James Guillaume

James Guillaume ( born on 16 February 1844 in London, † November 20, 1916 in Paris) was a Swiss anarchist and writer. He was one of the leading members of the Jura Federation in the First International, from which emerged the first anarchist movement in Switzerland.

Life

James Guillaume was born as the son of a Swiss watch dealer in London. In 1848 his family returned back to Switzerland after the Neuchâtel public against the Prussian monarchs collected and had been a republican constitution. Guillaume's father was in the new Republic of Neuchâtel judge, prefect and 1853-1888 Council of State.

After high school, James Guillaume studied from 1862 to 1864 at the University of Zurich philosophy and literature. During his studies he translated Gottfried Keller's novella collection The People of Seldwyla into French. After his studies he became in 1864 teacher of history and literature at the trade school in Le Locle. In order to form the working population, he organized evening lectures for apprentices. He read, among others the works of Ludwig Feuerbach, Charles Darwin, Charles Fourier, and Louis Blanc.

The call to unite all workers, which was founded in London in 1864 First International resulted in the Jura and western Switzerland to the formation of the sections. Guillaume founded in Le Locle, together with the old Republican Constant Meuron in 1866 a section. In the years 1868 to 1870 was editor of Guillaume Le Progres, the first anarchist newspaper in Switzerland.

Ideological tensions divided the International into two groups. The 1871 in the Jura Federation (Fédération Jurassic ) combined sections demanded in the circular of Sonvilier the reorganization of the London International on a federal basis and the conversion of the General Council in a correspondence office. At the Hague Congress of the International in 1872, the delegates decided majority for the position of Karl Marx, that the conquest of political power is necessary and required by the anarchists against the restriction on the economic struggle and joined Guillaume and Mikhail Bakunin from.

The minority of the First International founded in 1872 in St. Imier anti-authoritarian International, which henceforth had its center in the Jura. The national federations of Belgium, England, Holland, Italy and Spain joined in because they wanted to maintain their independence by the General Council in London. The Jura - anarchism of the 1870s developed by free political discussions on the one hand by the ideas of Michael Bakunin's starting, who was friends with Guillaume, on the other hand, the experience of evaluating own practice. James Guillaume was instrumental in Peter Kropotkin's conversion to anarchism and helped him with the anarchist agitation of Switzerland in the 1870s.

Guillaume had already been released in 1869 as a teacher for his political activities. He moved to Neuchâtel, where he took over the family printing company. From 1872 to 1878 he edited the Bulletin de la Fédération Jurassic, in which he further formulated the theory libertärsozialistische.

1878, the political pressure was so great that Guillaume had to emigrate to Paris, where he was offered at an educational dictionary employees. He was concerned with the education of the French Revolution and later became editorial secretary of the geographical lexicon of Hachette. A political activity was not possible in the climate of the post- Commune - time.

It was not until 1905 been politically active when they a continuation of his libertärsozialistischen ideas of the First International noted in the emerging anarcho-syndicalist movement.

Works

His four-volume book L' International: Documents et souvenirs is the most important source of information about the First International from an anarchist perspective.

Guillaume edited Bakunin's collected works, which were published in 1907 in French.