Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 10.djvu/567

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REVIEWS 551

lectivism. In this he has succeeded well. The present work, before appearing as a volume, was published in L'humanite nouvelle. To M. Naquet anarchism is really the same as anarchistic communism, and the only doctrine of anarchistic communism is that presented by Kropotkin in Words of a Rebel and The Conquest of Bread. This is the only doctrine which he discusses, and in doing so he draws up a criticism of the teachings of Elisee Reclus and Jean Grave, who are disciples of the Russian anarchist. To this we shall object that the author either was ignorant of, or wilfully passed over in silence, the fact that anarchism is not anarchistic communism. Anarchism is a doctrine, the essence of which is the absence of authority, of govern- ment. It lies along the politico-moral line. Anarchistic communism is only a variety of this doctrine. It is a combination of the com- munistic doctrine a variety of socialism, which displays itself in the economic line with the anarchistic doctrine. Thus there may be anarchists who are not communists ; and, in fact, there are many such. We shall only mention Tucker's disciples. The title of the book is therefore wrong. It ought to have been Le communism? anarchique et le collectivisme autoritaire. The qualificative autori- taire is necessary, because there exists an anarchistic collectivism, as may be ascertained by reading the Spanish doctrinal pamphlets.

We must further observe that anarchistic communism has other doctrinal representatives than Kropotkin. Many are those who have published pamphlets advocating an anarchistic-communistic system different from that proposed by Kropotkin. Among others may be mentioned: Enrico Malatesta, Ricardo Mella, Clemens, Parsons, and Dyer D. Lum. If M. Naquet had examined the doctrines of these writers, some of the criticisms which he makes would never have been written.

These reservations aside and the high value of M. Naquet's book demanded them we consider his work a monument to doc- trinal criticism. The author shows his sympathy for anarchistic communism. It stands for him as a very beautiful ideal. Neverthe- less, no adversary of anarchistic communism has ever published such a severe criticism, or shown in such a precise and irrefutable way that it represents a social system which is impossible of realization as long as human nature remains what it is.

The book contains fifteen chapters. First of all, the analogies and differences between collectivism and anarchism are examined. In this first chapter we see that, in the author's opinion, anarchism is