Anarchists of the early 20th century in the Russian Empire. Portrait of the movement.

In the early 20th century anarchism in the Russian Empire was much more powerful movement than it is today. I would like to draw a generalized portrait of this movement, which was radically different from the anarchism of our days.

The ethnic composition

According to modern Russian historian V. Krivenky "about half of all the anarchists were Jewish". In addition, among the anarchists there were many representatives of other nacionalnih minorities - Armenians, Georgians, Latvians, Ukrainians. Ethnic minorities in the tsarist Empire suffered from oppression. Many of them were deprived of a number of public rights, and had no schools, and other institutions on their national languages. People protested in such a radical way. We can say that in a sense, Russian anarchism was a movement of oppressed national minorities. But this is an exaggeration because among the anarchists there were many Russians.

The Age

Most of the anarchists were very young. For example, the age of many of the anarchists from group Black Flag was 19-20 years old. However this was generally typical for all revolutionary movements of the time.

The class composition

The anarchist movement is almost 100% consisted of workers. Some of them were workers of the big factories, others were hired workers-artisans from small businesses. There were a small number of anarchists among the peasants.

Of course, there were intellectuals, like Petr Kropotkin, Apollon Karelin, Juda Grossman-Roshchin and Mendel Dainov, who wrote theoretical works. And a part of anarchists were studying these works. Individual theorists-anarchists cood be popular. But many of anarchists were critical about intelligentsia itself as a harmful phenomenon, considered them a special hostile caste. Here anarchists differed from the authoritarian socialist parties.

The reason is that all centralized authoritarian left-wing political parties (Mensheviks, Bolsheviks, socialist revolutionaries, Bund, the Dashnaks, etc.) were controlled by intellectuals. To the question, for whatever reason the worker must execute decisions of the party chief, the latter answered was that this chief read Marx. Sometimes party members choose the leadership, but intellectuals have always received the highest positions. Many ordinary party members - the workers, resigned from these parties to anarchists. They did not want anyone to obey. Historically, many anarchists were political dissidents of left-wing parties.

They saw fighting organization as a voluntary Federation of Autonomous self-governing groups and use such methods as strikes, occupation of factories, armed rebellion and "propaganda by action". Anarchists used the economic terror against the business during strikes. This was categorically rejected by the majority of left-wing parties.

19-year-old worker Paul Golman was a member of the Strike Committee in Yekaterinoslav-city. This, according to close knowing his work “gives him a deep aversion to any game in the government, even a temporary revolutionary”. “Not the speakers made me an anarchist, but life itself... BSC (Strike Committee - author's note) there i was working and Its negative activities. Every honest man who took part in it, and had seen with his own eyes Its fatal mistakes, have once and for all to break with the statists” – he will say later. Paul leaves the socialist revolutionary party and becomes an anarchist.

Location and the number

Anarchists of the early 1900's (including the period of the 1905-1907 revolution) are first of all, the workers of the regions of the Empire inhabited by national minorities. Anarchists were active everywhere throughout the Empire. But there were three large industrial centers, where they were most influential - Bialystok, Odessa and Baku.

The total number of anarchists were from 5 to 10 thousand people (more likely closer to 10K). This is a good indicator, if we take into account two circumstances. Firstly, along with the anarchists in Russia acted another libertarian-socialist movement - the organization of social-revolutionaries-maximalists (Pro-anarchist wing of the socialist-revolutionaries, SSRM), the number of which reached 5 thousand. Secondly, the number of the most influential in Russia "socialist" parties - the social-revolutionaries and the social-democrats (divided into Mensheviks and Bolsheviks) were in each case 40-50 thousand people. Thus, although libertarian socialists were less in number, their impact (at least in some regions) was not less then authoritarian influence.

Ideology and activities

All or nearly all anarchists supported the idea of libertarian (anarcho) communism, a society of total self-government, communes and federalism as the goal of struggle. The differences between them in this period focused mainly on tactics. Anarchists had two major ideological trends - Black Flag rebels (Juda Grossman-Roshchin) and anarcho-syndicalists (Jacob Novomirskiy).

Bialystok, the heart of anarchist uprising

Black Flag spoke for organizing armed rebellions wich will transform the citys into self-governing communes. They said that even if such a revolt was suppressed, it would be the best way to promote the ideas of anarchism - propaganda by action. Black Flag dominated among the anarchists of Bialystok.

Bialystok was a city with the population 100 thousand and about 30 thousand workers of the textile industry. About 60% of city residents were Jews. The city of Bialystok was the largest center of Russian anarchism during the revolution of 1905-1907. Largely anarchist movement spread from Bialystok to other cities together with the workers-migrants and propagandists. We find it difficult to call their number. But we know that in certain moments they together with the SR-maximalists have had a decisive influence on the majority of the workers of the city.

Anarchists of Bialystok were not opponents of the organization or economic strikes. They had special sections for the organization strikes in each economic sector. All the sections are united in the federation ("Group", as they called it). "Group" participated in numerous strikes in the city. It became so influential that businessmen usually agree with the demands of the strikers if they learned that the strike involved anarchists or s-r maximalists. The matter is that unwillingness to fulfill the requirements threatened with death. However anarchists "...acted only at the moment when extra pressure was needed or when it was necessary to eliminate the most fanatical entrepreneurs" (Juda Grossman-Roshchin).

Odessa, the homeland of anarcho-syndicalism

Odessa was a large industrial city with a population about half a million people. It was also an important trade and transport center. There were three major ethnic communities - Jews, Ukrainians and Russians, and many smaller ones.

Сity became the center of Russian anarcho-syndicalism. Jakob Novomirsky was the ideologist of this movement. Inspired by the experience of growing American revolutionary labor movement (IWW), he tried to create an organization of revolutionary syndicalists in Odessa. This organization has about 5000 people, but the influence of the organization spread to an even larger number of people. However, some sources estimate the number of anarcho-syndicalists in Odessa as one thousand.

When it comes to tactics, we see that it had nothing to do with the activity of modern unions. Anarcho-syndicalists of Odessa created an illegal organization of workers. For example, the shipping company leadership tried to break the strike using workers, the members of the nationalist Black-Hundred organization (Union of the Russian People), as a scabs. In response, anarcho-syndicalists blew up one of the steamers. One can criticize such activities, but, in any case, it is impossible to accuse their members of the absence of revolutionary aims and methods.

It is interesting that Novomirsky himself criticized Black Flag faction for excessive violence, considering violence not as a major means but only as one of the methods of mass struggle preparing future General strike which grow into a General armed uprising. Novomirskiy strongly criticized Grossman-Roshchin for preaching the idea of "Holy hatred and Holy revenge against the bourgeoisie". As a revolutionary anarcho-syndicalist, he was a supporter of the gradually increasing experience and self-organization of the working class in the course of radical strikes and direct (but not necessarily violent) action. The revolutionary syndicates are the "cells of the future society of workers". However in his view this did not contradict the task of creation after the revolution the territorial self-governing communes. Just syndicates will manage production in these communes.

Baku, the capital of revolution in Caucasus and in Transcaucasia

Baku was the largest industrial city in Transcaucasia, with a population over 200 thousand and the center of Russian oil industry. Population of the city was divided into many ethnic communities: Russians, Azerbaijanis, Armenians, Jews, Iranians. The revolutionary influence extended from Baku not only in other regions of the Transcaucasia, but in Iran with migrant workers employed in the oil industry of the city. Iranians returning home carried with them the revolutionary ideas.

Modern Azerbaijani historians believe that 2,5 thousand workers-anarchists acted at the city. However, it is possible that this figure is exaggerated. Unlike Bialystok and Odessa anarchists of Baku were very fragmented, had many factions. The attempt to unite these groups led to clashes. It is known that the most influential group was called "Anarchy" and the "Internationale".

As in Bialystok anarchists participated in the strikes and economic terror. In addition, they produced leaflets against national enmity. The anarchists were in a state of armed confrontation with the Armenian nationalists (Dashnaktsutyun), which killed the leader and ideologist of the local anarchists Sarkis Keleshian (Sevuni).

We do not clearly understand the ideology of these anarchists, but it can be assumed that they were close to Black Flag.

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Along with militant groups peaceful propagandists of anarchism acted. In addition, there was a large anarcho-pacifist religious movement of Christians, supporters of the ideas of Leo Tolstoy.