I believe there is merit in the Anarchism Without Adjectives approach. If people can agree that we should reject political authority and that we should not impose our economic system on those who don’t accept it, we would have a much larger tent than we do now. Don’t most here believe that economic pluralism will result in anarchy? Yet I don’t see a great coalition between anarchic camps.
Surely some, or many, communists would acknowledge a right to emancipation. Surely the gulf between anarcho-capitalists and mutualists is only the result of different expectations of market outcomes.
I see potential for collaboration among anarchists. I expect others here agree.
There’s a number of senses anarchism without adjectives could be used- (1)strategic, (2)vision of anarchy, (3)kind of anarchy advocated .I’m not sure which sense your using here.
(1) I believe all anarchists should seek to work together insofar as they truly believe in anarchism and I am more than willing to work with those who have deep concern for social issues in the ways that I do.So yes I definatley favour stronger alliances with all sorts of anarchists.
(2) I accept and am happy to admit that under anarchy there will be a pluralism of different systems like mutualism, communes,co-ops,anarcho-communist settlements,primitivist groups etc.
(3) which I understand to be the conventional use of anarchy without adjectives is sort of indifference to which system is best and seems to be a lets see what happens I’ll favour the best then type attitude(I can’t agree with this). I could be wrong though.Like I said there’s a least 3 possible uses of the term.
I agree, without knowing what issues you refer to. If you oppose political authority (the definition of anarchism, IMO) then we can work together.
I agree.
I am not saying you can’t have an economic preference. All I ask is that you allow people to choose which community and what system they want to live in. If you are a mutualist and want to live in mutualism, that is fine. Just don’t force me to live in that system if I want to be capitalist.
^ That is pretty much my point. There is no reason to inherently think one is closer to anything just because it has the label “anarchist” on it. There is no reason to think of it as a term that is somehow inherently more beneficial than things such as green, paleoconservative, conservative, socialist, etc. All that matters is the structures of reality and what can and can not be said about such things.
Many left-wing anarchists formally declare, and possibly even believe, to be against violence. But in practice support the use of force. To some anarchism merely is a theory that excuses the use of violent activism, a MacGuffin. Look at the kind of anarchists smashing stuff at anti-globalization protests, demanding more cartelizing protection for big business.
Many left-wing anarchists formally declare, and possibly even believe, to be against violence. But in practice support the use of force. To some anarchism merely is a theory that excuses the use of violent activism, a MacGuffin. Look at the kind of anarchists smashing stuff at anti-globalization protests, demanding more cartelizing protection for big business.
Right. I think it’d be better to stay away from such loose cannons.
There is trouble with the ‘big tent’ approach to ‘anarchism’. First of all there is the obvious objection that someone like Bakunin was not an anarchist, he proposed coercive collectives governed by secret conspirators. He intended to replace one tyranny with another.
There is the second that if you believe that private property is the root of all evil and free exchange results in Satanic corruption then it would be hard to reconcile this with a belief in a libertarian society.
As much as it may pain libertarians it may be that understanding and promoting libertarianism does require a fairly advanced and unintuitive understanding of economics and society which may be out of reach for most ordinary people.
Depending on how you define property ,this isn’t true.
No, its still very true. The ones that defend “private property” are still few and far between.
This sounds like typical An-cap hermit strategy.
You need to re-read the page then as no strategy has been pushed. Rather, a strategy (big-tentism) has been criticizsed. And can you give some links showing that the “hermit strategy” is typical an-cap one?
Then wouldn’t it make sense to ally with some rather than throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Some, sure. That some excludes most anarchists though.
Don’t most of us support economic pluralism? Is that not a good place to make friends with other anti-statists?
Only to the extent that its voluntary, not to the extent it undermines people’s property. Other anti-statists seem to have no qualms with people claiming property simply because they work on it. Most forms, in fact, consider private property and the state to both be the enemy.
So if we ever want to get things changed, allies make that much easier. Rejecting all but the purest AnCaps will lead to a microscopic tent.
Thats a strawman first of all. I haven’t said “reject all but the purest AnCaps.” I’ve made it clear that we shouldn’t ally with groups that are hostile to private property, which includes most anarchists. There’s a German proverb "Mit solchen Freunden braucht man keine Feinde mehr" - maybe allies haven’t always been know to make things “that much easier.” Allying with minarchists, agorists, Objectivists, secessionists, and other decentralists seems fine by me. As most of them understand the crucial role private property has, they just need a little more consistency.
What evidence do you have than most anarchists are not voluntarists by our definition?
I didn’t say you did. I was just making a point.
It’s funny that you find it acceptable to ally with those who support taxation (a rejection of private property) while attacking anarchists for rejecting private property.