Written: 1867-1872
Source: Marxism, Freedom and the State
Publisher: Freedom Press, London; 1950
First Published: 1950
Translated: K.J. Kenafick
Online Version: Bakunin Reference Archvie (marxists.org) 1999
Transcription/Markup: Natasha
Morse
Table of Contents:
Introduction
Chapter I: Introductory
Chapter II: Marxist Ideology
Chapter III: The State and Marxism
Chapter IV: Internationalism and the State
Chapter V: Social Revolution and the State
Chapter VI: Political Action and the Workers
This book is Bakunin's
version of the spit between himself and Karl Marx that took place
in the late 1860s and early 1870s. Bauknin saw the schism between
them arising out of different perceptions of the function of the
state in the Socialist program. Specifically, Bakunin held that
the International tended to be too accepting of the concept of
the state, which he viewed as a dangerous and dehumanizing institution.
The state, he wrote "imposes injustice and cruelty on all
its subjects, as a supreme duty. It restrains, mutilates, it kills
the humanity in them, so that, ceasing to be men, they are no
longer anything but citizens."
Bakunin wrote the essays that detail his dispute with Marx from
1870-1872, prior to his expulsion from the International. Other
essays regarding emancipation and the general characteristics
of the state were excerpted from Federalism, Socialism and
Anti-Theologianism, from 1867. K.J. Kenafick, an Australian
editor and translator, combined these works into the book Marxism,
Freedom and the State in 1950.