Johann Joseph "Hans" Most (February 5, 1846 – March 17, 1906) was a German-American Social Democratic and then anarchist politician, newspaper editor, and orator.

Most saw in the doctrines of Karl Marx and Ferdinand Lassalle a blueprint for a new egalitarian society and became a fervid supporter of Social Democracy, as the Marxist movement was known in the day.

[12] Most was repeatedly arrested for his verbal attacks on patriotism, religion, ethics and for his gospel of terrorism, preached in prose and in many songs such as those in his Proletarier-Liederbuch (Proletarian Songbook).

[13] After advocating violent action, including the use of explosives, as a mechanism to bring about revolutionary change, Most was forced into exile by the government.

[14] Convinced by his own experiences of the futility of parliamentary action, Most began to espouse the doctrine of anarchism, which led to his expulsion from the German Social Democratic Party in 1880.

[15] In March 1881, Most expressed his delight in the pages of the Freiheit over the assassination of Tsar Alexander II of Russia and advocated its emulation; for this Most was imprisoned by British authorities for a year and a half.

Among his associates was August Spies, one of the anarchists hanged for conspiracy in the Haymarket Square bombing, in whose desk police found an 1884 letter from Most promising a shipment of "medicine," his code word for dynamite.

He was imprisoned in 1886, again in 1887, and in 1902, the last time for two months for publishing after the assassination of President McKinley an editorial in which he argued that it was no crime to kill a ruler.

[22] Most was famous for stating the concept of the "propaganda of the deed" (Attentat): "The existing system will be quickest and most radically overthrown by the annihilation of its exponents.

"[23] Most is best known for a pamphlet published in 1885: The Science of Revolutionary Warfare, a how-to manual on the subject of bomb-making which earned the author the moniker "Dynamost".

A gifted orator, Most propagated these ideas throughout Marxist and anarchist circles in the United States and attracted many adherents, most notably Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman.