Graham R (Ed.) - Anarchism - A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas Volume One - From Anarchy to Anarchism (300 CE to 1939)

394/ ANARCHISM
Socialism, then, must be built; it must be set into operation amid the collapse,
in conditions of distress, crisis, improvisations. I will now shout from the rooftops
how out of the greatest need the greatest virtue must be established, and the new labour
corporations out of the fa ll of capitalism and the pressing needs of the living
masses. I will not fail to rebuke the proletarians of industry, who consider themselves
the only workers, for their narrow-mindedness, the wild obstinacy, intransigence and
crudeness of their intellectual and emotional life, their irresponsibility and incapacity
for a positive economic organization and leadership of enterprises. By absolving
men of guilt and declaring them creatures of social conditions, one does not make
these products of society different than they are, while the new world will be built
not with men's causes but with the men themselves .
. ..[Slocialism is possible and necessary in every form of economy and technology.
It has no usc fo r the industrial and mercantile technology of capitalism nor fo r
the mentality that produced this monstrosity. Because socialism must commence
and because the realization of spirit and virtue is never mass-like and normal but
rather results only from the self-sacrifice of the few and the new venture of pioneers,
socialism mllst free itself from ruin out of poverty and joy in work. For its sake we
must return to rural living and to a unification of industry, craftsmanship and agriculture,
to save ourselves and learn justice and community. What Peter Kropotkin
taught us about the methods of intensive soil cultivation and unification of intellectual
and manual labour in his important and now famous book Fields, Factories and
Workshops [Selection 341 as well as the new form of credit and monetary cooperative
must all be tested now in our most drastic need and with creative pleasure. Necessity
demands, voluntarily but under threat offamine, a new start and construction, without
which we are lost.
Let me add one last word, the most serious one. If we convert the greatest hardship
into the greatest virtue and transform the emergency labour made necessary by
the crisis into the provisional beginning of social ism , our humiliation will be credited
to our honour. Let us disregard the question as to how our socialist republic, arising
out of defeat and ruin, will stand among the victorious nations and the mighty countries
presently devoted to capitalism. Let us not beg, let us fear nothing, let us not
flinch. Let us act among the nations, like Job activated by his suffering, abandoned by
God and the world in order to serve God and the world. Let us construct our economy
and the institutions of our society so that we can rejoice in hard work and a worthy
life. One thing is certain: when things go well with us in poverty, when our souls are
glad, poor and honourable men in all other nations, in all of them will follow our ex-