Errico Malatesta Quotes About Anarchism

• We anarchists do not want to emancipate the people; we want the people to emancipate themselves.

  Errico Malatesta

  Freedom, People, Want

  Errico Malatesta (2015). “Life and Ideas: The Anarchist Writings of Errico Malatesta”, p.83, PM Press

• Anarchy is a word that comes from the Greek, and signifies, strictly speaking, "without government": the state of a people without any constituted authority. Before such an organization had begun to be considered possible and desirable by a whole class of thinkers, so as to be taken as the aim of a movement (which has now become one of the most important factors in modern social warfare), the word "anarchy" was used universally in the sense of disorder and confusion, and it is still adopted in that sense by the ignorant and by adversaries interested in distorting the truth.

  Errico Malatesta

  Taken, Class, Organization

  "Anarchy". Pamphlet by Errico Malatesta, www.marxists.org. 1891.

• Not whether we accomplish anarchism today, tomorrow, or within ten centuries, but that we walk towards anarchism today, tomorrow, and always.

  Errico Malatesta

  Today, Tomorrow, Century

  Errico Malatesta, Paul Avrich Collection (Library of Congress) (1933). “A talk between two workers”

• Anarchism is the abolition of exploitation and oppression of man by man, that is, the abolition of private property and government; Anarchism is the destruction of misery, of superstitions, of hatred. Therefore, every blow given to the institutions of private property and to the government, every exaltation of the conscience of man, every disruption of the present conditions, every lie unmasked, every part of human activity taken away from the control of the authorities, every augmentation of the spirit of solidarity and initiative, is a step towards Anarchism.

  Errico Malatesta

  Lying, Taken, Blow

  Errico Malatesta (2014). “The Method of Freedom: An Errico Malatesta Reader”, p.272, AK Press

• If you say that you reject violence when it exceeds the limits imposed by the needs of defense, they accuse you of pacifism, without understanding that violence is the whole essence of authoritarianism, just as the repudiation of violence is the whole essence of anarchism.

  Errico Malatesta

  Essence, Understanding, Needs

  Errico Malatesta (2015). “Life and Ideas: The Anarchist Writings of Errico Malatesta”, p.138, PM Press

• In the anarchist milieu, communism, individualism, collectivism, mutualism and all the intermediate and eclectic programmes are simply the ways considered best for achieving freedom and solidarity in economic life; the ways believed to correspond more closely with justice and freedom for the distribution of the means of production and the products of labour among men. Bakunin was an anarchist, and he was a collectivist, an outspoken enemy of communism because he saw in it the negation of freedom and, therefore, of human dignity.

  Errico Malatesta

  Mean, Men, Justice

  Errico Malatesta (2015). “Life and Ideas: The Anarchist Writings of Errico Malatesta”, p.22, PM Press

• Anarchists are opposed to violence; everyone knows that. The main plank of anarchism is the removal of violence from human relations. It is life based on freedom of the individual, without the intervention of the gendarme. For this reason we are the enemies of capitalism which depends on the protection of the gendarme to oblige workers to allow themselves to be exploited--or even to remain idle and go hungry when it is not in the interest of the bosses to exploit them. We are therefore enemies of the State which is the coercive violent organization of society.

  Errico Malatesta

  Organization, Boss, Enemy

  Errico Malatesta (2015). “Life and Ideas: The Anarchist Writings of Errico Malatesta”, p.45, PM Press

• Anarchists generally make use if the word "State" to mean all the collection of institutions, political, legislative, judicial, military, financial, etc., by means of which management of their own affairs, the guidance of their personal conduct, and the care of ensuring their own safety are taken from the people and confided to certain individuals, and these, whether by usurpation or delegation, are invested with the right to make laws over and for all, and to constrain the public to respect them, making use of the collective force of the community to this end.

  Errico Malatesta

  Military, Taken, Mean

  "Anarchy". Pamphlet by Errico Malatesta, www.marxists.org. 1891.

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