Ask an Anarchist

[Old Hippy]

I haven't actually read much on anarchist theory apart from stuff that might crop up in other books on related topics.
So could you recomend a couple of starting books for reading, complicated is OK, but ones that don't require having read several dozen books before hand just to know where the point is coming from.

 

[Phrossack]

Apologies if these have been brought up before, I haven't read the first 21 pages.

How might an anarchist society be implemented and sustained?

What are the differences between anarchism and libertarianism?

Do you know anything about Élisée Reclus?

 

[Mouthwash]

This is a very good question which deserves a more considered answer than I give right this moment, and I didn't want to just ignore, so I promise to get back to it when I get a chance.

I'd like to know, too.

 

[Phrossack]

Every time I see this thread title, I can't help but read it as "Ask an Antichrist."

 

[ParkCungHee]

Apologies if these have been brought up before, I haven't read the first 21 pages.

How might an anarchist society be implemented and sustained?

I don't like the idea of implementing anarchy in a geographical sense. I don't look for the day Italy will become an anarchist nation, or something like that.

Anarchist relations and social solutions are everywhere, and they are in fact, the norm. We're engaging in one right now, interaction based on non-coercion.

The struggle then, isn't to seize power and drive out the "statists" or whatever you want to call them, but is the struggle between non-coercive behavior, and the coercive apparatuses of society.

The struggle for an Anarchist way of life is therefor a very personal struggle. It is not a struggle like other political movements, because it is a rejection of the political in place of the humane. That's not a struggle that can be measured in square miles controlled, or subscribers on a mailing list, but only in genuine human interaction.

What are the differences between anarchism and libertarianism?

While Anarchism is the rejection of the coersive apparatus of the state, Libertarianism is about stripping the state of the trappings and accouterments that the state has acquired over the centuries, and paring it down to it's essential function: the regulation of property and the implementation of violence.

In this regard, libertarianism is the most fundamentally keen eyed political movement today, because they haven't been drawn in by the ideological disguises Social Democratic, or Conservative Nationalist/Theological have tried to place over the state.

They understand the state is not created to help people. It is not, and was not conceived of, as such an exercise.

At the same time, they're by far the farthest from political reality, because they don't understand the roles these ideological justifications play. The state did not begin looking after people's livelihoods because the state is a thing to enrich our lives. It did so as a way to continue and extend it's power, and to grease the wheels of property ownership.

And lastly, because they're so keen sighted, Libertarianism is the most morally dysfunctional form of politics that has current currency. Because it sees the state for what it really is, and then sets about ensuring it does not even have a veneer of good deeds anymore.

Do you know anything about Élisée Reclus?

Not a thing. I'll have to try and read him.

 

[Borachio]

Anarchist relations and social solutions are everywhere, and they are in fact, the norm.

I agree fully with this. It's a wonder one doesn't hear it expressed more often.

I do, though, find it alarming when main-stream politicians start saying much the same thing. (Minus the word "anarchist", of course.)

 

[Hygro]

Spoiler :

Possibly, but not one that I would imagine transferring to a barter-system. To the extent that a stateless society adopts some sort of market or market-like mechanisms for large-scale problems (and it might; calculation problems are unfortunately A Thing), I think this would all be built around negotiation and trust, so any "currency", if that's even the word, would be about keeping a public account. It would be a matter of keeping reciprocal systems of behaviour transparent and roughly equitable, and if it stopped functioning as such, became a means of exercising power, then people could simply cease to recognise it, because it would after all exist only through consensus and not through the authority of any state. That wouldn't transfer to private bartering in any systematic way, even if we can imagine single off-the-books exchanges, because if it isn't functioning as part of a system of public account, it doesn't mean anything. (Further, I imagine that such a system would largely exist between communities or sectional organisations of some size- call them syndics, if you wanna get The Dispossessed-y about it- rather than between individuals, who I don't imagine would have cause to trade with each other in any routine fashion. And what use would it be organisations like this to engage in a barter-system?)

There's a certain kind of anarchist that gets a bit too enthusiastic about bitcoin, but that might approach a sketch of an anarchist "currency", a way of formalising a system of "paying it forward", rather than about exchanging values. Bitcoin et al. are still structured as stores of value because they exist within a monetary economy, but if you take away the context of a capitalist society, I think we can see them acting a something more like digital wampum belts than as money in the conventional sense.

(At this point, Hygro is invited to explain how and why I'm completely botching the theory of money and should probably stop.)

just saw this. I think you're doing fine. I'm in trope-think mode at the moment cuz I have to get things done so I can't think as critically as I would earlier in the year.

Buuuuuut as far as I can see your post was in fact that was one of the best post-money concepts of money I've read. Indeed it seems to me that given how we happened to have moved as a species, becoming increasingly numeric and matrixed in our thinking, a future more rational more fair system would still contain a numeric unit of account. I find your vision as good as any I've seen so far.

I'd like to add something, though, regarding a few posts above mine, which is that the state probably didn't just formalize a system of credit to simplify things but also to have a grip of the commercial and social relations of all people under the purview of the state.

Truth be told, the more I learn about what money actually is the more coercive the entire concept becomes. Its validity in a free system really does require that democracy and a social contract are sufficient expressions of a free society, which is, as Terx so famously reminded us, a dubious claim.

 

[Borachio]

Anarchist relations and social solutions are everywhere, and they are in fact, the norm. We're engaging in one right now, interaction based on non-coercion.

The struggle then, isn't to seize power and drive out the "statists" or whatever you want to call them, but is the struggle between non-coercive behavior, and the coercive apparatuses of society.

The struggle for an Anarchist way of life is therefor a very personal struggle. It is not a struggle like other political movements, because it is a rejection of the political in place of the humane. That's not a struggle that can be measured in square miles controlled, or subscribers on a mailing list, but only in genuine human interaction.

Hmm. I don't know.

Once you start talking about even small scale coercion being required in any situations, using accounting in some form or other (both of which Mr Fish has alluded to), recognizing that most of human relations are in fact anarchic ones, and that social solutions to problems are actually the only solutions, it doesn't seem much of a step to me to conclude that what we have now is pretty much anarcho-syndicalism anyway: people organizing themselves in ad hoc ways as they think fit.

It seems to be largely a matter of perspective. If you take a local fine detail view and concentrate on the rather obvious inequalities then the world does seem dominated by repressive state organizations designed to protect the interests of elites. If on the other hand you take a broad brush global long-term view, just who exactly is repressing whom?

I must be getting old. The more I look at it, the more political theorizing all seems meaningless.

 

[Mouthwash]

Do you think that Russell Brand is doing a good thing, right now?

 

[Flying Pig]

Hmm. I don't know.

Once you start talking about even small scale coercion being required in any situations, using accounting in some form or other (both of which Mr Fish has alluded to), recognizing that most of human relations are in fact anarchic ones, and that social solutions to problems are actually the only solutions, it doesn't seem much of a step to me to conclude that what we have now is pretty much anarcho-syndicalism anyway: people organizing themselves in ad hoc ways as they think fit.

I think the crucial difference is that you can't opt out - you're right that in practice the institutions which control society are little more than groups of people agreeing to work together, but in an anarchist society it would be possible to remove oneself from their influence. Currently, you have to pay taxes and you have to be covered by the police and the NHS; anarchists would say that this amounts to coercion, and that you should be allowed to opt out.

Do you think that Russell Brand is doing a good thing, right now?

I read a sardonic comment yesterday that most of Russell Brand's sentences sound like they should be ended with 'parklife!'

 

[W|M]

When did the black poppy start being used? Is it popular among British anarchists?

 

[Borachio]

For all the shirkers, skulkers, deserters, malingerers, fraternisers, mutineers, troublemakers, voluntary POWs, so-called cowards and those executed for having the only sane response to the horror of war between competing capitalists.

Hahahaha.

I'd never heard of this. I must get one.

 

[Flying Pig]

Yes... see, my problem with that is that a lot of troublemakers, shirkers and deserters may well have been protesting the futility of war between competing capitalists, but they also put their comrades in danger by doing so. I'm not sure how to celebrate noble resolve and passive resistance without also celebrating selfishness.

 

[Hygro]

Yes... see, my problem with that is that a lot of troublemakers, shirkers and deserters may well have been protesting the futility of war between competing capitalists, but they also put their comrades in danger by doing so. I'm not sure how to celebrate noble resolve and passive resistance without also celebrating selfishness.

Unless those comrades are the ones ruining it for everyone by necessitating fighting....

 

[Flying Pig]

Even so - there are plenty of good and noble reasons why someone might not disobey orders, just as there are for why they might disobey them in the first place. I'm sure that some people refused to soldier or were sloppy in their work because they were opposed to the war in general, but I'm also sure (having worked with a few of them) that some were idle and sloppy because they were idle and sloppy people. If all the men on all sides went on strike then there could be no war, but if only some of the men on one side go on strike then more of the rest of their side get killed. Whatever you believe about war or wars as a large concept, I don't think that allows you to let down people who have put their trust in you and have no more responsibility for the war than you do. I definitely don't want to celebrate the genuine shirkers.

 

[ParkCungHee]

Yes... see, my problem with that is that a lot of troublemakers, shirkers and deserters may well have been protesting the futility of war between competing capitalists, but they also put their comrades in danger by doing so. I'm not sure how to celebrate noble resolve and passive resistance without also celebrating selfishness.

See, to me, the much bigger problem is how many shirkers, skulkers, deserters, malingerers, fraternisers, mutineers, troublemakers, voluntary POWs etc., did these things for actually noble reasons, or in any sort of consistent fashion.

I'm very suspicious of celebrating the German soldier who had no problem manning the guns for the whole war, and then desert or became a voluntary POW in the fall of 1919. Or the fraternizer who was thinking about how much a Pickelhaub would sell for. Or the troublemaker who decided to punch someone because he didn't like the man's face.


Just because we oppose the futility of war, and the competing capitalists, doesn't mean we should reduce these persons into something much simpler ("a problem for capitalists"). Reducing people into essential purposes and judging them on that is what the madness of war runs on.

 

[Traitorfish]

When did the black poppy start being used? Is it popular among British anarchists?

It's not really a big thing. Mostly people seem to remember it when November rolls around, but nobody really does anything about it. (Like I said, nobody outside of the anarchist scene/movement, delete according to how generous you're feeling.) My impression is that it began some time in the eighties, but I'm not sure if that's true. It certainly seems like something that would start in the eighties, or maybe the nineties pretending to the eighties.

Yes... see, my problem with that is that a lot of troublemakers, shirkers and deserters may well have been protesting the futility of war between competing capitalists, but they also put their comrades in danger by doing so. I'm not sure how to celebrate noble resolve and passive resistance without also celebrating selfishness.

If everyone shirked, deserted or mutinied, there wouldn't be any danger in the first place. It's not clear to me that passively endangering people because of selfishness is any more objectionable than actively endangering them because of ideology or deference.

See, to me, the much bigger problem is how many shirkers, skulkers, deserters, malingerers, fraternisers, mutineers, troublemakers, voluntary POWs etc., did these things for actually noble reasons, or in any sort of consistent fashion.

I'm very suspicious of celebrating the German soldier who had no problem manning the guns for the whole war, and then desert or became a voluntary POW in the fall of 1919. Or the fraternizer who was thinking about how much a Pickelhaub would sell for. Or the troublemaker who decided to punch someone because he didn't like the man's face.

Just because we oppose the futility of war, and the competing capitalists, doesn't mean we should reduce these persons into something much simpler ("a problem for capitalists"). Reducing people into essential purposes and judging them on that is what the madness of war runs on.

That's a fair point. But I'd suggest there's a difference between remembrance and celebration, and in this case, the point is to highlight the fact that there were alternatives to blind obedience, rather than to claim nobility for the disobedient.

That's perhaps one of the reasons it's never really caught on: the red poppy and white poppy both make some claim to nobility, but nobody really believes that mutineers and deserters were inherently noble- or for that that matter they should be, that they require any greater motive than "I don't want to do" to legitimise their actions- so it's not an entirely appropriate vehicle for the message.

 

[Borachio]

Yes... see, my problem with that is that a lot of troublemakers, shirkers and deserters may well have been protesting the futility of war between competing capitalists, but they also put their comrades in danger by doing so. I'm not sure how to celebrate noble resolve and passive resistance without also celebrating selfishness.

Hmm.

I'd just like to emphasize this:

the only sane response to the horror of war between competing capitalists​

And present to the court as exhibit A, this.

 

[Flying Pig]

If everyone shirked, deserted or mutinied, there wouldn't be any danger in the first place. It's not clear to me that passively endangering people because of selfishness is any more objectionable than actively endangering them because of ideology or deference.

Hm. From John Smith's perspective, if he shirks then he makes himself a bit safer while putting everyone else in danger. If everyone else were refusing to soldier, it would be a different kettle of fish, but since they weren't, most of the time, I think it stands that putting yourself out of danger and thereby increasing the danger to those around you is objectionable. I've every sympathy and admiration for those who felt so strongly about their objections that they were willing to risk being shot for it, or who served as stretcher-bearers and the like, but not for selfishness or cowardice dressed up as principle.

 

[Traitorfish]

Hm. From John Smith's perspective, if he shirks then he makes himself a bit safer while putting everyone else in danger. If everyone else were refusing to soldier, it would be a different kettle of fish, but since they weren't, most of the time, I think it stands that putting yourself out of danger and thereby increasing the danger to those around you is objectionable. I've every sympathy and admiration for those who felt so strongly about their objections that they were willing to risk being shot for it, or who served as stretcher-bearers and the like, but not for selfishness or cowardice dressed up as principle.

Who says it was dressed up in principle? "This is insane" is reason enough to shirk. If they're set on getting themselves killed and him along with it, what duty does he have to cooperate in the whole process? Borachio referenced Catch-22, which is a good example: one of the most aggressively anti-war novels ever written, but makes no claim to high moral principles. The novel ends with the protagonist deserting, but it's given no sheen of principle, just a refusal continuing to participate in a great self-destructive game.

If there's an argument, here, it's that people shouldn't half-arse their shirking: they should shirk good and proper, if not simply mutiny or desert, render themselves entirely non-functional and force the military machine to write them out of the script. If there's a duty to minimise the likelihood of other people blundering into suicide, it only requires that we rid them of the illusion that they can or should rely on us in the first place, not that we have to fulfil their unasked-for expectations.