Why does the Makhnovist movement show there is an alternative to Bolshevism?

The key Leninist defence of the actions of the Bolsheviks in the Russian revolution is that they had no other choice.

What was the Kronstadt Rebellion?

The Kronstadt rebellion took place in the first weeks of March, 1921. Kronstadt was (and is) a naval fortress on an island in the Gulf of Finland. Traditionally, it has served as the base of the Russian Baltic Fleet and to guard the approaches to the city of St. Petersburg (which during the first world war was re-named Petrograd, then later Leningrad, and is now St. Petersburg again) thirty-five miles away.

Were any of the Bolshevik oppositions a real alternative?

The real limitations in Bolshevism can best be seen by the various oppositions to the mainstream of that party. That Bolshevik politics were not a suitable instrument for working class self-liberation can be seen by the limited way which opposition groups questioned Bolshevik orthodoxy -- even, in the case of the opposition to the rising Stalinist bureaucracy.

How did Bolshevik ideology contribute to the failure of the Revolution?

It is a truism of Leninism that Stalinism has nothing to do with the ideas of Bolshevism. Moreover, most are at pains to stress that these ideas have no relation to the actual practice of the Bolshevik Party after the October Revolution.

What caused the degeneration of the Russian Revolution?

As is well known, the Russian Revolution failed. Rather than produce socialism, the Bolshevik revolution gave birth to an autocratic party dictatorship residing over a state capitalist economy. In turn, this regime gave rise to the horrors of Stalin's system.

11 What is the myth of "Natural Law"?

Natural Law, and the related concept of Natural Rights, play an important part in Libertarian and "anarcho"-capitalist ideology. Right-libertarians are not alone in claiming that their particular ideology is based on the "law of nature". Hitler, for one, claimed the same thing for Nazi ideology. So do numerous other demagogues, religious fanatics, and political philosophers.

10 Would laissez-faire capitalism be stable?

Unsurprisingly, right-libertarians combine their support for "absolute property rights" with a whole-hearted support for laissez-faire capitalism. In such a system (which they maintain, to quote Ayn Rand, is an "unknown ideal") everything would be private property and there would be few (if any) restrictions on "voluntary exchanges." "Anarcho"-capitalists are the most extreme of defenders of pure capitalism, urging that the state itself

9 Is Medieval Iceland an example of "anarcho"-capitalism working in practice?

Ironically, medieval Iceland is a good example of why "anarcho"-capitalism will not work, degenerating into de facto rule by the rich. It should be pointed out first that Iceland, nearly 1,000 years ago, was not a capitalistic system.

8 What role did the state take in the creation of capitalism?

If the "anarcho"-capitalist is to claim with any plausibility that "real" capitalism is non-statist or that it can exist without a state, it must be shown that capitalism evolved naturally, in opposition to state intervention. However, in reality, the opposite is the case. Capitalism was born from state intervention and, in the words of Kropotkin, "the State . . . and capitalism . . .

7 How does the history of "anarcho"-capitalism show that it is not anarchist?

Of course, "anarcho"-capitalism does have historic precedents and "anarcho"-capitalists spend considerable time trying to co-opt various individuals into their self-proclaimed tradition of "anti-statist" liberalism.