Peter Kropotkin (1842–1921) was a Russian activist, scientist, and philosopher, who advocated anarchism. Kropotkin was a proponent of a decentralised communist society free from central government and based on voluntary associations of self-governing communities and worker-run enterprises. He wrote many books, pamphlets and articles, the most prominent being “The Conquest of Bread and Fields, Factories and Workshops”, and his principal scientific offering, “Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution”.

Peter Kropotkin was born in Moscow, into the second-highest level of the Russian aristocracy. His mother was the daughter of a Cossack general. His father, Alexei Petrovich Kropotkin, was a prince in Smolensk, of the Rurik dynasty which had ruled Russia before the rise of the Romanovs. Kropotkin's father owned large tracts of land and nearly 1,200 male serfs in three provinces. His enthusiasm for the changes happening in the Russian Empire turned to disappointment when the Bolsheviks seized power in the October Revolution. "This buries the revolution", he said. He thought that the Bolsheviks had shown how the revolution was not to be made; by authoritarian rather than libertarian methods. He had spoken out against authoritarian socialism in his writings (for example The Conquest of Bread), making the prediction that any state founded on these principles would most likely see its own breakup and the restoration of capitalism.

This book is first serious look at the economic side of the popular Gallic uprising, exploring: the spirit of the revolt, the declaration of the rights of men, the fears of the middle classes, financial difficulties of the Revolution, feudal legislation in 1790, social demands and arbitrary taxation, the problems with paper money, schemes for the socialization of the means of subsistence and exchange and much more. This book may change how modern readers think about the French Revolution.