Uh. My understanding of anarchy is that power is not an issue at all. It's not that you have no power, or everyone has power, it's that everyone has equal power so power isn't the issue. It would be lovely if it worked... just like communism!

Seeing as how people are born unequal, people having equal power is very very unlikely if not impossible, right? If power was truly equally spread, then the slightest inequality could completely disrupt the entire system.

Besides, if all power between all agents is equal, then it basically nullifies that power as none of it can accomplish anything. Power should probably be only measured in terms of its relative strength over another agents, right? Therefore, if everyone has equal power, it basically adds up to everyone having no power.

its called anarchy because it is derived from an old greek word which means without rulers.

Anarchy is based on community and egalitarianism.

no chris, it is about empowerment.
havnt you ever heard the expression 'every man a king, every women a queen'? thats reffering to anarchism.

I am so profoundly confused if you call that expression a reference to anarchy. Aren't kings and queens abolished in an anarchy?

ha its just an expression. you're reading too deeply.

if everyone is a king, then it really means that no one is

Right. No one is a king. No one is a ruler. And no one has power. Right?

"Reading too deeply"? All I'm doing is reading.

I'm not doing a very good job of this.

I guess it depends what you mean by power. usually its a direct democracy, which would be alot more power than the average american has.
but no one would have the power that the president does.
but power really isnt important because you can pretty much do whatever you want anyway

I'm not sure I understand your last post because you do write, as you frequently admit, very unclearly. I'll do my best.

If, in an "anarchy", everyone can do as they wish then it sounds to me like everyone has maximum power. This is why I thought it should maybe be called panarchy. Everyone is a ruler and everyone has authority. Is this the case?

everyone has authority over themselves. yes.

I think as far as the words go, it makes sense either way - just like the expression - if everyone is a king, then no one is. If no one has power, then everyone has power.

I therefore paradoxically conclude that:
anarchy = panarchy

and dividing both sides by a^2nrchy, I mathematically conclude that 1 = p (sorry, I can't resist when I see a verbal equation - I have to solve it)

yeah thats right. but its more than just a play on words, its true

Ok, so we're getting somewhere: is it true that anarchy does involve a kind of disempowerment. I realize that it's a glass half empty/glass half full concept but I think it's important. Perhaps anarchy=disempowerment while panarchy=empowerment?

In either case, I think the result is equally unfortunate. With no power or control dynamic between people and peoples, it seems to logically follow that everyone becomes isolated and ceases to be a member of any society. For without any power play, no interaction between people would occur, right? Why would anyone speak to anyone else unless the person being spoken to had something that the first person wanted? By having this thing or idea, the other person has power, even if very slight, over the first person.

Why would anyone speak to anyone else unless the person being spoken to had something that the first person wanted?

my friend I think you live in a very sad world

Wait. How is what you said different from what I said... you're saying everyone is empowered but obviously not to the real extent of a king and queen. But the point is that everyone is equal in power relative to each other. If that's the case, power becomes a non-issue in an anarchy... Supposedly nobody would vie for power, nobody would compete for power, nobody would hurt another person for power. Yes? You can call it what you want, but if everyone has equal relative power, it's both empowerment and disempowerment... it just depends upon the position you're coming from.

Even if you strip men of all their technology, they will still form groups and beat eachother to death for food. That's primitivism at its very best, because we're assuming that anyone has enough food.

Similar but inverse to what Jerkface says, I think the fact that humans interact means that without homogenization there will always be power dynamic, even if not consciously. Some people are more likable than others, some people are smarter than others, some people are harder workers... I don't think you can deny that these people will have more power than others if just in terms of social standing. Anarchy would work if the population was homogenous in that everyone was equally likeable, equally smart, and equally hard workers... but that might be practically impossible.

The fundamental flaw in anarchy is that it is based on the premise that individuals do not gain from collective directed actions when all of known history demonstrates the opposite,

Chris, I mostly agree but I'm not certain that power becomes a "non-issue". Perhaps if a perfect (p)anarchy were accomplished, it may become a non-issue, but it's so fragile. The slightest inequality would disrupt the entire system, right? There would be no checks and balances.

Sicarius, if you wish to give up, that's ok with me. Your position is very hard to defend and I wouldn't blame you for admitting that you are driven by your emotional comfort zone more than your intellect. But please do not judge me. You do not know me or my world. It's rude and an entirely separate matter from our chat.

In an anarchist society, say I decided to start killing people. What would be the anarchist response?

Jerkface, yeah I was defining a perfect anarchy which I believe to be practically unattainable, but at least interesting and optimistic speculation. To borrow a word that's been tossed around with so many meanings recently, perfect anarchy is unsustainable. =P

Chris, I think your idea that anarchy requires homogeneity amongst the population makes a lot of sense. Were we all worker ants with identical traits, it could work.

Sorry Chris, I seem to perpetually be two posts behind. Bleck.

Aaaaanyway, it sounds like if there were an anarchist society and, for some unforseen reason, one member went on a murderous rampage, everyone else would be sitting ducks since they don't have any sort of defense mechanism. Maybe some would adapt but probably far too late. Does that sound about right, Sicarius?

@ChrisP: "Some people are more likable than others"

Hey thanks Chris ;-)

yeah chris, thats put well. power is a non-issue.

people might vie for power, but who would follow them? they would probably just get laughed at. the only way you can make someone obey you is if you lock up the food. like in this culture. I mean if you could just go pick all your food out of your yard would you really get a job?

thucy, there used to be plenty of food, overpopulation is a big problem

I didnt mean to offend jerkface, I just do not share your worldview at all. sometimes I talk to people to see how their doing, if they're enjoying thier day, to see if they would like to play some chess or go on a walk, to see what they think about something, or just to tslk to them. I talk to people all the tiem without wanting anything from them.

if you were a murderer or rapist or w/e in an anarchist society, its up to everyone who live in the community to decide. maybe they will exile you, or kill you, or imprison you, or maybe nothing.

Don't worry about offending people; that's not an issue. I'm not saying that talking to someone means you necessarily get something FROM them but you do gain from the experience, right? You have a reason for talking to them, right? Therefore, they have some smidgen of power over you because they could always withhold the conversation unless you give them something. I know this is a very unlikely and bizarre scenario but I'm simply illustrating that you benefit from these interactions and for that reason alone, the power dynamic is unequal.

Wait, if everyone in the anarchist community has the power and authority to decide what to do with a murderer then we're REALLY messing with our perfectly equalized power structure. And didn't you say before that people had authority over themselves, with the implication that they didn't have authority over others? If someone (or a group) makes a move against the murderer, then he (or the group) would be exercising an authoritative power over the individual murderer. This is no longer an anarchist society.

Also, this isn't about worldview. This is about logic and organization. I don't believe anything I've written here is very enlightening at all about the way I view the world in which I live. (After all, our subject, the anarchist society, is VERY different from the world in which I live)

not true. if they community collectively decides to take action that is anarchism.
no sane person would let a killer or rapist or child molester or etc just walk around their community.
when the community as a whole makes the decision, a collective decision reached by consensus that in no way makes it authoritative. its self defense really

That's an interesting idea Sic. If there was such a massive abundance of resources, would anyone bother to compete? I would argue that yes, people would still naturally compete, because there are things other than food that people value. For example, people would compete for lovers because presumably attractive mates can't be an abundance... you can always do better. Everything can't be in abundance, even if our basic necessities are, and people will compete for those things if it betters their life or increases their reproductive success.

Abundance may exist at some times, but it's always ephemeral because abundance encourages reproduction and population growth until the resources are not so abundant anymore, and full and hearty competition resumes. There was plenty of competition in hunter gathering societies. For basic necessities and especially for the right to have children in an environment of relatively low carrying capacity.

If you do nothing about the murderer or rapist or general exploiter, then it might encourage more, and the exploiters will have gained the upper hand on your peaceful anarchist society. If you do something about it, then what you are doing is exercising a monopoly of violence by saying that no individual can harm another individual, but if one does, then everyone else is within their rights to harm the culprit. How is this different from police other than the fact that we have people who specialize in deterring criminals so that we can do other things? You might point to the injustice in our "justice" system and that police are often responsible for brutal beatings and whatnot, but I don't think that's the general tendency, and besides that, any system exercising a monopoly of violence is in danger of committing injustice. Say in our little hunter gathering tribe you find a pretty gemstone that I covet. I steal it from you, and you are outraged to find your gemstone has gone missing. Immediately fingers are pointed at the less likable, less smart, and lazy fellow who seems like he would steal something like that. He's injustly exiled while I caress my stolen bounty having gotten away with it.