Kropotkin Quotes

“Letters and science will only take their proper place in the work of human development when, freed from all mercenary bondage, they will be exclusively cultivated by those who love them, and for those who love them.”
― Pyotr Kropotkin, The Conquest of Bread

“Two reefs tower in front of the anarchist. The first, the state, must be overcome, especially in a hurricane, when the waves soar. He ineluctably runs aground on the second one, society, the very image that flickered before him. There is a brief intermezzo between the fall of the legitimate powers and the new legality. Two weeks after Kropotkin’s funeral cortege, in which his corpse had followed the Black Banners, the sailors of Kronstadt were liquidated. This is not to say that nothing had happened in between—Merlino, one of the disillusioned, hit the nail on the head: ‘Anarchism is an experiment.”
― Ernst Jünger, Eumeswil

“Mutual aid [called this in Kropotkin's 1902 Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution means that every participant is both giver and recipient in acts of care that bind them together, as distinct from the one-way street of charity. 86”
― Rebecca Solnit, A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster

“The radical economist J K Gibson-Graham (two women writing under one name) portray our society as an iceberg, with competitive capitalist practices visible above the waterline and below all kinds of aid and cooperation by families, friends, neighbors, churches, cooperatives, volunteers, and voluntary organizations from softball leagues, to labor unions, along with activities outside the market, under the table, bartered labor and goods, ad more, a bustling network of uncommercial enterprise. Kropotkin's mutual-aid tribes, clans, and villages never went away entirely, even among us, here and now.”
― Rebecca Solnit, A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster

“Britta wanted to try to turn a guard. Tamara thought it was idiotic.

“What are you going to do? Buy him beer and tell him about Kropotkin?”

I envisioned the conversation:

Vanguard: Wage Slave, are you aware that you are but a wire nail in the toolbox of capitalism?
Wage Slave: I thought I was a chisel.
Vanguard: No, the petit bourgeois are the chisels.
Wage Slave: What about a washer set? Can I be a washer set?
Vanguard: No, my ferret, run free! For I have unlocked your collar with knowledge!
Wage Slave: I want to be a chisel.

Vanguard pushes screaming ferret through hole in fence cut by the clippers of noblesse oblige.

“Well, maybe we could bribe him,” said Britta. Tamara laughed.

“With what? Health insurance?”
― Vanessa Veselka, Zazen

“Go! And remember! Zebra is fine creature to admire, but you do not have to ride it.”
― John Allison, Bad Machinery Volume One: The Case of the Team Spirit

“Mutual aid [called this in Kropotkin's 1902 Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution] means that every participant is both giver and recipient in acts of care that bind them together, as distinct from the one-way street of charity.”
― Rebecca Solnit, A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster

“For all his saintly qualities, however, Kropotkin by no means offered blanket opposition to the use of violence. He upheld the assassination of tyrants if the perpetrators were impelled by noble motives, though his acceptance of bloodshed in such instances was inspired by compassion for the oppressed rather than by any personal hatred of the ruling despots. Kropotkin believed that acts of terror were among the very few means of resistance available to the enchained masses; they were useful as "propaganda by the deed," calculated to supplement oral and written propaganda in awakening the rebellious instincts of the people. Nor did Kropotkin shrink from revolution itself, for he hardly expected the propertied classes to give up their privileges and possessions without a fight. Like Bakunin, he anticipated an upheaval that would demolish capitalism and the state for all time. Nevertheless, he earnestly hoped that the rebellion would be a tame one, with "the smallest number of victims, and a minimum of embitterment." Kropotkin's revolution was to be speedy and humane—quite unlike Bakunin's demonic visions of fire and brimstone.”
― Paul Avrich, The Russian Anarchists

“A Russian social scientist Kropotkin believed morality is natural and instinctual. He pointed out that in nature, species that cooperate survive—birds fly in swarms, hunted animals move in herds, ants walk in lines, wolves hunt in packs. Darwin observed that cooperation leads to stronger biological organization”
― Mason Carter, A Philosophy of Scars: A Story of Broken Hearts and Overthinking Minds

“Illegitimate hierarchies—systems that force one person to submit to another—violate cooperation and mutual aid. That’s why things like rape are unethical. It’s not just about different moral views—it’s an act of domination.”
― Mason Carter, A Philosophy of Scars: A Story of Broken Hearts and Overthinking Minds