Anarchist Socialists?

[rational thinker]

Why and how can there be so many anarchist socialists? How is that even possible? Isn't that a paradox of some sort, a complete contradiction? I've heard many people calling themselves that, notably Noam Chomsky, George Orwell, and etc.

[Pennsylvania]

I believe that the key problems Anarcho-Socialists have with free market economics are:

1) Wage labor
2) Real Property ownership (i.e. land ownership)

Anarcho-Socialists believe that wage labor is akin to slavery in that it is exploitative and that it is a violation of "anarchism" by definition (i.e. employment itself is hierarchy). Technically, I believe they are in the right here, but the important factor is that employment is not achieved by force, and therein lies the disagreement between them and proponents of free markets.

As far as land ownership is concerned, doesn't it at least make a little sense that if one person owns a piece of land, you are essentially forcing others off that land until such time as you are dead, or you sell the land either to another private owner, or to the people in common? However, I believe the key counter argument here is that if the labor-value theory of property is to be adopted in an Anarcho-Socialist society then individuals are essentially always removing some form of natural resource from the earth and introducing into the private sector. For example, If I find a forest which has previously never been found, and harvest the timber, the labor I have used to harvest that timber makes the wood rightfully mine, yet because it is mine, others are excluded from using it until I relinquish ownership of it.

[Kludge]

Do anarcho-anythings believe in anything other than anarchy? I always thought the hyphen afterwords was more a statement of their morals or ethics.

[Brooklyn Red Leg]

Noam Chomsky can call himself Mother Teresa, it won't make it true. He's a Statist fuckhole who has stabbed college student's in the back over the 1st Amendment by siding with the University douchebags on 'speech codes'. Just do a search on Penn & Teller's Bullshit: College and you'll see what I mean.

As for Anarcho-Socialists, yea, it does seem like they are polar opposites. I think they just like to claim 'Anarchist' roots to throw people off the scent. As far as I'm concerned, their stance against private property is just another form of Statism.

[Paulitician]

Most of all the early anarchists were socialists, even a lot of the individualists ones, like Benjamin Tucker who wrote a essay called State Socialism and Anarchism: How Far They Agree, And Wherein They Differ (http://praxeology.net/BT-SSA.htm)

The article @ Wikipedia on libertarian socialism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarian_socialism) may help your understanding on what sets anarcho-socialists apart from state socialists. Here's the intro with my emphasis:


Libertarian socialism is a group of political philosophies that aim to create a society without political, economic, or social hierarchies, i.e. a society in which all violent or coercive institutions would be dissolved, and in their place every person would have free, equal access to tools of information and production, or a society in which such coercive institutions and hierarchies were drastically reduced in scope.

This equality and freedom would be achieved through the abolition of authoritarian institutions that own and control productive means as private property, in order that direct control of these means of production and resources will be shared by society as a whole. Libertarian socialism also constitutes a tendency of thought that informs the identification, criticism and practical dismantling of illegitimate authority in all aspects of social life. Accordingly libertarian socialists believe that “the exercise of power in any institutionalized form – whether economic, political, religious, or sexual – brutalizes both the wielder of power and the one over whom it is exercised.”

While more state-based varieties of socialism emphasize the role of the state or political party in promoting state control of the economy and social engineering, libertarian socialists place their hopes in trade unions, workers' councils, municipalities, citizens' assemblies, and other non-bureaucratic, decentralized means of action. Most libertarian socialists advocate doing away with the state altogether, seeing it as a bulwark of capitalist class rule.

Political philosophies commonly described as libertarian socialist include most varieties of anarchism (especially anarchist communism, anarchist collectivism, anarcho-syndicalism, most forms of mutualism, some forms of individualist anarchism, social ecology, autonomism and council communism). Some writers use libertarian socialism synonymously with anarchism.


EDIT: Was George Orwell really an anarchist socialist? I thought he was a social democrat/fabian socialist.

[Fox McCloud]

I never really understood how it could work....they first seek to enlarge the State so it encompasses everything and controls everything so they can get their ideas put into place.

Once that's done...I don't know what they expect to happen...for the State to just slowly dissolve into thin air?

Also, if all forms of coercion are abolished and those policies exist...what keeps someone from coming in and taking over or going against those policies? After all, without the State to enforce the policies, it'd eventually break down into utter chaos (and collapse of that society) or anarcho-capitalism would eventually take its place. After all, even if a whole generation is indoctrinated in such beliefs, eventually someone, somewhere will be born that wants more that just what's given to him, or new philosophies will emerge....I just really can't see how "anarchy"+"socialism" works.

[rational thinker]

Thanks for your answers, but I still don't understand how one can be an anarchist (the complete absolving of government) and yet still want a government to provide healthcare, tax citizens, spread the wealth, and etc.

How can they ask such a government for services if it doesn't exist because they're ANARCHISTS? This is seriously fucking with my head.

[Jeremy]

Anything anarchy is utopia anyway, so it doesn't really matter. Voluntarists may be different though...

[rational thinker]

Anything anarchy is utopia anyway, so it doesn't really matter. Voluntarists may be different though...

Yes, but it still doesn't answer the question. Socialism would be force by the government. That is against anarchy.

[Pennsylvania]

Oh I see what you are getting at a little better now. I think the problem is there are sort of two widely accepted connotations of socialism. One means the government owns the means of production, and the other means the people own the means of production socially. So Anarcho-Communism I think would be a better term for Anarcho-Socialism.

[rational thinker]

Oh I see what you are getting at a little better now. I think the problem is there are sort of two widely accepted connotations of socialism. One means the government owns the means of production, and the other means the people own the means of production socially. So Anarcho-Communism I think would be a better term for Anarcho-Socialism.

So doesn't that mean that communism means "no government?" Isn't that the antithesis of what communism is all about?

[zade]

I think most of you are misunderstanding.

To many of us here, property is a natural right. Therefore to the libertarian, in the abscence of government, individual property would still exist. To the anarcho-socialist, property is an institution, not based in nature, but enforced by the govenrment. Therefore in the abscence of government everyone would have equal access to resources, not in the vein that the government is distributing resources, but in view of the fact that there would be no government to enforce property rights.

In addition, many anarcho-socialists are admitedly idealistic, in that they're hope is that abolishment of institutional government would lead to a community oriented, voluntary program of wealth distribution, rather than a coercive one.

[Pennsylvania]

So doesn't that mean that communism means "no government?" Isn't that the antithesis of what communism is all about?

Not exactly, communism is the ideal stateless condition which would result if the vanguard state (Dictatorship of the Proletariat in Marxist-Leninist terms) were to dissolve. Communists paradoxically see the state as a means to achieve the end result of statelessness.

[mediahasyou]

All of these societies rely upon voluntary consent and contracts.

The anarchy term means without government.

[mediahasyou]

These systems all involve a change in the social structure. Changing this would involve voluntary consent.

That is not any different than our current government that relies on voluntary consent. However, our current government uses SOME coercion to make people voluntarily consent. For efficiency reasons the government cannot coerce every individual. Therefore, a vast majority must voluntary consent for our current system to be upheld.

[Kludge]

To many of us here, property is a natural right. Therefore to the libertarian, in the abscence of government, individual property would still exist.

As a libertarian, I disagree :p

Anarchy is anarchy. There are no rights.

[Paulitician]

Thanks for your answers, but I still don't understand how one can be an anarchist (the complete absolving of government) and yet still want a government to provide healthcare, tax citizens, spread the wealth, and etc.

How can they ask such a government for services if it doesn't exist because they're ANARCHISTS? This is seriously fucking with my head.
Agreed, I have observed some social anarchists who advocate all this (people like Chomsky, Zinn, as well as some of your everyday social anarchists). When I was reading news about the Greece riots, one reason the paper gave for anarchists rioting is because government was cutting down on services :confused:. One would think that both social anarchists as well as more market oriented anarchists would be trying to set up alternative institutions that compete with the state and not ask for the state's help.

Redistribution, I could see why people would find that necessary/acceptable (other than for flawed Marxist ideological reasons), but I personally have never observed when the rich get truly soaked for the sake of us plebs. There have been various criticism of Chomskyites who say we need a strong centralized government first before we can have anarchy (A notion I find absolutely ridiculous!), such as this Roderick Long essay below (I've posted this before).


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Chomsky’s Augustinian Anarchism (http://www.theartofthepossible.net/2008/09/04/chomskys-augustinian-anarchism/)

Noam Chomsky is perhaps the United States’ best-known anarchist. There’s a certain irony to this, however; for just as St. Augustine once prayed, “Grant me chastity and continence, but not yet,” Chomsky’s aim is in effect anarchy, but not yet.

Chomsky’s reason for the “not yet” is that a powerful central government is currently necessary as a bulwark against the power of the corporate elite; thus it will not be safe to abolish or even scale back the state until we first use the state to break the power of the corporate elite:


In the long term, I think the centralized political power ought to be eliminated and dissolved and turned down ultimately to the local level, finally, with federalism and associations and so on. On the other hand, right now, I’d like to strengthen the federal government. The reason is, we live in this world, not some other world. And in this world there happen to be huge concentrations of private power that are as close to tyranny and as close to totalitarian as anything humans have devised.

There’s only one way of defending rights that have been attained, or of extending their scope in the face of these private powers, and that’s to maintain the one form of illegitimate power that happens to be somewhat responsible to the public and which the public can indeed influence.
(You Say You Want a Devolution)

Now Chomsky’s notion of the state as a crucial bulwark against “concentrations of private power” might initially seem puzzling, given that – as Chomsky’s own research has confirmed time and again – the state has historically been the chief enabler of such concentrations. But what Chomsky seems to mean is not so much that it generally acts as a bulwark now, but rather that it can be made to do so; if you’re facing a much stronger opponent (private power) who also has a sword (government power), you’re better off trying to grab the sword and use it against him than you would be simply destroying the sword.

Why does Chomsky see state power as less dangerous and more usable than private power? Chomsky answers:


The government is far from benign – that’s true. On the other hand, it’s at least partially accountable, and it can become as benign as we make it.

What’s not benign (what’s extremely harmful, in fact) is something you didn’t mention – business power, which is highly concentrated and, by now, largely transnational. Business power is very far from benign and it’s completely unaccountable. It’s a totalitarian system that has an enormous effect on our lives. It’s also the main reason why the government isn’t benign.
(On Gun Control)

There are two assumptions here with which I want to take issue.

First, Chomsky assumes that the influence of private business on government is “the main reason why the government isn’t benign.” Why on earth does he believe this? Monopoly power tends to invite abuse, whether those who direct that power or mostly within or mostly outside the state apparatus. If Chomsky thinks government would be so harmless without evil capitalists pulling the strings, why does he want to abolish it even in the long run?

Second, Chomsky assumes that state power is “partially accountable” while business power is “completely unaccountable.” Now to begin with, I’m not sure whether the accountability of state power is here being contrasted with that of actually existing, state-enabled business power or instead with the accountability of business power as it would be without governmental support. But if it’s the former, then the contrast, even if correct, would provide no grounds for resisting the state’s abolition; the fact that X + Y is more dangerous than X by itself is not a good reason to defend X. The contrast is relevant to a defense of the state only if business, without state support, would still be less accountable than the state. And here it seems obvious that the state – even a democratic state – is far less accountable than genuinely private business.

After all, a business can get your labour and/or possessions only if you agree to hand them over, while a government can extract these by force. Of course you can try to vote your current representatives out of office, but only at multiple-year intervals, and only if you convince 51% of your neighbours to do likewise; whereas you can terminate your relationship with a business at any time, and without getting others to go along. Moreover, each candidate offers a package-deal of policies, whereas with private enterprise I can choose, say, Grocery A’s vegetables and Grocery B’s meats.

David Friedman illuminates the contrast:


When a consumer buys a product on the market, he can compare alternative brands. … When you elect a politician, you buy nothing but promises. … You can compare 1968 Fords, Chryslers, and Volkswagens, but nobody will ever be able to compare the Nixon administration of 1968 with the Humphrey and Wallace administrations of the same year. It is as if we had only Fords from 1920 to 1928, Chryslers from 1928 to 1936, and then had to decide what firm would make a better car for the next four years….

Not only does a consumer have better information than a voter, it is of more use to him. If I investigate alternative brands of cars …. decide which is best for me, and buy it, I get it. If I investigate alternative politicians and vote accordingly, I get what the majority votes for. …

Imagine buying cars the way we buy governments. Ten thousand people would get together and agree to vote, each for the car he preferred. Whichever car won, each of the ten thousand would have to buy it. It would not pay any of us to make any serious effort to find out which car was best; whatever I decide, my car is being picked for me by the other members of the group. … This is how I must buy products on the political marketplace. I not only cannot compare the alternative products, it would not be worth my while to do so even if I could.
(The Machinery of Freedom)

The “accountability” provided by democratic government seems laughable by comparison with the accountability provided by the market. The chief function of the ballot, it would seem, is to make the populace more tractable by convincing them they’re somehow in charge.

None of this should be news to Chomsky, who after all has himself pointed out:


As things now stand, the electoral process is a matter of the population being permitted every once in a while to choose among virtually identical representatives of business power. That’s better than having a dictator, but it’s a very limited form of democracy. Most of the population realizes that and doesn’t even participate. … And of course elections are almost completely purchased. In the last congressional elections, 95 percent of the victors in the election outspent their opponents, and campaigns were overwhelmingly funded by corporations.
(Chomsky’s Other Revolution)

Well, yes, exactly. So what is the basis of Chomsky’s faith in the democratic state?

Chomsky might object that my defense of market accountability ignores the fact that such “accountability” involves voting with dollars, so that the wealthy have more votes than the poor – whereas in a democratic state everyone has an equal vote. But even if we leave aside the causal dependence of existing disparities of wealth on systematic state intervention – as well as the fact that government, by controlling the direction of resources it does not own, magnifies the power of the wealthy – it still remains the case that however few dollars one may have, when one votes with those dollars one gets something back, whereas when one votes with ballots one gets back nothing one was aiming for unless one happens to be voting with the majority. Which is less democratic – a system in which the effectiveness of one’s vote varies with one’s resources, or one in which 49% of the population has no effective vote at all?

Chomsky is hardly unaware that what he calls “business power” depends crucially on government intervention – since he has done as much as anyone to document this relationship. As he notes:


Any form of concentrated power, whatever it is, is not going to want to be subjected to popular democratic control or, for that matter, to market discipline. Powerful sectors, including corporate wealth, are naturally opposed to functioning democracy, just as they’re opposed to functioning markets, for themselves, at least.
(Reflections on Democracy; emphasis added)

So if the corporate elite are so terrified of the free market, why is Chomsky so reluctant to hurl them into it?

Perhaps Chomsky’s view is that although government is needed to create these concentrations of private power, it’s not needed to maintain them, so just suppressing the state at this point in the game would leave business power intact. That’s not a crazy view, but it needs argument. After all, systematic government intervention on behalf of big business isn’t just something that happened back in the Gilded Age or the Progressive Era or the New Deal; it continues, massively and unceasingly. I wouldn’t claim (indeed I’ve denied) that private power depends solely and uniquely on state support; but it’s hard to believe that all that state support is simply superfluous, as it must be if removing such state support wouldn’t appreciably weaken businesss power.

Chomsky has said (in Answers to Eight Questions on Anarchism) that although he finds himself “in substantial agreement with people who consider themselves anarcho-capitalists on a whole range of issues,” and also “admire[s] their commitment to rationality,” he nevertheless regards the free-market version of anarchism as “a doctrinal system which, if ever implemented, would lead to forms of tyranny and oppression that have few counterparts in human history.” Why? Because “the idea of ‘free contract’ between the potentate and his starving subject is a sick joke.”

But this argument is blatantly question-begging. Chomsky is assuming the very point that’s in dispute – namely that without government intervention on behalf of the rich, the economy would be divided into “potentates” and “starving subjects.” Now it’s true that market anarchists (for reasons explained elsewhere, I prefer to avoid the term “anarcho-capitalist”) themselves have sometimes – mistakenly, in my view – described their ideal economy as looking very much like the distribution of wealth and labour roles in our present economy, only minus the state. But why should Chomsky take their word for it? If the state really is intervening massively and systematically on behalf of the “potentate” and against the “starving subject” – as Chomsky must admit that it is, since his research explicitly demonstrates just this – why on earth would he expect that power imbalance to remain unchanged once that intervention ceases?

Not only does Chomsky underestimate the resources of anarchy, but he also appears to overestimate the serviceability of the state. He writes as if, even though the state is doing lots of bad stuff now, this could all be changed if more people would vote correctly. Now it’s true enough that people voting differently can make a difference to just how bad the government is. (If enough Germans had voted differently in 1932, they could have gotten a less awful regime.) Still, at the end of the day, what’s wrong with a coercive monopoly is not that the wrong people are running it, but rather that – leaving aside its inherent injustice – such a monopoly brings with it incentival and informational perversities which there is no way to avoid (except by removing the source of the problem, the monopoly, in which case what you have is no longer a state).


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It's kind of like what Benjamin Tucker pointed out in that essay I linked to:


First, then, State Socialism, which may be described as the doctrine that all the affairs of men should be managed by the government, regardless of individual choice. Marx, its founder, concluded that the only way to abolish the class monopolies was to centralize and consolidate all industrial and commercial interests, all productive and distributive agencies, in one vast monopoly in the hands of the State. The government must become banker, manufacturer, farmer, carrier, and merchant, and in these capacities must suffer no competition. Land, tools, and all instruments of production must be wrested from individual hands, and made the property of the collectivity. To the individual can belong only the products to be consumed, not the means of producing them. A man may own his clothes and his food, but not the sewing-machine which makes his shirts or the spade which digs his potatoes. Product and capital are essentially different things; the former belongs to individuals, the latter to society. Society must seize the capital which belongs to it, by the ballot if it can, by revolution if it must. Once in possession of it, it must administer it on the majority principle, though its organ, the State, utilize it in production and distribution, fix all prices by the amount of labor involved, and employ the whole people in its workshops, farms, stores, etc. The nation must be transformed into a vast bureaucracy, and every individual into a State official. Everything must be done on the cost principle, the people having no motive to make a profit out of themselves. Individuals not being allowed to own capital, no one can employ another, or even himself. Every man will be a wage-receiver, and the State the only wage-payer. He who will not work for the State must starve, or, more likely, go to prison. All freedom of trade must disappear. Competition must be utterly wiped out. All industrial and commercial activity must be centered in one vast, enormous, all-inclusive monopoly. The remedy for monopolies is monopoly.

But then of course the state would wither away and die off :rolleyes:. People like Chomsky and Zinn are philosphically libertarian socialists, but practically are state socialists (well, actually social democrats... but almost state socialists). To me those positions are basically completely opposite, ergo to hold both positions at the same time--I would agree, it can't be possible. But principled libertarian socialism is IMO totally possible (I was concvinced of this when I considered the nature[s] of private property, or property as such), as much as most people here would disagree with that.

[torchbearer]

for more info see: hippy commune

[Paulitician]

So doesn't that mean that communism means "no government?" Isn't that the antithesis of what communism is all about?
According to Marx & Engels, the last stage of communism would not have government (by that time the state would have withered away :o). So, there are various versions of communism! I'm not sure why people here don't understand this, there various conceptions for different terms/systems. Now, whether those different conceptions are actually possible in the real world, well, some of you might be right to have your objections