The individualist anarchists like Josiah Warren, Stephen Pearl Andrews, Lysander Spooner, Benjamin Tucker, have must more in common with AnCaps than they do with AnComs.
Josiah Warren's principle of "the sovereignty of the individual" is the same as the non-aggression principle.
Stephen Pearl Andrews explicitly wrote in defense of wage labour and bosses.
Lysander Spooner defended absentee land ownership.
Benjamin Tucker thought his ideas were very similar to that of libertarian sociologist Herbert Spencer.
And all of them were opposed to communism.
Hi,
This is actually a question rooted in externalities.
Basically, imagine this scenario:
A factory produces widgets, but in doing so pollutes a local river. However the town where all the workers live is upstream of the pollution, so it doesn't affect them. However a town downstream does. So the producers don't bear the full cost of production.
How would the other town seek compensation?
In a statist system pigovian taxes or State courts (tort law) could be used to deal with this, at least in theory
How does ancapistan deal with this? How does civil litigation work in anarchism?
Typically.i hear private courts. But what makes those decisions binding? Like if the court rules against the factory, and they don't like that, then why bother listening to the court? The state solves this through the coercive institution of the police. How does ancapistan deal with this? Private police? But then, couldn't richer folks just use that to enforce their will on everyone?
Would be curious to see your response
Hi,
I have been reading up on labor vouchers cause I know a lot of socialists tend to like them. Up to this point I had never really been sold on the idea because I was never really sold on the Labor Theory of Value (despite being a market socialist, my views on how labor is exploited in capitalism are kinda complex and nuanced and not the subject of this post). However, it's always good to challenge your beliefs so I started reading up on it.
To start with i looked at wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labour_voucher
The critique section mainly focused on communist critiques which advocate abolishing markets anyways, so I haven't really read a pro-market critique of the idea.
I do know that Robert Owen tried setting up a labor voucher style shop and it did actually work in his small community, though he eventually shut it down.
Like I said, I'm not totally sold on the idea, but if you can address these concerns:
- Some labor voucher systems make no distinction between difficulties of jobs. So like a neurosurgeon would get 1 voucher for 1 hour of work the same as a janitor. Both do valuable work of course, but one is significantly more difficult and requires significantly more training. There are some systems of labor vouchers that advocate for differential amounts of vouchers or making a voucher worth more for harder work, though.
- Again, not totally sold on the labor theory of value
- The advantages over traditional money are that you can't use it to just make more money. But I don't necessarily take issue with this. Goods get value from both capital and labor. Both are required for a good. If capital provides value that's fine to remunerate. In my model of market socialist a combination of the bond market and credit unions and crowdfunding would be used to finance coops.
- How do you ensure labor vouchers are actually destroyed? Like, some advocate for doing this through government agencies, but it's not like anyone has ever heard of corruption in a government agency before or skimming off the top. I guess I have a very strong distrust of centralized authority.
- I have read some concerns about incentives for improving capital or re-investment. NGL don't totally understand them, so feel free to either refute these types of arguments or support them
So I am trying to figure out my thoughts on labor vouchers as a concept. I have read pro-voucher stuff and read some communist critiques o
... keep reading on reddit β‘'Grillers' are the people that 'just want to grill'. They don't involve themselves in matters of society and politics. Grillers bbq in their back yard and let politics and society do what it will. They are often equated to political moderates but I see a distinction. A moderate could have a strong conviction for moderation and so would not be a griller. A Nazi could have a very weak conviction for Naziism and would be a griller.
Mutualists, like grillers, have very weak convictions about how institutions will work. When asked about how property and dispute resolution will work they respond, 'However the community decides (I just want to grill)'.
CMV
Cheers
Mutualism is an ideology who seeks to establish a stateless society based around a combination of free trade of goods between individuals, as long as a mutual credit bank and mutual aid structures.
https://preview.redd.it/5rfdw543xt281.jpg?width=1648&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=6e409683c4aa4c464c4ccfc861718fe0d662ccf8
As the title says, I am wondering if I should consider myself a mutualist. I'll run you through some of my political opinions.
I'm pro-choice, pro-LGBTQIA+ and think gender is a social construct. I also believe in free at the point of use, universal healthcare and free educationBut that puts me in the modern western centre left so isn't entirely helpful.
I do not support the idea of the state. It is inherently oppressive and inhibits individual freedom. I do however support small, local governments if the people in a particular area want that. I do not support individuals like Stalin who are too authoritarian. I support abolishing police and prisons. Punitive justice isn't justice at all. I support the legalisation of sex work. Sex work is work. I also support the legalisation of drugs. At the very least, an individual should be able to own a handgun. And I do not think it's right you need the government's permission to get married.
I believe in a market. Otherwise I do not know how luxury goods would be distributed. Everyone should be ensured a minimum standard of living. Everything an individual needs to survive should be provided for. You shouldn't have to work to live. I'm also not opposed to globalisation but if something can be produced locally (i.e water, certain foods and electricity) then it should be. Big business is destroying the planet and exploiting workers. I support small, independent/locally owned business. Of you want to open a business you should be able to without the permission of the government. I think automation can be used as a force of good, eventually making it possible for people to pursue whatever hobby they want without fear of losing their home. Of banks exist at all, they should be small and locally owned to invest in the community. Utilities should be locally owned.
This is the part that may make me not a mutualist (or maybe it doesn't I really don't know): I think you should be able to own your own home and the land it's on but nobody needs 100k acres of land. And if you have a summer home for example, you should be able to rent it out when you're not using it.
If you have any questions feel free to ask. Thanks!
I have been talking in another thread about market socialism. They argued it was not socialist because the tendency for monopoly is still there. I mean, ignoring the fact that would mean every socialist state wasn't socialist (cause they were rife with monopolies, usually from the state), I wanted to examine this claim.
The argument basically goes like this. When firms compete, some will be successful and others will fail. This allows the more successful firms to accumulate profit and expand, making it harder to compete.
The usual counter is, well if a firm gets large enough that it begins to manipulate prices and be bad, then others will enter that market.
The counter to this is usually, "price wars". The idea is that big monopolies can rely on their coffers to keep them through a price war while they kill competition. No investor wants to invest in a guaranteed failed enterprise. So the fear of price wars keeps competition out and the market competitive.
I haven't heard a response to this last point. Would be curious to hear it.
I go back and forth on this point. I think there is some merit to the claim that the state creates monopolies (patents, barriers to entry, etc). But also, this does seem plausible. I have read conflicting reports on the history of standard oil and whether it engaged in price wars. I know this was alleged but never actually rendered guilty in court. If someone knows the history there I'd love to learn it. So, yeah: in a free market system are monopolies inevitable?
If they are, then what are some in-state solutions to breaking them up?
So how does investment work? Like most decentralized models of market socialisn rely on using debt to finance stuff, so like bonds, direct loans, crowd funding, etc.
My question is, say I get wealthy off my investments and loans. Like say I'm an entrepreneur, I start a small software coop that brings in a lot of renevue. (This is not unheard of, Stardew valley was made by one guy and netted the creator millions). There are only a few workers so each walks away with millions. Then I take my millions and buy bonds, direct loans to other coops or individuals, low but not 0 interest. Now I have grown my millions.
In a statist society cops (pigs) would protect my accumulated capital. What would prevent someone from taking it in an anarchist one? I didn't get it from worker exploitation (like I said, started a coop and then lent out the money, hell even without the lending I still would have money). How would I ensure that my wealth would be safe?
For those who are opposed to the loaning/debt, how would you finance industry? How would the millions I made at the coop be protected? Thanks for the clarification!
Despite being the original form of anarchism, mutualism was slowly overtaken by the more communitarian forms of anarchism. These were collectivism, which, though Bakunin is still a beloved figure among libertarians, seems to be pretty thoroughly dead; and Malatesta and Kropotkin's communism, the communism of mutual aid.
Proudhon did war against socialists like Louis Blanque and Karl Marx. However, I don't know what the mutualist arguments against collectivism and communism are.
Compared to communism and collectivism, mutualism is much more pro-property (or perhaps pro-possession), and significantly less violent. Do mutualists believe that it is just for workers to seize the property of capitalists, which mutualists, like other anarchists, consider to be illegitimate? Obviously, these factories will not be seized for all, as Kropotkin desired, but rather for the workers to run themselves.
Hi, I'm am just learning about socialism, anarchism, mutualism, communism, etc so forgive me if I am not too well versed in theory. But what do mutualists think of Revolution? Should we seize the means of production by force and establish a mutual society with anti capitalist markets with no state that way? Or should mutualism be evolutionary? Such as building within the capitalist, statist society we have now with grassroots cooperation and mutual aid rather then the confrontational strategy associated with revolution.
I really don't see the difference. I am probably one of them, or maybe like a minarchist version of one of them, but not sure which.
I am a market socialist that is for certain. Oppose intellect property rights and the property rights that exist under capitalism (because of extraction of surplus value). However, I do want worker coops and I am not opposed to probate debt based investment (not stocks per SE, more like buying bonds or crowdfunding) though I also want credit unions. I am opposed to investors getting economic profit (i.e. surplus value, more value than they created through loaning to the coop), but I feel the free market prevents this.
So where do I fall? What is the difference between the two?
Like the title says any mutualist critiques or disagreements with anarcho-communism?
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What is a mutual credit bank/union and what is its purpose in relation to mutualist theory?
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How will monopolies be prevented in a Mutualist society?
I have a post here: https://www.reddit.com/r/mutualism/comments/prilnc/what_do_yall_think_of_my_plan/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
That walks through my idea of an entrepreneur in market socialism.
One user u/DecoDecoMan has been arguing with me saying it is hierarchical and that mutualism is a) not maker anarchism and that b) the subset of mutualism that is market anarchism is inherently different from what I described.
He then basically says his version is anarchic and non hierarchical. I ask for specifics as to how that would work but keep getting the same answer: no hierarchy. But I don't understand the specifics of what he is saying. It is frustrating vague. Any specifics is responded with "no hierarchy". But what does that mean? How do entities participate in the market? He said he was sorta opposed to coops as i envisoned them. Idk I am really struggling to understand what he is saying.
For the mutualists here, can you explain how your version of market socialism would work. What entities would participate in the market? How would say, a car, get produced?
Also, please no brigading, i am genuine trying to understand
Hi,
I am aware that mutualists don't support absentee ownership, landlords, businessman, etc. I know that in the mutualist system, ownership of property is determined by use. However, how long would it take for someone to leave a property (let's say a house) and it not be theirs anymore. How could we avoid a system where I could steal someone's old clothes because he or she wasn't using them anymore? How would use be determined? Without government, how would one gain title to a piece of land?
What's your opinion on them and what they think?
I can't ever do enough damage to him before he regens and for some reason I can't wait for others to join
If anyone can help me with this guy i would greatly appreciate it because i can't do anything
Hi,
I used to be a mutualist myself, and for that time when I was, anarcho-capitalism lived rent-free in my head. I couldn't understand how these people who claimed earnestly to be anarchists were being rejected by so much of the anarchist community, especially when they claimed to hate government so much, almost more that we did. Above everything else, I wanted unity between these two houses, both alike in dignity. It was only when I shifted by to being a libertarian of the Kropotkin-Bakunin school that I realised why we don't consider them anarchists. If a government is a territorial monopoly on force, and property is the right to do what one pleases with an object or geographical area, in the absence of a higher government, the proprietor is the government. The only situation in which this is consistent is in a situation where absentee property ownership doesn't exist and a person has exclusive power over his possessions.
One of the defenses that anarcho-capitalists give is that their ideology is the heir of mutualism. Why do they claim this when Proudhon literally said that property is theft and Spooner said that a man is no less a slave because he chooses another master once in a term of years?
Hi there. So as the title said, Iβve recently become rather draw to anarchist thought, Mutualism especially. How ever, I still have some concerns for how a completely none hierarchical society would be run. For context, right now I would consider myself a libertarian/market socialist who wants a government run similar to the Democratic Confederalism in Rojva. Iβve read What is Property, but not much beyond that.
First of, how would government work? By government I mean the entity which allows for the coordination of people, outside of local communities and such, which Iβm pretty sure could just be run by direct democracy. Would there be any kind of federalism to link these communities together? If so, how would they be run?
Second off, how would the legal system work? Could local communities set rules under Mutualism? If so, how would these rules be enforced? What would happen to people who broke them? Could they be fined or sentenced to community service? For more serious crimes, could people be banished, imprisoned, or killed? Denned mutual aid and employment?
Third off, I like how Mutualism allows for markets, but as George Orwell once said, βthe problem with compition is that somebody wins them.β What happens if monopolies form, or two coops have a major dispute? How will we ensure things remain fair? How do we stop successful coops from centralizing power?
Finally, will the people in a Mutualist society have some common ideal of who they or shared identity? This may be a major departure from the individualist anarchism that most mutualists believe in. I donβt know if Iβm arguing for something compatible with a more comintarian version of Mutualism or not, but I really think having a shared group identity with your community, despite the risks of tribalism and petty bigotry, is something people really need. Does Mutualism allow for this?
Anyway, thanks for reading.
The title says it all. What are some of the most effective arguments and valid critiques of the system proposed by anarcho-communists from a mutualist or market anarchist perspective? Do you believe occupancy and use is a fundamentally better approach to property than complete collective ownership? Are markets inherently more effective or efficient than gift economies? I'm very curious to how all of you articulate your thoughts on this. Discuss.
Distributism is very similiar to mutualism in many aspects, because of that i ask this question. If you guys don't know what it is, put a comment and i respond.
Trying to get a mutualist discord going active. Feel free to join and come and go as you please.
Hi,
This is actually a question rooted in externalities.
Basically, imagine this scenario:
A factory produces widgets, but in doing so pollutes a local river. However the town where all the workers live is upstream of the pollution, so it doesn't affect them. However a town downstream does. So the producers don't bear the full cost of production.
How would the other town seek compensation?
In a statist system pigovian taxes or State courts (tort law) could be used to deal with this, at least in theory
How does mutualism deal with this? How does civil litigation work in anarchism?
What are mutualists general opinion on the labor theory of value and the subjective theory of value ? Are they useful? Any critiques of both of them ? Why do you prefer one over the other if you do?
I really don't see the difference. I am probably one of them, or maybe like a minarchist version of one of them, but not sure which.
I am a market socialist that is for certain. Oppose intellect property rights and the property rights that exist under capitalism (because of extraction of surplus value). However, I do want worker coops and I am not opposed to probate debt based investment (not stocks per SE, more like buying bonds or crowdfunding) though I also want credit unions. I am opposed to investors getting economic profit (i.e. surplus value, more value than they created through loaning to the coop), but I feel the free market prevents this.
So where do I fall? What is the difference between the two?
