The law has no claim to human respect. It has no civilizing mission; its only purpose is to protect exploitation.
Peter KropotkinRead
True progress lies in the direction of decentralization, both territorial and functional, in the development of the spirit of local and personal initiative, and of free federation from the simple to the compound, in lieu of the present hierarchy from the centre to the periphery.
Interpretation
What this quote means
True progress is achieved by decentralizing power and fostering local initiatives.
In this quote, Kropotkin asserts that genuine advancement in society is rooted in the decentralization of authority. By promoting local autonomy and encouraging individual initiative, society can thrive through collective efforts, rather than being constrained by a centralized hierarchy. This shift from a rigid structure to a more fluid and cooperative model is essential for meaningful development.
Themes
DecentralizationInitiativeProgressLocalCooperation
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in a presentation about local governance reforms.
More from Peter Kropotkin
All quotes →Have not prisons - which kill all will and force of character in man, which enclose within their walls more vices than are met with on any other spot of the globe - always been universities of crime?
Peter KropotkinRead
Man is appealed to be guided in his acts, not merely by love, which is always personal, or at best tribal, but by his perception of his oneness with each human being. In the practice of mutual aid, which we can re-trace to the earliest beginnings of evolution, we thus find the positive and undoubted origin of our ethical conceptions; and we can affirm that in the ethical progress of man, mutual support- not mutual struggle- has had the leading part.
Peter KropotkinRead
It is only by the abolition of the State, by the conquest of perfect liberty by the individual, by free agreement, association, and absolute free federation that we can reach Communism — the possession in common of our social inheritance, and the production in common of all riches.
Peter KropotkinRead
When we ask for the abolition of the State and its organs we are always told that we dream of a society composed of men better than they are in reality. But no; a thousand times, no. All we ask is that men should not be made worse than they are, by such institutions!
Peter KropotkinRead
Everywhere you will find that the wealth of the wealthy springs from the poverty of the poor.
Peter KropotkinRead
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We are here because one odd group of fishes had a peculiar fin anatomy that could transform into legs for terrestrial creatures; because the earth never froze entirely during an ice age; because a small and tenuous species, arising in Africa a quarter of a million years ago, has managed, so far, to survive by hook and by crook. We may yearn for a ‘higher answer’– but none exists
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