Anarchism The core of anarchism is the doctrine that society can and should be org anized without the

coercive authority of the state. Although it is possible to find anarchist tendencies in the thought of m any individuals stretching back to antiquity, the first political theorist to ar gue unequivocally for a stateless society was GODWIN in a book published in 1793 ; the first to call himself an anarchist was PROUDHON. Anarchism as an ideology had its greatest influence in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, when revolutionary movements of this persuasion emerged in a number of western countries. More recently its impact has weakened, although numbers of individual s continue to think of themselves as anarchists, and sporadically impinge on the political scene. Anarchist thinkers by no means form a homogeneous group, and at times th ey may seem to be held together only by their recognition of a common enemy, the state. They differ most overtly about the economic arrangements that should pre vail in a stateless society: on this question anarchists form a spectrum, rangin g from defenders of private property and free competition in the market, to advo cates of complete common ownership, co-operative labour and distribution accordi ng to need. These differences, which will be analysed in greater depth below, re flect divergences of view on more fundamental questions, such as the meaning of JUSTICE and FREEDOM, and the possibilities of HUMAN NATURE. All anarchists agree, however, on the need to dispense with compulsory f orms of AUTHORITY, of which the state is merely the highest development. They do not necessarily object to authority of every kind: most anarchists would recogn ize the authority of experts scientists or doctors, for instance in their own fields , and many would recognize the moral authority of collective decisions taken in a genuinely democratic manner. Their criticisms are directed at authority assume d by people with no special claim to it; at authority that stretches beyond part icular areas of expertise to embrace the whole of human existence; and, above al l, at authority that enforces its commands coercively. The state is plainly guil ty on all three counts; the anarchist critique extends, however, to other hierar chical forms of authority to churches, to armies, to enterprises run by capitalist bosses, and, in more recent times, to impersonal bureaucracies. All the for exploiting them by extracting money or services by threat and indoct rination. Anarchists reject two popular justifications of the state: that it perfo rms useful social functions, and that its authority is legitimized by the CONSEN T of its subjects. For anarchists, many of the tasks carried out by the state ar e necessary only for the state's own benefit: it undertakes national defence, fo r instance, but what it is really doing is defending its own sovereignty against other states. Other functions, such as personal protection, would in the absenc e of the state be carried out privately or by local communities. As for the idea of consent, anarchists ask when consent is supposed to have been given, and wha t happens to individuals who now try to withdraw it. They reject the view that e lections are a genuine means of agreeing to be governed, seeing them instead as occasions when the populace is tricked into supporting one or other member of th e ruling class. Anarchism looks forward to a society in which personal freedom is at a m aximum; in which material goods are fairly distributed; and in which common task s are carried out by voluntary agreement. But there are major differences of opi nion as to how these desirable aims may be achieved. Four main currents in anarc hist thought may be distinguished: individualism, mutualism, collectivism and co mmunism. se institutions are denounced for coercing their victims, and