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ELI5 why is anarchy not "the guy with the bigger stick" making the rules? (lemmy.giftedmc.com)

submitted 10 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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I'm politically agnostic and have moved from a slightly conservative stance to a vastly more progressive stance (european). i still dont get the more niche things like tankies and anarchists at this point but I would like to, without spending 10 hours reading endless manifests (which do have merit, no doubt, but still).

Can someone explain to me why anarchy isnt the guy (or gal, or gang, or entity) with the bigger stick making the rules?

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (2 children)

Anarchy, in it's purest sense, is to a system what darkness is to light. Darkness is the absence of light, not a thing in-and-of itself. Anarchy is the lack of an establishment or system, rather than a system in itself.

What this means, in practical application, is that most anarchists are simply opposed to whatever system exists currently. Human nature dictates that SOME system will exist as long as we do, so true anarchy can only exist when there are no longer humans around to perceive it.

In historical context, this almost always means that when anarchy "takes over," what it creates is a "systemic void" which - like any vacuum - quickly gets filled. Usually by the guy with the biggest stick.

[–] zik 15 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

I think this is a common misconception about anarchies - that there's no social control of any kind. If you look at actual real world anarchies like Freetown Christiania in Copenhagen they don't believe in a complete absence of organisation. Far from it - they develop community-based committees which have no actual power in themselves but are used to develop concensus on issues that affect the whole community. So rather than abolishing all rules they're all about human collaboration and concensus.

For instance when hard drugs became a problem in Christiana the residents got together and banned hard drugs. It's not a law as such but everyone's in agreement that if you try to sell hard drugs you'll be ejected.

It's not a perfect place and it's hard to say that their brand of anarchy works well as a system of government. It seems to have been a mixed experience for many people who've lived there. But it's definitely been an interesting social experiment.

There are plenty of documentaries on youtube if you're interested.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago (2 children)

they develop community-based committees which have no actual power in themselves but are used to develop concensus on issues that affect the whole community. So rather than abolishing all rules they're all about human collaboration and concensus.

So it's a democracy.

[–] BiteSizedZeitGeist 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

It doesn't sound like there are any elections, or representatives, or bills or candidates to vote on. Just conducting an ad-hoc "all in favor say aye" type of vote doesn't mean it's a democracy. Just because many people come to a consensus doesn't mean it's a democracy.

[–] cozycosmic 7 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Elections and representatives are "representative democracy", not a true democracy. Voting on issues is democracy. Democracy literally means "the people have the power"

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago

Hmm... so an approach that would have gotten Rodeo's point across better might have been to say,

"so anarchy is just another name for the purest form of democracy."

Because democracy is such a broad word that it is occasionally applied to the United States, despite the CIA's history of coups and the FBI's history of extrajudicial assassinations of citizens.

[–] BiteSizedZeitGeist 3 points 10 months ago

I'm talking about the level of organization. There's a difference between saying "the best way to resolve this conversation is to ask everyone present for a vote" and "there's going to be another cyclical election soon, these will be the matters we're going to vote on." Counting ayes and nays doesn't make things a capital-D Democracy, it's the institutionalization of these practices.

[–] zik 2 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Democracies usually have laws and some kind of government. There are no laws in Freetown Christiania and there's no individual who has direct power over another.

[–] trolololol 4 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Nah that's the stereotypical view, where anarchy = chaos. For some reason it also needs to find a dumpster and put fire on it, and ffs I never understood that reference.

Anarchists don't agree with any of those analogies