Anton Semenovych Makarenko (Ukrainian: Анто́н Семе́нович Макаре́нко, Russian: Анто́н Семёнович Мака́ренко, *1888  – †1939) was a Ukrainian and Soviet educator and writer, who promoted democratic ideas and principles in educational theory and practice. As one of the founders of Soviet pedagogy, he elaborated the theory and methodology of upbringing in self-governing child collectives and introduced the concept of productive labor into the educational system. Makarenko is often reckoned among the world’s great educators, and his books have been published in many countries.

In the aftermath of the Russian Revolution he established self-supporting orphanages for street children - including juvenile delinquents - left orphaned by the Russian Civil War. Among these establishments were the Gorky colony and later the Dzerzhinsky labor commune in Kharkiv, where the FED camera was produced.

Although there was some opposition by the authorities at the early stages of Makarenko's "experiments", the Soviet establishment eventually came to hail his colonies as a grand success in communist education and rehabilitation. Among his key ideas were "as much exigence towards the person as possible and as much respect for him as possible", the use of positive peer pressure on the individual by the collective, and institutionalized self-government and self-management of that collective. He also rejected physical punishment.

Makarenko was one of the first Soviet educators to urge that the activities of various educational institutions—i.e., the school, the family, clubs, public organizations, production collectives and the community existing at the place of residence—should be integrated.

Makarenko wrote several books, of which The Pedagogical Poem (Педагогическая поэма), a fictionalized story of the Gorky Colony, was especially popular in the USSR. In 1955 a movie with English title Road to Life was produced.

Like most things Soviet, Makarenko's ideas came under heavy criticism after the fall of communism. His system has been accused of many of the same supposed faults as Soviet Communism in general, such as giving the child collective too much power over the individual child, over-emphasizing discipline and leaving insufficient space for individual freedom.