Okay, I have a few propositions for yall. 1. A free society is inherently pluralist; as opposed to communist or socialist. 2. This will probably include markets, limited by an application of the homestead principle of property. I stand wholly in agreement with Karl Hess in saying that there is only one kind of anarchist, “as defined by the long tradition and literature of the position itself”, and that is “a person in opposition to authority imposed through the hierarchical power of the state. The only expansion of this that seems to me to be reasonable is to say that an anarchist stands in opposition to any imposed authority.” Fundamentally, this means people have the right to organize their lives, their work, and their communities as they see fit: “It does not say how to be free. It says only that freedom, liberty, can exist.” I derive this belief from the principle of bodily autonomy. You own your body. Logically, then, you own your labor, and the product of your labor, as well. Logically, it is your decision how you will dispose of this. You can trade it, for example. For what, for how much, nobody else can say; whether according to the labor theory of value or the subjective theory of value, nobody else can say. You can give it away, for example. You can assign somebody a 50% share of it. You can assign nine people 10% each. “For those who have socialist economic preferences, such arrangements might be called a commune. For those who have capitalist economic preferences, such arrangements might be called a company.” Which you choose to enter, nobody else can say. It follows from all this that syndicalism and markets are not mutually exclusive, are not inherently in opposition. Both derive readily from the principle of bodily autonomy; both are based on free exchange and voluntary agreements. It follows that both individualism and collectivism are valid, and that a truly free society will accommodate both; as a free society must surely be as diverse as humanity is diverse. ... The constant mistake of some socialistic and communistic anarchists is the frequent abdication of their first principles in favor of a particular ideal. To insist that all individuals should have the greatest choice in the way they live their lives, and that they should form free and voluntary associations, and then proceed immediately to tell you what these associations will be based on, or what they will look like, is to repudiate the notion of choice and to commit a colossal fallacy. Adamas, for example, believes in “an organized, homogeneous, continuative anarchist movement, connected for a common action of struggle and demand,” and imagines it possible that “all who call themselves anarchists” will “agree about what is to be done.” Malatesta had the sense to refute this, declaring that “we remain communist in our sentiment and aspiration, but we want to leave freedom of action to the experimentation of all ways of life that can be imagined and desired.” Communism, it emerges, is a statement of preference to which not all people will adhere, and to which nobody in a free society will be forced to adhere. The reason for this, as was clear to Malatesta, is that imposed communism “would be the most detestable tyranny that the human mind could conceive.” Furthermore, “free and voluntary communism is ironical if one has not the possibility to live in a different regime - collectivist, mutualist, individualist - as one wishes, always on condition that there is no oppression or exploitation of others.” Thus, Malatesta affirms the pluralism inherent in the concept of a free society: “Probably all possible forms of ownership, use of the means of production and all forms of distribution will be experimented with simultaneously, in the same or other locations, and they will be merged together and adapted in various ways until practical experience identifies the best form or forms.” And in doing so basically concurs with Proudhon that competition is “the spice of exchange, the salt of work. To suppress competition is to suppress liberty itself.” ... So, will everybody in a free society be a communist, or do you acknowledge pluralism?
Posted on: Sat, 01 Feb 2014 02:10:50 +0000
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