Victor Prosper Considerant (12 October 1808 – 27 December 1893) was a French utopian socialist philosopher and economist who was a disciple of Charles Fourier.

Biography

Considerant was born in Salins-les-Bains, Jura and studied at the École Polytechnique (1826 diploma). He entered the French Army as an engineer, rising to the rank of captain. However, he resigned his commission in 1831, in order to devote himself to advancing the doctrines of Fourier. Subsequently, working as a musician, he collaborated with Fourier on newspapers. He edited the journals La Phalanstère and La Phalange. On the death of Fourier in 1837, Considerant became the acknowledged head of the movement, and took charge of La Phalange.

In collaboration with Jean-Baptiste Godin and others, Considerant was a founder and first director of the La Réunion colony established in 1855 near Dallas, Texas.

After the failure of La Reunion, Considerant retreated to a farm in San Antonio where he advocated for a new colony in Uvalde Canyon.

He was a member of the First International, founded in 1864, and took part in the 1871 Paris Commune. He died in Paris in 1893.

Contrary to a common error, his name is not written Considérant as he explained: "... there is no acute accent on my e. I have fought in vain for more than sixty years ever since my name was printed to defend it [from the accent]!"

Citations

Further reading

  • Jonathan Beecher, Victor Considérant and the Rise and Fall of French Romantic Socialism. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2000.
  • Carl J. Guarneri, The Utopian Alternative: Fourierism in Nineteenth-Century America. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1991.
  • Principles of Socialism: Manifesto of Nineteenth Century Democracy by Considerant in PDF format