Biographical Material

James Guillaume (1844-1916)

James Guillaume was born in London, February 16, 1844 to George and Susanne Guillaume. Guillaume first became interested in Anarchism as a student in Zurich, and furthered his interest and understanding as a printer in Neuchatel, Switzerland. He later became one of the leading members of the Jura Federation, the Anarchist wing, of the First International. He met Bakunin in 1869, and adopted much of his anarcho-collectivist ideas. Both Guillaume and Bakunin were expelled from the International at the Hague Congress in 1872. In 1876 he wrote his essay Ideas on Social Organization. Guillaume was later active in founding the Anarchist St. Imier International. He played a large role in Kropotkins conversion to Anarchism. The two, Guillaume and Kropotkin worked together in Switzerland during the later 1870s as anarchist agitators. And soon after, in the early 1880s, Guillaume withdrew himself from the movement, only to become active again twenty years later in the Anarcho-Syndicalist movement. During this period he wrote L'International: Documents et Souvenirs, a four-volume work which is one of the more important pieces of work documenting the Anarchist point of view relating to the First International. In 1889 he became a French citizen. He edited Bakunins collected works published in French in 1907, as well as writing Bakunins biography. He died November 20, 1916.