Meta_Digital t1_j0zjhfe wrote
Reply to comment by chrispd01 in Anarchism at the End of the World: A defence of the instinct that won’t go away by Sventipluk
Liberalism is built on capitalism, which is an economic totalitarian (using the article's wording) hierarchy. Anarchism is fundamentally incompatible with capitalism (as is any egalitarian society).
chrispd01 t1_j0znmp7 wrote
Could you lay that out in a little more detail ? Seems to me like you are asserting some ideas and drawing connections which are not beyond dispute. You may be corect but I cant really follow - this is not so much an explanation asnan assertion
Which I gotta say is really ironic given the subject if this thread and the article
Meta_Digital t1_j0zs2ey wrote
Liberalism as a political ideology grew from thinkers like John Locke (the supposed "Father of Liberalism") and Adam Smith during the Enlightenment.
This is the very early days of capitalism, before socialists would coin the term, and theorists were just attempting to objectively describe economics. They didn't yet fully understand that they were describing a particular mode of economics. You can see this confusion to this day, where many just assume that "capitalism" means "markets" and that "free market" means "freedom". This is a leftover from those early thinkers.
Liberalism, as a political ideology, takes these economic assumptions and integrates them into a political and moral theory. For instance, Locke's idea of personal rights and property rights being essentially the same can be found in liberal democracies (and was a justification for voting rights being connected with land ownership). This is where we also see the argument for laissez-faire economics, or the idea that a government should let the market regulate the economy of a nation (every prior system restrained markets with a heavier hand since markets regularly commit atrocities for profit). It's also where you see the idea of the "tyranny of the majority", which references the fear of the "agrarian" population (the working class at the time), and how if they had democratic power, they'd vote away the private property of the ruling class (the founding fathers of the US specifically write about this).
The result is a preservation of the autocratic caste system of capitalism which divides everyone into employer (owner) and employee (worker) where the former has all the wealth and makes all the decisions, and the latter does all the work and makes none of the decisions. Liberalism specifically preserves this arrangement through democratic suppression of workers (look up the history of worker's rights; they weren't won democratically), often through state violence. The police are one such institution, which exist primarily to protect private property rights, because it is impossible for private property owners to protect their own property, and it is unprofitable to pay for that expense yourself, so it becomes subsidized by tax payers under liberal democracy to maintain the caste system of capitalism.
That's a very brief overview of the subject, but you can find a little more information on the Wikipedia page. It's not going to be as direct a response, but you should be able to verify what I've said here.
chrispd01 t1_j0zvzmh wrote
I was not 100% sure where you were going with that but I appreciate you laying this out.
It seems to me, though that there are a couple of ways of looking at this development. , see the development of liberal democracy, increasing recognition within certain spheres of an individual. That is individual has a certain dignity and worth and independence that cannot be abrogated. I don’t think it’s wrong to see political development as the increasing expansion of that zone. So you see things like the Magna Carta before locke as beginning to impose limits on arbitrary rule, and that trend continuing.
For my own self, I think the notion of private property can be overstated and can warp itself through disproportionate political influence and act to a bridge the autonomy of others.
But I’m not sure that problem isn’t found, and just the institution itself. That is to say the remedy for all the ills you identify are thoighbthe exercise of political power
If you tell me that because of economics, there is disproportionate, political power, I would agree. But I would also say that that is not liberal democracy. That is the warping of liberal democracy to a different end
Meta_Digital t1_j0zypy8 wrote
Liberalism is very specifically the combination of democracy with capitalism. What we are living through is the natural consequence of trying to merge democracy with its opposite. Either you end up with a society that abolishes capitalism for some form of socialism (democracy in the economy), or you end up with a society that abolishes democracy in favor of some form of capitalism (some kind of corporate feudalism or fascism). We are living through the latter today.
I agree that over time there is an expansion of the moral sphere, but the path to moral expansion is treacherous, and we are currently in a period of backsliding. Victories won in the past are being rolled back. Some are new victories, like abortion rights in the US. Some are ancient victories, like acceptance of gay or trans people. I do agree that in general there is an expansion of this sphere, but only over very long periods of time, and in the short term it expands and contracts, sometimes violently.
We have this narrative of progress, which is an Enlightenment thought, which paints history as backwards and primitive while painting the present as progressive and advanced. Sadly, the real world is much more complicated than that. Some progress is made and some progress is lost as time marches on. It's convenient for those in power to paint the past as being worse because this is a much easier (and more profitable) strategy than actually making the present better. Be wary of progress narratives because, more often than not, they're misleading.
The world today has many wonders, but it also has more inequality than any historical period, the rising threat of nuclear war, and global ecological collapse. These are all the result of not only failure to progress, but serious regress. The point of critiquing liberal democracy is to ask how we got to such a dire situation and work towards something better than this. Anarchism is one, of several, such responses.
chrispd01 t1_j100evg wrote
Yeah. But from the article I read, it seems to suggest that the answer to the problem is not really anarchism, but just better liberal democracy. That is a liberal democracy that is less influenced by special interests.
Meta_Digital t1_j101v4y wrote
Yeah, I agree actually. The article seems to conflate socialism with "when the government does stuff". Socialism is, instead, just the democratic organization of an economy. Thus it's incompatible with liberalism.
Take the Zapatistas in Mexico. They control an anarchist autonomous zone, and their economic system is socialist in structure. Socialism and anarchism are perfectly compatible, though socialism is not necessary. One could have a communist economy that functions as a sharing or gifting economy instead, for instance.
Or, look at the autonomous zone in Syria, Rojava. It is also founded on anarchist principles, and once again, its economic structure is socialist.
Basically, if you're going to take an anarchist stance, it's also going to be anti-capitalist. That's why anarchists universally don't consider anarcho-capitalism to be a form of anarchism, because that ideology (which is mostly a byproduct of online tests like the political compass which nobody should take seriously) doesn't actually apply the anarchist critique to capitalism (which is often its primary target).
tcl33 t1_j100nnp wrote
If we allow people to engage in voluntary market exchange, something looking like capitalism will organically emerge. It takes authoritarianism to disrupt that. You have to use force to stop it, or to rearrange it.
Meta_Digital t1_j1027cz wrote
Voluntary market exchanges existed for thousands of years before the creation of private property and capital. It actually took an extreme amount of violence to create private property. It was absolutely not the result of some natural tendency.
tcl33 t1_j106bp3 wrote
To me private property means that when I give you A and you give me B, you are entitled to keep A, I am entitled to keep B, and society recognizes those entitlements and stands ready to use force to repel anybody who attempts to initiate force to seize A from you or B from me. How does market exchange work without that?
Meta_Digital t1_j107v3u wrote
Private property is a specific kind of property.
So, let's use a house as an easy example. If I buy a house (outright, it's totally paid for), then it becomes my personal property. I can do with it what I want and my ownership is legally protected based on where I am.
If I rent my home, then it is not my personal property, it is someone else's private property. There might be some tenet rights that I have, depending on where I live, but overall the private property owner (who does not use the property for anything other than making money) has the property rights.
Similarly, if I take a mortgage on the house, then it is the bank's private property. The bank will for the most part not interfere too much, but at the end of the day, the home is not my property, it is the property of the bank for the purpose of making money. That is, the bank's private property.
And from this you should be able to understand what private property is. It's property you own, but do not use, for the sake of collecting some kind of passive income. It's the central feature of a capitalist economy. I own land and charge rent for someone else to use it. I own a building and charge someone else to use it. I have an idea and charge anyone else who uses it. In essence, I am allowed to hold something hostage from society unless they pay me. Maybe it's a national or international business, where I do not myself work, but from which I become independently wealthy. Like Elon Musk buying Tesla and then getting complete control over the company and personally collecting its profits. That's capitalism, and it's intrinsically totalitarian, as the article points out.
Markets, where stuff is traded or bought and sold, predate capitalism and will continue long after capitalism is gone. What the market is allowed to do is determined by the economic system that it's in. For instance, a slave economy is a kind of "free market" where humans can be bought and sold as property in a slave market. Feudal societies had markets. Tribal societies can setup markets. No capitalism is required for markets or property to exist. Private property, however, is a unique feature of capitalism.
tcl33 t1_j10iaqh wrote
OK. I get your definition of private property.
I originally said:
> If we allow people to engage in voluntary market exchange, something looking like capitalism will organically emerge. It takes authoritarianism to disrupt that. You have to use force to stop it, or to rearrange it.
And I'll add to that, something like capitalism and private property (according to your definition) will organically emerge.
It will emerge the moment someone notices that foreign visitors to a particular town would like a place to bathe, eat, and sleep for the night, and that they don't want to buy a home. That someone will buy a or build a structure of some sort and charge people to stay there for the night, and he will call it an inn. At that moment, private property has organically come online. He has created capital that he uses to generate income for himself.
And the only way it doesn't come online is if you establish an authoritarian enforcement regime to tell the would-be capitalist that, "You are allowed to build or buy a structure for your own use, and you can sell it to someone else so they can use it, but you can't charge someone to use it temporarily. It doesn't matter if there are visitors to this town pleading for someone to build an inn so they have a place to sleep for the night. You are not allowed to do that, and if you try, we will use force to stop you."
That's how it has to go. If you're for it, and you believe this enforcement regime makes for a better world, fine. Just argue for that. But it does involve dominance. It does involve the threat of force.
The author argues that anarchy is the absence of dominance. But this is not the absence of dominance.
Meta_Digital t1_j10t90k wrote
In some countries, governments provide housing on a temporary basis for people who need or want it; thus replacing the need for private landlords. One could also institute a rationing or sharing system by removing housing as a commodity from the economy. There's historically an unlimited number of options to this issue and in no way are we limited to feudal landlordism nor is capitalism predetermined.
tcl33 t1_j10uoe3 wrote
But let's just be clear, you do endorse the existence of a regime sufficiently dominant to forcefully prevent the establishment of an inn? And therefore you reject the author's call for an "anarchy" that precludes dominance? Furthermore you agree with my original claim that...
> If we allow people to engage in voluntary market exchange, something looking like capitalism will organically emerge. It takes authoritarianism to disrupt that. You have to use force to stop it, or to rearrange it.
...and you believe that this is a good thing?
Meta_Digital t1_j10vju5 wrote
No, I do not think capitalism is predetermined by the existence of markets. Capitalism didn't emerge organically; it emerged through violence. The enclosure of land and the privatization of the world was militaristic; as was the suppression of labor and of women, who were burned as witches. Even today witches are burned where capitalism is getting established. This is not something that just happened on its own.
Yes, some forms of authority are going to exist, but that isn't contradictory to anarchism. Just like authoritarianism doesn't mean pure 100% control over the oppressed (which is impossible), it's opposite is not 100% pure freedom from control. What anarchism represents is the minimizing of hierarchy and control. Instead of thinking about this as a struggle between two imaginary extreme ways of being, think of it as the struggle between two opposing processes of movement - one towards greater control over others and the other towards lesser control over others.
tcl33 t1_j12ny6w wrote
> I do not think capitalism is predetermined by the existence of markets.
But according to your definition of capitalism (which is owning things you don't use to produce an income for yourself) the moment someone's ranch, farm, plantation, or vineyard produces more meat, wheat, spice, cotton, or grapes than the owner uses, and he sells them for income, capitalism emerges. In what world is that not virtually guaranteed to happen for somebody?
And then, if in addition to simply producing goods out of the earth, some enterprising people see an opportunity to build something people will pay to use (like an inn or a stable), will they not build it if they have the means and incentive? Will someone not build a boat to ferry people across a river, for a fee? Will someone not build a carriage to pull with a horse to transport goods for a fee? Is it not virtually guaranteed all of this will organically happen for somebody because people need/want all of it to happen?
> Yes, some forms of authority are going to exist, but that isn't contradictory to anarchism. Just like authoritarianism doesn't mean pure 100% control over the oppressed (which is impossible), it's opposite is not 100% pure freedom from control.
OK, but to all the owners of goods/service producing farms, ranches, plantations, vineyards, inns, stables, ferry or delivery services, what you think of as "minimizing hierarchy and control" is going to look like some pretty strict control. Basically, you want to make all of that illegal, and you stand ready to deploy state violence to ensure none of it is allowed.
> one towards greater control over others and the other towards lesser control over others.
It sounds to me like you're all for greater control over others as long as "others" are people who create things people want to pay for. And you need a strong state to ensure that this control is effective.
But your state is going to need to be even stronger than that. Not only is it going to have to enforce these prohibitions on capitalism, now without anybody else to do them, the state is going to have to provide all of these goods and services itself. And a state that powerful is going to need a well defined command and control hierarchy if it's going to work at all. And now you've just brought the Soviet Union back online.
This isn't anarchism at all.
What am I missing?
Meta_Digital t1_j146rje wrote
> In what world is that not virtually guaranteed to happen for somebody?
No, capitalism is merely the existence of capital. Capital is a very complex concept, but it can be easily understood as private property which exists only for the purpose of producing more capital. So, a ranch is a capitalist ranch if it's someone's private property. If there's an employer and employees (which only exist under capitalism, as lords and serfs only do under feudalism). If the employee produces someone else's property through their labor which is sold as capital for the sake of capital accumulation.
> Basically, you want to make all of that illegal, and you stand ready to deploy state violence to ensure none of it is allowed.
No. Simply the secession of state protection of private property through violence (such as through the police) makes the existence of private property impossible. It requires violence to preserve, not end.
> Not only is it going to have to enforce these prohibitions on capitalism, now without anybody else to do them, the state is going to have to provide all of these goods and services itself.
Again, no. Capitalism has to be preserved by a powerful state able to enclose land and protect property through the state apparatus. No it's not as easy as just getting rid of the state, nor is it as easy as what the USSR attempted (they killed anarchists along the way you know). I'd recommend maybe A Conquest of Bread for a more thorough explanation of what an anarchist society might look like and how we might get there. It's not such a small subject that a Reddit post can be sufficient.
tcl33 t1_j14blea wrote
> Again, no. Capitalism has to be preserved by a powerful state able to enclose land and protect property through the state apparatus.
For capitalism to stabilize into something durable and predictable, and therefore to scale, what you're saying is true.
But this does no violence to my original point which is that capitalism will form organically. You can see the types of examples I outlined in places lacking an effective state apparatus. Consider Somalia. Or the American frontier (in particular Deadwood style illegal settlements in Indian territory).
Again, without an effective state to nurture and preserve it, capitalism is unstable and unlikely to scale. But it will occur organically. That's all I'm saying.
> Capital is a very complex concept, but it can be easily understood as private property which exists only for the purpose of producing more capital. So, a ranch is a capitalist ranch if it's someone's private property. If there's an employer and employees (which only exist under capitalism, as lords and serfs only do under feudalism). If the employee produces someone else's property through their labor which is sold as capital for the sake of capital accumulation.
All of this happens at a limited scale in the absence of an effective state. It will occur spontaneously, because that's what happens when people want to buy and sell things, and hire and work for wages. It just happens. It's been happening for thousands of years.
Meta_Digital t1_j14d74f wrote
I think what's happening here is the conflation of a seed and a plant, or an egg with a chicken.
Everything in the universal contains potentialities. A thing has the potential within it to become other things, as a seed could become a plant (or be an ingredient in a meal).
So what you're seeing here is that. The capacity for capitalism exists within certain dynamics. The seeds of capitalism existed within the feudal system, for instance, and they matured through the adolescence of mercantilism. This was a potential which was unleashed through historical events like the Bubonic Plague and technologies like the steel plow or steam engine or ideologies like the Enlightenment. Historical events seemed to predetermine a capitalist system, which is pretty much what Marx and Engels argued.
But other potentialities also existed, and still exist. What could mature into capitalism could mature also into something else. Humanity is roughly 100,000 years old and capitalism makes up about 300 of those years. It doesn't look like it's going to make it much longer than that either due to its unstable nature. So it could be that capitalism is just a potential, a very rare potential, for human populations. The conditions were met, and opposing forces were incapable of stopping it (they certainly tried), and so we get it for a short time. But it's not inevitable, and it's not permanent. It just seems like that because it's the globally dominant system and has been for some time now, and that makes it hard to imagine that the world was or could be any other way.
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