Evolution and revolution: The anarchist geographers Elisée Reclus and Pëtr Kropotkin and their connection to modern science in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries

Abstract

This text examines the construction of a line of scientific thinking by a group of anarchist geographers who were active in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, most famously represented by Elisée Reclus and Pëtr Kropotkin. The members of this network were simultaneously intellectuals and activists, and the originality of their scientific production stands out in comparison with the science of that time. They were also interested in disciplines such as sociology, anthropology, and pedagogy, and used the scientific tools from the leading intellectual trains of thought of that era (such as positivism and especially evolutionism) in an attempt to reach different conclusions that did not justify social inequalities, but rather could be used to construct a fairer society.