Anarchism in Monaco

Last updated

This is a short history of anarchism in Monaco , primarily in the late 19th century and early 20th century. Monaco, a principality formerly under the absolute rule of the House of Grimaldi and a constitutional monarchy since 1911, is located on the French Riviera in Western Europe. The city-state and microstate is bordered exclusively by France and the Mediterranean Sea.

Contents

History

Amid a period of militant upheaval, in March 1894 Prime Minister Francesco Crispi of Italy responded to a request from the government of Monaco to help the Principality monitor political radicals. Crispi, a former insurrectionist himself, sent a confidential informant to watch over the community of Italian anarchists residing in the country. All expenses were paid for by Monaco. The same year, the Prime Minister had deployed the army and declared a state of siege in Sicily to put down the partially anarchist-led Fasci Siciliani, crushing an anarchist solidarity revolt in Lunigiana along the way. Only months later in June anarchists unsuccessfully attempted to shoot Crispi himself, successfully assassinating President Marie François Sadi Carnot. [1]

The prominent individualist anarchist Benjamin Tucker moved from the United States first to France and then to Monaco, after a 1908 fire in his New York City bookstore saw him lose both uninsured printing equipment and his 30-year stock of books and pamphlets. At the time of the fire his partner Pearl Johnson – 25 years his junior – was pregnant with their daughter, Oriole Tucker. Tucker moved to Monaco, where his daughter grew up, to better make use of the income from his invested inheritance. He spent much of the rest of his life in the city-state, mostly in almost complete political retirement. [2]

Tucker died in Monaco in 1939, in the company of his family. His daughter, Oriole, reported, "Father's attitude towards communism never changed one whit, nor about religion... In his last months he called in the French housekeeper. 'I want her,' he said, 'to be a witness that on my death bed I'm not recanting. I do not believe in God!" [3]

Léo Ferré (1916-1993) was born and, partially, schooled in Monaco. A Monegasque poet, composer and a dynamic and controversial live performer, he became a very prominent protest singer in France, releasing some forty albums and many successful singles throughout his career. A staunch anarchist, Ferré's often heavily political songs mixed revolt with love and melancholy. While he spent much of his life away from his birthplace, he returned to live in Monaco several times, before finally being buried there in 1993.

See also

Related Research Articles

Individualist anarchism is the branch of anarchism that emphasizes the individual and their will over external determinants such as groups, society, traditions and ideological systems. Although usually contrasted to social anarchism, both individualist and social anarchism have influenced each other. Mutualism, an economic theory particularly influential within individualist anarchism whose pursued liberty has been called the synthesis of communism and property, has been considered sometimes part of individualist anarchism and other times part of social anarchism. Many anarcho-communists regard themselves as radical individualists, seeing anarcho-communism as the best social system for the realization of individual freedom. Economically, while European individualist anarchists are pluralists who advocate anarchism without adjectives and synthesis anarchism, ranging from anarcho-communist to mutualist economic types, most American Individualist Anarchists advocate mutualism, a libertarian socialist form of market socialism, or a free-market socialist form of classical economics. Individualist anarchists are opposed to property that gives privilege and is exploitative, seeking to "destroy the tyranny of capital, — that is, of property" by mutual credit.

Francesco Crispi Italian statesman

Francesco Crispi was an Italian patriot and statesman. He was among the main protagonists of the Risorgimento, a close friend and supporter of Giuseppe Mazzini and Giuseppe Garibaldi and one of the architects of Italian unification in 1860.

Anarchists have employed certain symbols for their cause, including most prominently the circle-A and the black flag.

The history of anarchism is as ambiguous as anarchism itself. Scholars find it hard to define or agree on what anarchism means, which makes outlining its history difficult. There is a range of views on anarchism and its history. Some feel anarchism is a distinct, well-defined 19th and 20th century movement while others identify anarchist traits long before first civilisations existed.

Luigi Galleani Italian insurrectionary anarchist (1862–1931)

Luigi Galleani was an Italian anarchist active in the United States from 1901 to 1919. He is best known for his enthusiastic advocacy of "propaganda of the deed", i.e. the use of violence to eliminate those he viewed as tyrants and oppressors and to act as a catalyst to the overthrow of existing government institutions. From 1914 to 1932, Galleani's followers in the United States, carried out a series of bombings and assassination attempts against institutions and persons they viewed as class enemies. After Galleani was deported from the United States to Italy in June 1919, his colleagues are alleged to have carried out the Wall Street bombing of 1920, which resulted in the deaths of 40 people.

Anarchists have traditionally been skeptical of or vehemently opposed to organized religion. Nevertheless, some anarchists have provided religious interpretations and approaches to anarchism, including the idea that glorification of the state is a form of sinful idolatry.

Anarchism in the United States began in the mid-19th century and started to grow in influence as it entered the American labor movements, growing an anarcho-communist current as well as gaining notoriety for violent propaganda of the deed and campaigning for diverse social reforms in the early 20th century. By around the start of the 20th century, the heyday of individualist anarchism had passed and anarcho-communism and other social anarchist currents emerged as the dominant anarchist tendency.

Laurance Labadie was an American individualist anarchist and author.

Individualist anarchism in the United States was strongly influenced by Benjamin Tucker, Josiah Warren, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Lysander Spooner, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, Max Stirner, Herbert Spencer and Henry David Thoreau. Other important individualist anarchists in the United States were Stephen Pearl Andrews, William Batchelder Greene, Ezra Heywood, M. E. Lazarus, John Beverley Robinson, James L. Walker, Joseph Labadie, Steven Byington and Laurance Labadie.

Russian anarchism is anarchism in Russia or among Russians. The three categories of Russian anarchism were anarcho-communism, anarcho-syndicalism and individualist anarchism. The ranks of all three were predominantly drawn from the intelligentsia and the working class, though the anarcho-communists – the most numerous group – made appeals to soldiers and peasants also.

Egoist anarchism or anarcho-egoism, often shortened as simply egoism, is a school of anarchist thought that originated in the philosophy of Max Stirner, a 19th-century existentialist philosopher whose "name appears with familiar regularity in historically orientated surveys of anarchist thought as one of the earliest and best known exponents of individualist anarchism".

<i>Die Anarchisten</i>

Die Anarchisten: Kulturgemälde aus dem Ende des XIX Jahrhunderts is a book by anarchist writer John Henry Mackay published in German and English in 1891. It is the best known and most widely read of Mackay's works, and made him famous overnight. Mackay made it clear in the book's subtitle that it was not intended as a novel, and complained when it was criticised as such, declaring it instead propaganda. A Yiddish translation by Abraham Frumkin was published in London in 1908 by the Arbeter Fraynd collective, with an introduction by the journal's editor, prominent London anarchist Rudolf Rocker. It was also translated into Czech, Dutch, French, Italian, Russian, Spanish, and Swedish. Die Anarchisten had sold 6,500 copies in Germany by 1903, 8,000 by 1911, and over 15,000 by the time of the author's death in 1933.

Individualist anarchism in Europe proceeded from the roots laid by William Godwin and soon expanded and diversified through Europe, incorporating influences from individualist anarchism in the United States. Individualist anarchism is a tradition of thought within the anarchist movement that emphasize the individual and his or her will over external determinants such as groups, society, traditions, and ideological systems. While most American individualist anarchists advocate mutualism, a libertarian socialist form of market socialism, or a free-market socialist form of classical economics, European individualist anarchists are pluralists who advocate anarchism without adjectives and synthesis anarchism, ranging from anarcho-communist to mutualist economic types.

1895 Italian general election

General elections were held in Italy on 26 May 1895, with a second round of voting on 2 June. The "ministerial" left-wing bloc remained the largest in Parliament, winning 334 of the 508 seats.

Events from the year 1894 in Italy.

Lunigiana revolt

The Lunigiana revolt took place in January 1894, in the stone and marble quarries of Massa and Carrara in the Lunigiana, the northernmost tip of Tuscany (Italy), in support of the Fasci Siciliani uprising on Sicily. After a state of siege had been proclaimed by the Crispi government, armed bands dispersed into the mountains pursued by troops. Hundreds of insurgents were arrested and tried by military tribunals.

Benjamin Tucker American individualist anarchist

Benjamin Ricketson Tucker was an American anarchist and libertarian socialist. A 19th-century proponent of individualist anarchism which he called "unterrified Jeffersonianism", Tucker was the editor and publisher of the American individualist anarchist periodical Liberty (1881–1908) as well as a member of the socialist First International.

Anarchism in French Guiana has a short, and little recorded, history. The only continental territory in Latin America to remain under European control into the 21st century, Guiana has not seen the same political developments as most countries in the region. Still, anarchism has existed to some degree, mainly through the presence of political prisoners deported to the colony. In the modern era, anarchism has had a minor presence in the Guianan political milieu.

Anarchism is the political philosophy which holds ruling classes and the state to be undesirable, unnecessary and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority and hierarchical organization in the conduct of human relations.

Joseph Ishill (1888–1966) was a Romanian-born Jewish anarchist typesetter and bookbinder who worked with The Modern School. A commercial typesetter for most of his life, Ishill is most well known for his work with The Oriole Press, which he and his wife, Rose Florence Freeman founded in 1926.

References

  1. Bach Jensen, Richard (2013). The Battle against Anarchist Terrorism: An International History, 1878–1934 . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 86. ISBN   110-703-405-1.
  2. Shone, Steven J. (2013). American Anarchism. Leiden: Brill Publishers. p. 36. ISBN   900-425-195-2.
  3. Avrich, Paul (1996). Anarchist Voices . Princeton: Princeton University Press. p. 11. ISBN   0-691-04494-5.