Anarchist terrorism

Anarchist terrorism is the use of terrorism to further anarchist causes. Anarchists have often been portrayed as dangerous and violent, due partly to a number of high-profile violent acts including riots, assassinations, and insurrections attributed (sometimes falsely) to anarchists, mainly in the late 19th century and the early 20th century. The other reason for such a portrayal is extensive state and private propaganda labeling anarchism as a terrorist philosophy and anarchists as terrorists. Some revolutionaries of the late 19th century encouraged acts of political violence, such as bombings and the assassinations of heads of state Such actions are usually called 'propaganda by the deed'. Due, among many other things, to the violent reactions on the part of governments to propaganda by the deed, very few anarchists support this notion today.

Between 1894 and 1901, individual anarchists assassinated numerous heads of state. For example, US President McKinley's assassin, Leon Czolgosz, claimed to have been influenced by anarchist and feminist Emma Goldman - although Goldman disavowed any association with him, and despite the fact that he was a registered Republican who had never belonged to an anarchist organization. Because international terrorism arose during this time period, with the widespread distribution of dynamite, bombings were associated in the media with anarchists, an image that remains to this day. Private media, however, is typically hostile to anarchism. As a result, depictions in the press and popular fiction helped create a lasting public impression that anarchists are violent terrorists. This perception was enhanced by events such as the Haymarket Riot, where anarchists were blamed for throwing a bomb at police who came to break up a public meeting in Chicago, Illinois.

The use of terrorism and assassination, however, is condemned by most anarchists. Even anarchists who see acts of violence as justified in a context of insurrection and class war would often view individual acts of terrorism as ineffective, counter-productive, and even immoral. Much of the terrorism attributed to anarchists in the past has not been proven, and it must be assumed that some was institgated by agents provocateurs, a common practice in the past.