What does Nietzsche have to do with anarchism?

+6votes
I have seen anarchists talk (vaguely) about Nietzsche, and there seems to be a new fad of
anarcho-nihlism. Yet Nietzsche himself spoke quite negatively about anarchists, and many of his
ideas seem quite counter to anarchism (as practiced in the US). So what does Nietzsche's nihilism
have in common with anarchism, and what does he have to offer anarchist practice?

nihilism

practice

critical-thinking

nietzsche

asked Nov 24, 2010 by anonymous

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I recommend you start by reading Thus Spoke Zarathustra

commented Sep 1, 2011 by Redblood Blackflag

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5 Answers
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+8votes
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Firstly: Nietzsche and nihilism

I think that stating that Nietzsche was not a nihilist is too simplistic, and not entirely true, his
positions on nihilism were complex, and it could be argued that he was a nihilist, or at least aimed
to be one.
Nietzsche saw nihilism as the most extreme form of pessimism, something that comes from
weariness and an alienation from values. When one can recognize the existing value systems as
meaningless and empty, and not replace it with anything, they become nihilistic. He saw nihilism
as both positive and negative, as ... one of the greatest crises, a moment of the deepest selfreflection of humanity. Whether man recovers from it, whether he becomes master of this crisis, is
a question of his strength!
I think that it is helpful to first point out the two different types of nihilism you find in his works,
the idea of passive nihilism and active nihilism. The passive nihilist is the one who could not
recover from this crisis. It is a state in which a person, after having recognized that all external
values are empty and have no true authority, begins to find their own internal values meaningless,
giving up their own authority. With /all/ sense of authority gone one gives in to the spirit of
hopelessness and fatalism, ridding themselves of all responsibility. They withdraw from the world,
give up.
But it is possible (and Nietzsche argues that it is entirely desirable) that this recognition of
external value systems as meaningless can give way to a sense of rebelliousness, and strength.
This active nihilist seeks to destroy any and all remaining traces of an empty value system. The
strength of one's will is tested by whether or not it can recognize all value systems as empty and
meaningless, yet admit that these lies arise out of the ego and serve a purpose; whether one can
recognize that value is necessary for life while denying the existence of any universal truth.
Nietzsche saw this nihilism as a means to achieving an end, not an end in and of itself. It is
simply one step in the revaluation of values. Nihilism is a necessary to destroy what exists now in
order to create a place in which the ego/the will can truly take power and assert itself fully.
As anarchists we /are/ fighting to rid ourselves of the existing value systems (the capitalist

values of money above all, the Christian values of self-sacrifice, and god above all, etc), and
many of us already feel that alienation from these values. What we can take from his active
nihilism is the deconstructive nature that gives way to construction, a destruction that strengthens
and empowers. The realization that we need not only destroy what exists, but transcend it.
Nietzsche calls anarchists (and Christians) out on their apparent inability to do this: There is a
perfect likeness between Christian and anarchist: their object, their instinct, points only toward
destruction. . . . both are decadents ; both are incapable of any act that is not disintegrating,
poisonous, degenerating, blood sucking ; both have an instinct of mortal hatred of everything that
stands up, and is great, and has durability, and promises life a future. However, I don't think that
this is permanent.
Second: What anarchists can learn from Nietzsche's rejection of the slave morality.
Anarchist are some of the strongest adherents to the slave morality, Nietzsche even said so
outright. Our whole outlook on life, the way in which we function within this world is based upon
reaction, /resentment/. We view people/events/etc with through the eye of "good vs evil". We look
for that which is "evil" (capitalism, police, etc) and define anything that isn't that as "good". We do
not spend much time focusing on that which is "good", but rather are obsessed with the "evil", we
revolve our ideals/projects/lives around it. How is the US anarchist ideas of "evil" much different
than the Christian sin, or devil; how different is the anarchists' end of capitalism from the Christian
apocalypse, anarchist ideals from heaven? We have become the perfect (pitiful) disciples of our
/own/ slave morality.
And while Nietzsche argues that /all/ morality is something to be destroyed, if anarchists are
going to have a morality we would have something to learn from the master morality. Maybe we
would get somewhere constructive with our ideas if we began focusing on what was "good" for us,
what bettered us, our projects, our aims is certainly more productive that focusing on what is not
our enemies, labeling all that is opposed to our enemies as "good", spending our time dissecting
"evil", learning about "evil" in order to learn what is not evil, to better understand how we can be
not "evil". But we /could/ strive to go beyond morality entirely. . .
Well, this is long enough, so I will end it here. But I think that Nietzsche's critiques of anarchism
can be taken as constructive criticism, and can be learned from. I do not know much about
anarcho-nihilism, but I hope that it does not fall into the pit of passivity.
answered Nov 26, 2010 by Katherine diFiore (5,730 points)
edited Nov 26, 2010 by Katherine diFiore

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Excellent answer.
:)
commented Nov 26, 2010 by madlib

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Not to mention, Nietzsche's conception of happiness:http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/philosophy-guide-tohappiness/ (last part)

commented Nov 27, 2010 by Squee

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I don't want to get too nitpicky (I know, usually I revel in it!), but resentment (English) is a whole lot different from
ressentiment (French); the latter is what FN uses to describe an unfortunate tendency toward pettiness and a desire
for revenge when people who only merit our contempt do us "wrong." Ressentiment has much more to do with
unfulfillable expectations of bourgeois notions of justice and fairness than it does with feeling pissy.
commented Nov 28, 2010 by lawrence

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I understand that there this a difference between resentment and ressentiment. However, I find that using the word
"resentment" was perfectly applicable to anarchist morality, relevant to Nietzsche's slave morality, and suffices when
trying to do a "Nietzsche 101".
For all of those concerned with the definitions of important Nietzschean
words:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ressentiment
commented Nov 28, 2010 by Katherine diFiore

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Am I the only person who splits morality into two distinct types.
There is natural morality, and there is compulsive morality.
Many people can (at first) greatly appreceate natural morality. Witness most peoples reaction to such figures as J.C.,
Gandi, Nelson and many other similar figures throughout history. However the more nuerotic among us who posess
only a compulsive set of moral principles will eventually see in the person posessing genuine natural morality a
reflection of their bad selves whenever coming in contact with that better person. Very well put in the movie
'easyrider' when jack nicholson says something along the lines of ; "talk to people about personal freedom and they'll
all be with you, SHOW them a free person, ..... they'll get their guns out". Or nail you to a cross.
People who have natural morality DO NOT HAVE TO THINK HOW TO REACT TO A GIVEN SITUATION because their
natural morality does not RESIDE in their heads or on a bit of paper. A non neurotic natural anarchist's morality

occurs on an emotional enegy level. The right responces and decisions are automatically made while in the
background his heart sings when he comes into contact with things that are 'good for his soul' and his belly aches
when he comes into contact with bullshit.
Since Nietsche probably had no inkling of these two sorts of morality it could be argued that everything he wrote will
do little to directly help help us find the solution to our problems.
Our solution lies in the area of 'how can we prevent human beings becoming peversely neurotic between birth and
adolescence.
Start TODAY, yes TODAY, growing small or large groups of children who do not catch the EMOTIONAL PLAGUE from
the previous generation.
Not difficult and not costly. In 20 years we could have large numbers of young adults WITH NATURAL MORALITY who
could show us how to do it.
WHAT ARE WE WAITING FOR?
We could start today saving large numbers of humans from this 'same shit / different day' setup.
commented Jan 22, 2011 by ZenD

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I stopped reading this early on in your rant. Why don't you just say the two different types of morality are 1. The kind
I don't like and 2. The kind I like.
Being a moralist, you still operate on the assumption that there is an eternal standard of proper behavior for all
people at all times in all circumstances. To use your terminology, ALL morality is compulsive.
One last thing. Why is it the responsibility of any anarchist (presuming that the "we" you use refers to anarchists) to
"start... saving large numbers of humans" from anything? That is a humanist stance, and while I would say that most
anarchists are also humanists to some degree, the idea that anarchist practice should be primarily or exclusively
determined by humanist assumptions and metrics is obnoxious.
commented Jan 22, 2011 by lawrence

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Wow, ZenD. I am finding it difficult figuring out how to begin to wade through your bullshit.
If J.C. (Jesus Christ, I would assume) and Gandhi are examples of the your preferred morality, count me out,
thanks. If these are your equivalents to the ubermensch, everyone in your utopia is doomed.
Since Nietsche probably had no inkling of these two sorts of morality it could be argued that everything he wrote will
do little to directly help help us find the solution to our problems.
I read: since Nietzsche doesn't think just like me and didn't adhere to my oh-so-well-thought-out-and-researched
ideas, he is irrelevant. Fuck him. I am right, everything else is wrong. Did I misinterpret anything?
Our solution lies in the area of 'how can we prevent human beings becoming peversely neurotic between birth and
adolescence. Start TODAY, yes TODAY, growing small or large groups of children who do not catch the EMOTIONAL
PLAGUE from the previous generation. . . . In 20 years we could have large numbers of young adults WITH NATURAL
MORALITY who could show us how to do it.
Wow. We can grow children? Like in a lab and shit?
Are you interested in an anarchism that advocates for free will and autonomy or an 'anarchism' that wants a perfect
utopia filled with perfect people, all 'grown naturally'. If we just brainwash the next generation, everybody will be
perfect. And all of these perfect citizens will be raised by perfect parents. Because not passing on your flaws to your
children is easy, you can just vaccinate them against an emotional plague.... right?
Not difficult and not costly.
Ha! You have never cared for a child, have you?
WHAT ARE WE WAITING FOR? We could start today saving large numbers of humans from this 'same shit / different
day' setup.
You really should start writing for infomercials. ACT NOW, and you, too, could get a perfect, emotional-plaguevaccinated child. What are you waiting for? With this one, easy act you could save the planet. All you have to do is
make 5 easy payments of 19.99, sell your soul, and say goodbye to your individuality, autonomy, freewill, and best of
all, all of your flaws. Call NOW!
Your shit is way too whack to take seriously...
commented Mar 9, 2011 by Katherine diFiore

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I would also suggest the book I Am Not A Man, I Am Dynomite. It is a series of essays about Nietzsche and
Anarchism, some of the articles are so-so, but there are a few that are pretty amazing (I highly recommend
Nietzschean Anarchy and the Post-Mortem Condition.)
commented Apr 24, 2011 by Katherine diFiore

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i appreciate most of this response, KD, but this here got my goat:
>> Anarchist are some of the strongest adherents to the slave morality, Nietzsche even said so outright. Our whole
outlook on life, the way in which we function within this world is based upon reaction, /resentment/. We view
people/events/etc with through the eye of "good vs evil". <<
wow. first of all, you sound like you are speaking for (all) anarchists. then, as part of that, you state that (all)
anarchists see things through a moralistic lens of 'good vs evil'. shit, and i thought morals were a concept placed
above oneself, which one must (or at least should) defer to. the very antithesis of what anarchy means to me.
maybe i misunderstood something.

commented Mar 31, 2012 by funkyanarchy

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You're right, I make some pretty sweeping generalizations in that answer. I did lump /all/ anarchists into that
category.
I know that many individual anarchists actively do, or aim to, see the world through a lens free of such morality. I
find this to be totally desirable and I appreciate that you are among those.
However, that said, 'anarchism' as both an 'ism' and a culture /does/ have a morality, and a strong one at that.
I can clarify further, if necessary, but I fear that it could take us on the tangent of owning ideas vs ideas owning and
the moralistic implications of that.
commented Apr 8, 2012 by Katherine diFiore

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+3votes
Too many incorrect assumptions about FN to cover quickly, so only a few will have to do for now:
FN was not a nihilist.
Many critical anarchists speak quite negatively about anarchists.
Anarcho-nihilism (if such a beast actually exists as a discrete and identifiable tendency) has less to
gain from FN's ideas than from actual anarchists like Bakunin and Stirner.
FN's defiance toward, and ultimate refusal of, slave morality is a great tool to counter the oftenunexamined infusion of bourgeois ideology into anarchist (and other radical) discourse and
practice.
answered Nov 25, 2010 by lawrence (20,220 points)

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+1vote
I guess the strange thing about some of the above comments is: Nietzsche believed in self control.
Ressentiment and nihilism (or liberalism) (ie, anarchists and Christians), isn't just limited to Good
vs. Evil. For Nietzsche, anarchists and Christians were apathetic to things like Art. Anarchists and
Christians bound themselves to this incredible moral code and acted violently against all society.
To him this was stupid. On some level, breaking the law only justified the State, and "Once the
Prince is finished defeating you, you are no longer relevant to him." (paraphrase)
Ultimately, Nietzsche believed and hoped that a New Morality would emerge from the crisis of
nihilism. That was pretty much the only way he saw nihilism being a positive thing. The concept
that is actually picking up steam is this concept of the Overman. It relates to Aristotle's ideas on
the Ungoverneable. The person who does what they want and gains enough power, will become
the Overman, while also being the most hated person in society. Aristotle says, society would kill
this person. Nietzsche believed this would bring a new wave of morality.
On the other hand, Nietzsche is really often a gateway drug into philosophy. Usually, you can take
parts of what he said (out of context) and try to win arguments that way. He's one of the major
precursors to existentialism, and postmodernism (which some think is the New Morality). He's
kind of "that all American philosopher," only in Germany many, many years ago.
answered Mar 16, 2011 by veranasi (410 points)

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+2votes
The influence of Nietzsche has been so wide and complex in anarchist thinkers and activists that
this issue already has awhole wikipedia article on this.
Check:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchism_and_Friedrich_Nietzsche Nietzsche on the other
hand talked about nihilism but associated it with a negativity linked to conformism and submission
to the current societal forms. His famous call for the creation of a ubermensch clearly is a positive
program with humanistic and progressive possibilites. Nietzsche has influenced insurrectionists

oriented towards "nihilism" (ex:Renzo Novatore) yet he has also influenced more humanist
oriented free thinking anarchists such as Emma Goldman and Emile Armand.
answered Sep 11, 2012 by iconoclast (4,510 points)

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The other answers are great and interesting and I do not want to rehash what they have already
said so well -- I just wanted to add a couple notes they did not mentions.
One is that Nietzsche was an anti-statist. Nietzsche saw the creation of the modern State as
antagonistic to culture and strong willed humanity. It was the creation of a new God that people
would use to replace the old God and which they would bow and scrape before instead of using the
loss of the traditional society as an impetus to create something better. In other words, set fee by
the death of God and the old way of life, they created a new God to worship and efface themselves
before. A new master so they could remain mindless slaves.
Next, Nietzsche did not understand anarchism. He accused them of being worshipers of the State.
It seems he lumped them in with the socialists, and given the era he lived in, this is somewhat
understandable.
He also shares the Anarchist hatred of liberalism, while, like Sorel and others, valuing the state
that the fight for liberty has on man.
Also, Nietzsche was quite clear on the non proscriptive nature of his ideas. In Zarathustra he says
that he is not a shepherd to lead the masses, rather he comes to gather the "lonesome and the
twosome", those that want to "follow him by following themselves". Anarchism is similar -- it does
not want to create a party or an apparatus to lead the masses, rather it is a political philosophy of
individuals working together, resisting all attempts to rule them and refusing to engage in any
attempts to rule others. Similar to this, I would say Nietzsche's call for wide scale social
experimentation (as opposed to advocating one way for all of society) is in akin to the call for
decentralized and motley society.
Again, these are just random notes and thoughts, they are not meant to disagree with previous
answers.
answered Apr 28, 2013 by hamjam (450 points)

http://anarchy101.org/686/what-does-nietzsche-have-to-do-withanarchism

I am Not a Man I am
Dynamite: Friedrich Nietzsche
and the Anarchist Tradition
Brian Morris deplores John Moore and friends views on Nietzsche and anarchism.

This interesting collection of essays, mostly by male academic philosophers, is largely an attempt to
convince us that the reactionary philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche was actually a true anarchist pure,

creative, life affirming, elitist. By contrast, those awful nineteenth century anarchists such as Bakunin
and Kropotkin, in criticizing and challenging state power, economic exploitation under capitalism and all
forms of social oppression, were not real anarchists, for they were motivated only by envy, weakness
and ressentiment and were lacking in any creative impulse. These academics have their understanding
back-to-front, of course.
The collection is edited by the late John Moore, who is described in the introduction as an eccentric
iconoclastic thinker even though Moore joyfully embraced every intellectual fad around, from
primitivism and spiritualism to Nietzschean aristocratic individualism, and never lost an opportunity to
denigrate reason, socialism and class-struggle anarchism. Moore also repudiated the Enlightenment
unlike his guru Nietzsche and arrogantly described Kropotkin as obsolete, ignorant of the fact that
Kropotkin had critiqued modernity even before Nietzsche. Apparently Moore did not advocate the
revolutionary transformation of the capitalist order and the creative development of other forms of social
life based on mutual aid and voluntary co-operation. Instead he advocated insurrection by cultural
aesthetes. This starry-eyed follower of Nietzsche seems oblivious to the fact that the hermit of SilsMaria (as Nietzsche described himself) feared, hated, resented and repudiated all forms of insurrection,
especially on the part of the lower classes or the rabble, as he contemptuously described ordinary
working people. Moores linear two-stage conception of anarchist history is equally simplistic and quite
fallacious.
Within the collection there are some thoughtful essays exploring the links between Nietzsche and the
anarchist tradition, although the esoteric philosopher Ananda Coomaraswamy is certainly no anarchist,
being an ardent supporter of the caste system his anti-politics being related to the benefit of the
Brahman caste! There are also essays on the theory of chaos, an advocacy of which is said to be shared
by both Nietzsche and anarchists as you know, anarchists have long been ignorantly criticized for
being apostles of disorder and chaos instead of being honestly characterised as standing for intelligent
autonomy. This is as well as chaos being a characteristic of the world. The world, we are told, is
anarchistic! These detached academics do not appear to have heard of complexity theory, which was
actually expressed in embryonic form by anarchists like Kropotkin at the end of the nineteenth century.
There are essays also on such topics as nihilism, religion, and the death of God. Unfortunately these
essays consist largely of scholastic jargon and theological blather, with ample reference to the esoteric
writings of Deleuze and Heidegger. Im afraid they left me cold, and conveyed precious little about
Nietzsche or anarchism that I did not already know.
The essay that represents the main thrust of this collection is by Max Cafard. In a previous life he was
known as John Clark and was the author of a sterling critique of Max Stirner as well as being a keen
promoter of Murray Bookchins social ecology. Cafard has now, it seems, adopted liberal politics,
advocating bioregional representative government with coercive legal powers and a market economy, as
well as whole-heartedly embracing Nietzschean aristocratic individualism. What is surprising and quite
deplorable about Cafards essay (apart from his critique of postmodernism) is that he not only applauds
the farrago of nonsense and misunderstandings that Nietzsche expressed towards anarchism, but applies
this same crude psychologistic analysis to contemporary anarchism too. Venting his spleen on Murray
Bookchin in particular, as well as scores of other unnamed leftists, class struggle anarchists and anticapitalists, this liberal professor informs us that all opposition to the state, capitalism and other forms of
social oppression is purely motivated by ressentiment! Thus contemporary anarchists are dismissed by
Cafard as power-hungry dogmatists, fanatics, sectarians, nihilists as violent and rigid personalities who
not only have a contempt for people but are quite unable to love other beings or the Earth. Cafards long
essay is simply a banal regurgitation of Nietzsches own dim critique of anarchism full of venom,
malice, slander, misunderstandings and resentment itself. Enough said.
With a few exceptions the collection of essays in I am Not a Man I am Dynamitetake a rather
sycophantic and uncritical attitude towards Nietzsche, hardly challenging Nietzsches confused
understanding of socialism and anarchism. They also completely fail to engage with the concept of
aristocracy, which is a key notion and ideal for Nietzsche; and furthermore they interpret the
philosophers will to power as a purely a psychological category, involving creative agency. In fact, for
Nietzsche the will to power also involved social relationships of power, in terms of exploitation,
domination, suppression, command, overpowering the weak, mastery, and of course, war all of which
Nietzsche approved of and affirmed.
There is undoubtedly a libertarian aspect to Nietzsches philosophy: his solitary form of individualism,
with its aesthetic appeal to self-making so alluring to cultural aesthetes; the radical critique implied in
his revaluation of all values; his strident attack on the state in Thus Spoke Zarathustra; and his
impassioned celebration of the life instincts, personal freedom and power. But was Nietzsche really the
good anarchist as Cafard describes him? Hardly. For the radicalism of his aristocratic individualism is
more than off-set by his thoroughly reactionary mindset. The revaluation of all values did not for
Nietzsche extend to challenging aristocratic values, hierarchy, the class structure or economic forms of
exploitation and anyone who did so was vehemently denounced by Nietzsche as a dolt or a blockhead,
or as poisonous. Though he opposed tyranny and oligarchy, it is clear that socio-economic power for

Nietzsche should serve and protect the strong, the noble, the aristocracy. Under no circumstances should
power benefit the weak, the lower classes, the slaves or the rabble, let alone usurp the aristocratic order.
Nietzsche heaps praise upon the caste system and its ranked hierarchy; he clearly admired dictators like
Julius Caesar and Napoleon; and he even played around with the idea not simply of improving the
human race, but of eradicating the weak by poisoning their wells! Or was he simply being ironic?
Nietzsches misogyny is well known, and he often described women as chattel or property. Reciprocity,
mutual aid, and equal rights for all were all poisonous doctrines to Nietzsche, for what he valued was a
good and healthy aristocracy (his words). Dionysian philosophers, Nietzsche implies, should be the
commanders and legislators in the aristocratic order he envisaged. As a sympathetic biographer put it:
Nietzsche always identified with the nobility, and advocated a social system in which a small number of
select human beings dominates the rest and employs them as slaves (Hollingdale 1972). Hardly the
kind of society that anarchists envisage one based on mutual aid and co-operation and voluntary
associations: a free communism, a politics of community and of difference, to stick current labels on
these ideas.
Contributors to this collection may express their admiration and enthusiasm for Nietzsche and his
concept of the bermensch, but give me Kropotkin, Malatesta and Rocker any day. For all their
limitations you at least know which side of the fence they stand on: on the side of the oppressed,
creatively engaged in developing alternative modes of social life unlike Nietzscheans, who are intent
only on promoting a parasitic cultural elite.
Brian Morris 2006
Brian Morris is Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at Goldsmiths College, University of London. Recent
books by him include Kropotkin: Politics Of Community (2004, Humanity Press), Insects And Human
Life(2004, Berg) and Religion And Anthropology (2006, CUP).
John Moore (Ed) I am Not a Man I am Dynamite: Friedrich Nietzsche and the Anarchist Tradition New
York: Automedia 2004: ISBN 1570271216, 160pps, $15.95pb.

https://philosophynow.org/issues/58/I_am_Not_a_Man_I_am_Dynamite_Fri
edrich_Nietzsche_and_the_Anarchist_Tradition