SOURCE: "Fourier and Anarchism," in The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. XLII, February, 1928, pp. 228-62.

In the following excerpt, Mason argues that many elements of Fourier's philosophy were "typically anarchist."

In the writings of Fourier are to be found . . . characteristics of anarchist thought, together with some interesting peculiarities of his own.

He is usually classified as a socialist in the histories of socialist and economic thought. To open a discussion, however, on the similarities and differences between socialism and anarchism, and to attempt to relate the thought of Fourier to various possible definitions of either term, would involve a long and unprofitable rehash of the literature of the subject. My idea of the relation of Fourier to anarchism will become clear through the following consideration of his writings.

Fourier's thought fits very easily into the anarchist use of the conception of the natural order. . . . This is true despite...