Patrick Geddes

To answer the first, as briefly as I can: the anarchism of Kropotkin and Reclus shared with socialism the view that different classes in capitalist society had conflicting interests, leading to latent class war. They, like Marx, thought in terms of a revolution, an uprising of the oppressed, which would overthrow existing governments and ruling structures. They certainly agreed, as Proudhon had done, that property was theft and that the rich had inherited the earth - something that meant a lot to geographers.

But whereas late 19th socialists (whether agreeing or not on everything with Marx) saw the road ahead as a political trajectory, accepted the need for political parties, and were usually prepared to work within parliamentary elections as a method, anarchists took the view that a social revolution was needed, plus freedom from any kind of dictatorship (that of the proletariat included).
Their key value was individual freedom, and although they didn't use this term, what they were after was a cultural revolution alongside a material one: a change in hearts and minds, a coming together of free men (they used this terminology, although there were a few women in their ranks) without leaders and led. Although they are not usually linked to JJRousseau, a lot of their thinking can be traced back to him. (Ironically Elisee was originally called Jean-Jacques and Reclus in French means 'confined').

However their thinking was specifically a response to the19C industrial society JJ Rousseas never saw. Kropotkin wrote that representative democracy had served its turn and could not deal with the present class divisions. 'Anarchist communism' as his views were called took as its text 'to each according to his need'. Kropotkin and Reclus had developed their views, which basically didn't change much, in the 1870s in exile in Switzerland, after the Paris Commune of 1871 - about which I won't say much at all, as Mike Small will be referring to it. They wrote articles in various journals like Le Révolté and were essentially intellectuals.

But they were not ivory tower intellectuals. Kropotkin did not start or even really encourage the events in Lyon, in 1882, where a silk workers strike and uprising coincided with anarchist agitation, but at his trial he refused to condemn them, made a speech and was sentenced to prison for 4 years. He served part of the sentence at Clairvaux.

Elisee Reclus had also seen prison, having been captured when he was a simple guardsman during the second siege of Paris, under the Commune, and both were forced to go and live in exile from a quite early age. They were very uncompromising characters, refusing to condemn acts of violence even if they did not condone them. They also supported expropriation as the correct course of revolution and failing that 'la reprise individuelle' - ie the right of the poor to steal, because property is theft. This characteristic of theirs was intensified during the 1890s when anarchism became for the chancelleries of Europe and indeed the general public a bit like 'terrorism' today.

There was an outbreak of 'propaganda by the deed' as some anarchist characters called it, ie attentats or bomb attacks and assassinations. These were not random, but linked in a chain of repression and revenge, almost always by people who called themselves anarchists. For the most part their perpetrators were marginal oddballs, isolated both from society and from any organization, but the press tended to combine them as a conspiracy, the 'Black Hand' of international terrorism. [Conrad's 'Secret agent']

Much of this activity centred on France. Perhaps the most famous case was that of a man called Francis Konigstein, aka Ravachol, who left 2 bombs at the Paris apartment bblocks of magistrates who had sentenced demonstrators in 1891. He was executed. In December 1893, August Vaillant threw a bomb into the Assemblee nationale, injuring several MPs. He too was executed. Following that Emile Henry threw a bomb into the café Terminus at the Gare St Lazare. In revenge for his execution, apparently, an Italian anarchist Caserio stabbed the president of the republic Sadi-Carnot, in 1894 for not reprieving him. Elsewhere, a bomb in a theatre in Lyon, in Barcelona, the assassination in 1900 of the king of Italy and the Spanish prime minister. 'Dagger, dynamite and pistol' were seen as a threat to society, and in France a series of anti-terrorist laws passed, and a pre-emptive strike known as the 'Trial of the 30' launched, whereby various people rounded up for their views. [Paul Reclus descibed the 30 as
'a dozen burglars who called themselves anarchists; a dozen writers who had sent articles to anarchist papers; and a few comrades who were neither one nor the other']

Now, I am setting this out, so that you can see that in the 1890s, the term 'anarchist' was not a casual or innocent one. Although by modern standards, the bomb attacks caused hardly any loss of life (though they might have), they certainly caused a moral panic, coming so soon after the Commune and various other revolutions. All the people with whom Geddes was associated were in exile from their native lands for publishing anarchist propaganda. Kropotkin was persona non grata in both Russia and France so he came to London, Reclus brothers were in Belgium, Paul Reclus fled ahead off arrest and took refuge with Geddes in Edinburgh under an assumed name (as an engineer, he was doubly suspect in case he had constructed 'infernal machines'), Augustin Hamon editor of an anarchist magazine was tipped off and briefly took refuge in London, than on Paul Reclus's say-so was put up by Geddes in Edinburgh too. [I have n't time to talk so much abut Hamon who was a journalist, particularly sought because of his anti-militarist writing (another point on which libertarians and anarchists were very active in these years encouraging soldiers not to reply to the draft and so on). Hamon edited a review which would have been called advanced in Britain : Humanité Nouvelle to which all these people, Geddes included, sent articles, Geddes being for this context a biologist and specialist on sex along with Havelock Ellis]

We have some of their reactions to the wave of terrorist attacks, of which I'll give a couple of quotations just so that you can see that they did not distance themselves from them (extract from a letter by Reclus 1894):

'If you are talking about thinking anarchists, anarchists who weigh their words and their acts, who feel responsible for their behaviour towards the whole of humanity, it goes without saying that explosive fantasies cannot be attributed to them. Rockets that go off at random destroying staircases are not arguments; they are not even intelligently used weapons, because they can be turned against the poor and not against the rich, they can hurt the slave and not the master'

But 'when an isolated man, transported by his anger takes revenge upon the society which has brought him up in poverty, fed him poorly and advised him poorly, what can I say?'

It's easy to accuse the anarchists, he went on. 'it goes without saying that I consider any revolt against oppression as a good and just action. But to say as you [unnamed correspondent]do that "violent means are the only serious ones" - oh no, it is like saying that anger is the most serious form of argument.'

'If you read La Révolte, in which I write on occasion and the ideas of which I share, you will have seen that far from condemning Ravachol, on the contrary I admire his courage, his goodness and generosity with which he forgives the people who have denounced him'

La Pensee Social This was the same year in which he came to Geddes' s summer meeting for the first time, in 1893. And he was to come back at least one more time in 1895. On that occasion again, Reclus made no secret of his anarchist views. Here is an extract of a letter to his wife, which I quoted in the exhibition catalogue:

'In a few minutes, I am going to give my second lecture. The first [geography] went off very well, before a sympathetic audience, made up of people who really seemed to understand French. My fourth lecture will have to be in English, and will be for an audience mostly made up of anarchist workmen. This will be the difficult part of the campaign'. 16 August 95

With Reclus, what you saw was what you got; there was no way you could pretend he wasn't an anarchist by philosophy.

When Geddes came to write an obituary of Reclus, he played down his politics. He referred to him as ' a young idealist of '48, veteran of the siege of Paris [NB what most people wouldd understand by this was the Prussian siege] the irreconcilable exile from the Commune'. He had to face it of course, eventually, but what he wrote was 'Of Reclus's extreme political philosophy - his adoption and development of the doctrines of Anarchism - little need here be said ' there then follows a typical Geddesian digression about ' a higher idealism', and resolving it into 'Humanity as Individual', only to twist again and claim that Reclus moved away from the 'phase of negation represented by Bakounine' in his final writings (L'homme et la Terre, posthumous). He also remarked that 'the advent of well nigh every new doctrine in history has been discredited by the violence of fanatical adherents'.

This cautious writing lets us know that Geddes was well aware of the context , but seeks to tell us he did not share Reclus's views. Let me move on to the second question: why did Geddes nevertheless know and value these anarchists?

Part II

An easy answer would be that if we concentrate on Kropotkin and Reclus, but also Paul Reclus and Hamon, they were indeed intellectuals, far removed from the desperate and often maladjusted men who resorted to bombs. They were not rich, but they earned a living by the pen and had the respect of a powerful intellectual community which launched petitions to get them out of fixes. Both were family men,and in their everyday lives irreproachably law-abiding and the most charming of companions. GBShaw said of Kropotkin that he was 'amicable to the point of saintliness' And Elisee was described, by Geddes again, as 'generous, almost to excess'.

[One is reminded of De Gaulle, when Jean Paul Sartre was involved in various events during and after May 1968 in which he made inflammatory speeches against the government ; On n'arrête pas Voltaire!'. Civilized people can accommodate intellectuals with subversive ideas.]

There is also to some extent the awkward fact that Geddes, while he was engaging with aristocrats and French government ministers in the late 1890s, in the Franco-Scottish Society and in his negotiations over the 1900 exhibition summer school and other projects, was actually sheltering, as one of the family almost, Paul Reclus who shared all his father and uncle's views and who was actively wanted by the same French Third Republic. He had also sheltered Hamon, as we saw.[eventually the Geddes and Reclus family intermarried].

Another way to reconcile these, as I have argued in the catalogue, is that the climaxing of the Dreyfus affair in 1898-9 was a cement that united all progressive politicians and intellectuals - but that is another story.

The answer to our second question is however to be found not so much in personal affinities, romantic rebels or family matters, or even the Dreyfus Affair - but in ideas, and as you will no doubt already know the thread that unites Geddes and these men is geography. However geography was not something that they simply kept in a a separate compartment of their lives. It was also a world view.

Kropotkin had been on geographical mission to Siberia Manchuria, mapped the mountains of Asia. He loved what he called 'the joy of scientific creation' , but, he wrote,

'What right had I to these highest joys when all around me was nothing but misery and struggle for a mouldy bit of bread; when whatsoever I should spend to enable me to live in the world of higher emotions must needs be taken from the very mouths of those who grew the wheat an had not enough for their children?' [Caroline Cahm, Kropotkin biography, p 24]

Reclus was also passionate about the natural world and experienced it as joy. His brother recalled how on a walking trip to see the Mediterranean for the first time ' you bit my shoulder so hard that it drew blood'. He took a cosmic view. In his first book he wrote:

'the meanders of a stream, the grains of sand in a dune, the ridges on a sandy beach do not tell us less than the bends in a great river, the mighty mountains and the vast surface of the ocean'.

I can't go in depth into their geographical philosophies here, except to say that those who have read Geddes will recognize many points in common. What I will do in last remaining minutes is look at a project which united Geddes and Reclus in a common endeavour, and in which we can see in a small compass, - but a Great Globe - that universalist view which they both shared.

The big international exhibitions or World's Fairs were a feature of the late 19th century and a showcase for progress, science etc. but also served a politico-historical purpose: the Eiffel tower was the 'key' feature of the 1889 Paris Fair, (French steel construction) but also the anniversary of 1789 revolution. Chicago in 1893 celebrated Columbus, etc.

The idea originally for Paris 1900 was to have a Great Globe as the key. The Paris city council enthusiastically embraced it, in 1897, saying that

It used to be said that the Frenchman could be recognised by his small moustache and his absolute ignorance of geography. M. Elisee Reclus and his collaborators will give talks which will attract and influence many' - they also put a spin on it Reclus would not have liked: 'our colonial possessions so little known…. will certainly be the subject of public lectures'

Why had Reclus proposed it? He had been working on the idea for some time. In general terms because he believed strongly that children should be taught the truth. Flat 2-dimensional maps did not do this 'Children have to recite the names of the the 5 principal rivers in France, without any idea what they look like' . If I was a teacher, I would take them outside:… we would be able to look at the river bank, the current, see the ridges form on sand, the erosion of the bank etc. (much later than that earlier quotation: 1903).[ Cf P. Geddes and his field trips]

Our perception of the world should not be enclosed in a scholastic set of lists, or a lie. 'You must use a globe. The teacher should be intransigeant about this. It would be impossible to use maps withot betraying the cause of education'. Here he was talking about a simple wooden globe smooth surface in the schoolroom.

But the Great Globe was much more ambitious - a relief globe to scale, which therefore had to be 1:100,000, because of course any smaller and the relief would almost disappear, Everest would be a tiny bump. That is why all relief maps are vastly distorted. Another lie! Most existing large globes are not scientific, he said . He wanted the globe to fulfil all this but also to be beautiful : 'let us rule out any solution that isn't elegant'. And visible from a distance, if possible top of hill; and it will have to have a frame, metal and a skin to protect it. And it will need to rotate ; and have observation galeries etc etc. He got nephew Paul, engineer to help with the technical specifications.

One needs to realise that at this time, the globe was still only fairly recently explored (Australia on maps only for 100 years; interior of Africa; Arctic and Antarctic) and a lot still remained to be properly mapped anyway.

It would cost a very great deal of money, justified by ER as follows:
'This sum does not frighten us, because it represents useful work, which humanity cannot do without, if it is to acquire perfect knowledge of its environment, and we already know, alas, how much our human wealth has been wasted on futilities and crimes. So we launch an appeal to men of good will to help create this proposed project.'

Where did Geddes come in? Having met ER in 1890s, he took up the cause enthusiastically and tried to raise funds for it. Here is how he described it in his obituary of ER:

Fascinating as it was to listen to Reclus upon some great theme, as of Alps or Amazons, with his lucid and reasoned exposition, warmed with moral glow or vivid with poetic fire, it was on his globe that he surpassed himself. He had thought out how this was to be constructed as comprehensive summary of geodetic and cartographic science, how the panels must be arranged to be kept continually up to date, and thus form the permanent, yet ever-progressive record of geographic exploration and survey; how it should be oriented and revolved, lit and displayed, visited and studied; what should be its accessory resources, galleries, studies, reference collections and so on; in short, so as to meet every imaginable requirement of science, special and general, educatinal amd popular…[specs all 'plain and clear'] But then came the vivid phrace which brought all this mass of detail together; and the great globe rose beneath its mighty dome before his and his listeners' inward sight - a universal geography indeed…. The most monumental of museums…, the microcosm of the macrocosm'

Geddes also rightly saw it as 'the unity of the world now the basis and symbol of the brotherhood of man upon it: sciences and arts, geography and labour uniting into a reign of peace and goodwill'

There is a vast correspondence about the Globe in the Elisee Reclus papers in Paris. There were various attempts to get backing, or to combine it with a less scientific globe - partly behind his back. In April 1898 he admitted defeat. It wasn't going to happen. Eventually what happened was that another rather spectacular but less scientific Celestial globe (ie with the constellations marked on the outside) by Galeron replaced it at the Expo 1900. As Gary Dunbar puts it:

"Both Reclus & Geddes were regarded by their contemporaries as brilliant but impractical visionaries, notably lacking that one ingredient that the success of the globe scheme depended upon - shrewd business sense. Who knows what wd have been done with the scheme if a lesser man, ut one with greater financial acumen, had been at the helm?"

But the globe remained a dream and a symbol, very clearly echoed in Geddes's view of the Outlook Tower, as Geddes specifically writes: a visual representation of the world, with clear awareness of human impingement on it. The point about Reclus, more than Kropotkin, and more than Vidal de la Blache, who come to eclipse him in French geographical world, was that he recognised the impact of industrialism and human settlement on geography. His geography was political and surprisingly urban. Especially in his last posthumously published work, which his former publisher Hachette didn't take. L'homme et la terre.

As he wrote:

"Where all grace and poetry have disappeared from the landscape, imagination dies out, the mind is impoverished and a spirit of routine and servility [NB the opposite of freedom] takes possession of the soul' - this passage is quoted in The makers of modern geography which goes on to say that Reclus, Geddes and Mumford were all united in this. As Beatrice Giblin has argued, Reclus's geography was interdisciplinary, ahead of its time but firmly attached to a view of human society. In one of his articles, he quotes the story of the tower of Babel, but argues that now 'we have a shared language, that of scientific study', and in his final work he wrote:

"On this ball spinning in space, a grain of sand in the midst of immensity, what is the point of hating each other?"

Siân Reynolds, University of Stirling, from a paper given at the Geddes Study Day IFE 15 April 2004