Can anarchy survive on a large scale?

[WarRatsG]

As the topic says: is it possible for large populations with the kind of globalization we have today to maintain a stable anarchy?

I'm going to need some way of killing time for a while, and I'm curious to hear opinions. From my limited experience on the debate forum, I got the impression most of you are anarchists anyway ;)

 

The way I see it, anarchy on any level can go one of two ways:

 

Chaos and disorder, with everyone out for themselves and taking anything they like from any other, killing those who try to prevent them. Once the killing finally slows down and the fires stop burning, everyone has a gun and nobody has trust. Society breaks down in a weekend.

 

Or the complete opposite, where communities band together for mutual protection and to improve efficiency - those who try to kill or steal from the community are exiled or killed by the community. Any laws within the community are decided by the community, that is ALL of the community, and are followed voluntarily. It may sound like communism, but the difference is that you aren't forced to share anything and everything you have, you share with others so that they will share with you, but you keep as much as you like. It is a better version of democracy, for lack of a better word, since you aren't deciding who will make decisions - you cut out the middle man. Ideally, nobody has power because everybody has power.

 

Both are possible, probably depending on the location. Both have the same kind of problem though: both could degrade into a dictatorship, especially in the more built up areas and where unscrupulous corporations have a tighter hold. Those with the most leverage over their community, through intimidation or control of supplies, will create a hierarchy that benefits them.

 

I think that stable anarchies are only possible when the communities are small. For example, the aboriginal tribes maintain a non-hierarchical structure, and this does not lead to dictatorship or chaos - in fact, this leads to greater stability, as any disputes come to a compromise quickly in order to preserve harmony, unlike the US legal system where it is possible to sue your dry cleaner for a few million if they lose your shirt. In our societies, anarchy would not survive, because being screwed over is a big part of it.

 

In your day to day life, many decisions and interactions you have are based on anarchist principles, but the big picture is probably not. Anarchy is the default, fairest and probably the most effective way of life, but is too inefficient to maintain on a large scale - it simply will evolve into a hierarchy.

[HeyYou]

Think I have seen this flavor of thread before, but, here goes anyway.... :D

 

No. It can't. Human nature won't allow it. There MUST be someone 'in charge', else, things go to hades in a handbasket. No major infrastructure, no collective organizations for the public safety, (fire, police) and no central authority to deter crime. Granted, if everyone has a gun...... that would be somewhat of a deterrent, but, I don't think significant enough. And that's just internal issues. When you start dealing with the rest of the world, doing so on an individual basis would be a major nightmare.

[Passb]

Think I have seen this flavor of thread before, but, here goes anyway.... :D

 

No. It can't. Human nature won't allow it. There MUST be someone 'in charge', else, things go to hades in a handbasket. No major infrastructure, no collective organizations for the public safety, (fire, police) and no central authority to deter crime. Granted, if everyone has a gun...... that would be somewhat of a deterrent, but, I don't think significant enough. And that's just internal issues. When you start dealing with the rest of the world, doing so on an individual basis would be a major nightmare.

 

Your argument is full of fallacious assumptions about the necessity of a state. You are assuming without the state that particular and arbitrary things won't get accomplished. This was the same argument they made in defense of slavery by stating "without slavery, who will pick the cotton?" except now many statists bellow "without the government, who will build the roads?". As Murray Rothbard once said, the statist confuses the necessity of SOCIETY with the necessity of the STATE. I'd recommend watching this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0H2rSJayL_c

Edited January 25, 2013 by Passb

[HeyYou]

Think I have seen this flavor of thread before, but, here goes anyway.... :D

 

No. It can't. Human nature won't allow it. There MUST be someone 'in charge', else, things go to hades in a handbasket. No major infrastructure, no collective organizations for the public safety, (fire, police) and no central authority to deter crime. Granted, if everyone has a gun...... that would be somewhat of a deterrent, but, I don't think significant enough. And that's just internal issues. When you start dealing with the rest of the world, doing so on an individual basis would be a major nightmare.

 

Your argument is full of fallacious assumptions about the necessity of a state. You are assuming without the state that particular and arbitrary things won't get accomplished. This was the same argument they made in defense of slavery by stating "without slavery, who will pick the cotton?" except now many statists bellow "without the government, who will build the roads?". As Murray Rothbard once said, the statist confuses the necessity of SOCIETY with the necessity of the STATE. I'd recommend watching this:

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=0H2rSJayL_c

 

Is it? Show me ONE significantly sized group of people that without help of a government, constructed roads, bridges, a police force, fire department, or even a friggin hospital.

[Passb]

Think I have seen this flavor of thread before, but, here goes anyway.... :D

 

No. It can't. Human nature won't allow it. There MUST be someone 'in charge', else, things go to hades in a handbasket. No major infrastructure, no collective organizations for the public safety, (fire, police) and no central authority to deter crime. Granted, if everyone has a gun...... that would be somewhat of a deterrent, but, I don't think significant enough. And that's just internal issues. When you start dealing with the rest of the world, doing so on an individual basis would be a major nightmare.

 

Your argument is full of fallacious assumptions about the necessity of a state. You are assuming without the state that particular and arbitrary things won't get accomplished. This was the same argument they made in defense of slavery by stating "without slavery, who will pick the cotton?" except now many statists bellow "without the government, who will build the roads?". As Murray Rothbard once said, the statist confuses the necessity of SOCIETY with the necessity of the STATE. I'd recommend watching this:

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=0H2rSJayL_c

 

Is it? Show me ONE significantly sized group of people that without help of a government, constructed roads, bridges, a police force, fire department, or even a friggin hospital.

 

Saying the state is REQUIRED to do all of these things is not only juvenile but simply laughable. Aside from the moral reasons in opposition to the state, the economic arguments are quite basic. The state is incapable of calculating the opportunity costs of production and has no way of calculating, economically, where the most efficient use of resources should be directed. Both of these problems result in an extremely high level of inefficiency in providing even the most basic of services.

 

Look up the Icelandic Commonwealth (Medieval Iceland). This "significantly sized" group as you put had private defense agencies instead of a monopoly police force as well as what is now referred to as private law or private dispute resolution. A very good read from David Friedman: http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academic/Iceland/Iceland.html

Edited January 25, 2013 by Passb

[Werne]

Show me ONE significantly sized group of people that without help of a government, constructed roads, bridges, a police force, fire department, or even a friggin hospital.

No problem, I can give you five off the top of my head: Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia.

 

I'll even describe one for you:

Croatia is built like that, 4.5 million people who live on a private property of foreign companies. Politicians do nothing but bark at each other and they have no real power since everything inside the border is owned by someone else, even the border.

 

All of our road repairs and road/bridge constructions are funded and controlled by German private companies and are built without any consent from the government (our highways don't even have a building license but they are still built and used), same goes for the fire department. Hospitals are funded and controlled by Pliva, who is in turn controlled by US and German pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and Bayer. Police force is controlled my the Ministry of Internal Affairs which does nothing if NATO doesn't request it, it's funded by US and is about as useful as a screen door on a submarine. http://forums.nexusmods.com/public/style_emoticons/dark/rolleyes.gif

 

Hotels - foreign, clinics - foreign, hospitals - foreign, police - foreign, sea - foreign, land - foreign, electrical company - foreign, phone companies - foreign, water company - foreign, roads - foreign, oil company - foreign, military - foreign, government - exists but politicians do nothing whatsoever but sit on their arse and get payed for doing nothing.

 

Nothing in Croatia is owned by it's government and they don't help anyone but themselves. Also, half the government is in prison for theft, bribery, smuggling, murder, extortion, racketeering, war profiteering, threatening, etc. http://forums.nexusmods.com/public/style_emoticons/dark/laugh.gif

 

The same situation is in the other four countries I mentioned, they just have a different name.

So you see, you don't need a government for the state to function. http://forums.nexusmods.com/public/style_emoticons/dark/biggrin.gif

[HeyYou]

Think I have seen this flavor of thread before, but, here goes anyway.... :D

 

No. It can't. Human nature won't allow it. There MUST be someone 'in charge', else, things go to hades in a handbasket. No major infrastructure, no collective organizations for the public safety, (fire, police) and no central authority to deter crime. Granted, if everyone has a gun...... that would be somewhat of a deterrent, but, I don't think significant enough. And that's just internal issues. When you start dealing with the rest of the world, doing so on an individual basis would be a major nightmare.

 

Your argument is full of fallacious assumptions about the necessity of a state. You are assuming without the state that particular and arbitrary things won't get accomplished. This was the same argument they made in defense of slavery by stating "without slavery, who will pick the cotton?" except now many statists bellow "without the government, who will build the roads?". As Murray Rothbard once said, the statist confuses the necessity of SOCIETY with the necessity of the STATE. I'd recommend watching this:

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=0H2rSJayL_c

 

Is it? Show me ONE significantly sized group of people that without help of a government, constructed roads, bridges, a police force, fire department, or even a friggin hospital.

 

Saying the state is REQUIRED to do all of these things is not only juvenile but simply laughable. Aside from the moral reasons in opposition to the state, the economic arguments are quite basic. The state is incapable of calculating the opportunity costs of production and has no way of calculating, economically, where the most efficient use of resources should be directed. Both of these problems result in an extremely high level of inefficiency in providing even the most basic of services.

 

Look up the Icelandic Commonwealth (Medieval Iceland). This "significantly sized" group as you put had private defense agencies instead of a monopoly police force as well as what is now referred to as private law or private dispute resolution. A very good read from David Friedman: http://www.daviddfri...nd/Iceland.html

 

If you want to resort to insults, you can be added to my ignore list with a few quick clicks. Also, running off a line of feces is not an argument. None of what you discuss there matters one whit to the state, or the people. The people want roads to drive on. Individually, they are going to be unable to build the infrastructure required for such a project. convincing enough folks that it is a 'good idea' is one thing, getting the to do, let alone PAY FOR IT, is an entirely separate issue.

 

Also, your argument falls flat in the face of american history. The US government started the interstate system to ENCOURAGE commerce, and make it easier to transport goods around the country. They KNEW it would be a boon to the economy, both in the jobs created by the projects themselves, and the commerce they enabled.

 

 

Show me ONE significantly sized group of people that without help of a government, constructed roads, bridges, a police force, fire department, or even a friggin hospital.

No problem, I can give you five off the top of my head: Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia.

 

I'll even describe one for you:

Croatia is built like that, 4.5 million people who live on a private property of foreign companies. Politicians do nothing but bark at each other and they have no real power since everything inside the border is owned by someone else, even the border.

 

All of our road repairs and road/bridge constructions are funded and controlled by German private companies and are built without any consent from the government (our highways don't even have a building license but they are still built and used), same goes for the fire department. Hospitals are funded and controlled by Pliva, who is in turn controlled by US and German pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and Bayer. Police force is controlled my the Ministry of Internal Affairs which does nothing if NATO doesn't request it, it's funded by US and is about as useful as a screen door on a submarine. http://forums.nexusmods.com/public/style_emoticons/dark/rolleyes.gif

 

Hotels - foreign, clinics - foreign, hospitals - foreign, police - foreign, sea - foreign, land - foreign, electrical company - foreign, phone companies - foreign, water company - foreign, roads - foreign, oil company - foreign, military - foreign, government - exists but politicians do nothing whatsoever but sit on their arse and get payed for doing nothing.

 

Nothing in Croatia is owned by it's government and they don't help anyone but themselves. Also, half the government is in prison for theft, bribery, smuggling, murder, extortion, racketeering, war profiteering, threatening, etc. http://forums.nexusmods.com/public/style_emoticons/dark/laugh.gif

 

The same situation is in the other four countries I mentioned, they just have a different name.

So you see, you don't need a government for the state to function. http://forums.nexusmods.com/public/style_emoticons/dark/biggrin.gif

 

No, you need foreign governments, and private companies operating at the behest of same.... How is that in any way considered "Anarchy"?

[Vagrant0]

Is it? Show me ONE significantly sized group of people that without help of a government, constructed roads, bridges, a police force, fire department, or even a friggin hospital.

Mormons when they setup in Salt Lake City. Hell, most of the towns that formed during the western expansion before there was any official state. Then you have closed communities like the Amish. Most of these functioned without the aid of any federal body aside from being little more than a word of authority for judges, and doctors, and generally setup their own local government, law enforcement, and services for the benefit of the community. Outside the US, there are thousands of instances where you have small communities who have established things like this in order to maintain their own prosperity irrespective of whatever government claims that part of land.

 

As a matter of fact, any time you have any large group of people together in any place who have to cooperate with eachother for mutual benefit, there will always be some people who help enforce the laws of the group, treat those who are sick or injured, oversee community building projects, or just act as a leadership to help coordinate and direct people. Even in groups who oppose the state, or rebel against society, you still usually have a leader, an enforcer, and a medic, in addition to soldiers, strategists, and recruiters. In a sense, even these anarchist groups still develop a power structure and a communal body where people have specific jobs solely for the benefit of that community.

 

It's only in small groups that you have complete anarchy, and that is usually because there are no members who are more capable at any one particular aspect of operation. Once you grow larger specialization becomes necessary for the sake of keeping that group operational.

 

Beyond this point though, the real problem with Anarchy is in the broad way it is usually used, described, and what other notions are attributed or divested from it. But that's what happens when you start mixing political philosophy with the rebellious nature of youth. Essentially being that the above point is both an aspect of how societies should work within Anarchy, as well as what makes them non-anarchist depending on a person's actual definition due to the nature of some just not wanting to work within the rules of that community.

[HeyYou]

So while they may not call their power hierarchy "government", or "the state" that is, in fact, what it amounts to in any event...... so, not really anarchy at all.

 

Which, again, is human nature, and why I don't believe that anarchy is this sense can work with a large group.

[Passb]

Think I have seen this flavor of thread before, but, here goes anyway.... :D

 

No. It can't. Human nature won't allow it. There MUST be someone 'in charge', else, things go to hades in a handbasket. No major infrastructure, no collective organizations for the public safety, (fire, police) and no central authority to deter crime. Granted, if everyone has a gun...... that would be somewhat of a deterrent, but, I don't think significant enough. And that's just internal issues. When you start dealing with the rest of the world, doing so on an individual basis would be a major nightmare.

 

Your argument is full of fallacious assumptions about the necessity of a state. You are assuming without the state that particular and arbitrary things won't get accomplished. This was the same argument they made in defense of slavery by stating "without slavery, who will pick the cotton?" except now many statists bellow "without the government, who will build the roads?". As Murray Rothbard once said, the statist confuses the necessity of SOCIETY with the necessity of the STATE. I'd recommend watching this:

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=0H2rSJayL_c

 

Is it? Show me ONE significantly sized group of people that without help of a government, constructed roads, bridges, a police force, fire department, or even a friggin hospital.

 

Saying the state is REQUIRED to do all of these things is not only juvenile but simply laughable. Aside from the moral reasons in opposition to the state, the economic arguments are quite basic. The state is incapable of calculating the opportunity costs of production and has no way of calculating, economically, where the most efficient use of resources should be directed. Both of these problems result in an extremely high level of inefficiency in providing even the most basic of services.

 

Look up the Icelandic Commonwealth (Medieval Iceland). This "significantly sized" group as you put had private defense agencies instead of a monopoly police force as well as what is now referred to as private law or private dispute resolution. A very good read from David Friedman: http://www.daviddfri...nd/Iceland.html

 

If you want to resort to insults, you can be added to my ignore list with a few quick clicks. Also, running off a line of feces is not an argument. None of what you discuss there matters one whit to the state, or the people. The people want roads to drive on. Individually, they are going to be unable to build the infrastructure required for such a project. convincing enough folks that it is a 'good idea' is one thing, getting the to do, let alone PAY FOR IT, is an entirely separate issue.

 

Also, your argument falls flat in the face of american history. The US government started the interstate system to ENCOURAGE commerce, and make it easier to transport goods around the country. They KNEW it would be a boon to the economy, both in the jobs created by the projects themselves, and the commerce they enabled.

 

 

Show me ONE significantly sized group of people that without help of a government, constructed roads, bridges, a police force, fire department, or even a friggin hospital.

No problem, I can give you five off the top of my head: Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia.

 

I'll even describe one for you:

Croatia is built like that, 4.5 million people who live on a private property of foreign companies. Politicians do nothing but bark at each other and they have no real power since everything inside the border is owned by someone else, even the border.

 

All of our road repairs and road/bridge constructions are funded and controlled by German private companies and are built without any consent from the government (our highways don't even have a building license but they are still built and used), same goes for the fire department. Hospitals are funded and controlled by Pliva, who is in turn controlled by US and German pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and Bayer. Police force is controlled my the Ministry of Internal Affairs which does nothing if NATO doesn't request it, it's funded by US and is about as useful as a screen door on a submarine. http://forums.nexusmods.com/public/style_emoticons/dark/rolleyes.gif

 

Hotels - foreign, clinics - foreign, hospitals - foreign, police - foreign, sea - foreign, land - foreign, electrical company - foreign, phone companies - foreign, water company - foreign, roads - foreign, oil company - foreign, military - foreign, government - exists but politicians do nothing whatsoever but sit on their arse and get payed for doing nothing.

 

Nothing in Croatia is owned by it's government and they don't help anyone but themselves. Also, half the government is in prison for theft, bribery, smuggling, murder, extortion, racketeering, war profiteering, threatening, etc. http://forums.nexusmods.com/public/style_emoticons/dark/laugh.gif

 

The same situation is in the other four countries I mentioned, they just have a different name.

So you see, you don't need a government for the state to function. http://forums.nexusmods.com/public/style_emoticons/dark/biggrin.gif

 

No, you need foreign governments, and private companies operating at the behest of same.... How is that in any way considered "Anarchy"?

 

That's fine, I'd rather not listen to an irrational statist who has yet to present any evidence of their position in a thoughtful and logical fashion. Line of feces? My undergraduate field of study is in economics, a field in which you clearly do not understand. If rational arguments presented with references offend you, that's fine, I've noticed in my line of work statists are very wary of economics in relation to the state. You've demonstrated you are unwilling to even investigate the material I've presented.

 

Would you care to provide any references for your incorrect statements? This is basic argumentative strategy for trying to coherently establish any position in an argument, and I have yet to see any kind of even basic references to other sources.

 

Another good article to investigate is a great book or entry on Robert Nozick's "Anarchy, State and Utopia". Although, I highly doubt you will investigate this wiki entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchy,_State,_and_Utopia

Edited January 26, 2013 by Passb