The Essential Kropotkin

by Pyotr Kropotkin, Emile Capouya (Editor), Keitha Tompkins (Editor)

More than any Russian thinker of his time, Prince Peter Kropotkin (1842-1921) anticipated the great social and ethical problems of the twentieth century. This book is a definitive general selection from all his works, including Appeal to the Young, Law and Authority, The Wage System , and Anarchism . The major works represented include Memoirs of a Revolutionist; Mutual Aid; The Great French Revolution ; and Fields, Factories, and Workshops .

Genres: Philosophy, Politics, History, Nonfiction

322 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1975

About the author

Pyotr Alekseyevich Kropotkin, prince, Russian anarchist, and political philosopher, greatly influenced movements throughout the world and maintained that cooperation, not competition, the means, bettered the human condition.

Pyotr Alexeyevich Kropotkin (Пётр Алексеевич Кропоткин, other spelling: Pëtr Kropotkin, Pierre Kropotkine), who described him as "a man with a soul of that beautiful white Christ, which seems coming." He wrote many books, pamphlets and articles, the most prominent being The Conquest of Bread and Fields, Factories and Workshops , and his principal scientific offering, Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution . He also contributed to the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition .

Reviews

[Josh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Written at the turn of the last century, Kropotkin's ideas are just as resonant (maybe more so) today. As evinced in this past election, even socialist ideas retain a heavy stigma that prevents their wisdom from getting serious play in mainstream discourse. Anarchism is wholly absent from the debate. With mass capitalism hitting critical mass, fuel and food crises, and the promises of western progress growing thinner and thinner, Kropotkin's key assertions not only seem all the more appealing, but all the more feasible. Why shouldn't social sciences (economics, politics) follow evolutionary law? (Religious fundamentalism and the rigid moral metaphysics that underlie law certainly prevent this fluidity.) Why shouldn't economics be considered from the bottom, consumer-side first--a view that would cloth, feed and house all people without the pitfalls of interest, profit and monetary abstraction.

These ideas are not new and they are not radical. Far from the reactionary, adolescent quality that most assign to anarchism (a convenient state stigma), Kropotkin is not calling for violent overthrow, upheaval, or even revolution per se. His vision is evolutionary. We can't get directly there from here, for there are many phases we must first move through (many of which are necessarily socialistic). And even if we ever arrive at a time when both capitalism and the state have fallen away, like the rusty shell of an obsolete machine, this will not be the end. His vision is not utopian, it is pragmatic. An anarchist is one, like any organism in any biome, that must constantly be adapting.

Barack Obama has changed the conversation; now let's take the conversation to a place it's never been allowed to go in mainstream politics.

[Samuel · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm not sure if it's included in this particular collection, but Kropotkin's 'Appeal to the Young' should be required reading for every single college graduate.