19th Century
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon
1809–1865 · Mutualism
Property is theft, and the first anarchist said it out loud.
In their words
“Liberty is not the daughter but the mother of order.”
Proudhon answered the question What is Property? with the most famous answer in the movement's history: it is theft, insofar as it is the right of a few to live from the labor of others. He called instead for a society of small holders and mutual credit without a state or a master, and was the first to adopt the word anarchist as a term of honor rather than accusation.
Why it matters for freedom
He coined the word anarchist for a positive program: order that grows from free contracts instead of commands.
Who they stood against
property privilege, the state, and the socialists who wanted a bigger state instead