Writing an introduction to any set of ideas is, really, a process of categorizing information in two categories - that which is relevant and that which is not - and the broader the theme of the introduction, the larger the category of non-relevant information. In an effort to limit the excluded information to an absolute minimum, I will approach the ideas of anarchism in two quite separate and unrelated ways - as a philosophical framework ('philosophical anarchism') and then briefly as a revolutionary ideology ('revolutionary anarchism'). The conclusion, then, will focus on the similarities between the two uses of the term and, hopefully, be able to define some fundamental characteristic common to the two forms of anarchism.

Philosophical anarchism recognizes the state as a centralized means of coercion and tries to find the moral authority of the state: when is it legitimate to use force and who decides? Modern philosophy is largely based on contract theory - the idea that government is legitimate if it is fair and if the citizens approve of it. Hobbes seems to suggest that when men form a state, they surrender some of their rights to that state so that it can, if needed, control or punish them. Rawls, a more recent American philosopher, created the idea of some original position in which the future subjects to a state negotiate its construction, each behind a veil of ignorance with respect to their position in the future society, and suggested that the outcome of such a debate would be a fair and morally legitimate society.

Both these ideas acknowledge the moral neutrality of an inexistent state - that there is nothing immoral about anarchy - and that a suppressive state has no moral authority without the consent of the governed. The social contract theory examines a state of nature, often defined by the absence of rights and existence of unrestrained freedoms, and shows how the creation of a monopoly on the use of power in a state would benefit all. On such a basis, the moral authority of a state is established as long as the terms of the social contract can be accepted by its subjects.

To philosophical anarchism, however, such an argument is insufficient by the following argument:

• That a contract is in the best interest of its subjects is irrelevant to the contract's validity. Only the accpetance of the subject of the contract determines its validity.
• The social contract assumes its own validity and a contract cannot be valid if there is no alternative to it: the social contract can be accepted, or the authority established by the social contract that is rejected will take action as suggested by the social contract. Either way, the terms of the social contract are employed.

If an alternative existed to accepting the social contract, however, it would have some validity. Plato suggested that members of a society implicitly agree to the terms of the social contract by their choice to stay within that society and if leaving society is a real option, the contract would have greater moral legitimacy.

Revolutionary or political anarchism, on the other hand, is the more classical form of anarchism - a non-statist socialist stance. In the 1840's, Marx and Bakunin met and argued in Paris, primarily over the role of the state: could socialism be introduced by a minority through a state, as the Marxists claim, or could socialism only be introduced by the working class itself? The collapse of the Eastern Block in the early 1990's has shown that the statist path to socialism was a failure, but the non-statist path has not yet been properly tried and assessed.

Since revolutionary anarchism demands the support of the masses - of the whole working class as opposed to a minority of intellectuals and politicians - there is a lesser requirement for force than with the Marxist revolutionary ideology. Revolutionary anarchism is based on the philosophical anarchism discussed above and, with that, the recognition of the immorality of force: an ideal anarchist revolution would be based on disobedience rather than violence; on wearing out the state rather than tearing it down. Inherent in anarchism in all its forms is a rejection of force, a rejection of violence; some pacifist ideal to the establishment of socialism and ideas for the establishment of a society that is not in itself immoral.