Dillinger4
Es gibt Zeit
Some of Nozick was behind Reagan/Thatcher social policies.
Educate me about Anarchism.
- Thread starter Stoat Boy
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Some of Nozick was behind Reagan/Thatcher social policies.
dennisr
the acceptable face
that may be necessary at some point - for now we can get by with pointing and laughing - then anarchists can blame the 'authoritarians' for the summary justice meted out if it all goes pear-shaped
nino_savatte
No pasaran!
All you need to do is look at Ayn Rand and the Objectivists to understand what a diabolical idea 'anarcho-capitalism' is. Their idea of 'freedom' is to shackle society to the whims of capitalism. There would be no regulation of the business sector, who would be allowed to do whatever they pleased. In other words they would be required to 'regulate' themselves. Business doesn't like regulation and it is hard to see how they could ever act ethically under an anarcho-capitalist system. I wonder what the Randists think of pollution and how businesses would 'regulate' themselves with regard to this?
DotCommunist
So many particulars. So many questions.
right libertarians can suck my balls. It would quickly become like a verhoeven satire, without the humour.
I think most things anarchists say turn out to be true BUT like you hint at in the post, i don't think they could run a society. Without law and order gangsters would just take over. And how would you share work out- who would do the shite jobs ?
I have a personal anarchy sorta thing going on where i mistrust power mad lunatics yet at the same time respect the few in power that try to change things for the better.
Steve Booth
Bourgeois apologist
Need to get away from the word
One of the things needed is a project which works. People might ask: So what have the anarchists ever done for us? There needs to be some sort of project which is fun, which is worthwhile and which gets peoples' attention and popular support. There are probably lots of them out there - let's hear about them eh?
Talking about the way words are hijacked and their meanings alterted, what about the most common application of the 'Anarchist' word in the media where it means disorder, chaos, violence and rioting? - This is the first hurdle you have to get over. So long as many people are convinced you are a nihilist, any kind of progress is impossible.
One of the things needed is a project which works. People might ask: So what have the anarchists ever done for us? There needs to be some sort of project which is fun, which is worthwhile and which gets peoples' attention and popular support. There are probably lots of them out there - let's hear about them eh?
danny la rouge
Ninja swords for all disabled people
Why? As Kropotkin pointed out around 100 years ago, international post was arranged (not consciously, but in fact) along the principles anarchism calls for. As Colin Ward points out in Anarchy in Action, anarchist impulses and organisational principles exist and flourish under every stone.
What does that mean, though? By "law and order" do you mean a state? Did you read the link in my earlier post? (Post 7). Or do you think anarchists wouldn't defend the revolutionary society?
This is covered in all the primers, and has certainly been covered ad nauseam in the time I've been on this site.
Furthermore, Libertarian socialism has a number of models for a just and fair distribution of work tasks. An example would be Parecon.
But I ask you this: if it your conception that the way it is now done is the only way? Give the crap jobs to the people with the least choices, and pay them insultingly? Because that doesn't strike me as a good way.
DotCommunist
So many particulars. So many questions.
Dillinger4
Es gibt Zeit
Voley
🐭
This is where the whole thing falls down, for me. The majority would opt out, I'm certain of it.
DotCommunist
So many particulars. So many questions.
Paulie Tandoori
shut it you egg!
They didn't in Spain. For eg: Orwell wrote:
I had dropped more or less by chance into the only community of any size in Western Europe where political consciousness and disbelief in capitalism were more normal than their opposites. Up here in Aragon one was among tens of thousands of people, mainly though not entirely of working-class origin, all living at the same level and mingling on terms of equality. In theory it was perfect equality, and even in practice it was not far from it. There is a sense in which it would be true to say that one was experiencing a foretaste of Socialism, by which I mean that the prevailing mental atmosphere was that of Socialism. Many of the normal motives of civilized life--snobbishness, money-grubbing, fear of the boss, etc.--had simply ceased to exist. The ordinary class-division of society had disappeared to an extent that is almost unthinkable in the money-tainted air of England; there was no one there except the peasants and ourselves, and no one owned anyone else as his master.
bluestreak
HomosexualityIsStalin’sAtomBombtoDestroyAmerica
The gangsters have already taken over. The last thirty years have seen the rule of corrupt, greedy, power-crazed bastards undermining accountability and passing public money to private organisations and lining their own pockets.
kabbes
First intersubjective, then internalised
Is this where I give my roadmap speech again? To effect change, you need people to be dissatisfied, to understand the goals that they are trying to achieve and to understand how they get from here to there. Trying to make change without all three of these is doomed to failure. That's why imposing change is so hard.
The point is that you don't just suddenly impose an anarchist world and then hope that people don't opt out of it. You persuade them that the current system doesn't suit their needs, anarchism is their best choice and show them the steps that will achieve it. Then by the time you reach the anarchist state, the question of opting out doesn't arise in the first place, because it has been chosen organically by the people.
The point is that you don't just suddenly impose an anarchist world and then hope that people don't opt out of it. You persuade them that the current system doesn't suit their needs, anarchism is their best choice and show them the steps that will achieve it. Then by the time you reach the anarchist state, the question of opting out doesn't arise in the first place, because it has been chosen organically by the people.
danny la rouge
Ninja swords for all disabled people
I know. I'm not particularly attached to any of the words that describe where I sit in the spectrum: libertarian, communist, socialist, anarchist. Too many connotations with all of them. (I toyed with the word "leveller" for a while, but that's got issues, too).
Although I'd describe myself as an anarchist communist (to those who follow these terms that's an understandable position), I'm not too purist about the sort of society I'd like too see. For me there's a spread around that corner of the map, as it were, which would include council communism and so on, all of which I find perfectly acceptable and honourable.
If there's a word that would convey all that, let's hear it.
Spion
I hear ya
I think he means like in Iraq. The existing state power was destroyed and no new power adequately filled its place. Result = gangs/localised political forces stepped in.
danny la rouge
Ninja swords for all disabled people
cesare
shady's dreams ♥
It would be interesting to write down all the bad/good things that each government has done ... to see how it all stacks up.
I suspect that people will look back and wonder why the fuss about Thatcher compared to what followed (except, of course, that she was the architect).
danny la rouge
Ninja swords for all disabled people
That's not absence of tyranny, though; that's plurality of competing tyrannies
Voley
🐭
That's the only example of it happening, though, isn't it? Or Paris in '68 or whenever it was, some argue. The rest of the time the world's done something else which leads me to believe that it's simply something that the majority of people don't want.
frogwoman
Let them eat newts
Paulie Tandoori
shut it you egg!
But if you take this up with Kabbes points above regards dissatisfaction with current circumstances and a unique set of pressures bringing about a strong desire to do things more equitably and differently, it does demonstrate that people can actually do quite remarkable things.
To be quite honest with you, one of the big big sticking points with anarchist theory for me is precisely around organisation, because accepted thinking of communes organising up to confederations and so on feels very last century. However, I've been involved in enough co-operative ventures to be confident that given the freedom and autonomy to act according to their own intelligence, most people would actually grasp opportunities if they saw them as bringing about a level playing field, for want of a better way to put it.
Spion
I hear ya
And every society has its wannabe tyrants who will spring up as the old power declines. The question for people who want progressive social change is how you will address the physical force those people will launch against you
danny la rouge
Ninja swords for all disabled people
I don't agree; I think people have a very strong mutual aid impulse. So strong it has to be - often literally - beaten out of us.
You're assuming that because capitalism's modes of organisation have been around for a few hundred years, that's all there could be. Well, even recorded history has alternatives prior to capitalism. There's nothing necessarily "natural" about any of them.
Paulie Tandoori
shut it you egg!
which then gets reported in lazy media as "ANARCHY BREAKS OUT IN BAGHDAD!!!!!!!!"
danny la rouge
Ninja swords for all disabled people
Indeed so.
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