"The Ego and His Own", the testament of the philosophic incendiary Max Stirner, remains, one hundred and fifty years after its appearance, the most subversive, the most antisocial, the most radical book in the history of political thought. Writing in a highly idiosyncratic idiom, Stirner launches an extreme and uncompromising attack on Christianity, the state, society, the family, socialism and revolts against the monarchy of abstract ideas, as exemplified by the entire rational tradition of Western philosophy. His book represents the culmination of Left Hegelianism. In the place of moral imperatives, he postulates the will of the sovereign egoist, who lives untrammelled by convention or authority. Rights, obligations, duties do not exist. The might of the ego is the sole determining factor in conduct. He takes his doctrine to its logical conclusion and, at times, to its illogical extreme by urging reasons for crime against all institutions and in the egoist's bid for power in the war of each against all, the arena of which is the embattled socius. He has been interpreted as a harbinger of Fascism and, among other things, an important proto-Nietzschean thinker. He bears many resemblances to his successor Nietzsche, as in how he champions egoism, celebrates the passions, and also in his call for a transvaluation of existing values and the need to create one's life anew. But there is a crucial difference: Stirner, a disciple of Hegelian idealism, is critical; Nietzsche, assertive. Stirner's egoism is spontaneous and capricious while Nietzsche's semi-altruistic egoism always has the highest social end in view. A must for those who want to discover a forgotten classic of political thought.
