Scarcity-in-the-small
Scarcity-in-the-small
Discussions about scarcity and anarchism that I've seen online seem to always talk about "scarcity in the large", i.e. how does an anarchist society allocate production, food, labour, materials etc.
I've a question about anarchism and scarcity in the small. Say, a really nice location, eg. a breezy location in a very hot climate, or the room with the nice windows in the community centre, or Bag End at the top of the hill. Say, an anarchist community has decided to use the location for purpose X, but a minority wants to use it for purpose Y. Maybe an even smaller minority wants to do Z, and a bunch of other people have their own little ideas about how to use it. Some are transient and could be accommodated (you get it on Tuesdays 5-7) but others might not be ("our sculpture project needs to dry out in that specific spot for the next 4 months, we know it blocks the view but it's the only place the breeze hits just right!") or could be contradictory (the siesta people vs the loud backgammon players can't both use the spot at high noon) or antagonistic (the teenagers who want to party late vs the new parents who need quiet for the babies). And dis-association doesn't really help here because that's the nice spot for many kilometers around or there is literally no way to create another beach for our small island community because that's literally the only place on the island where sand exists, so we can't just off and leave. (* Many of these examples are imagining a hot summer in an anarchist Greece, sorry it's almost August.)
It looks to me like a simple non-life-and-death scenario like this could potentially completely poison and destroy a community and in the face of that it would be the little death of anti-authoritarian organizing. Like yea, when life and death matters are at hand, anarchists will band together and conquer the bread. But petty small-scale little shit where it's managing annoyances and small grievances, I don't think non-authoritarian decision making can solve. And I suspect it's crap like this that has killed off many intentional communities and experiments or made them veer away from non-hierarchical, anti-authoritarian organizing.
Have anarchist thinkers seriously thought of this?
Practical answer here: Overall, the aim is to not prevent someone from doing something, so you're actually checking with everyone if it's OK to use a space for Purpose X. If a subset want to use it for Purpose Y, they have a meeting with a facilitator. The facilitator does the hard work (there are guides) but overall people just talk about their interests and what they want to achieve. Basically everyone talks until there's an agreement in place, and this must be unanimous (otherwise people keep talking).
Here's an example video of a meeting in action, though the aim is there not to make decisions.
Thank you.
Of course plenty of anarchist thinkers have thought about this. Of course non-authoritarian decision-making can solve small issues, if it's done right. If people give up on organizing because they can't figure out these sorts of problems, they're simply not very committed to the process, and it is that non-committal attitude rather than the small problems themselves that can poison and destroy a community.
Any pointers to essays would be welcome.
That said, I think you're sidestepping the problem with a no true Scotsman fallacy. Anarchist groups disintegrate due to petty shit all the time. Why would anarchist communes be immune to the same things?
While there should be highly coordinated groups like organizations, I think there should be something in between an organization and completely uncoordinated atomized autonomous action. These in-between groups should subsidize cooperation across social distance and difference to make people cooperate and keep the group from disintegrating.
With respect to managing collective property, I have made a post linking an article that I think would be of interest
Essays could be nice, but I don't know any off-hand. That said, I myself am an anarchist thinker. I don't have to be published or be considered "great" in order to know anything.
It's not a fallacy. I'm not side-stepping; I'm confronting your concerns directly. I'm not saying that anarchist groups never disintegrate because of petty issues, nor am I saying that anarchist groups are always immune to these problems. What I am saying is that it is possible for such groups to do well, depending.
It's just simple logic. If you've ever experienced a successful negotiation and compromise situation with another human being, with whom you had some conflicting interests, you're aware that it can be done. Extrapolate it to more people, who happen to be anarchists, and there you have it. It just depends on how able and willing everyone involved is, in connection with the particular problems that they're having.
You'll have problems in literally any and every group of people, but how good people are at dealing with them varies a great deal.
I understand your cynicism, given the state of the world, but it's inaccurate and also discouraging to others if you go about stating things like "But petty small-scale little shit where it’s managing annoyances and small grievances, I don’t think non-authoritarian decision making can solve." It's not always, but it can, sometimes. You know what I mean?
Isn't this just the opposite of "who does the dishes"? The answer to "Who gets the room with the nice windows in the community center?" is the same: Everyone.
And yeah, doing that in way that's fair to everyone is tough but also super rewarding. Since it's really different for every resource and community there won't be any generalized solution.
I think this sort of question comes from a capitalist, scarcity sort of mindset, even while he's asking about anarchism.
In that system, it's advantageous and encouraged to be selfish. There are a bunch of reasons for this, having wealth allows zero relationship transactions, theft or charity from you potentially deprive you of your means to live etc.
The opposite is encouraged in systems with less or no ownership or hierarchy, as power is derived from participation and cooperation. Respect is going to get you what you want.
Have anarchist thinkers seriously thought of this?
The answer to that question is almost always that yes, they have. In this case I'd say start with reading The Dispossessed to get your imagination going before looking further into the topic at the anarchist library.
This seems to be more of a case of:
This seems kind of unnecessary. They've been pretty reasonable and polite, and after a quick look at their post history I didn't see any sign that this was asked in bad faith.
I get that anarchists probably get tired of answering questions, but it also seems like an important part of getting people who aren't already 100% onboard to better understand anarchy?
It may be a lack of imagination on my part, but I had trouble understanding most of the answers they got too, so I guess I sympathize.
my two favourite types of questions from nonanarchists:
- 'how would anarchism handle [insert consequence of capitalist conditioning]'
- 'how would anarchism work in [insert description of a group of capitalists]'
you can't reject the premise of the question, because their eyes gloss over and they call you an idealist.
Feel free to ask questions here.
Literally on the sidebar.
I don't think my behaviour in this thread has been smarmy or antagonistic, as your cartoon implies, but if it has, I apologize.
I got my answer from Flora, so I'm thanking good faith responses and I'm outta here, glossing my eyes and back with the other nonanarchists. Checkmate, I guess.
Hmmm le guin
Your description doesn't give me any elements of a community that is trying to organize itself with horizontal principles. It sounds more like random people put together for some reason, trying to solve individual problems, without any sense of good will.
So this doesn't seem to me like a scarcity problem.
The vast majority of communities are exactly random collections of people. Even a carefully put together intentional community will become random 1-2 generations down the line.
Just to clarify that I talk about randon people in contrast to people who consciously want to be part of a community with horizontal organization principles.
It is true that children don't necessarily take on the convictions of their parents, but communities are build around structures of common purpose (and not primarily family bonds). What you seem to have in mind is a typical modern suburb with no shared purpose, which is pretty much the opposite of what anarchists think of as communities.
All your examples are equivalent to sharing in kindergarten.
There isn't a petty or serious enough disagreement where negotiation isn't possible. There's no situation where every single compromise is unpalatable, unless you are being antagonistic.
If people won't negotiate, they get nothing.
But that just creates the authority of the status quo. The people who want "nothing new happening" are the ones who win by default. It's basically entrenched anarchist nimbyism.
Ok, here's me not being an anarchist, but I think that assuming that all people are not going to be petty and antagonistic is even more utopian that post-scarcity.
No.
The act of trying to dictate the use of resources without negotiating with other stakeholders is the kind of parasitism that anarchism mitigates.
They can certainly have a voice if they come to the table and do the work of engaging with people.
If someone is petty or antagonistic, direct democracy will shut them down. Getting outvoted isn't tyranny.
I think the fediverse already experienced what happens when those problems arise during the canvas event and yet it was still eventually resolved peacefully.
There was limited space on the board and certain structures couldn't be created somewhere else because it was in relation to something that was in that specific part of the board (the pony blast was a big attraction and the rainbow traveled through a lot of things.) So if you want to see what happens look at one of those time lapses very closely.
Edit: And what was even more interesting about that event is a lot of the negotiation happened without any direct communication where as in this hypothetical community you would be able to talk to those people.
Could you please fix the link? It goes to the creative commons license text.
The link is there because that's the licence he is publishing his comments under.
https://canvas.fediverse.events/#x=500&y=250&zoom=1
This thing is what he's talking about