reasons why people say anarchism could never work

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peebo
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02 Feb 2012, 3:42 am

fraac wrote:
I labelled the formulations of anarchism that I've seen, not Noam Chomsky. I always like to be sufficiently specific.


i do apologise, i took your comment as referring to anarchists in general and should have been more specific. but this does perhaps suggest that in the instance you are interested, further research may be indicated.

Quote:
'Communism rejects authority'... but you said 'no individual has the right to coerce another' and 'anarchism generally holds that a set of rules...' and 'capital would be held in common ownership'. Those all imply an authority to stop unwanted things happening.


third party authority is not required to enforce rights given a common consensus on what these rights are. the community itself enforces them. this is a principle of almost every form of anarchism, or libertarian forms at least (and, that is, libertarian in the european rather than american context, of course).
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Also, ACTUAL HISTORY, where Communism didn't work because the regulators weren't autistic so considered themselves a privileged class. How do you argue against actual history that shows the failings of a system designed to control human nature?


ACTUAL HISTORY exhibits zero examples of communism. we can look at the russian revolution which was working very briefly towards a pre-communist society before being usurped. however many would argue that it had no chance right from the start, particularly those of a marxist bent. marxist thought dictates that russian society was certainly not an ideal starting point for a communist revolution. and them we have the rise of stalin and the notion of socialism in one state. it was bound to fail from that point.


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peebo
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02 Feb 2012, 3:44 am

AceOfSpades wrote:
Sweetleaf wrote:
fraac wrote:
I labelled the formulations of anarchism that I've seen, not Noam Chomsky. I always like to be sufficiently specific.

'Communism rejects authority'... but you said 'no individual has the right to coerce another' and 'anarchism generally holds that a set of rules...' and 'capital would be held in common ownership'. Those all imply an authority to stop unwanted things happening. Also, ACTUAL HISTORY, where Communism didn't work because the regulators weren't autistic so considered themselves a privileged class. How do you argue against actual history that shows the failings of a system designed to control human nature?


See none of those examples in history are actually Communism....communism by default cannot have any sort of ruling class, that would defeat the purpose of communism.
Oh right it hasn't been tried yet. Or maybe it was tried plenty of times and left a power vacuum for the state to fill.


it wasn't tried. the only instance where it was tried in the very early stages was russia. everywhere else that has been labelled communist followed that flawed model.


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peebo
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02 Feb 2012, 3:47 am

fraac wrote:
Regulators aren't corrupt because society conditioned them. They're corrupt because they're nonautistic humans. They'll always be selfish, shortsighted, petty and spiteful.

Only way it would work is with a single powerful (autistic) ruler. A Hitler figure, if you will.


they are corrupt because they hold power. and power corrupts.


http://libcom.org/library/power-corrupt ... il-bakunin

mikhail bakunin wrote:
The State is nothing else but this domination and exploitation regularised and systemised. We shall attempt to demonstrate it by examining the consequence of the government of the masses of the people by a minority, at first as intelligent and as devoted as you like, in an ideal State, founded on a free contract.

Suppose the government to be confined only to the best citizens. At first these citizens are privileged not by right, but by fact. They have been elected by the people because they are the most intelligent, clever, wise, and courageous and devoted. Taken from the mass of the citizens, who are regarded as all equal, they do not yet form a class apart, but a group of men privileged only by nature and for that reason singled ouit for election by the people. Their number is necessarily very limited, for in all times and countries the number of men endowed with qualities so remarkable that they automatically command the unanimous respect of a nation is, as experience teaches us, very small. Therefore, under pain of making a bad choice, the people will always be forced to choose its rulers from amongst them.

Here, then, is society divided into two categories, if not yet to say two classes, of which one, composed of the immense majority of the citizens, submits freely to the government of its elected leaders, the other, formed of a small number of privileged natures, recognised and accepted as such by the people, and charged by them to govern them. Dependent on popular election, they are at first distinguished from the mass of the citizens only by the very qualities which recommended them to their choice and are naturally, the most devoted and useful of all. They do not yet assume to themselves any privilege, any particular right, except that of exercising, insofar as the people wish it, the special functions with which they have been charged. For the rest, by their manner of life, by the conditions and means of their existence, they do not separate themselves in any way from all the others, so that a perfect equality continues to reign among all. Can this equality be long maintained? We claim that it cannot and nothing is easier to prive it.

Nothing is more dangerous for man's private morality than the habit of command. The best man, the most intelligent, disinterested, generous, pure, will infallibly and always be spoiled at this trade. Two sentiments inherent in power never fail to produce this demoralisation; they are: contempt for the masses and the overestimation of one's own merits.


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?Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all.?

Adam Smith


peebo
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02 Feb 2012, 3:49 am

abacacus wrote:
Sweetleaf wrote:
fraac wrote:
I labelled the formulations of anarchism that I've seen, not Noam Chomsky. I always like to be sufficiently specific.

'Communism rejects authority'... but you said 'no individual has the right to coerce another' and 'anarchism generally holds that a set of rules...' and 'capital would be held in common ownership'. Those all imply an authority to stop unwanted things happening. Also, ACTUAL HISTORY, where Communism didn't work because the regulators weren't autistic so considered themselves a privileged class. How do you argue against actual history that shows the failings of a system designed to control human nature?


See none of those examples in history are actually Communism....communism by default cannot have any sort of ruling class, that would defeat the purpose of communism.


You are correct, but the issue is that Communism will always fall to human nature. It is hard-coded in to the majority to be better than others, the competitive drive.

It's a crying shame, because aside from that Communism is an amazing system that could achieve so much, if it wasn't for human beings.


how can we be so sure that this is human nature and not simply learned behaviour?


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?Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all.?

Adam Smith


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02 Feb 2012, 3:53 am

artrat wrote:
It can't work because of human nature and mental illnesses such as sociopathy and schizophrenia.
I once thought that a similar philosophy may work but then I grew up. Anarchy is noting more than a Utopian dream that can never work because of human nature.


what on earth does "mental illness", particularly schizophrenia, have to do with it? this is certainly a rather discriminatory statement. we need to have to be crushed by the boot of the state because, somehow, of schizophrenics??

and the sociopathy/psychopathy issue was cleared up in the other thread. less than 0.6% of the population wouldn't ever be able to hold the rest to tyranny in mutual, co-operative self-governing society.



and what is this human nature of which you speak? if it were really human nature, then i would presume that i would also be affected by it. fortunately the fact that i, and many others, live life with no compulsion to coerce and dominate my neighbour surely suggests that this phenomenon is not, per se, human nature? perhaps we could refer to it instead as an undesirable and delusional behaviour resulting from centuries of living under dominance and coercion?

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If it ever would work then many people would die in the process of achieving anarchy. That would mean a bloody world revolution.
It would be impossible to have an anarchist nation without the participation of the entire world.


of course this is indeed the case. however, many people die in the name of perpetuating the status quo. surely pragmatism would suggest that a bloody yet short lived revolution resulting in peaceful and egalitarian co-existence is more desirable than ongoing perpetual brutality and coercion?


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?Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all.?

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fraac
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02 Feb 2012, 11:21 am

Okay so if no nation is larger than a local community, how do you deal with the constant warring with neighbouring communities?



peebo
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02 Feb 2012, 1:00 pm

that depends upon exactly what you mean by nation. i didn't make any specific reference to nations per se. decisions might be made at local level, but that is not to say that intra community decisions might not be made by councils composed of delegates from each community. there are many ways that it could be organised.

but the traditional notion of a sovereign nation is anathema to anarchism.


besides, you talk as though disagreement between local communities would be a terribly heinous thing, do you think it would really be as bad or worse than the constant warring and antagonism between authoritarian nation states? i doubt it. the existence of states predicates the existence of antagonism between states and subsequently perpetual war.


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fraac
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02 Feb 2012, 2:01 pm

peebo wrote:
the existence of states predicates the existence of antagonism between states and subsequently perpetual war.


Yes, and if you have a few large states you can insulate most people from the fighting. With small communities you can't do that. With larger communities you're soon talking about the current system.



techstepgenr8tion
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02 Feb 2012, 2:09 pm

Its not practical. Encourages too much redundancy.


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02 Feb 2012, 2:11 pm

fraac wrote:
peebo wrote:
the existence of states predicates the existence of antagonism between states and subsequently perpetual war.


Yes, and if you have a few large states you can insulate most people from the fighting. With small communities you can't do that. With larger communities you're soon talking about the current system.


but the absence of states doesn't imply insular small communities. networks between small communities can forge links on a larger scale.


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02 Feb 2012, 2:19 pm

Why do you think that wouldn't lead to the current system? It happened once, what would stop it happening every time?



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02 Feb 2012, 2:22 pm

peebo wrote:
but the absence of states doesn't imply insular small communities. networks between small communities can forge links on a larger scale.


fraac wrote:
Why do you think that wouldn't lead to the current system?


Lol, would? That is the current sytem.

peebo wrote:
but the absence of states doesn't imply insular small communities. networks between small communities can forge links on a larger scale.

Lol, links like counties, states, and then...gasp....federal government.

San Francisco needs something they can only get from Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh needs something they can only get from Houston or Dallas, Houston or Dallas need something directly from Montana. Without a secure highway system, a paid for (somehow) set of interstate infrastructure, they simply do without. Highway bandits would be a problem as well with no consistency in patrol.


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02 Feb 2012, 2:43 pm

peebo wrote:
and the sociopathy/psychopathy issue was cleared up in the other thread. less than 0.6% of the population wouldn't ever be able to hold the rest to tyranny in mutual, co-operative self-governing society.


There might be a lot more sociopaths than we are aware of. Not all people with antisocial personality traits are violent criminals, and their glib, superficial charm might allow some of them to reach high positions. But a much bigger issue in this context is narcissism, which is rampant in both politics and the upper corporate hierarchy. Two interesting links on this subject:

http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/narcissism.htm - Narcissistic people most likely to emerge as leaders
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evo ... n-politics

The less laws we have to keep these types in check (laws that regulate the market economy, for example), the easier it is for them to exploit others. Just look at the distribution of wealth in the USA. That's unbridled narcissism in action.



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02 Feb 2012, 2:53 pm

CrazyCatLord wrote:
But a much bigger issue in this context is narcissism, which is rampant in both politics and the upper corporate hierarchy. Two interesting links on this subject:

http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/narcissism.htm - Narcissistic people most likely to emerge as leaders
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evo ... n-politics

A lot of violence as well comes from narcissism and people being too badass for their own good. Everyone around them who seems weaker is a potential mark and if they don't give up the goods soft and sweet like most would then they get hammered down for not knowing their place as nails.

I think the difference with peebo's mentality is he apparently hasn't been shaken down much (by adults or by peers) as being weak or inferior for not being macho. If a guy does have that experience he understands, loud and clear, that he lives in a world that doesn't think the way he does. Then again though, I would have to give him this from a side that he isn't thinking of - kinda like they mentioned in Ciderhouse Rules, that the work group would go out, pick apples or whatever, and the guy who had a nutoriously bad attitude never returned with them - no one asked why. I think with a less lawyered up society bullies would often show up missing under puzzling cirstances and people would simply shrug it off as history (then again that's hoping that bully is within a culture who will deal with him/her rather than go sycophantic).


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peebo
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02 Feb 2012, 3:08 pm

techstepgenr8tion wrote:
peebo wrote:
but the absence of states doesn't imply insular small communities. networks between small communities can forge links on a larger scale.


fraac wrote:
Why do you think that wouldn't lead to the current system?


Lol, would? That is the current sytem.


not at all. what we are talking about here isn't simply a matter of structure but rather how society is organised and governed in a dynamic sense. besides, what i am talking about would clearly function as a bottom up arrangement. there would be no overarching authoratitive body governing from above.

Quote:
peebo wrote:
but the absence of states doesn't imply insular small communities. networks between small communities can forge links on a larger scale.

Lol, links like counties, states, and then...gasp....federal government.


again, while there might indeed be structural similarities, clearly what i am talking about would be organisationally quite different.[/quote]

Quote:
San Francisco needs something they can only get from Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh needs something they can only get from Houston or Dallas, Houston or Dallas need something directly from Montana. Without a secure highway system, a paid for (somehow) set of interstate infrastructure, they simply do without. Highway bandits would be a problem as well with no consistency in patrol.


what would motivate highway bandits?


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fraac
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02 Feb 2012, 3:13 pm

We're living in a bottom-up system! How do you think this happened? You can't make this unhappen, and even if you did it would happen again.