Over at the Attack the System group, Peter Bjørn Perlsø has posed a great question:
If the state is as harmful to human society and reprehensible as anarchists usually say it is, why does it exist at all in the extent that it does today and have done throughout history?
This question isn't just perceptive; it's essential to answer when formulating the anarchist alternative. Dain Fitzgerald offered an explanation which I think is sound:
- A kind of institutional, non-ideological scenario takes place in which the "natural monopoly" of defense consolidates itself.
- Perhaps ideological, or even pre-ideological, people want to "escape from freedom" and desire the security of the state.
Here's my take:
I couldn't agree more, Peter - thanks for bringing this up. Anarchists do well to have an explicit answer to this question in order to better understand their own strategies and principles. As much as we may despise it, the state is a human phenomenon - if you don't start there, your anarchism is likely to resemble the plot line of the Lord of the Rings.
I think Dain has it right, essentially. However, I don't think the two reasons he gives are really different reasons. People associate for defensive purposes, but there comes a point where people decide they do not want defense and mere "holding the line" to be a day-to-day concern. Violence in defense of one's self interests is correctly seen as a horrible necessity, but eventually individuals want to distance themselves from this necessity. The perfect freedom of the unencumbered human is seen as fearful and dangerous and requires moderation; ideally, by principles of law and sound, elite judgment; in practice, by a class of people who decided to assume the terrible burden of engaging in violence.
The state arises from the belief that an essential part of being human can be more effectively realized by delegation than by self acceptance. The reasons behind the delegation may be supernatural or practical; it does not really matter. In the end, we all become less human so that we may have an illusion of peace and justice - indeed, so we can pretend to minimize "risk", as if simply ignoring danger, violence, and other parts of being human makes them go away or makes the human being any more morally acceptable.
So, as propagandists, I believe anarchists should make arguments that violence is part of the human experience. We deprive ourselves of the chance for peace and justice because we refuse to give ourselves the absolute freedom to pursue it. We refuse because, I believe, we're afraid of our own power. To pacify ourselves artificially is to strip a certain part of our humanity away.
I don't mean to over-psychologize this, but I see the state almost as our shadow selves. In the ideal that most people hold (in order to cope with this monopoly on violence), the state comprises the terrible but essential tasks of being human - waging violence, instilling discipline, making final and arbitrary judgmenets, assuming responsibility for moral acts, etc.
I'd love to hear your thoughts on this matter, either via the Attack the System Yahoo! Group or in the comments below.
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