cooperation

From Fifth Estate # 418, Summer 2026 by Stephen Duplantier

Russian revolutionary and geographer Peter Kropotkin was a pioneer in understanding how forests and steppes were a living archive of anarchist practice. Every bioregional regime has its own variations, but the commonalities shine through. His major stance was that species practicing mutual aid survive and attain their “highest development.” He saw the forest’s mingled life, stories of plants being successful by cooperation, and not as a result of Social Darwinist struggles and endless war. There are struggles, but these are against circumstances and not internecine. Cooperation, not warfare, is a natural law, and understanding nature’s patterns is a way to know and practice more.

From Anarchist Writers

The Dutch-American primatologist and ethologist Frans de Waal died of stomach cancer on 14 March 2024. His research was of interest to anarchists for it centred on primate social behaviour, including conflict resolution, cooperation, inequity aversion and empathy. In other words, subjects which Peter Kropotkin pioneered in Mutual Aid and Ethics. Unusually, de Waal was well aware of Kropotkin’s work and mentioned it in his writings, noting repeatedly how Kropotkin “rightly noted that many animals survive not through struggle, but through mutual aid."