I don’t know who wrote that Wikipedia article but it’s really really wrong. Libertarian as a leftist idea actually surfaces in the early to mid 20th century, at the same time as the mostly unrelated right wing libertarianism. They had maybe a decade head start on using the term. It really gets going around 1920 when leftist political philosophers start trying to synthesize lessons from all of the different sections of communism.
The mid 19th century is Karl Marx. The citations mostly talk about anarchism. One of them expressly says to call yourself a whole ass anarchist. So as best as I can tell this is a case where left and right wing editors have gone back and forth on the page with little oversight from political historians and left us with a page that doesn’t reflect reality.
The word “Libertaire” (french for left-wing libertarian, the amercian libertarian is called “Libertarien”) was created in 1857 to differentiate from “Libéral” (which could be seen as an equivalent to nowadays liberals). In France it is still used as a synonym for ‘Anarchist’, though it has a wider sense, since it describes any left-wing movement that opposes authority/power (so libertarian communists that do not accept the “anarchist” label are still included in the “Libertaire” label). The Wikipedia page seems well written from what I know.
@LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net Good luck in your reclaming of the word. There are parts of the world and languages in which it is still a powerful and unifying word for anti-authoritarian left, english language can still evolve this way !
That’s great. In one language. France also calls potatoes ground apples. But we don’t directly translate it. We use the words from the thinkers of communism. Which are Communism, Socialism, and Anarchy.
In French it goes back to antinomianism. In English it goes back to the free will debates in religion and political philosophy.
It hasn’t been a standardized label used by political thinkers until the early 1900’s though. The Wikipedia article is just plain wrong unless it’s the French language page. Which it isn’t.
I mean, do you really think political theories, especially ones that promotes international unity, developed themselves separately in each country? If you really wanted to use words from the thinkers of communism, you should at least know that :
- a good part of them were french
- a good majority of them lived in france at some point
- a huge majority of them were from Europe and traveled across many countries to avoid political repression
In fact, terms you actually use for anarchy, socialism and communism are both directly translated from french and influenced by philosophies elaborated in France. It does not even matter that it’s France specifically. England and Germany both have a huge role in this, Switzerland has a great role in the development of anarchist theories. Spain had a lot of influence on the notion of Libertaire. Russia and China of course brought a lot to the communist theories though mostly not for the better. All of these countries influenced each other, it is still the case.
Libertaire/libertarian was never a standardized label and still isnt, but it was used and not only in France, since half the 19th century. Just because it’s english language does not mean it should only analyze the political theory of english-speaking country. Without this analysis you cannot understand half the anarchist history of at least France and Spain.
Just because a word has evolved to a specific sense does not mean we should forget its previous meaning, nor does it mean it cant evolve back.
