I should abandon Twitter, I know, but let's take a brief Twitter detour that I feel is relevant to the subject we just left behind in last month's series. There has been a lot of talk amongst and against leftists in the Discourse lately regarding two things I want to
Pharmaceutical manufacture and process engineering aren’t subsistence farming. You can’t just have people pitching in when it suits them. You need tightly controlled supply chains, tightly controlled processes, strict change control, verification and validation. Good luck maintaining all that in an anarchist community.
Please don’t project your strawman view of an “anarchist community” here. None of these things you mention can not exist in an “anarchist community” nor is there even such a thing as a single “anarchist community”.
If anything, anarchist production principles are probably more suitable for all the things you mention, than the current ones that are at the wims of external investors with competing interests.
nor is there even such a thing as a single “anarchist community”.
How large can an anarchist community be so the decision process maintains the libertarian proposal of social organization (direct involvement/participation, no representation, decision mostly by concensus unless critical in time and blocked by an insignificant minority).
I feel certain comments are creeping in the direction of violating rule #4, but I will nevertheless echo the observation previously given, that an “anarchist community” is less a concrete entity than it is an abstraction used to facilitate discussion, the same as other social structures, such as family, town, or firm.
Most people agree trivially that a society that produces insulin is vastly superior to one that produces no insulin. Given that the necessity of insulin production is not a locus of controversy, the only further points needing to be agreed are the ones relating to the organization and methods of production, and to the delegation of responsibility, just as is required in any society.
and to the delegation of responsibility, just as is required in any society.
you are making all that fuss about community, family, town, … only to pass this authoritarian construct labeled “society” under the table. Massive “social groups” require central authority and organization, communities don’t or in reverse the size of community is determined by the ability to decentralize decision and avoid hierarchy.
Pharmaceutical manufacture and process engineering aren’t subsistence farming. You can’t just have people pitching in when it suits them. You need tightly controlled supply chains, tightly controlled processes, strict change control, verification and validation. Good luck maintaining all that in an anarchist community.
Please don’t project your strawman view of an “anarchist community” here. None of these things you mention can not exist in an “anarchist community” nor is there even such a thing as a single “anarchist community”.
If anything, anarchist production principles are probably more suitable for all the things you mention, than the current ones that are at the wims of external investors with competing interests.
How large can an anarchist community be so the decision process maintains the libertarian proposal of social organization (direct involvement/participation, no representation, decision mostly by concensus unless critical in time and blocked by an insignificant minority).
I’d say pretty small.
I feel certain comments are creeping in the direction of violating rule #4, but I will nevertheless echo the observation previously given, that an “anarchist community” is less a concrete entity than it is an abstraction used to facilitate discussion, the same as other social structures, such as family, town, or firm.
Most people agree trivially that a society that produces insulin is vastly superior to one that produces no insulin. Given that the necessity of insulin production is not a locus of controversy, the only further points needing to be agreed are the ones relating to the organization and methods of production, and to the delegation of responsibility, just as is required in any society.
you are making all that fuss about community, family, town, … only to pass this authoritarian construct labeled “society” under the table. Massive “social groups” require central authority and organization, communities don’t or in reverse the size of community is determined by the ability to decentralize decision and avoid hierarchy.