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This is a slightly revised version of my FAQ on anarchist theory. As
always, comments, criticisms, and corrections will be much appreciated. In
particular, if you think that any argument or viewpoint has been presented
weakly or inadequately, please write me at bcaplan@gmu.edu to
discuss your preferred formulation.
To view the hypertext version of the FAQ (so the links work), go to
http://www.gmu.edu/departments/economics/bcaplan.
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Anarchist Theory FAQ
or
Instead of a FAQ, by a Man Too Busy to Write One
by
Bryan Caplan
Version 5.2
I heartily accept the motto, - "That government is best which
governs least;" and I should like to see it acted up to more
rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to
this, which I also believe, - "That government is best which
governs not at all;" and when men are prepared for it, that
will be the kind of government which they will have.
--Henry David Thoreau,
"On the Duty of Civil Disobedience"
Some writers have so confounded society with government, as to
leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not
only different, but have different origins ... Society is in
every state a blessing, but Government, even in its best state,
is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.
--Thomas Paine,
Common Sense
They [the Marxists] maintain that only a dictatorship -- their
dictatorship, of course -- can create the will of the people,
while our answer to this is: No dictatorship can have any other
aim but that of self-perpetuation, and it can beget only slavery
in the people tolerating it; freedom can be created only by
freedom, that is, by a universal rebellion on the part of the
people and free organization of the toiling masses from the
bottom up.
--Mikhail Bakunin,
Statism and Anarchism
In existing States a fresh law is looked upon as a remedy for
evil. Instead of themselves altering what is bad, people begin by
demanding a law to alter it. If the road between two villages is
impassable, the peasant says, "There should be a law about parish
roads." If a park-keeper takes advantage of the want of spirit in
those who follow him with servile obedience and insults one of
them, the insulted man says, "There should be a law to enjoin
more politeness upon the park-keepers." If there is stagnation in
agriculture or commerce, the husbandman, cattle-breeder, or corn-
speculator argues, "It is protective legislation which we
require." Down to the old clothesman there is not one who does
not demand a law to protect his own little trade. If the employer
lowers wages or increases the hours of labor, the politician in
embryo explains, "We must have a law to put all that to rights."
In short, a law everywhere and for everything! A law about
fashions, a law about mad dogs, a law about virtue, a law to put
a stop to all the vices and all the evils which result from human
indolence and cowardice.
--Peter Kropotkin,
"Law and Authority"
[W]hoever desires liberty, should understand these vital facts,
viz.: 1. That every man who puts money into the hands of a
"government" (so called) puts into its hands a sword which will
be used against himself, to extort more money from him, and also
to keep him in subjection to its arbitrary will. 2. That those
who will take his money, without his consent, in the first place,
will use it for his further robbery and enslavement, if he
presumes to resist their demands in the future. 3. That it is a
perfect absurdity to suppose that any body of men would ever take
a man's money without his consent, for any such object as they
profess to take it for, viz., that of protecting him; for why
should they wish to protect him, if he does not wish them to do
so?... 4. If a man wants "protection," he is competent to make
his own bargains for it; and nobody has any occasion to rob him,
in order to "protect" him against his will. 5. That the only
security men can have for their political liberty, consists in
their keeping their money in their own pockets, until they have
assurances, perfectly satisfactory to themselves, that it will be
used as they wish it to be used, for their benefit, and not for
their injury. 6. That no government, so called, can reasonably be
trusted for a moment, or reasonably be supposed to have honest
purposes in view, any longer than it depends wholly upon
voluntary support.
--Lysander Spooner,
No Treason: the Constitution of No Authority
If we look at the black record of mass murder, exploitation, and
tyranny levied on society by governments over the ages, we need
not be loath to abandon the Leviathan State and ... try freedom.
--Murray Rothbard,
For a New Liberty
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Table of Contents
1. What is anarchism? What beliefs do anarchists share?
2. Why should one consider anarchism in the first place?
3. Don't anarchists favor chaos?
4. Don't anarchists favor the abolition of the family, property,
religion, and other social institutions besides the state?
5. What major subdivisions may be made among anarchists?
6. Is anarchism the same thing as libertarianism?
7. Is anarchism the same thing as socialism?
8. Who are the major anarchist thinkers?
9. How would left-anarchy work?
10. How would anarcho-capitalism work?
11. What criticisms have been made of anarchism?
a. "An anarchist society, lacking any central coercive authority,
would quickly degenerate into violent chaos."
b. The Marxist critique of left-anarchism
c. The minarchists' attack on anarcho-capitalism
d. The conservative critique of anarchism
e. "We are already in a state of anarchy."
12. What other anarchist viewpoints are there?
13. What moral justifications have been offered for anarchism?
14. What are the major debates between anarchists? What are the recurring
arguments?
a. "X is not 'true anarchism.'"
b. "Anarchism of variant X is unstable and will lead to the
re-emergence of the state."
c. "In an anarchist society in which both systems X and Y existed, X
would inevitably outcompete Y."
d. "Anarchism of type X would be worse than the state."
e. Etc.
15. How would anarchists handle the "public goods" problem?
a. The concept and uses of Pareto optimality in economics
b. The public goods problem
16. Are anarchists pacifists?
a. Tolstoyan absolute pacifism
b. Pacifism as opposition to war
17. Have there been any historical examples of anarchist societies?
18. Isn't anarchism utopian?
19. Don't anarchists assume that all people are innately virtuous?
20. Aren't anarchists terrorists?
21. How might an anarchist society be achieved?
22. What are some addresses for anarchist World Wide Web sites?
23. What are some major anarchist writings?
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1. What is anarchism? What beliefs do anarchists share?
Anarchism is defined by The American Heritage College Dictionary
as "The theory or doctrine that all forms of government are
unnecessary, oppressive, and undesirable and should be
abolished." Anarchism is a negative; it holds that one thing,
namely government, is bad and should be abolished. Aside from
this defining tenet, it would be difficult to list any belief
that all anarchists hold. Just as atheists might support or
oppose any viewpoint consistent with the non-existence of God,
anarchists might and indeed do hold the entire range of
viewpoints consistent with the non-existence of the state.
As might be expected, different groups of anarchists are
constantly trying to define anarchists with different views out
of existence, just as many Christians say that their sect is the
only "true" Christianity and many socialists say that their
socialism is the only "true" socialism. This FAQ takes what seems
to me to be the impartial view that such tactics are pointless
and merely prevent the debate of substantive issues. (N.B. The
preceding definition has been criticized a number of times. To
view my appendix on Defining Anarchism, click here.)
2. Why should one consider anarchism in the first place?
Unlike many observers of history, anarchists see a common thread
behind most of mankind's problems: the state. In the 20th-century
alone, states have murdered well over 100,000,000 human beings,
whether in war, concentration camps, or man-made famine. And this
is merely a continuation of a seemingly endless historical
pattern: almost from the beginning of recorded history,
governments have existed. Once they arose, they allowed a ruling
class to live off the labor of the mass of ordinary people; and
these ruling classes have generally used their ill-gotten gains
to build armies and wage war to extend their sphere of influence.
At the same time, governments have always suppressed unpopular
minorities, dissent, and the efforts of geniuses and innovators
to raise humanity to new intellectual, moral, cultural, and
economic heights. By transferring surplus wealth from producers
to the state's ruling elite, the state has often strangled any
incentive for long-run economic growth and thus stifled
humanity's ascent from poverty; and at the same time the state
has always used that surplus wealth to cement its power.
If the state is the proximate cause of so much needless misery
and cruelty, would it not be desirable to investigate the
alternatives? Perhaps the state is a necessary evil which we
cannot eliminate. But perhaps it is rather an unnecessary evil
which we accept out of inertia when a totally different sort of
society would be a great improvement.
3. Don't anarchists favor chaos?
By definition, anarchists oppose merely government, not order or
society. "Liberty is the Mother, not the Daughter of Order" wrote
Proudhon, and most anarchists would be inclined to agree.
Normally, anarchists demand abolition of the state because they
think that they have something better to offer, not out of a
desire for rebellion as such. Or as Kropotkin put it, "No
destruction of the existing order is possible, if at the time of
the overthrow, or of the struggle leading to the overthrow, the
idea of what is to take the place of what is to be destroyed is
not always present in the mind. Even the theoretical criticism of
the existing conditions is impossible, unless the critic has in
mind a more or less distinct picture of what he would have in
place of the existing state. Consciously or unconsciously, the
ideal, the conception of something better is forming in the mind
of everyone who criticizes social institutions."
There is an anti-intellectual strain in anarchism which favors
chaos and destruction as an end-in-itself. While possibly a
majority among people who have called themselves anarchists, this
is not a prominent strand of thought among those who have
actually spent time thinking and writing about anarchist theory.
4. Don't anarchists favor the abolition of the family, property,
religion, and other social institutions besides the state?
Some anarchists have favored the abolition of one or more of the
above, while others have not. To some, all of these are merely
other forms of oppression and domination. To others, they are the
vital intermediary institutions which protect us from the state.
To still others, some of the above are good and others are bad;
or perhaps they are bad currently, but merit reform.
5. What major subdivisions may be made among anarchists?
As should become plain to the reader of alt.society.anarchy or
alt.anarchism, there are two rather divergent lines of anarchist
thought. The first is broadly known as "left-anarchism," and
encompasses anarcho-socialists, anarcho-syndicalists, and
anarcho-communists. These anarchists believe that in an anarchist
society, people either would or should abandon or greatly reduce
the role of private property rights. The economic system would be
organized around cooperatives, worker-owned firms, and/or
communes. A key value in this line of anarchist thought is
egalitarianism, the view that inequalities, especially of wealth
and power, are undesirable, immoral, and socially contingent.
The second is broadly known as "anarcho-capitalism." These
anarchists believe that in an anarchist society, people either
would or should not only retain private property, but expand it
to encompass the entire social realm. No anarcho-capitalist has
ever denied the right of people to voluntarily pool their private
property and form a cooperative, worker-owned firm, or commune;
but they also believe that several property, including such
organizations as corporations, are not only perfectly legitimate
but likely to be the predominant form of economic organization
under anarchism. Unlike the left-anarchists, anarcho-capitalists
generally place little or no value on equality, believing that
inequalities along all dimensions -- including income and wealth
-- are not only perfectly legitimate so long as they "come about
in the right way," but are the natural consequence of human
freedom.
A large segment of left-anarchists is extremely skeptical about
the anarchist credentials of anarcho-capitalists, arguing that
the anarchist movement has historically been clearly leftist. In
my own view, it is necessary to re-write a great deal of history
to maintain this claim. In Carl Landauer's European Socialism: A
History of Ideas and Movements (published in 1959 before any
important modern anarcho-capitalist works had been written), this
great socialist historian notes that:
To be sure, there is a difference between
individualistic anarchism and collectivistic or
communistic anarchism; Bakunin called himself a
communist anarchist. But the communist anarchists also
do not acknowledge any right to society to force the
individual. They differ from the anarchistic
individualists in their belief that men, if freed from
coercion, will enter into voluntary associations of a
communistic type, while the other wing believes that
the free person will prefer a high degree of isolation.
The communist anarchists repudiate the right of private
property which is maintained through the power of the
state. The individualist anarchists are inclined to
maintain private property as a necessary condition of
individual independence, without fully answering the
question of how property could be maintained without
courts and police.
Actually, Tucker and Spooner both wrote about the free market's
ability to provide legal and protection services, so Landauer's
remark was not accurate even in 1959. But the interesting point
is that before the emergence of modern anarcho-capitalism
Landauer found it necessary to distinguish two strands of
anarchism, only one of which he considered to be within the broad
socialist tradition.
6. Is anarchism the same thing as libertarianism?
This is actually a complicated question, because the term
"libertarianism" itself has two very different meanings. In
Europe in the 19th-century, libertarianism was a popular
euphemism for left-anarchism. However, the term did not really
catch on in the United States.
After World War II, many American-based pro-free-market
intellectuals opposed to traditional conservatism were seeking
for a label to describe their position, and eventually picked
"libertarianism." ("Classical liberalism" and "market liberalism"
are alternative labels for the same essential position.) The
result was that in two different political cultures which rarely
communicated with one another, the term "libertarian" was used in
two very different ways. At the current time, the American use
has basically taken over completely in academic political theory
(probably owing to Nozick's influence), but the European use is
still popular among many left-anarchist activists in both Europe
and the U.S.
The semantic confusion was complicated further when some of the
early post-war American libertarians determined that the logical
implication of their view was, in fact, a variant of anarchism.
They adopted the term "anarcho-capitalism" to differentiate
themselves from more moderate libertarianism, but were still
generally happy to identify themselves with the broader
free-market libertarian movement.
7. Is anarchism the same thing as socialism?
If we accept one traditional definition of socialism -- "advocacy
of government ownership of the means of production" -- it seems
that anarchists are not socialists by definition. But if by
socialism we mean something more inclusive, such as "advocacy of
the strong restriction or abolition of private property," then
the question becomes more complex.
Under the second proffered definition, some anarchists are
socialists, but others are not. Outside of the Anglo- American
political culture, there has been a long and close historical
relationship between the more orthodox socialists who advocate a
socialist government, and the anarchist socialists who desire
some sort of decentralized, voluntary socialism. The two groups
both want to severely limit or abolish private property and thus
both groups fit the second definition of socialism. However, the
anarchists certainly do not want the government to own the means
of production, for they don't want government to exist in the
first place.
The anarchists' dispute with the traditional socialists -- a
dispute best illustrated by the bitter struggle between Karl Marx
and Mikhail Bakunin for dominance in the 19th-century European
workers' movement -- has often be described as a disagreement
over "means." On this interpretation, the socialist anarchists
and the state-socialists agree that a communal and egalitarian
society is desirable, but accuse one another of proposing
ineffective means of attaining it. However, this probably
understates the conflict, which is also over more fundamental
values: socialist anarchists emphasize the need for autonomy and
the evils of authoritarianism, while traditional socialists have
frequently belittled such concerns as "bourgeois."
When we turn to the Anglo-American political culture, the
story is quite different. Virulent anti-socialist
anarchism is much more common there, and has been from the early
19th-century. Great Britain was the home of many intensely
anti-socialist quasi-anarchistic thinkers of the 19th-century
such as Auberon Herbert and the early Herbert Spencer. The United
States has been an even more fertile ground for individualist
anarchism: during the 19th-century, such figures as Josiah
Warren, Lysander Spooner , and Benjamin Tucker gained prominence
for their vision of an anarchism based upon freedom of contract
and private property. And in the 20th-century, thinkers residing
within the United States have been the primary developers and
exporters of anarcho-capitalist theory.
Still, this geographic division should not be over-stated. The
French anarchist Proudhon and the German Max Stirner both
embraced modified forms of individualism; a number of
left-anarchists (often European immigrants) attained prominence
in the United States; and Noam Chomsky and Murray Bookchin, two
of the most influential theorists of modern left-anarchism, both
reside within the United States.
8. Who are the major anarchist thinkers?
The most famous left-anarchists have probably been
Mikhail Bakunin and Peter Kropotkin. Pierre Proudhon is
also often included although his ideas on the desirability of a
modified form of private property would lead some to exclude him
from the leftist camp altogether. (Some of Proudhon's other
heterodoxies include his defense of the right of inheritance and
his emphasis on the genuine antagonism between state power and
property rights.) More recent left-anarchists include Emma
Goldman, Murray Bookchin , and Noam Chomsky.
Anarcho-capitalism has a much more recent origin in the latter
half of the 20th century. The two most famous advocates of
anarcho-capitalism are probably Murray Rothbard and David
Friedman. There were however some interesting earlier precursors,
notably the Belgian economist Gustave de Molinari. Two other
19th-century anarchists who have been adopted by modern
anarcho-capitalists with a few caveats are Benjamin Tucker and
Lysander Spooner. (Some left-anarchists contest the adoption, but
overall Tucker and Spooner probably have much more in
common with anarcho-capitalists than with
left-anarchists.)
More comprehensive listings of anarchist figures may be found in
a number of broad historical works listed later in the FAQ.
9. How would left-anarchy work?
There are many different views on this. Among left- anarchists,
there are some who imagine returning to a much simpler, even
pre-industrial, mode of social organization. Others seem to
intend to maintain modern technology and civilization (perhaps in
a more environmentally sound manner) but end private ownership of
the means of production.
To be replaced with what? Various suggestions have been made.
Existing firms might simply be turned over to worker ownership,
and then be subject to the democratic control of the workers.
This is the anarcho-syndicalist picture: keeping an economy based
upon a multitude of firms, but with firms owned and managed by
the workers at each firm. Presumably firms would then strike
deals with one another to secure needed materials; or perhaps
firms would continue to pay money wages and sell products to
consumers. It is unclear how the syndicalist intends to arrange
for the egalitarian care of the needy, or the provision of
necessary but unprofitable products. Perhaps it is supposed that
syndicates would contribute out of social responsibility; others
have suggested that firms would elect representatives for a
larger meta-firm organization which would carry out the necessary
tasks.
It should be noted that Tom Wetzel disputes my characterization
of anarcho-syndicalism; he argues that very few
anarcho-syndicalists ever imagined that workers would simply take
over their firms, while maintaining the basic features of the
market economy. Rather, the goal has usually been the
establishment of an overarching democratic structure, rather than
a multitude of uncoordinated firm-centered democracies. Or at
Wetzel states, "Anarcho-syndicalism advocates the development of
a mass workers' movement based on direct democracy as the vehicle
for reorganization of the society on the basis of direct workers'
collective power over social production, thus eliminating the
domination and exploitation of the producing class by an
exploiting class. Workers cannot have collective power over the
system of social production as isolated groups competing in a
market economy; rather, workers self- management requires
structures of democratic control over social production and
public affairs generally. Workers' self- management thus refers,
not just to self-management of the individual workplace, but of
the whole system of social production. This requires grassroots
bodies, such as workers' congresses or conventions, through which
coordinated policies for the society can be developed in a
democratic manner. This is proposed as a substitute or
replacement for the historical nation-state." On this
interpretation of anarcho-syndicalism, the revolutionary trade
unions are a means for achieving an anarchist society, rather
than a proposed basis for social organization under anarchy.
Many would observe that there is nothing anarchistic about this
proposal; indeed, names aside, it fits easily into the orthodox
state-socialist tradition. Bakunin would have probably ridiculed
such ideas as authoritarian Marxist socialism in disguise, and
predicted that the leading anarchist revolutionaries would
swiftly become the new despots. But Wetzel is perhaps right that
many or even most historical anarcho-syndicalists were
championing the system outlined in his preceding quotation. He
goes on to add that "[I]f you look at the concept of 'state' in
the very abstract way it often is in the social sciences, as in
Weber's definition, then what the anarcho-syndicalists were
proposing is not elimination of the state or government, but its
radical democratization. That was not how anarchists themselves
spoke about it, but it can be plausibly argued that this is a
logical consequence of a certain major stream of left-anarchist
thought."
Ronald Fraser's discussion of the ideology of the Spanish
Anarchists (historically the largest European anarchist movement)
strongly undermines Wetzel's claim, however. There were two
well-developed lines of thought, both of which favored the
abolition of the State in the broad Weberian sense of the word,
and which did indeed believe that the workers should literally
have control over their workplaces. After distinguishing the
rural and the urban tendencies among the Spanish ideologists,
Fraser explains:
Common to both tendencies was the idea that the working
class 'simply' took over factories and workplaces and
ran them collectively but otherwise as before...
Underlying this vision of simple continuity was the
anarcho-syndicalist concept of the revolution not as a
rupture with, the destruction and replacement of, the
bourgeois order but as the latter's displacement. The
taking over of factories and workplaces, however
violently carried out, was not the beginning of the
revolution to create a new order but its final goal.
This view, in turn was conditioned by a particular view
of the state. Any state (bourgeois or working class)
was considered an oppressive power tout court - not as
the organization of a particular class's coercive
power. The 'state' in consequence, rather than the
existence of the capitalist mode of production which
gave rise to its particular form, often appeared as the
major enemy. The state did not have to be taken,
crushed, and a new - revolutionary - power established.
No. If it could be swept away, abolished, everything
else, including oppression, disappeared. The capitalist
order was simply displaced by the new-won workers'
freedom to administer the workplaces they had taken
over. Self-organized in autonomous communes or in
all-powerful syndicates, the workers, as the primary
factor in production, dispensed with the bourgeoisie.
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