God and the State

He is remembered as one of the originators of modern anarchy, a foe to Marx, and a radicalizer of youth through Russia and Europe in the 19th century. His name has been honored by pop culture of late in Tom Stoppard's trilogy of plays The Coast of Utopia, and on the philosophical playground of TV's Lost, which features characters named for-and often interpreted to represent the thinking of-famous philosophers through history. He is Russian revolutionary MIKHAIL ALEXANDROVICH BAKUNIN (1814-1876), and God and the State is his only published work. Unfinished at the time of his death and rambling and disjointed at best, this is nevertheless a provocative exploration of Bakunin's ideas on the enslavement of humanity by religion, its use by the state as a weapon against the people, and the necessity of throwing off the chains of God-worship. It remains a vital document of the anarchist movement, and is essential reading for anyone wishing to understand the upheavals of 19th-century Russia.