Editing Anarchism and violence

{{Short description|Issue in anarchism}}
{{Anarchism sidebar |issues}}

'''Anarchism and violence''' have been linked together by events in [[anarchist history]] such as [[Revolution|violent revolution]], [[terrorism]], and [[assassination attempt]]s. Leading late 19th century anarchists espoused [[Propaganda of the deed|propaganda by deed]], or ''attentáts'', and was associated with a number of incidents of [[political violence]]. [[Anarchist thought]], however, is quite diverse on the question of violence. Where some anarchists have opposed [[coercive]] means on the basis of coherence, others have supported acts of violent revolution as a path toward anarchy.<ref>Fowler, R.B. The Western Political Quarterly, Vol. 25, No. 4. (Dec. 1972), pp. 743-744</ref> [[Anarcho-pacifism]] is a school of thought within anarchism which rejects all violence.

Many anarchists regard the state to be at the definitional center of [[structural violence]]: directly or indirectly preventing people from meeting their basic needs, calling for violence as self-defense.{{efn|See also: [[Right of self-defense]]}}

Perhaps the first anarchist periodical was named ''[[The Peaceful Revolutionist]]''.

== Propaganda by deed ==

[[Image:Come unto me, ye opprest.jpg|thumb|left|An American political cartoon, published in 1919, depicting a European anarchist preparing to destroy the [[Statue of Liberty]].]]

Propaganda by deed (or propaganda of the deed, from the French {{lang|fr|propagande par le fait}}<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Houen |first1=Alex |title=The Secret Agent: Anarchism and the Thermodynamics of Law |journal=ELH |date=1998 |volume=65 |issue=4 |pages=995–1016 |doi=10.1353/elh.1998.0031 |s2cid=159570078 |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/11420/summary |access-date=28 May 2021}}</ref>) is specific political [[direct action]] meant to be exemplary to others and serve as a catalyst for revolution. It is primarily associated with acts of violence perpetrated by proponents of [[insurrectionary anarchism]] in the late 19th and early 20th century, including bombings and [[assassinations]] aimed at the State, the [[ruling class]], and [[Church arson]]s targeting religious groups, even though propaganda of the deed also had [[nonviolent resistance|non-violent]] applications.<ref>Anarchist historian [[George Woodcock]], when dealing with the evolution of [[anarcho-pacifism]] in the early 20th century, reports that "the modern pacifist anarchists, ...have tended to concentrate their attention largely on the creation of [[intentional community|libertarian communities]] – particularly farming communities – within present society, as a kind of peaceful version of the propaganda by deed." [[George Woodcock]]. ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20200625224917/https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/b2f0/6f1c33482d38bce16bab534565d929f8bfb7.pdf Anarchism: A History of Libertarian Ideas and Movements]'' (1962), page 20.</ref> These acts of [[terrorism]] were intended to ignite a "spirit of revolt" by demonstrating the state, the middle and upper classes, and religious organizations were not omnipotent and also to provoke the State to become escalatingly repressive in its response.<ref name="Merriman"/> The [[1881 London Social Revolutionary Congress]] gave the tactic its approval.<ref name="Abidor"/>

The Italian revolutionary [[Carlo Pisacane]] wrote in his "Political Testament" (1857) that "ideas spring from deeds and not the other way around"<ref name="Smith"/> and [[Mikhail Bakunin]] stated in 1870 that "we must spread our principles, not with words but with deeds, for this is the most popular, the most potent, and the most irresistible form of propaganda."<ref>{{cite book |url=http://marxists.org/reference/archive/bakunin/works/1870/letter-frenchman.htm |title=Letter to a Frenchman on the Present Crisis |date=1870 |author-link=Mikhail Bakunin |first=Mikhail |last=Bakunin |via=[[Marxists Internet Archive]]}}</ref> By the 1880s, the slogan "propaganda by deed" had begun to be used both within and outside of the anarchist movement to refer to individual bombings, [[regicide]]s and [[tyrannicide]]s, and was formally adopted as a strategy by the anarchist [[1881 London Social Revolutionary Congress]].<ref name="Merriman">{{cite book |last=Merriman |first=John M. |date=2016 |title=The Dynamite Club: How a Bombing in Fin-de-Siècle Paris Ignited the Age of Modern Terror |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=w8mtCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA63 |publisher=[[Yale University Press]] |page=63 |isbn=978-0300217926 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref>

While revolutionary bombings and assassinations appeared as an indiscriminate call to violence to outsiders, anarchists saw "the idea of the propaganda by deed, or the ''attentat'' (attack), [as having] a very specific logic". In a capitalist world founded on force and constant threat of violence (laws, church, paychecks), "to do nothing, to stand idly by while millions suffered, was itself to commit an act of violence". This did not seek to justify violence but find what violence would effectively undo malignant state forces.<ref>{{cite book |last=Gage |first=Beverly |title=The Day Wall Street Exploded: A Story of America in its First Age of Terror |location=New York |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |year=2009 |isbn=978-0199759286 |pages=44–45 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YDxnDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA44 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref> Propaganda by deed included stealing (in particular [[bank robbery|bank robberies]]&nbsp;– named "expropriations" or "revolutionary expropriations" to finance the organization), rioting and [[general strike]]s which aimed at creating the conditions of an insurrection or even a revolution. These acts were justified as the necessary counterpart to state repression.  As early as 1911, [[Leon Trotsky]] condemned individual acts of violence by anarchists as useful for little more than providing an excuse for state repression. "The anarchist prophets of the 'propaganda by the deed' can argue all they want about the elevating and stimulating influence of terrorist acts on the masses," he wrote in 1911, "Theoretical considerations and political experience prove otherwise." [[Vladimir Lenin]] largely agreed, viewing individual anarchist acts of terrorism as an ineffective substitute for coordinated action by disciplined cadres of the masses. Both Lenin and Trotsky acknowledged the necessity of violent rebellion and assassination to serve as a catalyst for revolution, but they distinguished between the ''ad hoc'' bombings and assassinations carried out by proponents of the propaganda by deed, and organized violence coordinated by a professional [[Vanguardism|revolutionary vanguard]] utilized for that specific end.<ref>{{cite book |last=Gage |first=Beverly |title=The Day Wall Street Exploded: A Story of America in its First Age of Terror |location=New York |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |year=2009 |isbn=978-0199759286 |page=263 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YDxnDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA263 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref> 

[[File:Johannmost.jpg|thumb|left|120px|[[Johann Most]]]]

Some anarchists, such as [[Johann Most]], advocated publicizing violent acts of retaliation against counter-revolutionaries to "preach ... action as propaganda".<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/bright/most/actionprop.html|title=Action as Propaganda|website=dwardmac.pitzer.edu}}</ref> It was not advocacy for mass murder, but a call for [[targeted killings]] of the representatives of capitalism and government at a time when such action might garner sympathy from the population, such as during periods of government repression or labor conflicts,<ref>{{cite book |last=Gage |first=Beverly |title=The Day Wall Street Exploded: A Story of America in its First Age of Terror |location=New York |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |year=2009 |isbn=978-0199759286 |page=48 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YDxnDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA48 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref> although Most himself once claimed that "the existing system will be quickest and most radically overthrown by the annihilation of its exponents. Therefore, massacres of the enemies of the people must be set in motion."<ref>{{cite magazine |url=https://www.vice.com/en/article/kill-the-banker-0000525-v21n12/ |title=When Revolution Came to America |last=Ketcham |first=Christopher |date=16 December 2014 |magazine=[[Vice (magazine)|Vice]] |access-date=8 April 2017}}</ref> In 1885, he published ''The Science of Revolutionary Warfare'', a technical manual for acquiring and detonating explosives based on the knowledge he acquired by working at an explosives factory in New Jersey.<ref>{{cite book |last=Gage |first=Beverly |title=The Day Wall Street Exploded: A Story of America in its First Age of Terror |location=New York |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |year=2009 |isbn=978-0199759286 |page=49 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YDxnDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA49 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref> Most was an early influence on American anarchists [[Emma Goldman]] and [[Alexander Berkman]]. Berkman attempted propaganda by deed when he tried in 1892 to kill industrialist [[Henry Clay Frick]] following the deaths by shooting of several [[Homestead Strike|striking]] workers.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/bright/berkman/prison/chapter4.html|title=Chapter 4|website=dwardmac.pitzer.edu}}</ref>

As early as 1887, a few important figures in the anarchist movement had begun to distance themselves from individual acts of violence. [[Peter Kropotkin]] thus wrote that year in ''Le Révolté'' that "a structure based on centuries of history cannot be destroyed with a few kilos of dynamite".<ref>quoted in Billington, James H. 1998. ''Fire in the minds of men: origins of the revolutionary faith'' New Jersey: Transaction Books, p. 417.</ref> A variety of anarchists advocated the abandonment of these sorts of tactics in favor of collective revolutionary action, for example through the [[trade union]] movement. The [[anarcho-syndicalism|anarcho-syndicalist]], [[Fernand Pelloutier]], argued in 1895 for renewed anarchist involvement in the labor movement on the basis that anarchism could do very well without "the individual dynamiter."<ref>{{cite web |url=http://blackrosebooks.net/anarism1.htm |title=Anarchism: A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas, Volume One &#124; Robert Graham |publisher=[[Black Rose Books]] |access-date=26 October 2010 |archive-date=29 September 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080929121644/http://www.blackrosebooks.net/anarism1.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref> [[Political repression|State repression]] (including the infamous 1894 French ''[[lois scélérates]]'') of the anarchist and [[labor movement]]s following the few successful bombings and assassinations may have contributed to the abandonment of these kinds of tactics, although reciprocally state repression, in the first place, may have played a role in these isolated acts. The dismemberment of the French [[socialist movement]], into many groups and, following the suppression of the 1871 [[Paris Commune]], the execution and exile of many ''[[communards]]'' to [[penal colonies]], favored individualist political expression and acts.<ref>Historian [[Benedict Anderson]] thus writes: <blockquote>In March 1871 the Commune took power in the abandoned city and held it for two months. Then [[Adolphe Thiers|Versailles]] seized the moment to attack and, in one horrifying week, executed roughly 20,000 Communards or suspected sympathizers, a number higher than those killed in the recent war or during [[Robespierre]]'s '[[Reign of Terror|Terror]]' of 1793–94. More than 7,500 were jailed or deported to places like New Caledonia. Thousands of others fled to Belgium, England, Italy, Spain and the United States. In 1872, stringent laws were passed that ruled out all possibilities of organizing on the left. Not till 1880 was there a general amnesty for exiled and imprisoned Communards. Meanwhile, the Third Republic found itself strong enough to renew and reinforce [[Napoleon III of France|Louis Napoleon]]'s imperialist expansion—in Indochina, Africa, and Oceania. Many of France's leading intellectuals and artists had participated in the Commune ([[Gustave Courbet|Courbet]] was its quasi-minister of culture, [[Arthur Rimbaud|Rimbaud]] and [[Pissarro]] were active propagandists) or were sympathetic to it. The ferocious repression of 1871 and thereafter, was probably the key factor in alienating these milieux from the Third Republic and stirring their sympathy for its victims at home and abroad. {{Cite journal |last=Anderson |first=Benedict |author-link=Benedict Anderson |title=In the World-Shadow of Bismarck and Nobel |journal=[[New Left Review]] |volume=II |issue=28 |pages=85–129 |publisher=New Left Review |date=July–August 2004 |url=http://newleftreview.org/II/28/benedict-anderson-in-the-world-shadow-of-bismarck-and-nobel}} </blockquote> According to some analysts, in [[History of Germany since 1945|post-war Germany]], the prohibition of the [[Communist Party of Germany|Communist Party]] (KPD) and thus of institutional [[far-left politics|far-left political]] organization may also, in the same manner, have played a role in the creation of the [[Red Army Faction]].</ref>

The anarchist [[Luigi Galleani]], perhaps the most vocal proponent of propaganda by deed from the turn of the century through the end of the First World War, took undisguised pride in describing himself as a subversive, a revolutionary propagandist and advocate of the violent overthrow of established government and institutions through the use of 'direct action', i.e., bombings and assassinations.<ref name="GAL">Galleani, Luigi, ''La Fine Dell'Anarchismo?'', ed. Curata da Vecchi Lettori di Cronaca Sovversiva, University of Michigan (1925), pp. 61–62: Galleani's writings are clear on this point: he had undisguised contempt for those who refused to both advocate and ''directly participate'' in the violent overthrow of capitalism.</ref><ref name="GAL2">Galleani, Luigi, ''Faccia a Faccia col Nemico'', Boston, MA: Gruppo Autonomo, (1914)</ref> Galleani heartily embraced physical violence and terrorism, not only against symbols of the government and the capitalist system, such as courthouses and factories, but also through direct assassination of 'enemies of the people': capitalists, industrialists, politicians, judges, and policemen.<ref name="GAL2"/><ref name="AVR1">Avrich, Paul, ''Sacco and Vanzetti: The Anarchist Background'', Princeton University Press (1991), pp. 51, 98–99</ref>  He had a particular interest in the use of bombs, going so far as to include a formula for the explosive [[nitroglycerine]] in one of his pamphlets advertised through his monthly magazine, ''[[Cronaca Sovversiva]]''.<ref name="AVR1"/>  By all accounts, Galleani was an extremely effective speaker and advocate of his policy of violent action, attracting a number of devoted Italian-American anarchist followers who called themselves [[Galleanists]].  Carlo Buda, the brother of Galleanist bombmaker [[Mario Buda]], said of him, "You heard Galleani speak, and you were ready to shoot the first policeman you saw".<ref>Avrich, Paul, ''Anarchist Voices: An Oral History of Anarchism in America'', Princeton: Princeton University Press (1996), p. 132 (Interview of Charles Poggi)</ref>

== Anarcho-pacifism ==
[[File:Blessed are the Peacemakers.gif|alt=|thumb|right|''Blessed are the Peacemakers'' by [[George Bellows]], ''[[The Masses]]'', 1917.]]
{{see also|Anarcho-pacifism|Antimilitarism}}
Anarcho-pacifism (also pacifist anarchism or anarchist pacifism) is a form of anarchism which completely rejects the use of violence in any form for any purpose. Important proponents include [[Leo Tolstoy]] and [[Bart de Ligt]]. [[Mohandas Gandhi]] is an important influence.

[[Henry David Thoreau]], though not a pacifist himself,<ref>{{cite book |last1=Thoreau |first1=Henry |editor1-last=Rosenblum |editor1-first=Nancy |title=Thoreau: Political Writings |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QpT7MEwYy5QC&q=%22advocate%20of%20nonviolence%22&pg=PR24 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=0521476755 |page=xxiv|date=1996-05-23 }}</ref> influenced both Leo Tolstoy and Mohandas Gandhi's advocacy of [[Nonviolent resistance]] through his work ''[[Civil Disobedience (Thoreau)|Civil Disobedience]]''.<ref name="ppu.org.uk">{{Cite web |url=http://www.ppu.org.uk/e_publications/dd-trad8.html#anarch%20and%20violence |title="Resiting the Nation State, the pacifist and anarchist tradition" by Geoffrey Ostergaard |access-date=2010-03-08 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110514052437/http://www.ppu.org.uk/e_publications/dd-trad8.html#anarch%20and%20violence |archive-date=2011-05-14 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

At some point anarcho-pacifism had as its main proponent [[Christian anarchism]]. The first large-scale anarcho-pacifist movement was the [[Tolstoyan]] peasant movement in [[Russia]]. They were a predominantly peasant movement that set up hundreds of voluntary anarchist pacifist communes  based on their interpretation of Christianity as requiring absolute pacifism and the rejection of all coercive authority.

"Dutch anarchist-pacifist Bart de Ligt's 1936 treatise ''The Conquest of Violence'' (with its none too subtle allusion to Kropotkin's ''The Conquest of Bread'') was also of signal importance."<ref>{{Cite web |title="Anarchism and the Movement for a New Society: Direct Action and Prefigurative Community in the 1970s and 80s" by Andrew Cornell |url=http://anarchiststudies.org/node/292 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130518071734/http://www.anarchiststudies.org/node/292 |archive-date=May 18, 2013}}</ref> "Gandhi's ideas were popularized in the West in books such as [[Richard Gregg (social philosopher)|Richard Gregg]]'s ''The Power of Nonviolence'' (1935), and Bart de Ligt's ''The Conquest of Violence'' (1937).
[[Peter Gelderloos]] criticizes the idea that nonviolence is the only way to fight for a better world. According to Gelderloos, pacifism as an ideology serves the interests of the state.<ref>{{cite book|last=Gelderloos|first=Peter|title=How Nonviolence Protects the State|year=2007|publisher=South End Press|location=Cambridge, MA|isbn=9780896087729|pages=128}}</ref>

== Anarchist theory ==
{{see also|Anarchist schools of thought}}
Anarchism encompasses a variety of views about violence. The [[Tolstoyanism|Tolstoyan]] tradition of [[non-violent resistance]] is prevalent among some anarchists. [[Ursula K. Le Guin]]'s novel ''[[The Dispossessed]]'', a fictional novel about a society that practices "Odonianism", expressed this anarchism:

{{quote|Odonianism is anarchism. Not the bomb-in-the-pocket stuff, which is terrorism, whatever name it tries to dignify itself with, not the social-Darwinist economic '[[libertarianism]]' of the far right; but anarchism, as prefigured in early [[Taoism|Taoist]] thought, and expounded by Shelley and Kropotkin, Goldman and Goodman. Anarchism's principal target is the authoritarian State (capitalist or socialist); its principle moral-practical theme is cooperation (solidarity, [[Mutual aid (organization theory)|mutual aid]]). It is the most idealistic, and to me the most interesting, of all political theories.<ref>[[Ursula K. Le Guin]]|Preface of '[[The Day Before the Revolution]]' ('In Memorial to [[Paul Goodman (writer)|Paul Goodman]] 1911-1972'), published in the anthology '[[The Wind's Twelve Quarters]] Vol2'</ref>}}

Emma Goldman included in her definition of Anarchism the observation that all governments rest on violence, and this is one of the many reasons they should be opposed. Goldman herself didn't oppose tactics like assassination in her early career, but changed her views after she went to Russia, where she witnessed the violence of the Russian state and the [[Red Army]]. From then on she condemned the use of terrorism, especially by the state, and advocated violence only as a means of self-defense.

===Discourse on violent and non-violent means===
Some anarchists see violent revolution as necessary in the abolition of capitalist society, while others advocate non-violent methods.  
[[Errico Malatesta]], an [[anarchist-communist|anarcho-communist]], propounded that it is "necessary to destroy with violence, since one cannot do otherwise, the violence which denies [the means of life and for development] to the workers."<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/anarchists/malatesta/rev_haste.html |title=The revolutionary haste by Errico Malatesta<!-- Bot generated title --> |access-date=2003-01-11 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030210201006/http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/anarchists/malatesta/rev_haste.html |archive-date=2003-02-10 |url-status=dead }}</ref> As he put it in ''[[Umanità Nova]]'' (no. 125, September 6, 1921):

{{quote|It is our aspiration and our aim that everyone should become socially conscious and effective; but to achieve this end, it is necessary to provide all with the means of life and for development, and it is therefore necessary to destroy with violence, since one cannot do otherwise, the violence that denies these means to the workers.<ref>[[Umanità Nova]], n. 125, September 6, 1921. A translation can be found at [http://www.marxists.org/archive/malatesta/1921/09/haste.htm The revolutionary haste by Errico Malatesta]. Retrieved June 17, 2006.</ref>}}

Anarchists with this view advocate violence insofar as they see it to be necessary in ridding the world of exploitation, and especially states.

[[Pierre-Joseph Proudhon]] argued in favor of a [[non-violent revolution]] through a process of [[dual power]] in which libertarian socialist institutions would be established and form associations enabling the formation of an expanding network within the existing state-capitalist framework with the intention of eventually rendering both the state and the capitalist economy obsolete. The progression towards violence in anarchism stemmed, in part, from the massacres of some of the communes inspired by the ideas of Proudhon and others. Many anarcho-communists began to see a need for revolutionary violence to counteract the violence inherent in both capitalism and government.<ref>Goldman, Emma. 'Anarchism and Other Essays' Mother Earth (1910) p. 113.</ref>

[[Anarcho-pacifism]] is a tendency within the anarchist movement which rejects the use of violence in the struggle for social change.<ref name="Anarchism 1962">{{Cite book |last=Woodcock |first=George |title=[[Anarchism: A History of Libertarian Ideas and Movements]] |year=1962}}</ref> The main early influences were the thought of [[Henry David Thoreau]]<ref name="ppu.org.uk"/> and [[Leo Tolstoy]].<ref name="Anarchism 1962"/><ref name="ppu.org.uk"/> It developed "mostly in Holland, Britain, and the United States, before and during the Second World War".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Woodcock |first=George |title=[[Anarchism: A History of Libertarian Ideas and Movements]] |year=1962}}, p. 21: "Finally, somewhat aside from the curve that runs from [[anarchist individualism]] to [[anarcho-syndicalism]], we come to [[Tolstoyanism]] and to pacifist anarchism that appeared, mostly in Holland, Britain, and the United states, before and after the Second World War and which has continued since then in the deep in the anarchist involvement in the protests against nuclear armament."</ref> Opposition to the use of violence has not prohibited anarcho-pacifists from accepting the principle of resistance or even [[Nonviolent revolution|revolutionary action]] provided it does not result in violence; it was in fact their approval of such forms of opposition to power that lead many anarcho-pacifists to endorse the [[anarcho-syndicalist]] concept of the general strike as the great revolutionary weapon. Later anarcho-pacifists have also come to endorse the non-violent strategy of dual power.

Other anarchists have believed that violence is justified, especially in [[self-defense]], as a way to provoke social upheaval which could lead to a social revolution.

[[Peter Gelderloos]] criticizes the idea that nonviolence is the only way to fight for a better world. According to Gelderloos, pacifism as an ideology serves the interests of the state and is hopelessly caught up psychologically with the control schema of patriarchy and white supremacy.<ref>{{cite book|last=Gelderloos|first=Peter|title=How Nonviolence Protects the State|year=2007|publisher=South End Press|location=Cambridge, MA|isbn=978-0-89608-772-9|page=128}}</ref> The influential publishing collective [[CrimethInc.]] notes that "violence" and "nonviolence" are politicized terms that are used inconsistently in discourse, depending on whether or not a writer seeks to legitimize the actor in question. They argue that "[i]t's not strategic [for anarchists] to focus on delegitimizing each other's efforts rather than coordinating to act together where we overlap". For this reason, both CrimethInc. and Gelderloos advocate for [[diversity of tactics]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://crimethinc.com/2012/03/27/the-illegitimacy-of-violence-the-violence-of-legitimacy|title=CrimethInc.: The Illegitimacy of Violence, the Violence of Legitimacy|first=CrimethInc Ex-Workers|last=Collective|website=CrimethInc.|date=27 March 2012 }}</ref> [[Albert Meltzer]] criticised extreme pacifism as authoritarian, believing that "The cult of extreme nonviolence always implies an elite." However, he did believe that less extreme pacifism was compatible with anarchism.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Meltzer|first=Albert|url=https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/albert-meltzer-anarchism-arguments-for-and-against#toc14|title=Anarchism: Arguments for and Against|date=1981|publisher=Cienfuegos Press|isbn=978-0-904564-44-0|language=en}}</ref>

[[File:Berkman with Frick (1892).jpg|thumb|[[Alexander Berkman]]'s attempt to assassinate industrialist [[Henry Clay Frick]], as illustrated by W. P. Snyder for ''[[Harper's Weekly]]'' in 1892.<ref name="Gage2009"/>|alt=Two men are sitting at a desk while a third man enters the office carrying a gun]]

[[File:Bomb French Chamber 1893.jpg|thumb|right|Artist's rendition of the bomb thrown by the anarchist [[Auguste Vaillant]] into the Chamber of Deputies of the French National Assembly in December 1893<ref name="Abidor"/>]]

== Notable actions ==
*
* '''July 23, 1892'''&nbsp;– [[Alexander Berkman]] tries to kill American industrialist [[Henry Clay Frick]] in retaliation for the hiring of [[Pinkerton National Detective Agency|Pinkerton detectives]] to break up the [[Homestead Strike]], resulting in the deaths of seven striking members of the [[Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers]]. Although badly wounded, Frick survives, and Berkman is arrested and eventually sentenced to 22 years in prison.<ref name="Gage2009">{{cite book|last=Gage|first=Beverly|title=The Day Wall Street Exploded: A Story of America in its First Age of Terror|url=https://archive.org/details/daywallstreetexp0000gage|url-access=registration|location=New York|publisher=[[Oxford University Press]]|year=2009|isbn=978-0199759286|pages=[https://archive.org/details/daywallstreetexp0000gage/page/59 59–60]}}</ref>
[[Image:Liceubomb.jpg|thumb|Explosion of Liceu of Barcelona by the anarchist Santiago Salvador in the cover of the newspaper ''Le Petit Journal'', November 7, 1893<ref name="Law2009"/>]]
* '''November 7, 1893'''&nbsp;– The Spanish anarchist Santiago Salvador throws two [[Orsini bomb]]s into the [[orchestra pit]] of the [[Liceu|Liceu Theater]] in [[Barcelona]] during the second act of the opera ''[[William Tell (opera)|Guillaume Tell]]'', killing some twenty people and injuring scores of others.<ref name="Law2009">{{cite book |last= Law|first=Randall D.|date=2009 |title=Terrorism: A History|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=I1sXp8D80V0C&pg=PA107|publisher=Polity|page=107 |isbn=978-0745640389}}</ref>
* '''December 9, 1893'''&nbsp;– [[Auguste Vaillant]] throws a [[nail bomb]] in the [[French National Assembly]], killing nobody and injuring one. He is then sentenced to death and executed by the [[guillotine]] on February 4, 1894, shouting "Death to bourgeois society and long live anarchy!" (''À mort la société bourgeoise et vive l'anarchie!''). During his trial, Vaillant declares that he had not intended to kill anybody, but only to injure several deputies in retaliation against the execution of [[Ravachol]], who was executed for four bombings.<ref name="Abidor">{{cite book |last= Abidor|first=Mitchell|date=2016 |title=Death to Bourgeois Society: The Propagandists of the Deed|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ELZHEAAAQBAJ&pg=PT7|publisher=PM Press |isbn=978-1629631127}}</ref>
* '''February 12, 1894'''&nbsp;– [[Émile Henry (anarchist)|Émile Henry]], intending to avenge Auguste Vaillant, sets off a bomb in ''Café Terminus'' (a café near the [[Gare Saint-Lazare]] train station in Paris), killing one and injuring twenty. During his trial, when asked why he wanted to harm so many innocent people, he declares, "There is no innocent bourgeois." This act is one of the rare exceptions to the rule that propaganda by deed targets only specific powerful individuals. Henry was convicted and executed by guillotine on May 21.<ref name="Abidor"/>
* '''February 15, 1894'''&nbsp;– A chemical explosive carried by [[Martial Bourdin]] prematurely detonates outside the [[Royal Observatory, Greenwich]] in [[Greenwich Park]], killing him.<ref>{{ cite web | title = Propaganda by Deed - the Greenwich Observatory Bomb of 1894 | url = http://www.rmg.co.uk/explore/astronomy-and-time/astronomy-facts/history/propaganda-by-deed-the-greenwich-observatory-bomb-of-1894 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20130217012429/http://www.rmg.co.uk/explore/astronomy-and-time/astronomy-facts/history/propaganda-by-deed-the-greenwich-observatory-bomb-of-1894 | url-status = dead | archive-date = February 17, 2013 }}</ref>
* '''June 24, 1894'''&nbsp;– Italian anarchist [[Sante Geronimo Caserio]], seeking revenge for Auguste Vaillant and Émile Henry, stabs [[Marie François Sadi Carnot|Sadi Carnot]], the [[President of France]], to death. Caserio is executed by guillotine on August 15.<ref name="Abidor"/>
[[File:Angiolillo-assassinato.jpg|thumb|Assassination of Spanish Prime Minister [[Antonio Cánovas del Castillo]] by [[Michele Angiolillo]] in August 1897.<ref name="Esenwein"/>]]
* '''August 8, 1897'''&nbsp;– [[Michele Angiolillo]] shoots dead [[Prime Minister of Spain|Spanish Prime Minister]] [[Antonio Cánovas del Castillo]]  at a thermal bath resort, seeking vengeance for the imprisonment and torture of alleged revolutionaries in the [[Montjuïc trial]]. Angiolillo is executed by [[garotte]] on August 20.<ref name="Esenwein">{{cite book |last= Esenwein|first=George Richard|date=1989 |title=Anarchist Ideology and the Working-class Movement in Spain, 1868–1898|publisher=University of California Press|page=197 |isbn=978-0520063983}}</ref>
[[File:Assassinato luigi.jpg|thumb|An artist's rendition of the stabbing of [[Empress Elisabeth of Austria]] by the Italian anarchist [[Luigi Lucheni]] in Geneva, September 10, 1898.<ref name="Newton2014"/>]]
[[File:McKinleyAssassination.jpg|thumb|right|A sketch of [[Leon Czolgosz]] shooting [[William McKinley|McKinley]] in New York, September 6, 1901.<ref name="Weir2013"/>]]
* '''September 10, 1898'''&nbsp;– [[Luigi Lucheni]] stabs to death [[Empress Elisabeth of Austria|Empress Elisabeth]], the consort of Emperor [[Franz Joseph I of Austria|Franz Joseph I]] of [[Austria-Hungary]], with a needle file in [[Geneva]], Switzerland. Lucheni is sentenced to life in prison and eventually commits suicide in his cell.<ref name="Newton2014">{{cite book |last= Newton|first=Michael|date=2014 |title=Famous Assassinations in World History: An Encyclopedia|publisher=[[ABC-CLIO]]|page=134 |isbn=978-1610692854}}</ref>
* '''July 29, 1900'''&nbsp;– [[Gaetano Bresci]] shoots dead [[Umberto I of Italy|King Umberto]] of Italy, in revenge for the [[Bava Beccaris massacre]] in [[Milan]]. Due to the abolition of [[capital punishment]] in Italy, Bresci is sentenced to penal servitude for life on [[Santo Stefano Island]], where he is found dead less than a year later.<ref>{{cite book|last=Hill|first=Rebecca|date=2009|title=Men, Mobs, and Law: Anti-Lynching and Labor Defense in U.S. Radical History|url=https://archive.org/details/menmobslawantily01hill/page/167|publisher=Duke University Press|page=[https://archive.org/details/menmobslawantily01hill/page/167 167]|isbn=978-0822342809}}</ref>
* '''September 6, 1901'''&nbsp;– [[Leon Czolgosz]] [[Assassination of William McKinley|fatally shoots]] U.S. President [[William McKinley]] at point-blank range at the [[Pan-American Exposition]] in [[Buffalo, New York|Buffalo]], [[New York (state)|New York]]. McKinley dies on September 14, and Czolgosz is executed by [[electric chair]] on October 29. Czolgosz's anarchist views have been debated.<ref name="Weir2013">{{cite book |last=Weir|first=Robert E. |date= 2013|title=Workers in America: A Historical Encyclopedia, Volume 1|publisher=ABC-CLIO|page=39 |isbn=978-1598847185}}</ref>
* '''November 15, 1902'''&nbsp;– [[Gennaro Rubino]] attempts to murder King [[Leopold II of Belgium]] as he returns in a procession from a [[Requiem Mass]] for his recently deceased wife, [[Marie Henriette of Austria|Queen Marie Henriette]]. All three of Rubino's shots miss the monarch's carriage, and he is quickly subdued by the crowd and taken into police custody. He is sentenced to life imprisonment and dies in prison in 1918.<ref>{{cite book|chapter=Edward Joris: Caught Between Continents and Ideologies?|first=Maarten|last=Van Ginderachter|title=To Kill a Sultan: A Transnational History of the Attempt on Abdülhamid II|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=o4w9DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA77|isbn=978-1137489319|editor-last1=Alloul|editor-first1=Houssine|editor-last2=Eldem|editor-first2=Edhem|editor-last3=Smaele|editor-first3=Henk de|year=2017|publisher=[[Palgrave Macmillan]]|page=77}}</ref>
* '''July 21, 1905'''&nbsp;– Members of the [[Armenian Revolutionary Federation]] launch an [[Yıldız assassination attempt|attempt on the life]] of Ottoman Sultan [[Abdul Hamid II]], but the bomb missed its target, instead killing 26 people and wounded 58 others. One of the conspirators, the Armenian anarchist [[Christapor Mikaelian]], was killed during the planning stages. The Belgian anarchist [[Edward Joris]] was also among those arrested and convicted for their part in the plot.<ref name="zon">{{cite book|chapter=Edward Joris: Caught Between Continents and Ideologies?|first=Maarten|last=Van Ginderachter|title=To Kill a Sultan: A Transnational History of the Attempt on Abdülhamid II|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=o4w9DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA77|isbn=978-1137489319|editor-last1=Alloul|editor-first1=Houssine|editor-last2=Eldem|editor-first2=Edhem|editor-last3=Smaele|editor-first3=Henk de|year=2017|publisher=[[Palgrave Macmillan]]|pages=67–97}}</ref>
[[File:Atentado contra los reyes Alfonso XIII y Victoria Eugenia de España, 1906.jpg|thumb|upright=1|The attempted regicide of [[Alfonso XIII of Spain]] and Princess [[Victoria Eugenie of Battenberg]] by Catalan anarchist [[Mateu Morral]], May 31, 1906.<ref name="Sánchez2018"/>]]
* '''May 31, 1906'''&nbsp;– Catalan anarchist [[Mateu Morral]] tries to kill King [[Alfonso XIII of Spain]] and Queen [[Victoria Eugenie of Battenberg|Victoria Eugenie]] immediately after their wedding by throwing a bomb into the procession. The King and Queen are unhurt, but 24 bystanders and horses are killed and over 100 persons injured. Morral is apprehended two days later and commits suicide while being transferred to prison.<ref name="Sánchez2018">{{cite book |last=Sánchez |first=Pablo Martín |date=2018 |title=The Anarchist Who Shared My Name |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=M1VyDwAAQBAJ&q=inauthor%3A%22Pablo%20Mart%C3%ADn%20S%C3%A1nchez%22&pg=PT218 |location= |publisher=Deep Vellum Publishing |page=218|isbn=978-1941920718}}</ref>
* '''February 1, 1908'''&nbsp;– [[Manuel Buíça]] and [[Alfredo Luis da Costa|Alfredo Costa]] shoot to death King [[Carlos I of Portugal]] and his son, Crown Prince [[Luís Filipe, Prince Royal of Portugal|Luís Filipe]], respectively, in the [[Lisbon Regicide]]. Both Buíça and Costa, who are sympathetic to a [[republicanism|republican]] movement in Portugal that includes anarchist elements, are shot dead by police officers.<ref>{{cite book |last= Weeks|first=Marcus|date=2016 |title=Politics in Minutes|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3HDkCgAAQBAJ&q=Carlos+I+of+Portugal+propaganda+deed&pg=PT294|publisher=Quercus|isbn=978-1681444796}}</ref>
* '''June 15, 1910'''&nbsp;– The Bosnian anarchist [[Bogdan Žerajić]] attempts to assassinate the Governor of Bosnia and Herzegovian [[Marijan Varešanin]], but failed and subsequently committed suicide.<ref name="Ćorović1992">{{cite book|last=Ćorović|first=Vladimir|author-link=Vladimir Ćorović|title=Odnosi između Srbije i Austro-Ugarske u XX veku|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wam3AAAAIAAJ|year=1992|publisher=Biblioteka grada Beograda|page=624|isbn=978-8671910156}}</ref>
* '''September 14, 1911'''&nbsp;– [[Dmitri Bogrov]] shoots Russian prime minister [[Pyotr Stolypin]] at the [[Kiev Opera House]] in the presence of Tsar [[Nicholas II of Russia|Nicholas II]] and two of his daughters, Grand Duchesses [[Grand Duchess Olga Nikolaevna of Russia|Olga]] and [[Grand Duchess Tatiana Nikolaevna of Russia|Tatiana]]. Stolypin dies four days later, and Bogrov is hanged on September 25.<ref name="Smith">{{cite book |last= Smith|first=Paul J.|date=2010 |title=The Terrorism Ahead: Confronting Transnational Violence in the Twenty-First Century|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UGNsBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA22|publisher=[[Routledge]]|page=22 |isbn=978-0765619884}}</ref>
* '''November 12, 1912'''&nbsp;– Anarchist [[Manuel Pardiñas]] shoots Spanish Prime Minister [[José Canalejas y Méndez|José Canalejas]] dead in front of a [[Madrid]] bookstore. Pardiñas then immediately turns the gun on himself and commits suicide.<ref name="Jun">{{cite book |last= Jun|first=Nathan|date=2011 |title=Anarchism and Political Modernity|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cueoAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA109|publisher=Continuum|page=109 |isbn=978-1441166869}}</ref>
* '''March 18, 1913'''&nbsp;– [[Alexandros Schinas]] shoots dead King [[George I of Greece]] while the monarch is on a walk near the [[White Tower of Thessaloniki]]. Schinas is captured and tortured; he commits suicide on May 6 by jumping out the window of the gendarmerie, although there is speculation that he could have been [[defenestration|thrown to his death]].<ref name="Apoifis2016">{{cite book |last=Apoifis|first=Nicholas |date=2016 |title=Anarchy in Athens: An ethnography of militancy, emotions and violence|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Vw-pDgAAQBAJ&q=Alexandros%20Schinas%20propaganda%20of%20the%20deed&pg=PT120|publisher=[[Oxford University Press]]|isbn=978-1526100634|pages=73–75}}</ref>
* '''July 4, 1914'''&nbsp;– [[Lexington Avenue explosion|A bomb being prepared for use]] at [[John D. Rockefeller]]'s home at [[Tarrytown, New York]] explodes prematurely, killing three anarchists, Arthur Caron, Carl Hansen and Charles Berg,<ref name="MOR">Morgan, Ted, ''Reds: McCarthyism in Twentieth-Century America'', New York: Random House, {{ISBN|978-0679443995}} (2003), p. 58</ref> and an innocent woman, Mary Chavez.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83030214/1914-07-05/ed-1/seq-1/|title=New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, July 05, 1914, Image 1|first=National Endowment for the|last=Humanities|date=July 5, 1914|via=chroniclingamerica.loc.gov}}</ref>
* '''October 13''' and '''November 14, 1914'''&nbsp;– ''Galleanists'' – radical followers of [[Luigi Galleani]] – explode two bombs in New York City after police forcibly disperse a protest by anarchists and communists at John D. Rockefeller's home in Tarrytown.<ref name="MOR"/>
[[File:Assassination of George I of Greece, 1913.png|thumb|right|Assassination of [[George I of Greece]] by [[Alexandros Schinas]] in 1913 as depicted in a contemporary [[lithograph]].<ref name="Apoifis2016"/>]]
* '''September 16, 1920'''&nbsp;– The [[Wall Street bombing]] kills 38 and wounds 400 in the [[Financial District, Manhattan|Manhattan Financial District]]. ''Galleanists'' are believed responsible, particularly [[Mario Buda]], the group's principal bombmaker, although the crime remains officially unsolved.<ref>{{cite book |last= Loadenthal|first=Michael|date=2017 |title=The Politics of Attack: Communiqués and Insurrectionary Violence (Contemporary Anarchist Studies MUP Series)|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=f19mDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA46|publisher=[[Manchester University Press]]|page=46 |isbn=978-1526114440}}</ref>
* '''September 27, 1932'''&nbsp;– A dynamite-filled package bomb left by ''Galleanists'' destroys Judge [[Webster Thayer]]'s home in [[Worcester, Massachusetts]], injuring his wife and a housekeeper.<ref name="ReferenceA">''New York Times'': [https://www.nytimes.com/1932/09/28/archives/bomb-menaces-life-of-sacco-case-judge-thayer-escapes-injury-wife.html "Bomb Menaces Life of Sacco Case Judge", September 27, 1932], accessed December 20, 2009</ref><ref>Cannistraro, Philip V., and Meyer, Gerald, eds., ''The Lost World of Italian-American Radicalism: Politics, Labor, and Culture'', Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers, {{ISBN|0-275-97891-5}} (2003) p. 168</ref>  Judge Thayer had presided over the trials of ''Galleanists'' [[Sacco and Vanzetti]].<ref name="AVR2">Avrich, Paul, ''Sacco and Vanzetti: The Anarchist Background'', Princeton University Press (1991), pp. 58–60</ref>

== See also ==
* [[Artivism]]
* [[Civil disobedience]]
* [[List of assassinations]]
* [[List of terrorist incidents]]
* [[V (comics)]]

== Notes ==

{{notelist}}

== References ==

{{reflist}}

== Bibliography ==

{{refbegin}}

* {{cite book |editor-last=Abidor |editor-first=Mitchell |date=2016 |title=Death to Bourgeois Society: The Propagandists of the Deed |url=https://pmpress.org/index.php?l=product_detail&p=732 |publisher=[[PM Press]] |isbn=978-1629631127}}
* {{cite book|last=Bantman|first=Constance|chapter=The Era of Propaganda by the Deed|editor-last1=Adams|editor-first1=Matthew S.|editor-last2=Levy|editor-first2=Carl|year=2018|title=The Palgrave Handbook of Anarchism|location=London|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-3319756196|pages=371–388|doi=10.1007/978-3-319-75620-2_22|s2cid=150140014 }}
* {{Cite book |last=Billington |first=James |author-link=James H. Billington |title=Fire in the Minds of Men |date=1980 |publisher=[[Basic Books]]|lccn=79-2750|isbn=0-465-02405-X}} <!-- pp. 11, 410, 428, 436-437 -->
* {{cite news |last=Coolsaet |first=Rick |title=Anarchist outrages |publisher=[[Le Monde diplomatique]] |date=September 2004 |url=http://mondediplo.com/2004/09/03anarchists}}
* {{cite book |last=Gage |first=Beverly |title=The Day Wall Street Exploded: A Story of America in its First Age of Terror |location=New York |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |year=2009 |isbn=978-0199759286 |url=https://archive.org/details/daywallstreetexp0000gage |url-access=registration}}
* {{Cite book |last=Merriman |first=John |title=The Dynamite Club |publisher=[[Houghton Mifflin Harcourt]] |location=Boston |year=2009 |isbn=978-0-618-55598-7}} <!-- pp. 93-94, 209 -->

{{refend}}

== Further reading ==

{{refbegin}}

*{{cite book |last=Forman |first=James|title=Anarchism: Political Innocence or Social Violence? |publisher=F. Watts |location=New York |year=1975 |isbn=0-531-02790-2 }}
* {{Cite book |editor1-last=Chaliand |editor1-first=Gérard |editor2-last=Blin |editor2-first=Arnaud |last1=Hubac-Occhipinti |first1=Olivier |chapter=Anarchist Terrorists of the Nineteenth Century |title=The History of Terrorism: From Antiquity to Al Qaeda |date=2007 |isbn=978-0-520-24533-4 |publisher=University of California Press |location=Berkeley |df=mdy-all |chapter-url-access=registration |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/historyofterrori00grar }}
*{{cite book |last=Richards |first=Vernon |title=Violence and Anarchism |publisher=[[Freedom Press]] |location=London |year=1983 |isbn=0-900384-70-0 }}
*{{cite book |last=Gelderloos |first=Peter |author-link=Peter Gelderloos |title=How Nonviolence Protects the State |publisher=South End Press |location=Boston |year=2007 |isbn=978-0-89608-772-9 }}
*{{cite book |last=Churchill |first=Ward |author-link=Ward Churchill |title=Pacifism as Pathology |publisher=[[AK Press]] |location=Stirling |year=2007 |isbn=978-1-904859-18-5 }}
*{{cite book | publisher=Anares Books | location=Australia | year=1979 | title=You can't Blow up a Social Relationship: The Anarchist case against Terrorism }}
*Wallis, Glenn (2022). "[https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/glenn-wallis-the-story-of-anarchist-violence The Story of Anarchist Violence]." ''The Anarchist Library''.

{{refend}}

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