User:Nas197/Anarchism in Russia

The Russian anarchist movement, initially influenced by Western philosophers William Godwin, Max Stirner, and Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, existed between approximately 1903 and 1917. The three main 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 – also made appeals to soldiers and peasants.

Forerunners: Bakunin and Kropotkin
Mikhail Bakunin was born to a wealthy family in 1814, and after leaving the army in 1836, became involved in radical political activism. After his imprisonment and expulsion to Siberia for participation in several insurrections during the late 1840s, Bakunin formed a secret anarchist group. He is well known for his conflicts with Marx during the First International. Bakunin’s charisma and radicalism inspired his contemporaries, including Sergey Nechayev, and several anarchist groups decades after his death in 1876. Of these groups, the most impactful was Chernoe Znamia.

In many respects, Peter Kropotkin and Bakunin shared a similar background. Like Bakunin, Kropotkin was born into an affluent and prestigious family, and became a revolutionary after a military career. Though Kropotkin lived outside of Russia between 1874 and 1917, he contributed to the anarcho-communist movement through his articles and books. In his best-known work, The Conquest of Bread, Kropotkin outlined his ideology. This work influenced Russia's anarcho-communist groups, which the Bolsheviks effectively eradicated during the early 1920s.

Though an admirer of Bakunin's, Kropotkin's formulation of anarchism was different in that it claimed a scientific origin and emphasized humanism more than violence (although it did not exclude terrorism as a revolutionary tactic).

Anarcho-communists before the October revolution
The most prominent anarcho-communist groups before the Russian Revolution were Chernoe Znamia and Beznachalie; both of these groups were proponents of terrorism. Other, more moderate groups included Khlebivoltsy, the Kiev Group of Anarchist Communists (of which Dmitri Bogrov was a member), and other Moscow-based groups that mostly engaged in propaganda production.

Founded in 1903, Chernoe Znamia was a terrorist group that primarily recruited young Jewish migrants from shtetls to larger cities. While a minority of its members were communards, most were proponents of motiveless terror, or bezmotivnyi. Its most impactful attacks included the Café Libman bombing and Nissan Farber's fatal stabbing of Jewish factory owner, Avram Kogan. Ideologically, the group was anti-syndicalist and anti-intellectualist.

Nikolai "Bidbei" Romanov formed Beznachalie in 1905. Initially based in Paris, the group moved to St. Petersburg in December of 1905. Beznachalie aided other anarchist terrorist groups by producing instructions for bomb production. In January of 1906, a police spy infiltrated the group, and the government prosecuted all but one of its twelve members. Beznachalie shared a similar ideology to Chernoe Znamia, except that Beznachalie considered employment and union membership counter to anarchism.

Peter Kropotkin founded Khlebivoltsy in August of 1903. It was the first anarchist group based in Bialystok, and it released the first anarchist journal ever distributed in Russia, Khleb i Volia. The organization committed expropriations and produced journals until it was effectively disbanded in 1909. It approved defensive terror in response to government violence but was not as radical as Chernoe Znamia or Beznachalie.

Anarcho-syndicalism before the October Revolution
The anarcho-syndicalist faction arose in Odessa in 1903, originating from the Bakuninist wing of the First International decades before. Its constituency, which included urban workers and the intelligentsia, was smaller than that of the anarcho-communists. There were detachments in various cities, notably including St. Petersburg and Moscow. Iakov Kirillovskii, alias Daniil Novomirskii, led the Southern Russia Group of Anarchists-Syndicalists and was the most prominent leader of the movement overall. While his group was outwardly anti-terrorist in strong contrast to other anarchist groups, it maintained a bomb laboratory and committed robberies to sustain itself and publish literature.

Ideologically, the anarcho-syndicalists favored industrialism and mechanization as opposed to their more agrarian anarcho-communist counterparts. Additionally, they favored establishing a formalized proletariat army, excluding the lumpenproletariat, to enact revolution. Their politics combined anarchism, Marxism, and trade unionism. Due to tsarist suppression in the aftermath of the 1905 revolution, many anarcho-syndicalists emigrated abroad, returning after the October revolution in 1917.

Anarchism During the Civil War
The arrival of the Russian Civil War left the anarchist movements with a painful choice: ally with the Bolsheviks against the White Army to the detriment of their anti-state cause, or aggress against the Bolsheviks and risk benefitting the more ideologically offensive White Army. At the end of the First World War, many anarchists fought German-Austrian troops with government approval. The majority of anarchists sided with the Bolsheviks, and some joined the Red Army. Bolshevik-anarchist relations changed with the signing of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. The Bolsheviks lost their tolerance for moderate anarchists' criticism, and cracked down on anarchism in Moscow and Petrograd. Tensions increased when the Moscow Federation of Anarchists' Black Guards antagonized the Bolsheviks through April and May of 1918, prompting a bloody Cheka raid. Many anarchists fled to Ukraine, and by the end of the year, the Nabat Confederation of Anarchist Organisations established its headquarters in Kharkiv. Nabat recruited Nestor Makhno, who was ideologically closest to Kropotkin, to command the new Black Army. Its first task was to fight against the German-Austrian occupation in Ukraine, which ended in November of 1918. With their exit came a power vacuum, which Mahkno's followers, the Mahknovists, quickly filled.

The Bolsheviks and Black Army made three tenuous alliances against General Denikin's White Army between 1918 and 1921. The first was between March and May of 1919, ending with a Cheka attempt on Mahkno's life and a raid on his headquarters. The Bolsheviks and Black Army reestablished their partnership in September of 1919 as Denikin threatened Moscow. When the White Army retreated, the Bolsheviks ordered Makhno to abandon his position to engage the Polish front. Recognizing this request as the Bolshevik's attempt to seize Ukraine, he refused, and hostilities continued until October of 1920. Between October and late November, the Red and Black Armies coordinated against the Whites in Crimea. As soon as the Bolsheviks anticipated victory, they rescinded their promise of amnesty for the anarchists, shot the Black Army's commanders, and arrested Nabat's members. In August of 1921, Makhno fled to Paris.

Beyond his military activities, Mahkno attempted to implement policy within his shifting territory. He successfully established four democratic counsels and pushed for peasant land redistribution.