James Guillaume
Bakunin's lieutenant
Federation of free communes.
Reformist Anarcho-CollectivistOne of 729 ideologies · enter the Anarcho-Collectivist hall →- Role
- Organiser & writer
- Era
- 1844–1916
- Region
- Switzerland
- Social band
- Reformist
- Placement
- −52 · −92 · +52
§ Where James Guillaume stands
3 axesGuillaume's Ideas on Social Organisation (1876) is the classic sketch of collectivist anarchism: land and the instruments of labour held by workers' associations and communes, with products exchanged or distributed according to labour performed. He expected that, once production became abundant, communities might move to free distribution by need, but he would not impose communism in advance.
He was the organisational mind of anti-authoritarian federalism. The Sonvilier Circular of November 1871 demanded that the International be a free federation of autonomous sections rather than a body directed by a central council, a principle the Saint-Imier congress of 1872 turned into the founding charter of the anti-authoritarian International.
A schoolteacher and later an editor of educational works, Guillaume was a secular progressive who saw free, rational education as part of emancipation, working in Paris on Ferdinand Buisson's Dictionnaire de pédagogie, a key text of the secular republican school. His progressivism took a nationalist edge in old age: his 1915 pamphlet Karl Marx pangermaniste cast Marx as a German chauvinist.
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§ The story
HistoricalJames Guillaume (1844–1916) was born in London to a Swiss family from the canton of Neuchâtel, where he grew up before becoming a teacher at the industrial school of Le Locle, a watchmaking town in the Jura. He joined the First International in the 1860s, met Mikhail Bakunin in 1869 and became his closest Swiss collaborator, editing a succession of papers for the Jura sections, above all the Bulletin de la Fédération jurassienne from 1872.
Guillaume drafted the Sonvilier Circular of 1871 attacking the centralism of Marx's General Council, was expelled with Bakunin at The Hague in 1872 and helped found the anti-authoritarian International at Saint-Imier. In 1878 he moved to Paris, where he worked on Ferdinand Buisson's Dictionnaire de pédagogie, edited Bakunin's works and wrote the four-volume history L'Internationale: documents et souvenirs (1905–10). In his last years he hailed French revolutionary syndicalism as the heir of the anti-authoritarian International, and during the First World War his fierce hostility to Germany led him to back France.
Notable for
- 01Led the Jura Federation
- 02Anti-authoritarian First International
- 03Chronicled the International
Key works & moments
- 1869Meets Bakunin and becomes his chief collaborator among the Jura internationalists.
- 1871Drafts the Sonvilier Circular against the General Council's centralism.
- 1872Expelled with Bakunin at The Hague; helps found the anti-authoritarian International at Saint-Imier.
- 1876Publishes Ideas on Social Organisation, a programme for the collectivist commune.
- 1905–10Publishes L'Internationale: documents et souvenirs, his four-volume history of the movement.
- 1915Publishes Karl Marx pangermaniste, attacking Marx as a German nationalist.
§ Minds closest to James Guillaume
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§ Common questions
4 answersWhat was James Guillaume's political ideology?
James Guillaume was a collectivist anarchist and the leading organiser of the Jura Federation: on the 99ideologies three-axis compass, a Reformist Anarcho-Collectivist. Economically he sat left of centre (−52), favouring collective ownership by workers' associations with rewards according to labour. On governance he was strongly libertarian (−92), building the International as a free federation without central authority, and socially he was moderately progressive (+52), a secular educator whose later years took on a strongly anti-German tone.
Was James Guillaume left-wing or right-wing?
Left-wing. Guillaume fought for the abolition of capitalist property and the state as a leader of the anti-authoritarian wing of the First International, and in later life he welcomed French revolutionary syndicalism. Within the left he stood against Marx's centralism, championing federalism and workers' self-organisation. His economic programme, which rewarded labour rather than distributing by need, was more cautious than anarchist communism, and his wartime support for France against Germany departed from the anti-war stance of most of the left.
What was the Jura Federation?
It was the anarchist federation of First International sections in the French-speaking Jura of Switzerland, constituted at Sonvilier in 1871. Rooted among watchmakers and engravers in towns such as Le Locle, La Chaux-de-Fonds and Saint-Imier, it became the centre of opposition to Marx's General Council and hosted the 1872 Saint-Imier congress that founded the anti-authoritarian International. Guillaume edited its bulletin, and Kropotkin later wrote that meeting its members in 1872 made him an anarchist.
Which minds are closest to James Guillaume?
On the 99ideologies three-axis compass, the minds closest to James Guillaume are Giuseppe Fanelli (98% alike), The Free Commune (archetype) (98% alike) and Carlo Cafiero (97% alike). The furthest is Adam Sutler (0% alike).