Ask an Anarchist

[Hygro]

Anarchists tend to respond that carrying out the very same counter-revolution under a red flag isn't much of a response either.

Neither defeat or self-cannibalism offer much by way of a working model.

Which means the path to anarchism is one that doesn't engender a violent pushback, which means a peaceful osmosis of institutions reworked into anarchist frameworks?

 

[Traitorfish]

So, what are some examples of a working model for anarchism?

It depends what you're looking for. We could talk about the Iroquois Confederacy, we could talk about the IWW, we could talk about the distribution of household chores; it depends on what point we're trying to investigate. I don't think anarchism really asks for precedents, any more than Marxism-Leninism does, only the demonstration of possibilities.

Which means the path to anarchism is one that doesn't engender a violent pushback, which means a peaceful osmosis of institutions reworked into anarchist frameworks?

I'm more pessimistic. I don't think that existing institutions are problematic only because they're associated with the state, but because they're constructed around a logic of authority. I'm just not convinced that the solution is taking that authority onto your own shoulders.

 

[Krajzen]

It depends what you're looking for. We could talk about the Iroquois Confederacy

Iroquis Confederacy was... A state...

, we could talk about the IWW,

I wouldn't really call Russian anarchist... regions in the Civil War succesfull

I don't think anarchism really asks for precedents, any more than Marxism-Leninism does, only the demonstration of possibilities.

AKA not being total fail

 

[Traitorfish]

Iroquis Confederacy was... A state...

Not by any reasonable measure. It had no centralised government, no coercive apparatus and no bureaucracy. It was barely a coherent entity at all, really, more a roundabout way of describing the sometimes-existence of broad policy consensus between localised leadership groups.

I wouldn't really call Russian anarchist... regions in the Civil War succesfull

The IWW was and is a predominantly American organisation. It did not participate in the Russian Civil War.

AKA not being total fail

I don't know what this means.

 

[timtofly]

I thought the point was more that appealing to the will of 'the people' means overriding the will of some of the individual persons - Max Stirner put it as 'liberty of the people is not my liberty'. So anarchist systems have to be opt-in on the individual level, rather than the collective.

My wording was not quite what I was attempting to say. Anarchy is not the will of the people. For anarchy to work the will of the people would have to align with the views of anarchy. Not that anarchy aligns with the will of the people.

Not even Utopia is the will of the people. There will always be some who want to put other people down to maintain control, and those who just don't get along with the mundane and peace.

 

[ReindeerThistle]

Neither defeat or self-cannibalism offer much by way of a working model.

So, what are some examples of a working model for anarchism?

It depends what you're looking for. We could talk about the Iroquois Confederacy, we could talk about the IWW, we could talk about the distribution of household chores; it depends on what point we're trying to investigate. I don't think anarchism really asks for precedents, any more than Marxism-Leninism does, only the demonstration of possibilities.

Thank you, this last thing answered the question. That is, to say, what the above examples have in common is that they function/ed in the absence of a state (meaning no management of class contradictions because there are none). In the case of most Native North American examples (Iroquois, and even Blackfoot and Sioux) could have survived indefinitely without a state, as they did for what seems like 10,000 years. (North America alone supported hundreds of millions of inhabitants with zero danger of depletion of resources... whereas Rome in 600 years cut down every tree on the Balkan coast.)

Perhaps answer me this: how then do the anarchists propose we get to that point?

 

[Traitorfish]

Speaking for myself? Class struggle. I'm a Marxist insofar as I think it all comes down to class, in the end. Where I differ from Marxists in the Orthodox and Leninist traditions is in how I think class struggle operates, specifically in regards to how it relates to political parties and to states.

(Honestly, I've been informed by the more black-flagg'd anarchist that I'm no such thing, lacking the apparently-requisite enthusiasm for veganism and DIY culture, just a Marxist who doesn't like parties.)

 

[Hygro]

I'm more pessimistic. I don't think that existing institutions are problematic only because they're associated with the state, but because they're constructed around a logic of authority. I'm just not convinced that the solution is taking that authority onto your own shoulders.

I guess by taking over institutions I meant overtaking their functions and abilities--for example using existing social infrastructure to interface closer to the mutual agreements of an anarchic body. I don't mean staffing businesses and congresses with anarchists in the same positions doing the same sorts of things.

It does seem based on what you say you think won't work, like the most feasible ways to win are either to overtake the democratic system and vote progressive reforms that reduce our dependence on violence and oppression which would then vote away the system, or at least make it as relevant as your own Monarch. That or simply everyone in our generation just opting out...

 

[Traitorfish]

I guess by taking over institutions I meant overtaking their functions and abilities--for example using existing social infrastructure to interface closer to the mutual agreements of an anarchic body. I don't mean staffing businesses and congresses with anarchists in the same positions doing the same sorts of things.

Ah, well, that I'd be more willing to agree with. In fact, I'd probably be more willing than a lot of anarchists to accept the retention of existing social infrastructures, because I'd place a much greater emphasis on workers' control than on opting-out.

It does seem based on what you say you think won't work, like the most feasible ways to win are either to overtake the democratic system and vote progressive reforms that reduce our dependence on violence and oppression which would then vote away the system, or at least make it as relevant as your own Monarch. That or simply everyone in our generation just opting out...

I suppose this is where I veer Marxist again, because I don't think there's much possibility of actually convincing people to anarchism, or revolutionism of any variety, through sheer abstract argument. That history is not propelled by Good Ideas. If people find anarchist arguments compelling, it's because and to the extent that the state and wage-system are unable to respond to their grievances, because doing so runs contrary to their fundamental logic. You can't convince the dragon to slay itself.

And, that's over-simplifying, obviously. People come to radical ideas for different reasons, with different degrees of readiness. And it's not the case that capitalism is absolutely constrained by a compulsion to make the most profit in the shortest space of time, because capitalists too behave in complex ways for complex reasons. But it contains a truth, that there's no easy way out, here, that we can't simply ascend to post-capitalism through good words and deeds.

(Even Park, who places a much greater focus than myself on good words and deeds, will doubtless agree that any movement away from capitalism and the state is going to be fraught with suffering, that it's always going to be a matter of contention and resistance, even if we never lift a hand.)

 

[Masada]

Honestly, I've been informed by the more black-flagg'd anarchist that I'm no such thing, lacking the apparently-requisite enthusiasm for veganism and DIY culture

But you have the beard and the chain for it riiiight?

 

[ReindeerThistle]

Speaking for myself? Class struggle. I'm a Marxist insofar as I think it all comes down to class, in the end. Where I differ from Marxists in the Orthodox and Leninist traditions is in how I think class struggle operates, specifically in regards to how it relates to political parties and to states.

Well, class struggle is underway. Unfortunately, the bourgeois press has convinced many of the workers otherwise.

I guess my question is, then, what does an Anarchist do to manifest the class struggle. How do you form the vehicles of change for the change you seek? Or, do you?

NB: Most of the Anarchists (those who go by that name) I have met in the States either argue amongst themselves or, for lack of their own manifestation of struggle, participate in my organizations. That is why in the open-ended organizations I work with we don't impose a political orientation, (nor read from Marx, Engels, Lenin or Stalin) since Marxist-Leninists work alongside Democrats, Republicans, Anarchists, Catholic Priests, Methodists and street gang members.

(Honestly, I've been informed by the more black-flagg'd anarchist that I'm no such thing, lacking the apparently-requisite enthusiasm for veganism and DIY culture, just a Marxist who doesn't like parties.)

Since you're the Anarchist originator of this thread, and actually have thought these things through, I will take you for your word.

 

[Traitorfish]

Well, class struggle is underway. Unfortunately, the bourgeois press has convinced many of the workers otherwise.

I guess my question is, then, what does an Anarchist do to manifest the class struggle. How do you form the vehicles of change for the change you seek? Or, do you?

I'd say that an anarchist, insofar as he is an anarchist, does not. The class struggle is a struggle of class against class, not left against right, progress against reaction, and least of all ideologues against counter-ideologues. Any really credible organisation has to be a basis of class, not ideology- I'm even sceptical of specifically "anarchist" as opposed to broadly workerist trade unions- and I think the role of anarchists within that is to argue for working class autonomy, not to occupy a position of leadership. The working class is a revolutionary subject in its own right, not a vehicle for another, party-political subject.

Essentially, I take class struggle anarchism to be the communist party as Marx described it, that anarchists "do not form a separate party opposed to the other working-class parties. They have no interests separate and apart from those of the proletariat as a whole. They do not set up any sectarian principles of their own, by which to shape and mould the proletarian movement". The practical content of anarchism is working class revolt, whether or not those engaged in that revolt identify themselves as "anarchists", the identification merely indicating a certain explicit conception of that revolt.

Where does that put me in the struggle? Absolutely peripheral. Of no consequence, I might say. I'm a student in a depressingly bourgeois university and a part-time retail worker, neither of which present very many ready opportunities for struggle. (And, honestly, I don't possess a temperament well-suited to provoking one.) But, I don't worry about that, because I don't fancy myself enlightened above other workers, and so not burdened by any greater responsibility. I've just read a bunch of pamphlets and got myself pissed off, is all.

(That's the weird thing, about these threads, you set yourself up as an authority, even a paragon, which I'm very much not. It's just something I'm interested in, as much from an academic interest in statelessness as any political commitments (hence the tendency to emphasise "anarchist" over "class struggle"), and figure I might as well share with whoever happens to be curious.)

But you have the beard and the chain for it riiiight?

I dunno, I've been told that beards are misogynistic and therefore anti-anarchist. Something to do with how women are expected to shave body hair and men aren't, so growing a beard is like revelling in the inequity, and I can kinda see the logic of making an argument about how physical ideas, exaggerated tertiary sexual characteristics, etc. play out in a sexist society, but it seemed like taking the thesis a bit too far.

 

[ReindeerThistle]

Where does that put me in the struggle? Absolutely peripheral. Of no consequence, I might say. I'm a student in a depressingly bourgeois university and a part-time retail worker, neither of which present very many ready opportunities for struggle. (And, honestly, I don't possess a temperament well-suited to provoking one.) But, I don't worry about that, because I don't fancy myself enlightened above other workers, and so not burdened by any greater responsibility. I've just read a bunch of pamphlets and got myself pissed off, is all.

I must contest... when I was 23 years old, I was a student at a depressingly bourgeois university and a part-time retail worker and I had beaucoup opportunities for class struggle.

But, at the risk of sounding "Spider-Manny," wouldn't the knowledge you possess (which a vast majority of workers do not) obligate you to teach what you know?

My point is what, then, does an Anarchist have for the workers who want to engage in the class struggle, consciously (rising against their class enemies versus "rising" every morning to go to work). I mean, when I was apprenticing to be a plumber I spent a year hauling pipes and watching the professionals before doing the repairs myself. That's the way work is taught, apprenticeship; learning from someone who has done it before. Ditto for electrical work. How does the worker get that kind of thing from the Anarchist? Workers are not taught class struggle by the bourgeoisie... but because of the laws of uneven development, not all workers come to class consciousness in the same way at the same time.

I dunno, I've been told that beards are misogynistic and therefore anti-anarchist. Something to do with how women are expected to shave body hair and men aren't, so growing a beard is like revelling in the inequity, and I can kinda see the logic of making an argument about how physical ideas, exaggerated tertiary sexual characteristics, etc. play out in a sexist society, but it seemed like taking the thesis a bit too far.

I dunno, my gf loves my "nottingham." And she's as ass-kicking a class warrior as I am. No hierarchy here.

My people do not have a policy on Sexism or Racist. We do have a policy on Racists and Sexists... (not really, we're unarmed!)

 

[Traitorfish]

I must contest... when I was 23 years old, I was a student at a depressingly bourgeois university and a part-time retail worker and I had beaucoup opportunities for class struggle.

But, at the risk of sounding "Spider-Manny," wouldn't the knowledge you possess (which a vast majority of workers do not) obligate you to teach what you know?

My point is what, then, does an Anarchist have for the workers who want to engage in the class struggle, consciously (rising against their class enemies versus "rising" every morning to go to work). I mean, when I was apprenticing to be a plumber I spent a year hauling pipes and watching the professionals before doing the repairs myself. That's the way work is taught, apprenticeship; learning from someone who has done it before. Ditto for electrical work. How does the worker get that kind of thing from the Anarchist? Workers are not taught class struggle by the bourgeoisie... but because of the laws of uneven development, not all workers come to class consciousness in the same way at the same time.

The working class generates its own intellectuals. (I disagree with Gramsci on most points, but on this he is solid.) If they become anarchists, that's good, but I don't think we can play the tape in verse, dropping anarchist intellectuals into position of leadership, even the loosest or most formal sort of leadership. This isn't anarchism, either, this is really rooted in the council communists and the autonomists, Marxists to a man, who stressed that the self-activity of the working class means activity born of struggle, not provoked by well-meaning radicals come-bearing-theory.

The best I can do, as a would-be intellectual sitting at the furthest fringes of the practical struggle, somewhere on the far side of "Here Be Dragons", is to hope to contribute to radical thought, critique and history, and to make that available to those more capable of using it. To produce something, whatever, that might nudge these organic intellectuals towards a more explicit position on working class autonomy. Perhaps, when I find myself in a different situation, I might expect to lend a more practical hand, but that'll come if and when it comes, and no amount of theorising makes me a leader.

 

[ReindeerThistle]

I don't get it, then. Whence comes the education of the workers? You're at a bourgeois uni... Do we enroll there? And if your reading Pannekoek, et al, is that what workers should read? How do they know where to look? And what about injustices that take place now? The income inequality? Police murder, hunger and homelessness. What do anarchists do about those?

I want to know how you think this will happen... And why. That's why I asked about models, because you said that defeat was not a working model for anarchism... But then you said there are none.

As a socio-economic system, capitalism is quite young, when you compare it (in Europe,that is) to 1000+ years of feudalism and 7000 years of the slave system. So, I know Capitalism.won't last forever... But until something replaces it, it will hobble along, propped up by its governments.

What do anarchist think will replace capitalism and how will it?

 

[timtofly]

Training should start at birth.

 

[Traitorfish]

I don't get it, then. Whence comes the education of the workers? You're at a bourgeois uni... Do we enroll there? And if your reading Pannekoek, et al, is that what workers should read? How do they know where to look? And what about injustices that take place now? The income inequality? Police murder, hunger and homelessness. What do anarchists do about those?

I'll reiterate what I've stated previously, that I don't claim to speak for anarchists generally. I don't even claim to speak for anarchists in this thread. "Anarchists" are not a homogeneous bloc, don't generally believe that they shuld be a homogeneous bloc, nor do they maintain the pretence that they would be a homogeneous bloc if only it wasn't for these damnable splitters failing to up hold the correct line. People do whatever it is they do, all I can do is relate it.

What do anarchist think will replace capitalism and how will it?

Communism, and working class self-activity. It's not my privilege to instruct the working class as to what form that self-activity should take.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

No, you do not.

So being an Anarchist does not require me to believe that anarchism is actually viable? Because if I don't expect people to actively prevent power from being accumulated, it will be accumulated. Or do you think it just magically will not?

Well yes, obviously. Anarchism isn't about making clinical observations

I wasn't making one. I was making an argument.
If you tell me "yes, obviously" people will oppress each other under virtually any conditions and at the same time tell me "No, you do not" need to assume that people will actively prevent the accumulation of power to be an Anarchist...
Then I see you either standing in the middle of a contradiction or else I see you proposing a variant of Anarchism which is decidedly not political in the sense that it itself does not even deem it possible to become political reality.

 

[ReindeerThistle]

That's the sense I get from the panel on this thread, too, Terp.

 

[Traitorfish]

Terxpahseyton, this is a question-and-answer thread, not a debate thread. Please structure future posts in the appropriate fashion, or kindly refrain from posting.