Victor Yarros
Victor Yarros was a 19th century American author. An anarchist for some year, he was a prolific contributor to the individualist anarchist periodical in the
United States called
Liberty.
Victor Yarros' political views changed radically during his life. Early on he associated with the anarcho-communists, only to later convert to
individualist anarchism and eventually repudiate anarchism altogether in favor of social democracy. Even during his time contributing to
Liberty Yarros' views on expropriation were unique for an individualist, "we, on the other hand, while insisting on the principle of private property, in wealth honestly obtained under the reign of liberty, do not think it either unjust or unwise to dispossess the landlords who have monopolized natural wealth by force and fraud.
Encyclopedia
Victor Yarros was a 19th century American author. An anarchist for some year, he was a prolific contributor to the individualist anarchist periodical in the
United States called
Liberty.
Victor Yarros' political views changed radically during his life. Early on he associated with the anarcho-communists, only to later convert to
individualist anarchism and eventually repudiate anarchism altogether in favor of social democracy. Even during his time contributing to
Liberty Yarros' views on expropriation were unique for an individualist,
"we, on the other hand, while insisting on the principle of private property, in wealth honestly obtained under the reign of liberty, do not think it either unjust or unwise to dispossess the landlords who have monopolized natural wealth by force and fraud. We hold that the poor and disinherited toilers would be justified in expropriating, not alone the landlords, who notoriously have no equitable titles to their lands, but all the financial lords and rulers, all the millionaires and very wealthy individuals."
He did not believe an anarchist society could be achieved until individuals learned to value liberty:
The abolition of the external State must be preceded by the decay of the notions which breathe life and vigour into that clumsy monster: in other words, it is only when the people learn to value liberty, and to understand the truths of the anarchistic philosophy, that the question of practically abolishing the State looms up and acquires significance.
Yarros initially based his individualist anarchism on egoism, penning an essay called
Why I Am An Egoist, however, he later repudiated egoism calling it "monstrously absurd and miserably nonsensical".
In his later works Yarros was openly critical of anarchism,
Of all the possible and impossible Utopias, that of the Philosophical Anarchists is, of course, the most preposterous one. How many persons of the world today can even imagine a society without the State? The first thing people do under pioneering conditions is to organize a government.
See also
References
External links
- by Victor Yarros - egoism
- by Victor Yarros - criticism of communist anarchism
- by Victor Yarros
