Kropotkin, Pëtr Alekseevich (1842–1921)

A founder of anarchist communism and guiding spirit of the international anarchist movement after the death of Bakunin, Kropotkin was also a distinguished geographer, a scientist and a positivist. He saw the development of anarchism as one aspect of the whole movement of modern science towards an integrated philosophy. He believed that the dominant phenomenon in nature was harmony, arrived at by a continuous process of adjustment between contending forces. In human, as in animal societies, the dominant phenomenon was mutual aid: thus once metaphysics, law and state authority had been shaken off, harmony could be realized.