"If we hope and even assume that the social question will be answered through communism, and not in this or that country but in the world, any thought of centralization must be a monstrosity"
About this Quote
The line lands like a dare: if you truly believe communism is the answer to the “social question” - not as a local reform project, but as a global upheaval - then centralization isn’t just a tactical mistake. It’s a moral and structural abomination. Most is drawing a bright boundary inside the revolutionary camp, aiming his fire at the temptation to treat socialism as something that can be administered from above once the old order is toppled.
“Hope and even assume” is doing sly work. He acknowledges the quasi-religious faith that animates big political movements, then immediately tries to discipline that faith with a hard rule: ends and means have to match. A worldwide emancipation cannot be built on a machine of command. The word “monstrosity” isn’t rhetorical excess; it’s a warning about how revolutions mutate. Centralization doesn’t merely concentrate power, it breeds a new ruling class, reproducing the very hierarchy communism claims to abolish.
Context matters. Most is writing out of the late 19th-century split between authoritarian socialism and anarchist-inflected revolutionary currents, shaped by the Paris Commune’s lessons and the growing shadow of party discipline and state power. His insistence on “in the world” is also a jab at narrow nationalism: a centralized communist state would be forced to compete, police borders, manage scarcity, and suppress dissent. Global liberation, in his view, requires decentralized organization precisely because the state form is designed for control, not freedom.
“Hope and even assume” is doing sly work. He acknowledges the quasi-religious faith that animates big political movements, then immediately tries to discipline that faith with a hard rule: ends and means have to match. A worldwide emancipation cannot be built on a machine of command. The word “monstrosity” isn’t rhetorical excess; it’s a warning about how revolutions mutate. Centralization doesn’t merely concentrate power, it breeds a new ruling class, reproducing the very hierarchy communism claims to abolish.
Context matters. Most is writing out of the late 19th-century split between authoritarian socialism and anarchist-inflected revolutionary currents, shaped by the Paris Commune’s lessons and the growing shadow of party discipline and state power. His insistence on “in the world” is also a jab at narrow nationalism: a centralized communist state would be forced to compete, police borders, manage scarcity, and suppress dissent. Global liberation, in his view, requires decentralized organization precisely because the state form is designed for control, not freedom.
Quote Details
| Topic | Freedom |
|---|
More Quotes by Johann
Add to List
