Anarchy & Community at Modern Times, 1851-1863

The appropriateness of its name arises from the fact that it is a sort of distilled essence of modern opinion, a summary and condemnation of the most remarkable peculiarities of modern society.-Henry Edger, Modern Times and the Labor Question IN 1864 THOMAS LOW NICHOLS, in his review of American intentional communities, asserted that "no social experiment in America has had any permanence, or any considerable success, that has not been based upon the religious sentiment."x He then described the Shakers and the Mormons as groups which had founded prosperous and longlived colonies.To support his argument by negative examples, Dr. Nichols referred to Robert Owen's failure at New Harmony and wrote at some length about an anarchist community in New York called Modern Times.Rosabeth Kanter, in her 1972 study of intentional communities, also placed Modern Times among the unsuccessful communities of the nineteenth century.According to Kanter's analysis, Modern Times lasted only fifteen years because its founders and inhabitants failed to develop mechanisms for commitment.Without a leadership hierarchy, Modern Times made no demands on its members.It had no fixed daily routines like those at more successful communities, where, "every bit of daily life was infused with the group's philosophy."At Modern Times there was no guide for behavior; there were, in fact, no rules at all.One symptom of the consistent adherence to anarchy at Modern Times was a period of free love.