Editing Mikhail Bakunin (section)

== Life ==

=== Early life ===

On {{OldStyleDate|30 May|1814|18 May}}, Mikhail Aleksandrovich Bakunin was born into [[Russian nobility]].{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=35}} His family's [[Priamukhino]] estate, in the [[Tver Oblast|Tver]] region northwest of Moscow, had over 500 serfs.{{sfn|Eckhardt|2022|p=308}} His father, [[Alexander Mikhailovich Bakunin]], was a Russian diplomat who had served in Italy. Upon returning to Priamukhino and marrying the much younger Varvara Aleksandrovna Muravyeva, the elder Bakunin raised his ten children<!-- add note here for the eleventh who died young--> in the [[Rousseauan]] pedagogic model.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=35}} Mikhail Bakunin, their third child and oldest son,{{sfn|Eckhardt|2022|p=309}} read the languages, literature, and philosophy of the period and described his youth as idyllic and sheltered from the realities of Russian life. As an early teenager, he began training for a military career at the [[St. Petersburg]] Artillery School, which he rejected.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=35}} Becoming an officer in 1833, he availed himself of the freedom to participate in the city's social life, but was unfulfilled. Derelict in his studies, he was sent to Belarus and Lithuania as punishment in early 1834, where he read academic theory and philosophy. He deserted the school in 1835 and only escaped arrest through his familial influence.{{sfn|Eckhardt|2022|p=309}} He was discharged at the end of the year and, despite his father's protests, left for Moscow to pursue a career as a mathematics teacher.{{sfnm|1a1=Shatz|1y=2003|1p=35|2a1=Eckhardt|2y=2022|2p=309}}

Bakunin lived a bohemian, intellectual life in Moscow, where [[German Romantic]] literature and [[German idealism|idealist philosophy]] were influential in the 1830s.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=35}} In the intellectual circle of [[Nikolai Stankevich]], Bakunin read German philosophy, from [[Immanuel Kant|Kant]] to [[Johann Gottlieb Fichte|Fichte]] to [[Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel|Hegel]],{{sfn|Eckhardt|2022|p=309}} and published Russian translations of their works.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=36}} Bakunin produced the first Russian translation of Hegel and was the foremost Russian expert on Hegel by 1837.{{sfn|Eckhardt|2022|pp=309–310}} Bakunin befriended Russian intellectuals including the literary critic [[Vissarion Belinsky]], the poet [[Nikolay Ogarev]], the novelist [[Ivan Turgenev]], and the writer [[Alexander Herzen]] as youth prior to their careers.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=36}} Herzen funded Bakunin to study at the [[University of Berlin]] in 1840. Bakunin's plans to return to Moscow as a professor were soon abandoned.{{sfn|Eckhardt|2022|p=310}}

In Berlin, Bakunin gravitated towards the [[Young Hegelians]], an intellectual group with radical interpretations of Hegel's philosophy,{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=36}} and who drew Bakunin to political topics.{{sfn|Eckhardt|2022|p=310}} He left Berlin in early 1842 for [[Dresden]] and met the Hegelian [[Arnold Ruge]],{{sfn|Eckhardt|2022|p=310}} who published Bakunin's first original publication. {{Lang|de|Die Reaktion in Deutschland}} ("The Reaction in Germany") proposes a continuation of the [[French Revolution]] to the rest of Europe and Russia.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=36}} Though steeped in Hegelian jargon and published under a pseudonym, it marked Bakunin's transition from philosophy to revolutionary rhetoric.{{sfn|Eckhardt|2022|p=310}}

=== Revolutionary activity and imprisonment ===
[[File:Young Bakunin.jpg|thumb|Bakunin, 1843]]

Throughout the 1840s, Bakunin grew into revolutionary agitation.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=36}} When his cadre aroused interest from Russian secret agents, Bakunin left for [[Zürich]] in early 1843. He met the proto-communist [[Wilhelm Weitling]] whose arrest led [[Bern]]'s Russian embassy to distrust Bakunin.{{sfn|Eckhardt|2022|p=310}} Defying Russian orders to return, the [[Governing Senate|Russian Senate]] stripped him of his rights as a nobleman and sentenced him [[trial in absentia|in absentia]] to [[penal labor]] in Siberia.{{sfnm|1a1=Shatz|1y=2003|1p=36|2a1=Eckhardt|2y=2022|2p=310}} Without steady financial support, Bakunin became an itinerant, traveling Europe meeting the people who had influenced him.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=36}} He visited [[Brussels]] and [[Paris]], where he joined international emigrants and socialists, befriended the anarchist [[Pierre-Joseph Proudhon]], and met the philosopher [[Karl Marx]], with whom he would later tussle.{{sfn|Eckhardt|2022|p=310}} Bakunin only became personally active in political agitation in 1847, as Polish emigrants in Paris invited him to commemorate the [[1830 Polish uprising]] with a speech.{{sfn|Eckhardt|2022|p=310}} His call for Poles to overthrow czarism in alliance with Russian democrats made Bakunin known throughout Europe and led the Russian ambassador to successfully request Bakunin's deportation.{{sfn|Eckhardt|2022|pp=310–311}}

When the French King [[Louis Philippe I]] abdicated during the [[February 1848 Revolution]], Bakunin returned to Paris and basked in the revolutionary milieu.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=36}} With the French government's support, he headed to Prussian Poland to agitate for revolt against Russia but never arrived.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|pp=36–37}} He attended the 1848 [[Prague Slavic Congress, 1848|Prague Slavic Congress]] to defend Slavic rights against German and Hungarian nationalism, and participated in [[1848 Prague uprising|its impromptu insurrection]] against the [[Habsburg empire|Austrian Habsburgs]]. Uncaptured, he wrote ''Aufruf an die Slaven'' ("Appeal to the Slavs") at the end of the year, advocating for a Slavic federation and revolt against the Austrian, Prussian, Turkish, and Russian governments. It was widely read and translated.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=37}}

After participating in both the Prague uprising and the [[May Uprising in Dresden|1849 Dresden uprising]], Bakunin was imprisoned, tried, sentenced to death, extradited multiple times, and ultimately placed in [[solitary confinement]] in the [[Peter and Paul Fortress]] of [[St. Petersberg, Russia]], in 1851. Three years later, he transferred to [[Shlisselburg Fortress]] near St. Petersberg for another three years. Prison weathered but did not break Bakunin, who retained his revolutionary zeal through his release. He did, however, write an autobiographical, genuflecting ''[[Confession (Bakunin)|Confession]]'' to the Russian emperor, which proved to be a controversial document upon its public discovery some 70 years later. The letter did not improve his prison conditions. In 1857, Bakunin was permitted to transfer to permanent exile in Siberia. He married Antonia Kwiatkowska there{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=37}} before escaping in 1861, first to Japan, then to San Francisco, sailing to [[Panama]] and then to New York and Boston, and arrived in London by the end of the year.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=38}} Bakunin set foot in America just as the [[American Civil War|Civil War]] was breaking out. Speaking with supporters of both sides, Bakunin stated that his sympathies were with the North, although he claimed hypocrisy in their stated goal of slave liberation while also forcing the South to remain in the Union.<ref name=":0" /> Bakunin also viewed the Southern political system and agrarian character as freer in some respects for its white citizens than in the industrial North.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web |last=Avrich |first=Paul |title=Bakunin in America |url=https://files.libcom.org/files/BAKUNIN%20AND%20THE%20UNITED%20STATES.pdf}}</ref> Though a fierce critic and enemy of slavery, Bakunin held a deep admiration for the United States as a whole, referring to the country as “the finest political organization that ever existed in history.”<ref name=":0" />

=== Back in Europe ===

In London, Bakunin reunited with Herzen and Ogarev. Bakunin collaborated with them on [[Kolokol (newspaper)|their Russian-language newspaper]] but his revolutionary fervor exceeded their moderate reform agenda. Bakunin's 1862 pamphlet ''The People{{'}}s Cause: Romanov, Pugachev, or Pestel?'' criticized the Russian tsar for not using his position to facilitate a bloodless revolution and forgo another [[Pugachev's Rebellion]]. In early August 1862, he briefly travelled to Paris.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Kawelin |first1=Konstantin |author1-link=Konstantin Kavelin |editor1-last=Dragomanow |editor1-first=Michail |editor1-link=Mykhailo Drahomanov |title=Konstantin Kawelins und Iwan Turgenjews sozial-politischer Briefwechsel mit Alexander Iw. Herzen: Mit Beilagen und Erläuterungen |series=Bibliothek russischer Denkwürdigkeiten; 4 Bd |date=1894 |publisher=Verlag der J. G. Cotta'schen Buchhandlung Nachfolger |location=Stuttgart |pages=64–66 |url=https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/000975825 |language=German}}</ref> In Paris at this time, famous photographer [[Nadar]] took four famous photographs of him on August 7, 1862. After being photographed, he also signed Nadar's ''Livre d'Or'' (autograph albume), wrote that (leaf 161): "Watch out that liberty doesn't come to you from the north."<ref>{{cite web |last1=Begley |first1=Adam |title=Nadar's Livre d'or |url=https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2017/07/05/nadars-livre-dor/ |website=[[The Paris Review]] |date=5 July 2017 |access-date=23 November 2023}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Nadar autograph album |url=https://findingaids.library.upenn.edu/records/UPENN_RBML_PUSP.MS.COLL.21 |access-date=23 November 2023}}</ref> In 1863, Bakunin joined in an unsuccessful effort to supply armed men for the Polish [[January Uprising]] against Russia. Bakunin, reunited with his wife, moved to Italy the next year, where they stayed for three years.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=38}}

Bakunin, in his early 50s, developed his core anarchist thoughts in Italy. He continued to refine these ideas in his remaining 12 years. Among this ideology was the first of many conspiratorial revolutionary societies, though none of these participated in revolutionary actions, chiefly the revolutionary toppling of the state, to be replaced by free federation between voluntarily associated economic producers.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=38}}

He moved to Switzerland in 1867, a more permissive environment for revolutionary literature. Bakunin's anarchist writings were fragmentary and prolific.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=38}} With France's collapse in the 1870 [[Franco-Prussian War]], Bakunin traveled to Lyon and participated in the fruitless [[Lyon Commune]] in which the citizens briefly occupied the city hall. Bakunin retreated to Switzerland.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|pp=38–39}}

In Switzerland, the Russian revolutionary [[Sergey Nechayev]] sought out Bakunin for a collaboration. Not knowing Nechayev's past betrayals, Bakunin warmed to Nechayev's revolutionary zeal and they together produced the 1869 ''Catechism of the Revolutionary'', a tract that endorsed an ascetic life for revolutionaries without societal or moral bonds. Bakunin's connection with Nechayev hurt the former's reputation. More recent scholarship, however, challenges the catechism's authorship, crediting Nechayev as the primary or sole author. Bakunin ultimately disavowed their connection.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=39}}

=== First International ===

[[File:Bakunin Monument Bern EN.webm|thumb|Video of Bakunin's grave]]

While Bakunin encountered [[Karl Marx]] in Paris (1844) and London (1864), he came to know him through the [[First International]] (International Working Men's Association), which Marx and [[Friedrich Engels]] formed in the 1860s. Bakunin's relationship with Marx became strained in the early 1870s for both interpersonal and ideological differences. Bakunin respected Marx's erudition and passion for socialism but found his personality to be authoritarian and arrogant. In turn, Marx was skeptical towards Russian reactionism and Bakunin's unruliness.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=39}} As Bakunin developed his anarchist ideas in this period, he came to see federative social organization, led by the peasantry and poorest workers, as the primary post-revolution goal, whereas Marx believed in a [[dictatorship of the proletariat]], led by organized workers in industrially advanced countries, in which the workers use state infrastructure until [[withering away of the state|the state withers away]]. Bakunists abhorred the political organization for which Marx advocated.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|pp=39–40}}

Marx had Bakunin and Bakunist anarchists ejected from the First International's [[Hague Congress (1872)|1872 Hague Congress]]. This breaking point split the Marxist socialist movement from the anarchist movement and led to the undoing of the International. Bakunin's ideas continued to spread nevertheless to the labor movement in Spain and the watchmakers of the Swiss [[Jura Federation]].{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=40}}

Bakunin wrote his last major work, ''Statism and Anarchy'' (1873), anonymously in Russian to stir underground revolution in Russia. It restates his anarchist position, establishes the German Empire as the foremost centralized state in opposition to European anarchism, likens Marx to German authoritarianism, and warns of Marx's dictatorship of the proletariat being led by autocrats for their own gain in the name of the proletariat. This premonition furthered the gulf between the Marxists and Bakunist anarchists.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=40}}

In one final revolutionary act, Bakunin planned the unsuccessful [[1874 Bologna insurrection]] with his Italian followers. Its failure was a major setback to the [[anarchism in Italy|Italian anarchist movement]]. Bakunin retreated to Switzerland,{{sfn|Drake|2009|pp=35–36}} where he retired, dying in [[Bern]] on 1 July 1876.{{sfn|Shatz|2003|p=41}}