Individualist Anarchism

Anarchism is the theory that there should be no ruling powers. Because libertarianism is a theory of limited government, some have argued that its logical extension (or reductio ad absurdum, depending on one's stance) is the absence of all government. Libertarian or individualist anarchism needs to be distinguished from socialist or collectivist anarchism. From the 1840s to the 1860s, anarchism was largely associated with the same social-revolutionary movements that produced Marxism. Although Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, in his 1840 work, What Is Property? maintained that all social arrangements should be based on voluntary contractual agreement, he also regarded property as theft. This idea is hardly the answer one expects to hear from a libertarian. The differences between individualist and collectivist anarchists are sometimes difficult to determine with ...