Mikhail Bakunin: The Philosophical Basis of His Theory of Anarchy

Mikhail Bakunin is usually remembered as a fiery anarchist agitator, not as a serious philosopher. This book overturns that caricature. Peter McLaughlin offers the first sustained reconstruction in English of the philosophical foundations of Bakunin’s social thought, showing him as a sophisticated critic of both idealism and authoritarian socialism.The study is organized around two central themes that run through Bakunin’s mature work: his “negative dialectic” of revolutionary critique and his robust naturalist ontology. Part One traces Bakunin’s development out of German idealism and Young Hegelian debates, through his engagement with Hegel, Bauer and Proudhon, toward a distinctively anarchist logic of negation directed at the state, hierarchy and metaphysics. McLaughlin shows how Bakunin’s atheism is inseparable from his politics, rather than a mere personal stance.Part Two examines Bakunin’s naturalism and his sweeping critique of religion and “theologism.” Here Bakunin appears alongside Kant, Hegel, Feuerbach, Comte and Marx, arguing for a view of nature as universal causality that encompasses both the natural and social worlds. McLaughlin highlights Bakunin’s insistence on the continuity between human beings and the rest of nature, and his objection to Marx’s economism and lingering Kantianism. The conclusion links Bakunin’s outlook to contemporary currents such as Murray Bookchin’s dialectical naturalism and Peter Singer’s “Darwinian Left.”Scholars of political philosophy, intellectual historians, students of anarchism and socialism, and readers interested in the relation between science, religion and radical politics will all find this book valuable. It offers both a corrective to standard Marxist and liberal dismissals of Bakunin and a timely reminder that questions about human nature, freedom, and our place in the natural world remain central to any emancipatory politics. Read more