Can we make sense of anarchism or is that an oxymoron? Guided by the principle that someone else's rationality is not an empirical finding but a methodological presumption, this book addresses that question as it investigates the ideas and action of one of the most prominent and underrated anarchists of all times: the Italian, Errico Malatesta.

Abolitionist thought visualizes a world without prisons – or a radical reduction or transformation of prisons and punishment. This fascinating book explores the abolitionist ideas of key early socialists and anarchists, writing from the late 18th to the early 20th centuries. It considers how these radical thinkers can provide insights into our present condition, both by highlighting the harms of punishment and by pointing to inspiring alternatives to current policy and practice.By ...

The original Anarchy in the U.K.This volume focuses on the crucial years in Errico Malatesta’s life when he was exiled in London. Responding to what he saw as the unrealistic insurrectionism and isolation into which anarchism had fallen, Malatesta advocated “a long and patient work to prepare and organize the people,” through which anarchism would operate in broad daylight to entrench itself in the workers’ movement.Among the concerns Malatesta addresses in...

The first in AK Press's ten-volume Complete Works of Malatesta. This one (volume three chronologically) focuses on two very important years in Errico Malatesta's life, when he returned to Italy to edit L'Agitazione. This volume begins the series with a bang.

For sixty years, Errico Malatesta's involvement with international anarchism helped fuel the movement's radical approach to class and labor, and directly impacted the workers' movement in Italy. A talented newspaper journalist, Malatesta's biting critiques were frequently short and to the point-and written directly to and for the workers. Though his few long-form essays, including "Anarchy" and "Our Program," have been widely available in English translation since the 1950s, the bulk of Ma...

A landmark achievement in documentary history.This volume of the Complete Works of Errico Malatesta covers the five and a half years from when the weekly Volontà was founded in June 1913, through the end of 1918, when Malatesta was exiled in London. Included are articles on trade unionism, criticisms of individualism, the problems of reformism, and articles on science and determinism. After a flurry of conferences and rallies in early 1914, news of the rev...

After escaping from forced residency on an island off the coast of Italy, Malatesta made his way to London and eventually Paterson, New Jersey, in 1899. Here, among thousands of weavers in the burgeoning silk industry, Malatesta contributed to the anarchist press and was caught up in intrigue with fellow Italian anarchists—resulting in a bullet to the leg on September 3, 1899. From the columns of Questione Sociale, he addressed the themes of organization, the anarchist program, fr...