The Place of Anarchism in Socialistic Evolution - An Address Delivered in Paris

Pyotr Alexeyevich Kropotkin was a Russian anarchist and geographerknownas a proponent of anarchist communism. Born into an aristocratic land-owning family, Kropotkin attended a militaryschooland later served as an officer in Siberia, where he participated in several geologicalexpeditions. He was imprisoned for his activism in 1874 and managedtoescapetwoyears later. He spent the next 41 years in exile in Switzerland, France (wherehewasimprisoned for almost four years) and England. While in exile, he gave lecturesandpublished widely on anarchism and geography. Kropotkin returned toRussiaafterthe Russian Revolution in 1917, but he was disappointed by the Bolshevikstate. Kropotkin was a proponent of a decentralized communist society free fromcentralgovernment and based on voluntary associations of self-governing communitiesandworker-run enterprises. He wrote many books, pamphlets and articles, themostprominent being The Conquest of Bread and Fields, Factories, andWorkshops,with Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution being his principal scientific offering. Hecontributed the article on anarchism to the Encyclopædia BritannicaEleventhEdition and left an unfinished work on anarchist ethical