/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.17427871]

Are there any books on anarchism?

[Anonymous No.17427883]

no there aren't

[Anonymous No.17427907]

>>17427871
Start with Proudhon I guess uhhhhh

[Anonymous No.17427915]

>>17427907
i already read proudhon

[Anonymous No.17427946]

>>17427871
It's from /leftypol/, isn't it? This is actually very interesting, how do libertarian socialists reconcile planning with decentralization and individual autonomy?

[Anonymous No.17427957]

>>17427946
>libertarian socialists
what?

[Anonymous No.17427962]

Engel's On Authority

[Anonymous No.17427974]

>>17427946
Union planning, worker council planning, that sorta thing. Can't speak for anarchists though. For the most interesting ideas regarding this, look up Daniel De Leon and his idea of an industrial congress.

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » !!oI3er5KKetj No.17427992]

>>17427871
Lots

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » !!oI3er5KKetj No.17427995]

>>17427915
Good. Bakunin and Kropotkin next

[Anonymous No.17428006]

I don't understand anarchism. It just sounds like "fascism but we have to start over from scratch with small communities" whenever I talk to a smart one. If you are okay with small scale volkisch communities, why not large ones or at least federations?

Also none of them seem to want to answer how an anarchist geopolitics would work in a world full of nations that see them as enemies (for breaking away from the capitalist world-rape omni-system) or victims (for being anything less than a state capable of sophisticated total war, by having a monopoly on violence and conscription). Some of them have told me it's more about educating people up to some utopian level where we will all naturally desire autonomous farming communities and individualist homesteads anyway, but then that sounds like Marxist communism to me, in that we have to go past bourgeois mentality and liberate the little authentic man inside us all, but until then we need to wage war against capitalism and create some kind of very state-seeming communist society.

I sort of understand anarchism as an initial starting point of radical individualism. But I just do not understand how it makes any sense as a social or political program.

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » !!oI3er5KKetj No.17428014]

>>17427946
>>17427974
Direct democracy. But include everyone, not just worksite councils.
The economics ought to be free, but I see a lot of resistance, so a nice bridge would be the non accumulative currency I bring up every now and then. Nothing centralized about it

[Anonymous No.17428024]

>17428014
silence yourself you moldy toorn

[Anonymous No.17428035]

>>17428014
Ive had this idea of a crypto currency thats proof of stake that gradually increases in amount every block halving.
That would prevent capital accumulation.
Like a reverse bitcoin if you will.
What do you think butterfly?
Leftypol shot it down ofcourse cause they dont like discussing things that are not written in books.

[Anonymous No.17428045]

>>17428006
All unironic anarchists/marxists I've met are basically Rousseauians who have deluded themselves into believing all evil is derived from society itself, not human nature. They seriously believe people would join hands and act as angels in a world free from social obligations.

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » !!oI3er5KKetj No.17428049]

>>17428006
Direct democracy, to arrange the workings of our lives, with a sizable group of non participants let alone to do as they please, is the EXACT OPPOSITE of fascism.
Fascists demanded a centralized government and ethnostate and will continue the imperialist war economy. Go modernist or Traditionalist, it will be a nightmare of blood and tyranny

>state-seeming
Only in that people live somewhere and call it by a name.

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » !!oI3er5KKetj No.17428062]

>>17428035
I donno. Have you read Cockshott’s book?
If it’s a functional non accumulative, it’s fine with me.

[Anonymous No.17428064]

>>17428049
>Direct democracy, to arrange the workings of our lives
What happens when the direct democracy votes for a single, central leader to make decisions for them?

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » !!oI3er5KKetj No.17428101]

>>17428064
It’s been shown throughout history that unilateral leadership and more pluralistic representative governments are highly corruptible. A series of communities that forget our history and grow too lazy are asking for disaster.
Too many would oppose such a mistake and vote it down. Once we have this superior system, we wouldn’t let it go that easily

[Anonymous No.17428118]

>>17428101
>Too many would oppose such a mistake and vote it down
Have you read history? What makes you think people are somehow wiser than literally every other country in history that tried direct democracy?

Even Plato realized that democracy always degenerates into tyranny.

[Anonymous No.17428122]

>>17428064
well in order for anarchism to work youd need a population thats violent, has an opinion on everything and that dislikes authority.
You know, like america.

[Anonymous No.17428125]

>>17428045
Is that really it? I was actually just going to say, it reminds me a bit of certain libertarians, whose philosophy seems to be at its core: "get rid of the evil clog in the drain, and the good will flow naturally and we'll all be fine." The evil for libertarians being unfree markets.

But I've come to learn that some libertarians are more mild than that and are simply advising that freedom, warts and all, is a better regulative ideal than totalitarian management. So I imagine there are anarchists who make of it less than a utopian binary.

>>17428049
That only partly answers my first question and doesn't touch my second. It is a partial answer because it doesn't answer things like, why did alienated states emerge at all if presumably the original synoicism was an equal contractual thing? How do you "manage" democracy to make sure it remains direct and fair? How do you prevent direct democratic participants from freely voting their rights away, as the Athenians did in the Peloponnesian War?

But it doesn't even answer the second question, namely: how do you achieve anything like this when other states will just see you as vulnerable dispersed populations waiting to be integrated into their own state frameworks (or killed so their people can appropriate your land)? Once again, there are many historical analogues, such as steppe peoples or German tribal federations simply being squeezed out by bigger and better organised states with access to slave economies and permanent standing armies.

Or how about this. How do you stop conspiracies and secret leagues from taking over or destroying your direct democracy? Same problem as libertarianism: under a free system, there will be people who are first to become powerful, either by acquiring resources others want, or by convincing others to follow them, like German chieftains and their "voluntary" warbands. Those people can then do all sorts of things to abuse disparate individual farmsteads and small weak communities that don't have permanent militaries. This is why "bandits" and "pirates" throughout history have often operated like small states. Look at the Victual Brothers that terrorised the North Sea, which was pretty "anarchic."

Or as long as we're on the subject of Northeast Europe, look at the Slavic Wends. Relatively isolated, probably relatively democratic communities similar to the earlier Germanic ones. The Germanics, now organised into Christian/post-Roman states, rolled over them and genocided and enslaved them. Then they did the same to the Balts and Lithuanians for another few hundred years, forcing them to mimic their organisational tactics. How do you prevent this?

>>17428101
>A series of communities that forget our history and grow too lazy are asking for disaster.
The ancient Athenians, as some have argued the peak of civilisation (they excluded slaves and women from politics so it was all elite, educated, civically engaged men) did it.

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » !!oI3er5KKetj No.17428137]

>>17428118
>every other country in history that tried direct democracy?
Which are those?
>Plato
Slave owners? Direct democracy?

[Anonymous No.17428151]

>>17428049
whats the point of direct democracy it just seems like more work for nothing in return

also in every anarchist society people were just getting lynched and i feel like thats actually worse and more repressive than just having a government that tries to protect and rehabilitate criminals

[Anonymous No.17428158]

>>17428137
Yes, Athens was a direct democracy, one of the few true ones in history. It just didn't have a 100% franchise. That is something different. Neither do we, by the way. We don't let children vote below an arbitrary age. How do you manage that?

So, you think if Athens had let everyone in Attica vote, it would have resulted in LESS tyranny?

Why do you think cities formed and delegated certain of their rights away to powerful men and organisations in the first place? It was plebs resisting warlord assholes who took advantage of an open "democratic" countryside to raid and plunder.

[Anonymous No.17428164]

>>17428125
>Is that really it? I was actually just going to say, it reminds me a bit of certain libertarians, whose philosophy seems to be at its core: "get rid of the evil clog in the drain, and the good will flow naturally and we'll all be fine." The evil for libertarians being unfree markets.
>But I've come to learn that some libertarians are more mild than that and are simply advising that freedom, warts and all, is a better regulative ideal than totalitarian management. So I imagine there are anarchists who make of it less than a utopian binary.

In my experience, libertarians are like naive, immature conservatives. They learn about some of the heuristics on liberty and why it can be good and treat them as iron law instead of the rules of thumb they are. They are not as blindly optimistic as anarchists are.

I remember talking to one of my professors who was an anarchist at heart about Stephen Pinker's statement that "all governments begin as protection rackets." It devolved into this longer conversation and my (lit) professor seemed to be convinced that war was a product of the machine and it was not inherent in humans.

I don't know how you categorize that type of naivete other than Rousseauian.

[Anonymous No.17428200]

>>17428014
How would planning look like in a system of direct economic democracy? A hypothetical scenario: demand for steel falls, steel mills have to be closed up. That would happen by the decree of the central planner in state socialism or by the decision of capitalist aiming to maximize his profit in capitalism. What would happen in a system where workers democratically decide what happens with the steel mill? Wouldn't they just choose a suboptimal solution and continue producing a commodity there is no desire for?

[Anonymous No.17428206]

>>17428122
America is stage four (democracy) of Plato's five regimes. Plato correctly pointed out that the desire for excess freedom would lead to the expansion of the lower class, which would ultimately result in an undisciplined, lazy, degenerate population who cannot control their own desires long enough to accomplish anything. Plato reckoned that these democracies always devolved into tyrannies because the people eventually become so fed up with their own incompetence, they'll look towards a strong man who can bring order to the chaos. That strong man eventually becomes a tyrant, as everyone is too lazy to sort out the affairs of their own lives and entrusts too much power in one man.

[Anonymous No.17428225]

[Anonymous No.17428227]

>>17428164
Its true though most people are not violent by nature.
Atleast im not.
Thats why soldiers have ptsd and such.
But thats besides the point.
The great flaw i see in anarchism and socialism/communism in general is that there is no incentive to work.
Ive seen it first hand when i went to cuba and saw how lazy cubans were.
Thats why communism worked best under stalin.
They had guards beat people in order to work.
Im sure they had similar measures under catalonia no doubt.

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » !!oI3er5KKetj No.17428242]

>>17428151
At first, a revolution is a lot of work, (lynched, yeah, statist capitalist cucks are the worst) but it would get easier. It’s just a grouping of about four or five thousand people making agreements with neighboring four or five thousands to run things more or less as they already do. Except they do it well and no one suffers privations.
> more repressive than just having a government that tries to protect and rehabilitate criminals
Governments are criminals. You know how much blood is on their hands?

>>17428158
They dabbled in it, but were not an honest DD. Yes. Freeing the slaves and a women would have led to a better Athens.

>>17428200
If it’s not temporary I suppose they dissolve the workers council and the workers look for other things to do. No reason to panic because no one is going to deprive them of food and shelter etc.

[Anonymous No.17428253]

>>17428227
That is true too. Also, if you look at the direct democracy attempts of OWS, you'd see how inefficient and terrible it is. Since they needed to come to complete consensus on every issue, there was non-stop gridlock. Eventually only those without a job would stick around to vote and thus, all policies were passed by the unemployed.

I can see such a thing happening in a direct democracy writ large. It would literally be rule by Karens.

[Anonymous No.17428258]

>>17428242
Why not respond to earnest effortposts directed at you? You are rude.

You know what I think happened to you, you started phoneposting. You still want to post because you're lonely, but you don't want to put effort in because you can't type. 4chan became social media for you, not a discussion board.

[Anonymous No.17428294]

>>17428242
i dont want anyone to get lynched though and also its not the concept of government thats responsible for killing people its specific governments that have existed through history

but imagine theres a revolution and someone says you support capitalism so you just fucking die i dont want there to be a revolution because pretty much every revolution in history has just sucked

[Anonymous No.17428302]

>>17428253
yes thats the anarchist autism.
51% majority wasnt good enough it had to be like 80%
And i also heard that in catalonia theyd just shoot people because courts were hierarchical.

[Anonymous No.17428334]

>>17427957
Refers to anarchism rather than state socialism/authoritarian socialism.

[Anonymous No.17428527]

>>17428164

Personally I don't think humans are naturally "good" (not sure if that word even means something), you need some degree of violence for evolutionary reasons. That said, I don't think that a global competition for everything is a sustainable approach. To buy all the shit we have you have to work more, and working more means crushing others who are trying to get more. We could house, cloth and feed every single human, but apparently most people prefer being naked and hungry and "earn" home, food and clothes. But, of course, since it's a race, most people don't receive a prize.

[Anonymous No.17428593]

>>17428035
Why would I want to hold it if I can't accumulate it?

[Anonymous No.17428668]

>>17428593
well the idea is that wealth would be inflated away.
Youd start out with one and on the next block reward youd get 10 and then 100 and so on...
Unlimited inflation basically so that wealth can not accumulated only that the goverment would not be in charge, an algorithm would.
Itd be pointless to sell it, itd just make sense to adopt it in a local community or country etc...

[Anonymous No.17428679]

>>17427907
Proudhon would have been banned from leftypol for antisemitism lel

[Anonymous No.17428691]

>>17428527
> That said, I don't think that a global competition for everything is a sustainable approach

I hear this over and over again and it must either be a meme or a oft-repeated half-baked thought. Competition IS life. You cannot exist in this world at any point in time without experiencing some level of competition. This does not mean you compete with everyone at every given moment, but you will always find yourself at odds with someone at one point or another.

Take a Black Friday sale. Now pretend the people there are fighting over something that's an actual necessity, like the last bit of food in the forest. You don't think people would fucking murder each other over the last bit of food when they murder each other over a flat screen TV?

People are brutal in a state of nature. Capitalism is the civilized version of that brutality. Take away capitalism and you have all of the brutality of man with none of the productivity.

[Anonymous No.17428729]

>>17428668
okay no that wouldnt make sense now that i think about it.
Okay how about this, a crypto currency you can mine by solving captchas with an increasing reward.
Yep, thatd make sense.

[Anonymous No.17428775]

>>17428691
>Competition IS life. You cannot exist in this world at any point in time without experiencing some level of competition.

I did not say it isn't. Conflict definitely generates progress. My point is, why not compete in "Let's make it so that no children has worms in their fucking eyes" instead of "Let's see how much gold I can steal from Congo" ?

[Anonymous No.17428802]

>>17428775
well if your concern is people from the congo then dont do anything.
Third world countries are getting rich at americas expense and china is building on them.

[Anonymous No.17428851]

>>17428802
>Third world countries are getting rich at americas expense

lol

[Anonymous No.17428856]

>>17428802
>getting rich
Not really, they are developing somewhat and China is profiting from it by basically taking on a soft colonizer role. The Belgian Congo also became fairly prosperous at its peak, definitely more so than now anyway.

[Anonymous No.17428880]

>>17428851
you should travel fren.
A lot of africans are not living on mudhuts anymore.
And yet america is slowly getting worse.
That leads me to the conclusion that theyre in fact getting rich at americas expense.

[Anonymous No.17428924]

>>17428880
Why would it be zero sum? If France grows more prosperous does that mean Austria necessarily weakens?

[Anonymous No.17428940]

>>17428924
Well its logic.
If you get cobalt from the congo for instance and the price of labor in the congo goes up then the price of cobalt goes up.

[Anonymous No.17429023]

>>17428227
Today I was reading about how white skin wasn't a change in the superficial physicality of the tone in response to the environment of Europe, like a sunburn, but rather an existing gene that was selected for because it was obviously more advantageous, so it was a dormant potentiality inside the genome already. So violence is the same no? The potentiality exists for violence. Communism is just an organization of capitalism. Monarchism is just an organization of anarchism. They are all the same, the only change is who benefits and who doesn't. In communism the proles are emotionally oppressed under the guise of freedom. In ideal communism, the elitist, healthy and virile intuitively take soft dominance over the weaker members. Perhaps they use condescension and pity to help out the weaker members, and thus we have the kind of society we live in now, more or less. People need to learn to surf on the flux of the spirit of civilization, that is essentially what anarchism is, except then it would no longer be anarchism - it would just be being.

[Anonymous No.17429042]

>>17428940
I don't think the cobalt market is the cause of America's decline lol

[Anonymous No.17429245]

>>17428679
Leftypol bans antisemitism? Damn they are fucking reddit after all. What about racism and misogyny?

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » !!oI3er5KKetj No.17429251]

>>17428227
>there is no incentive to work.
There is no incentive to worship work. There will be just enough work to go around, and as William Morris imagined it, people would actually worry about having too much idle time
>lazy Cubans
Did you ask them if they were having a good day?

>>17428253
>Karens.
You are the Karen here, Karen.

>>17428258
I had to do my laundry. They don’t provide wifi so I read my book.

>>17428294
No, it is the mere existence of statism. They smash and grab their power and then lie to the laborers. If a government hasn’t bloodied its hands to maintain power, its a rarity or a vassal state.
> but imagine theres a revolution
I can only see an honest to goodness revolution (not some shitty coup) when people make a conscious decision to pull out the linchpin holding state-capitalism together, and that’s accumulative currency. I would reach out to the Bugloo Boys and any other neoclassical liberals, you can’t get rid of states without starving them of their illusory currency. If we fail to unite against the enemy system, it is going to lead to our extinction.

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » !!oI3er5KKetj No.17429256]

>>17429245
Why would they want to entertain that crazy bullshit?

[Anonymous No.17429267]

>>17428225
Is this good?

[Anonymous No.17429276]

>>17429256
Because authoritarian control of speech for moral policing is not left wing? Stupid unloved hippie bitch

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » !!oI3er5KKetj No.17429330]

>>17429276
Why are you a racist/misogynist?

[Anonymous No.17429356]

>>17429330
Do you believe in authorities having control to silence people for "forbidden" speech, Miss Anarchist? Answer that first. Not even a real principled anarchist, just another lib. Should have expected from you.

[Anonymous No.17429383]

>>17429356
if anarchism is democracy which implies rule by karens.
Weve gone over this.

[Anonymous No.17429405]

>>17429330
do us all a favor. close your browser and use a bellows to blow the soot and dust out of your decrepit vaginal canal

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » !!oI3er5KKetj No.17429414]

>>17429356
Read Stirner.
Why are you a racist/misogynist?