Is anarchy a utopian dream or a dystopian nightmare?
(250 words)
Answers
Answer:
Explanation:
Anarchism says there's no need for a state, that it would be better to have a society without central government. Anarchists dislike the often heavy-handed authority that government brings. Yet the dream of the stateless society is not a simple one. How can we have law and order without government? What's involved in a self-governed society, free from authority? And how could we ever peacefully transition from central governance to anarchy? John and Ken question authority with James Martel from San Francisco State University, editor of How Not To Be Governed: Readings and Interpretations from a Critical Anarchist Left. This program was recorded live at the Marsh Theater in San Francisco.
The hosts welcome guest James Martel, editor of How Not to be Governed: Readings and Interpretations from a Critical Anarchist Left. He quickly dispels the myth of anarchy as a chaotic punk-rock situation, arguing that liberal capitalism has cast anarchism in this light to act as if that there is no alternative to the current system. After a break, Ken asks about the things we’d be missing out on under anarchy, like roads. James quips that states don’t build roads, people do – communities have been building roads long before nation-states existed. John questions how things would ever get done without the exchange of capital. James cites the example of the barter economy that functioned in Barcelona and other parts of Spain in the early twentieth century.
James brings up a key concept of anarchism: no representation. People can have others speak for them, but not represent them beyond what they consent to. He talks about assemblies of spokespeople who speak for those with like views. These assemblies, as they operated in Anarchist Spain, made decisions by consensus, rather than sheer majority vote. In this way, everyone is able to directly have a say in what gets done.A young audience member asks about what compels people to invent and create things such as iPhones without capitalist motivations. James replies that communities can still uphold intellectual property without coercion, but Ken and John aren’t satisfied with his answer that people would still invent for the fun of it. He goes further to say that when workers own their own labor, and do things collectively, they can do the same things they do now but in a way that doesn’t coerce them into oppression. Such collectivization is how anarchism would function.