Anarchy!! Wheeeeeee!! Freedom!
Or not? When I picture anarchy, I picture in my mind a bunch of people coexisting, not out of laws but because of mutual ideals. Something like, "if you don't try to steal my sheep then I wont kill you...". But then I have to think about all of the people who don't want to just coexist, they want more and more power. Obviously, like in any society, certain people with power rise up and lead the rest. Call them warlords, chieftains or whatever but anybody with power who makes descisions for other people is defined under government. That's what would happen, I suppose, if America became an anarchy. Hmmm... while on one level this idea is very tempting, I mean how would you like to own your very own little city-state where you didn't have to follow anyone elses laws but your own.(I would try to recreate a modern Athens where democracy would rule... or at least I'd try to =P) But what about the majority of the population who will fall under these people's rule? Their freedom is forfeit.
Now, before you totally accept those ideas, I admit that I haven't thought this all out and that there are most likely to be perfectly acceptable solutions instead of the ones I presented. For instance, if EVERYONE lived with the ideals of anarchy in our country then anyone who tries to gain power will be resisted by the majority of the population. That would be an ideal. The people would have to have firm beliefs in the ideals of anarchy to resist someone trying to take power but it is by no means not a possibility. I'd like to throw this in just to get creative juices flowing in your minds, you can live in anarchy whilst still in a form of government. You are presented with choices. You may choose to obey the law or not. It's completely your choice. In fact, everything you do is a choice, there is nothing that you could ever be forced to do, excepting by brute force. For example, if someone says, you can either give me a million dollars or be killed right now, you can't say that you were forced to give anyone a million dollars cuz you had the option to be killed as well. Not a very pleasant choice but you get the idea. Anyways, that was kind of a side note.
Anarchy as an ideal, I suppose, is doable. That's if everyone had their heads screwed on right. My belief is that there will always be people who don't think about their actions and just want more for themselves. They wouldn't be thinking because if the were then they'd see that doing what they're doing hurts them down the road. Let's say that there's a thief in this anarchical(is that how you say it?) society. Everyone else doesn't follow any rules, they just get along so that they can peacefully coexist. Well he keeps stealing things. Pretty soon, someone more powerful than him is going to decide that losing his property is worse than killing this man. So he'll kill the thief and everyone else who was stolen from will feel vindicated. You see, with no rules, while that gives you more chance to perpetrate things upon your neighbors, it also gives them the ability to take it out on you as much as they like. So in the interest of cohabitation, one would want to try to get along with his/her neighbors. Unfortunately not everyone thinks that logically so problems would ensue. The people in that society would have to grow up with those ideals and/or embrace them entirely for the society to work...
Well those are my forseen problems with this form of government and a couple solutions I thought about. I'm sure there are more so please educate me if you find them. So... what are your opinions on the subject?
I think people connected by a set of ideals is similar enough to a government because a common theme unifies them about what is right and wrong, what should be punished and shouldn't and therefore even if the mass rules, it is still a government.
~Jessica Mondillo
http://www.progressiveu.org/blog/jmondillo
Anarchy, like communism, is a form of government better in theory than in practice. As long as the human element exists, it will be corrupted. I don't think anarchy really is a good idea though. People need boundaries, or we will exploit any given situation.
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"Jesus take the wheeeeel!"
"I'm not sure she really understands how it works..."
I beg to differ. Somalia anyone?
If it is such a great place, why are people clamoring to get out? A large percentage of the would-be illegal immigrants that are piling up in North Africa in hopes of eventually breaking into Europe are refugees from your anarchist paradise.
Oh come off it. It shows that you don't need a government, so get over yourself. You do know that they Islamic Court is trying to take over the country as well as the UN, right? Unless you've been in a hole the past 3 years, you'll see that they're fleeing because people are dying everytime the Islamic Court send jihadists in. The US is under scrutiny for interogation of those fleeing the country. Kenya, the Islamic Court and other African countries are under Human Rights Watches for atrocities commited against people fleeing the fighting.
The battle is still being waged between the Islamic Court, the UN backed Transitional Government, Ethiopia, and the peoples of Somalia. To me that sounds like it isn't so safe because neighboring countries can't leave them the hell alone.
An effective form of anarchism can only be applied to a limited population society. It simply cannot support 6 billion people, and is therefore unrealistic. Also, it is impossible to try and coexist as an anarchist society with the current society. Sad, but true. The anarchists cannot compete with the luxury items that can be obtained through current society. So, with 6 billion people, we have the possibly most effective form of government. Sure, there are still a few kinks in it, but they can be ironed out with enough effort.
Of course, I'd be one of the first to advocate an anarchist society...if there were only a billion people, even.
The idea behind an anarchist society, as I interpret it, is that people make their own boundaries. As Cheezmaestro said, people are limited only by what other people can take.
Cheez, the greatest problem with implementing an anarchist society is how to integrate modern technology into it. For instance, what would happen to the power plants, the communication lines, the Internet? How would a community-based society maintain the "trappings of society." That right there is the reason most people don't like anarchy. Too many people think of us as bomb-throwing Weathermen, as society-destroyers. Too few see the society-builders. Too many literally can't imagine a different way of living.
"The people in that society would have to grow up with those ideals and/or embrace them entirely for the society to work..."
This is why creating new society is so hard. The founders would have to start over and stay completely on focus until they died. Dedication like that is almost non-existent.
Many things essential to life including water, food, salt, numerous metals are good in reasonable quantities but are lethal in extremes excess.
Anarchy is an extreme and the original blog along with most of the posts point out the problems. In theory, if freedom is good, then the absolute freedom offered by anarchy must be great. The problem is that the ideal does not match up with the reality of human nature. In order for anarchy to be successful, people would need to exercise responsibility along with their freedom. They need to recognize that just because they are free to enslave their neighbor that it probably is not the right thing to do. Idealist recognize that a certain percentage of people, when unshackled from the constraints and coercion of government will refuse to exercise this responsibility. They will use their freedom irresponsibly and soon society will degenerate into something approaching survival of the fittest.
But the ideals of anarchy are not bad. We should strive for as little government and as much freedom as possible. Sensible anarchists who are capable of seeing the problems of absolute anarchy should take a second hard look at either Libertarianism or small government conservatism. Both of these ideologies try to balance the ideal of maximum freedom against the reality of human nature.