Might is Right

Might Is Right, or The Survival of the Fittest, is a book by apparently pseudonymous author Ragnar Redbeard. It is considered to either advocate social Darwinism or satirize it, and was first published in 1896. In Might is Right, Redbeard rejects conventional ideas of human and natural rights and argues that only strength or physical might can establish moral right.

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Libertarian historian James J. Martin called it "surely one of the most incendiary works ever to be published anywhere." [1]

Authorship

Some, such as Adam Parfrey, suspect Ragnar was a pen name for radical New Zealander Arthur Desmond, a prominent advocate of Henry George's Single Tax. [2] Some see it as hard to reconcile the difference in their politics. Most who believe that Desmond was Redbeard believe the book to have been a work of satire.

Others believe that Jack London wrote Might is Right.[3] As with Desmond the difference in politics is great (London's political activism started in the Marxist Socialist Labor Party and ended in the Socialist Party), and mainstream London-scholars have not supported the assertion that Redbeard was London. Claims that London was Redbeard come, in part, from Satanists; Anton LaVey thought him "the most likely candidate".

Editions

• 1896
• Dil Pickle Press, 1927
• Revisionist Press, 1972 ISBN 0-87700-187-1
• Loompanics Unlimited, 1984 ISBN 0915179121
• M.H. P & Co. Ltd., 1996 (Centennial edition, with intro by Anton LaVey)
• Dil Pickle Press, 2005 ISBN 0-97282-330-1
• 29 Books, 2005 ISBN 097485672X (reprint of 1927 Dil Pickle edition)