Аннотация:Standard typologies of anarchism are based on categories such as individualism and communism that refer to philosophical issues or to different models of the future society. Such categorizations project an image of anarchism as more concerned with abstract questions than with practical matters. However, they are misleading. Through a cross‐national analysis of three major European anarchist movements, Italian, Spanish, and French, around the 1890s, I show that the most fundamental issues that divided all these movements alike were tactical, not theoretical. They concerned participation in the labor movement, collective action, and organization. By revising standard categorizations along these lines, anarchism can be rescued from the stereotypical charge of irrationalism and shown to be a movement in rational search of the best means to achieve its ends.
