Benjamin Tucker

Benjamin Tucker

Benjamin Ricketson Tucker (; 1854–1939) was an American individualist anarchist and self-identified socialist. Tucker was the editor and publisher of the American individualist anarchist periodical Liberty (1881–1908). Tucker described his form of anarchism as "consistent Manchesterism" and "unterrified Jeffersonianism". Tucker looked upon anarchism as a part of the broader socialist movement. Tucker harshly opposed state socialism and was a supporter of free-market socialism and libertarian socialism which he termed anarchist or anarchistic socialism. He connected the classical economics of Adam Smith and the Ricardian socialists as well as that of Josiah Warren, Karl Marx and Pierre-Joseph Proudhon to socialism. Some modern commentators have described Tucker as an anarcho-capitalist, although this has been disputed by others. During his lifetime, Tucker opposed capitalism and considered himself a socialist due to his belief in the labor theory of value and disputed many of the dictionary definitions of the term which he believed were inaccurate.


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