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thx1138inator t1_jdwomub wrote

Reply to comment by mbfunke in Vivek Venkataraman argues that political equality and proto-democracy were the most common form of political organisation in the "state of nature". These ideals preceded modern liberalism & statehood, and are arguably how humans have lived the majority of our evolution. by Ma3Ke4Li3

Maybe you've read "The Dawn of Everything" by the two David's? At least one of them is an anarchist (I assume as result of his archaeology studies).

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mbfunke t1_jdwpfq6 wrote

Nope, I haven’t read it, but maybe I’ll check it out. Personally I don’t think anarcho-communism scales to millions or billions of people. We need other systems for large scale organizations, but those aren’t the systems we adapted for evolutionarily. I think this disconnect helps to explain much of our social malaise.

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thx1138inator t1_jdws0os wrote

Exactly - What if the scale of our organizations is the root of the problem with modern humanity? The smaller the scale, the smaller the problems.

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mbfunke t1_jdx30wz wrote

It’s kind of unavoidable with the current population. We just have to find institutions that more closely approximate our inherited dispositions while conscientiously engaging in self-creation to match our new environment. I say “just” because it’s conceptually a straightforward problem, the actual implementation is huge lift.

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thx1138inator t1_jdx4ysu wrote

My thoughts are that we should be shifting political power into smaller groups. So, currently in the USA, there is significant power concentrated at the federal level. But, why should health care administration, for example, happen at the federal level rather than the state level? Human health concerns are really quite local (pandemics being an exception). Why not administer most health delivery/payment purely at the state level? The USA would get more diversity and innovation that way. We should really reconsider allowing concentration of so many decisions in the hands of so few people.

Counter point- we benefit from efficiency of scale. But man, when things go wrong at scale, they really go wrong!

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mbfunke t1_jdxprwj wrote

States are fucking huge by anarcho-communist standards. Self rule at that level is like an apartment complex population. We can’t effectively run equitable services at the apartment complex level. We’re stuck with massive agencies and federal bureaucracy. States aren’t better and are arguably much worse.

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thx1138inator t1_jdxtmu4 wrote

Depends on the state. I am quite happy with the government of the state of MN. I want others to be happy with the states they live in as well. I don't understand what southerners want but, I hope they get it for their sake (unless it causes damage to shared resources like the atmosphere).
But ultimately I think Americans should spend more time imagining the political structure they want to live under. Inequality will always exist. But what is a fair level? These are questions that have been pondered by humans for most of their history. I am a bit uncomfortable with the current, ossified nature of our political organization.

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