Ask an Anarchist

[calad]

Why anarchist blow up their food instead of eating it?

 

[Ajidica]

What benefit would living in an Anarchist society bring me, as opposed to living in a well-run Social Democrat society?

 

[Terxpahseyton]

States and countries often overlap but are not necessarily mutually dependent. The UK is a state that consists of countries, while an individual US state or an individual Swiss state isn't a country, but are - naturally - states.

How is any of this relevant Besides that I think that the differentiation of country and state you draw here to be a bit arbitrary or superficial (take your pick), all those countries / states rest on coercion to be in place.

Countries can also exist due to voluntary political association.

A country requires territory. Territory requires coercion to actually be territory. Otherwise it is just ... land.

 

[Falconiano]

Isn't anarchism essentially self-contradictory?

Which is to say: if a society were ever truly anarchic, then there would be no society?

Or is this just an incredibly naive question?

Society is an association of people usually sharing the same territory, it does not need a government to be determined as such.
Anarchy is just the rejection of rule enforcement from an elite.

I know that most of the capitalist propaganda tries hard to make it seem a society is in need of a government to work, but it's widely proven to be false.
In Italy we have minor groups of several thousands people who live indipendently on some mountains and they don't have any elite or government. They've been living like that for centuries.

Of course the elite wants the existence of an elite, so you will never hear them admit a society without an elite walking on the heads of the rest with the excuse of "controlling damage" can exist.

 

[Tahuti]

How is any of this relevant Besides that I think that the differentiation of country and state you draw here to be a bit arbitrary or superficial (take your pick), all those countries / states rest on coercion to be in place.

England and Scotland are countries. They aren't states. Therefore, your assumption that countries require states is disproven.

A country requires territory. Territory requires coercion to actually be territory. Otherwise it is just ... land.

You're reiterating your previous points without answering my point directly. [sigh]

Besides, why is that? Kurdistan is a piece of territory crisscrossing several states. And it's not just because of the PKK that is considered to be so. You might as well consider it a country, despite it's not a state. A "country" can be a cultural-geographical term completely divorced of any notion of government or states.

Society is an association of people usually sharing the same territory, it does not need a government to be determined as such.
Anarchy is just the rejection of rule enforcement from an elite.

I know that most of the capitalist propaganda tries hard to make it seem a society is in need of a government to work, but it's widely proven to be false.
In Italy we have minor groups of several thousands people who live indipendently on some mountains and they don't have any elite or government. They've been living like that for centuries.

Of course the elite wants the existence of an elite, so you will never hear them admit a society without an elite walking on the heads of the rest with the excuse of "controlling damage" can exist.

I agree with anarchists that society won't immediately collapse the absence of a state. However, the very existence of government is a bargain. We are not sure that anarchism can provide welfare. Or will necessarily lead to less coercion. So citizens surrender to a government to gain that security.

In many ways, the existence of government is a form of rational irrationality: Even if the existence of an elite authority is decisively proven as an parasitic thing, most have no direct interest in directly working against the state. If we don't pay taxes, we'll end up in jail, for instance.

And thinking of which, how would the anarchists respond to the idea government being a form of rational irrationality?

 

[timtofly]

I agree with anarchists that society won't immediately collapse the absence of a state. However, the very existence of government is a bargain. We are not sure that anarchism can provide welfare. Or will necessarily lead to less coercion. So citizens surrender to a government to gain that security.

In many ways, the existence of government is a form of rational irrationality: Even if the existence of an elite authority is decisively proven as an parasitic thing, most have no direct interest in directly working against the state. If we don't pay taxes, we'll end up in jail, for instance.

And thinking of which, how would the anarchists respond to the idea government being a form of rational irrationality?

What is the difference in surrender? Anarchist still have to work at surrendering their will to each other.

 

[ReindeerThistle]

TF, congrats on the new thread. It is high time people got educated in the theories and practice of all revolutionary political tendencies -- and anarchism and its many shades is often the least misunderstood. (Hence, the phrase "it was anarchy" to describe a chaotic situation is clearly an example of this). I would wish you well, but this thing is really taking off.

Question to the Panelists: what was it that led you to anarchism and a belief in anarchism?

 

[Terxpahseyton]

England and Scotland are countries. They aren't states. Therefore, your assumption that countries require states is disproven.

Err no, because there are just subsections of a state. They rest on the state as much as a village police force rests on the state.

You're reiterating your previous points without answering my point directly. [sigh]

I introduced the concept of territory and went on to assume that it was self-explanatory why a country requires territory and why territory requires coercion. Well apparently not.
So to spell it out a bit: What you think differentiates territory from land? Claim.
A dog pisses on a tree and claims this as its territory. Kurds live in the region known as Kurdistan and like to claim it as their territory. Such a claim becomes meaningless if not enforced against counter-claims. The establishment of territory pretty much by definition means to coerce others in bowing to your claim. Otherwise - as said - it is just land you happen to live on.
And if it is just some land you happen to live on, you have no country, but at best communities.
A country means communities claiming land. Communities claiming land means coercion.

Kurdistan is a piece of territory crisscrossing several states.

Kurds are not known to be anarchists. And as said, Kurds like to claim it as their territory, but they haven't been entirely successful so far.

 

[Tahuti]

I introduced the concept of territory and went on to assume that it was self-explanatory why a country requires territory and why territory requires coercion. Well apparently not.
So to spell it out a bit: What you think differentiates territory from land? Claim.
A dog pisses on a tree and claims this as its territory. Kurds live in the region known as Kurdistan and like to claim it as their territory. Such a claim becomes meaningless if not enforced against counter-claims. The establishment of territory pretty much by definition means to coerce others in bowing to your claim. Otherwise - as said - it is just land you happen to live on.
And if it is just some land you happen to live on, you have no country, but at best communities.
A country means communities claiming land. Communities claiming land means coercion.

I definitely know where you're going here, and it's good, just not fully there yet. Territories do not require coercion, but you have demonstrated a pattern that territories require marking. Violence is one way to mark territory. Other ways include pissing on objects. Or hanging billboards that say "This is England", for example. Or hanging flags. Or whatever. All of these do not necessarily involve states.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

Putting up a flag which says "this land is the territory of country x" but being unwilling to actually enforce that claims seems like saying that the Queen rules Australia.
It may be a true in a very technical sense, but on the other hand it seems to betray the meaning of "to rule".

 

[Tahuti]

Putting up a flag which says "this land is the territory of country x" but being unwilling to actually enforce that claims seems like saying that the Queen rules Australia.
It may be a true in a very technical sense, but on the other hand it seems to betray the meaning of "to rule".

"State" and "government" imply rule, "country" doesn't. "Country" is a geographical term that doesn't necessarily have any political connotations.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

So is Europe a country?
Is Siberia?
Are the Rocky mountains?
Why not?
Those are all geographical terms.

 

[Tahuti]

So is Europe a country?
Is Siberia?
Are the Rocky mountains?
Why not?
Those are all geographical terms.

That's a breach of logic you're making: I said that countries are geographical terms. That doesn't make the inverse true.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

Yeah but what differentiates a country from a geographical term?
You said people would not necessarily need to rule a land labeled a country. So what does this leave other than the label? Can me and some buddies find a country by labeling my garden the free nation of milk and honey? What is the meaning of territory if everyone is free to declare something the territory of whatever country? After all, claims don't need to be enforced.

 

[ReindeerThistle]

Where are the anarchist panel members to answer questions about anarchism?

Sent via mobile; apologies for any mistakes.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

Going the anarchist way and doing as they please I suppose

 

[Traitorfish]

(Just a note, I am going to answer these questions at some point today- most of the answers sitting in a .txt on my desktop, in fact. Sorry for the delay.)

 

[Traitorfish]

Okay, so "today" apparently means "in, like, a week". Sorry about that, had a lot on my plate...

Would a government(-like) entity that presents itself as a country but doesn't rely on taxation or any other form of coercion be compatible with anarchism?

Anarchists are opposed to authority, and that includes non-violent authority, which is what I assume this "non-coercive government" would be. Control isn't necessarilly excercised as direct coercion, but may take the form of monopoly over a particular intellectual resource or social function- even if, in practice, the tendency of ordinary people to prefer their own intellects and own organisations when given the chance means coercion is almost always part of the deal.

At the very least, we wouldn't see any reason to cooperate with such an entity for a moment longer than it appears proper to do so, which rather undermines its claim to any sort of meaningful "governance", rather than merely being some sort of private mediation firm that likes to put on airs.

Does this mean that TF is officially out of Ask a Red?

To clarify, I'll still participated in Ask a Red, but to spare confusion I'll be keeping my input there to basically academic questions, and saving my political and ethical pontificating for this thread.

The funding for all these public projects comes from the state though. Where will it come from when the state owl is gone? The reason private companies are able to complete a lot of these tasks is because they get paid for it. Without money, nobody would really jump at the chance to do it all for free.

Or would they?

The state doesn't produce these funds itself, though, but procures them through taxation, so again its function here is mediatory. In principle, the supply of these services could be organised outside of the state, either through structures of commerce or of mutual aid. The argument for the state is one of practicality, that it can provide such-and-such service more effectively than anyone else.
As for money, I don't think that most people are actually interested in it for its own sake, for its properties as money, but for its ability to fulfill their needs. If people can fulfill their needs without money, if goods can be distributed directly to those who need them, money would not be necessary. Like Star Trek, y'know?

Does the size of a society cause any problems for anarchist organization? Do difficulties tend to arise when a society (e.g. a city) grows large enough that the most of the members do not know most of the other members, and is this sort of excessive scale a major cause for the formation of hierarchy?

I think that it's hard to generalise. On the one hand, as socities become larger and more complex, it creates a greater need for large-scale organisation, which prompts the growhth of centralising authorities. On the other hand, this same development creates more oppurtunities for organisation outside of these authorities. They offer more oppurtunities to control, but are also more difficult to control, so the outcome depends on factors which can't be generalised about.

I'm curious about anarchist historical analysis, if there is any such school of thought.

I don't think that we can imagine a particular anarchist school or method, but I think it's certainly possible to develop an anarchist reading of history, but which I mean looking at relations of power in history (either between individuals or groups), and of resistance to or subversion of those relations. A lot of existing history can already be read as "anarchist", especially those examples of labour history with a strong interest in working class self-activity (e.g. E.P.Thompson's work), or studies of pre-capitalist societies with a strong anthropological influence.

How do we distinguish between adults and children in anarchy, when there are disputes between them?

That's a very good question, and to be honest I don't think there's a satisfactory answer. Anarchism tends to presume more-or-less rational agents, but in practice that tends to hit a lot of barriers, not just with children but with people suffering from mental illness or developmental disorders. Should an anarchist prevent a depressed person from commiting sucide, for example? No easy answers.
Chomsky suggests that we can talk of "legitimate authority" in cases like this, his example being that we would grab a child's arm to prevent it running out into traffic. The excercise of authority here is justified, he claims, because it stands in for the childs own insufficient reason. But that seems to me a little too easy, a little too willing to wave away instances of authoritarianism as merely practical, which would seem to reduce anarchism to a simply critique of certain kinds of authority. So, although I certainly agree that we would act to stop the child, I think that there remains a pronounced tension between an anarchist ideal and the more immediate duties to others.
I may be pessmistic, but my honesty tendency is to think that a "true" anarchy, an absolutely thorough-going abolition of all authority, is not plausible with a species such as ours, until whatever transhumanist ascendency we might hope for in the distant future, the best we can hope for is to keep authority "in retreat", as it were, to prevent the coalescence of permanent structures of authority, rather than to realistically hope for its total abolition.

I remember going to a Ralph Nader political rally when he ran for US President back in 2000. I get the impression that a lot of people who attend Green Party and other such political events seem to call themselves "anarchists". I was about 33 at the time, but it seemed like the median age of the rest of the participants was probably something like 19-21 years old. Reminded me a bit of a rock concert. Contrast this with a political convention by one of the major mainstream political parties and it seems like there is quite an age difference going on there. In my experience it seems like most people who call themselves "anarchist" or at least are most visible in the movement are usually pretty young. Would you agree? And if so why do you think this is?

Couple of ways of looking at this.

The first is that radical politics, or for that matter radical anything, tends to skew towards the young. A cynic might call it adolescent naivety, although I tend to think that it's a combination of the fact that, on the one hand, young people tend to have less of a stake in existing heirachies, and, on the other, they're less likely to have had their imagination fully ground out of them yet. (Worth noting, of course, they also tend to make the most enthusiatic fascists, too, becuase "radical" doesn't necessarilly imply democratic or egalitarian sentiments.) Anarchism, being a position which is inescapably radical, which by its nature doesn't really permit moderating currents, is likely to be even more predominantly youthful than other radicalisms.

The second is what people mean when they say "anarchism". A lot of people who use the term of themselves, I daresay most of those in the English-speaking world, are drawn to it for its connotations of individualism-without-egoism, rather than because of any particular affinity with Kropotkin, Tolstoy or Rocker. To call oneself an "anarchist" might simply be a short-hand for socially-concious individualism, which as you might expect is something youthful Green-voters tend to favour. After all, what liberally-minded person is not in principle against authority, however solemnly they might affirm the need for authorities in the here and now? I don't want to simply declare them "fake anarchist", because I think that even these shallow declarations of anarchism do tend to express some authentic affinity with anarchist principles (going back to that "not yet dead inside" thing above), but I wouldn't assume that self-identifications of "anarchism" are necessarilly very weighty.

What benefit would living in an Anarchist society bring me, as opposed to living in a well-run Social Democrat society?

Self-government. Even in the most benveolent social democracy, most of the major decisions about the world you live in are made for you, the structures of that world an alien monolith which you can merely navigate. Even with the most generouswelfare systems, most people are still going to spend a huge part of their time doing tedious, degrading work; even with the most liberal civil societies, most people are still at the whims of impersonal political and econimic structures; even in the most egalitarian and socially-minded capitalism, people are still ulimately subject to the inhuman self-interest of capital. Even the most utopian social democracy can't propose to do more than make all that a bit more bearable.

Society is an association of people usually sharing the same territory, it does not need a government to be determined as such.
Anarchy is just the rejection of rule enforcement from an elite.

I know that most of the capitalist propaganda tries hard to make it seem a society is in need of a government to work, but it's widely proven to be false.
In Italy we have minor groups of several thousands people who live indipendently on some mountains and they don't have any elite or government. They've been living like that for centuries.
Of course the elite wants the existence of an elite, so you will never hear them admit a society without an elite walking on the heads of the rest with the excuse of "controlling damage" can exist.

Although I agree with the broad sweeps, I'd caution agaisnt the emphasis on "elites". Elites are simply concentratiions of authority, and are objectionable because they are authorities, rather than simply because they are elites. Petty authorities are every bit as repugnant as large ones, and the language of "elites vs. people" tends to osbcure that.

Why anarchist blow up their food instead of eating it?

We don't have the patience for conventional barbecue.

 

[Takhisis]

Do you agree with Cheezy on the ultimate status of Anarchism being the same as of Communism?

Okay, so "today" apparently means "in, like, a week". Sorry about that, had a lot on my plate...

And like a true Anarrchist, you made a choice.

 

[Traitorfish]

Do you agree with Cheezy on the ultimate status of Anarchism being the same as of Communism?

I do, yeah. In theoretical terms, I'm more or less a heterodox Marxist, but I find "anarchist/anarcho-syndicalist" tends to better describe my political and ethical positions.