Godwin William - about property

About property (Predecessors of scientific socialism) - V. Godwin, 1958, M., Publishing house of the USSR Academy of Sciences, hard cloth cover, page: 176, with b/w pattern, format: 172 x 115 mm, circulation: 8,000 copies. Condition: excellent! Front cover has minor soiling, back cover has shop stamp.

William (William) Godwin (eng. William Godwin; 1756 - 1836) - English publicist, political philosopher, historian and novelist. Husband of feminist writer Mary Wollstonecraft, father of writer Mary Shelley. One of the founders of anarchism

Born in the family of a priest. After graduating from the seminary, he was a pastor for several years. Under the influence of the French enlighteners (J.-J. Rousseau, P. Holbach, K. Helvetia) in the early 1780s. broke with the church. Positively evaluating the Great French Revolution, Godwin remained an opponent of revolutionary violence. Godwin's political views are expressed in his "Discourse on Political Justice" (vols. 1-2, 1793), where, criticizing the existing social order associated with private property and state power that breeds violence and deceit, he paints a petty-bourgeois utopia of a free society of independent workers whose products of labor are distributed among all according to needs.

Godwin's petty-bourgeois utopia had a significant impact on the formation of various trends of utopian socialism, in particular Owen, and anarchism.

This work is a translation of the eighth book of Studies in Political Justice. This part of Godwin's work is especially interesting for assessing his attitude to the problem of property and his social ideal. The appendix contains the most significant passages from other parts of his work.