supremacy of Justice
§ X: Conditions for a philosophical propaganda
§ XI: Law of progress: Social destination
Volume II: Little Political Catechism
First Instruction: Of the social power, considered in itself
Instruction II: Of the appropriation of the collective forces,
and the corruption of the social power
Instruction III: Of the forms of government and their evolution
during the pagan-christian period
Instruction IV: Constitution of social power by the Revolution
Instruction V: Question of the agenda
Letter to Milliet
The Federative Principle
First Part: Principle of Federation
Chapter VI: Posing of the Political Problem: Principle of Solution
Chapter VII: Extrication of the Idea of Federation
Chapter VIII: Progressive Constitution
Chapter X: Political Idealism: Efficiency of the Federal Guarantee
Chapter XI: Economic Sanction: Agricultural-Industrial Federation
Conclusion
Letter to M.X
The Political Capacity of the Working Classes
To Some Workers from Paris and Rouen Who Had Sought His
Views of the Elections
Second Part: Development of the worker idea: Creation of economic right
Chapter IV: 2. The mutualist system, or, on the Manifesto –
Spontaneity of the idea of mutuality in the modern
masses – Definition
Chapter VIII: Application of the principle of mutuality to labour
and to wages – Of true commerce and agiotage
Chapter XIII: Chapter XIII: On Association, within Mutuality
Chapter XV: Objections against mutualist policy. Answer. Main
cause of the fall of States – Relation of the political
and economic functions in the new Democracy
Third Part: Political Incompatibilities – Conclusion
Chapter IV: On municipal liberty: That this liberty, essentially
federalist and incompatible with the unitary system,
can neither be demanded by the Opposition nor granted
by the imperial Government.
Appendix: The Theory of Property
Chapter IX: Summary
Appendix: The Paris Commune
International Worker’s Association: Federal Council of Parisian Section
On the Organisation of the Commune
Paris Today Is Free And In Possession Of Herself And The Provinces Are In Slavery
Declaration
Proposal on the Production of Goods
As can be seen, it is pretty comprehensive and it has lots of material which has never been translated before. In addition, it has some older material which has not been included in a book before. I should also mention I’ve revised some of these older translations to make them consistent and correct translation errors.
And I should also note that this work is hardly finished, even if this anthology is. There is a lot of material which is still untranslated. Obviously ones like Confessions of a Revolutionary or The Political Capacity of the Working Classes, but also Proudhon’s 1849 polemic with Louis Blanc and Pierre Leroux would be of interest. Still, before I even think about that, I think a new Bakunin anthology is called for…
Finally, I should say that I was aiming to blog once a week — something I’ve obviously failed to do this year. Unfortunately the deadline for this book, plus volume 2 of An Anarchist FAQ plus being busy at work and at home meant that hope was not made real. But, hopefully, that will change now that one of my projects is now been sent off.
until I blog again, be seeing you…
Iain
2 replies on “Proudhon Reader Contents”
Hi there! I found somewhere
Hi there! I found somewhere that you refer to yourself as an anarcho-communist, yet you’ve compiled this anthology of Proudhon. This puzzles me somewhat- what was your intention in doing this? Was it merely to gain a great understanding of mutualism, or was it maybe from being tired of straw man arguments being placed against mutualism (even though you of course don’t subscribe that view) and you wanted to be able to properly critique Proudhon?
Thanks!
I found somewhere that you
I found somewhere that you refer to yourself as an anarcho-communist, yet you’ve compiled this anthology of Proudhon. This puzzles me somewhat- what was your intention in doing this?
Yes, I consider myself a communist-anarchism. However, I recognise the contribution of Prooudhon to anarchism and his importance in the evolution of socialist ideas. The anthology seeks to show that. Plus he is a wonderful writer, with original thoughts on a whole range of subjects. He is also misrepresented and misunderstood — something I find annoying
Was it merely to gain a great understanding of mutualism, or was it maybe from being tired of straw man arguments being placed against mutualism (even though you of course don’t subscribe that view) and you wanted to be able to properly critique Proudhon?
Well, yes, in order to critique something you need to understand it. But that is not what drove the project. It really boils down to my interest in Proudhon and his ideas, his contribution to anarchism (and socialism as a whole) and my desire to show that what most people think Proudhon advocated was not actually what he did argue.
Suffice to say, many basic ideas of anarchist and Marxist thought can be traced to Proudhon. Yet few people realise that. Hopefully Property is Theft! will change that and people will gain a better idea of why Proudhon is important — even if you don’t agree with him on all subjects (like myself).