# Anarcho-syndicalism **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 15, 2020, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978 "2020-02-15T15:28:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2020, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/21 "2020-02-26T18:00:26Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > …some moistened bint has to chuck a scimitar at someone. > And he’s right, because violence is inherent in the system where watery tarts chuck swords around. And also in a system where [supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses](http://legacy.earlham.edu/~herdda/Pages/monty.htm). Hierarchy of power is a necessary component of all political systems, because all political systems include people who don’t respect the mandate, either occasionally or habitually. And all political systems exist in a world where other systems don’t respect the mandate, also either occasionally or habitually. Nah. It’s probably impossible to eliminate violence altogether from human societies (even something as “mild” as social shunning/refusal to associate being a form of violence) ; but eliminating hierarchy is piss easy. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2020, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/22 "2020-02-26T19:03:48Z")
The fact that you can’t eliminate violence, both inside and coming from outside a society, means you can’t eliminate hierarchy either. Nor can you eliminate the need for violence, and therefore some members of the society will have the authority to employ violence to enforce the hierarchy. This is going to be true of any society large enough that each member doesn’t already know every other member. There are also hierarchies of competence, where higher performers or the more experienced exert authority over others. If it were so easy, there would be all kinds of anarchist societies with no hierarchies, and there aren’t. They either don’t arise, arise but fall apart, or arise and are conquered by better-organized and therefore more efficient societies. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Kropotkin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kropotkin/32/18045_2.png) [@Kropotkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kropotkin)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2020, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/23 "2020-02-26T23:58:10Z")
Someone hasn’t done the reading. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/24 "2020-02-27T00:29:37Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > Also, the fact that several large scale anarchist communities have existed and some are still out there to this day kind of puts to rest the idea that “it could never work !”, dontchoo think ? Are there any that operated as an independent state (for a reasonable amount of time, and not in squalor, etc.)? You can make just about any kind of organization work as long as you embed yourself in a society that handles all the hard stuff like defense and a working economy. But that’s just outsourcing the problems. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/25 "2020-02-27T05:54:00Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > even something as “mild” as social shunning/refusal to associate being a form of violence No, it’s not. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/26 "2020-02-27T06:15:50Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > Are there any that operated as an independent state (for a reasonable amount of time, and not in squalor, etc.)? > > You can make just about any kind of organization work as long as you embed yourself in a society that handles all the hard stuff like defense and a working economy. But that’s just outsourcing the problems. Again : revolutionary Catalonia (some 6 million people), Makhno’s slice of Ukraine (7-8 million). They didn’t have anybody doing their defence for them. Although systematic hard data is difficult to come by and everything wasn’t happy rainbows on account of, well, civil war stuff ; industrial output reportedly doubled in Catalonia (although that varies a lot by sectors and there were issues with sourcing materials which, for the most part, were produced in areas controlled by Franquists) and agricultural output increased 30 to 50% compared to pre-war conditions. How’s that for a working economy ? And on smaller scales, even within our late capitalist hellscapes there are a whole bunch of entreprises practising \*autogestion \*(couldn’t find a translation for that word - self-governance I guess ?), and thriving (e.g. Buurtzog covers 70% of at-home medical services in the Netherlands) - I mean, it’s a lot easier to motivate workers when they actually get a fair slice of the profits of their labour, a say in what they do & why and there are no idle cats syphoning off the wealth nor anybody permanently relegated to “shit tasks”… There’s really nothing spectacularly efficient about hierarchical structures ; and quite the contrary in many cases. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/27 "2020-02-27T06:19:30Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > No, it’s not. Yes, it is. Helpful, innit ? ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 7:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/28 "2020-02-27T07:28:16Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > Again : revolutionary Catalonia (some 6 million people), Makhno’s slice of Ukraine (7-8 million). They didn’t have anybody doing their defence for them. They each seem to have lasted about three years before being overrun by their neighbors. I wouldn’t quite call that a rousing success. > [@Kobal2](#): > > industrial output reportedly doubled in Catalonia (although that varies a lot by sectors and there were issues with sourcing materials which, for the most part, were produced in areas controlled by Franquists) and agricultural output increased 30 to 50% compared to pre-war conditions. How’s that for a working economy ? Hard to say. What was the output compared to more stable areas? The percentage change doesn’t mean much if the production was still miserable before and after. > [@Kobal2](#): > > There’s really nothing spectacularly efficient about hierarchical structures ; and quite the contrary in many cases. Sure. There are many alternatives and variations on the corporation. And small communes can be stable. But again, they depend on the state they’re embedded in. States are better able to organize armies and mobilize against their stateless neighbors. History is littered with examples, with nothing to the contrary as best I can tell. Maybe in the modern world, where developed nations are very reluctant to go to war with each other, it’s possible again to go stateless. But even then, it depends on the good will of their neighbors. Just one bad actor ruins it for the rest. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 8:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/29 "2020-02-27T08:13:00Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > They each seem to have lasted about three years before being overrun by their neighbors. I wouldn’t quite call that a rousing success. Sure, but that’s kind of the utopic part of it - right now most every bit of the world is run by hierarchies where handfuls of people wield disproportionate amount of power and control (be it militarily or economically). They have an inherent incentive to destroy any example of societies that don’t run that way in a successful manner. And so any would-be stateless state or fully socialized economy will almost immediately be dogpiled and/or undermined (see: Allende) and is at an inherent disadvantage ; unless it happens at the margins where nobody really cares (as in Chiapas). The same thing happened with e.g. the French Revolution : it was immediately beset by its every neighbouring monarchies, which caused enough damage and internal strife & fear that it derailed almost entirely and ended up an Empire. That being said, what with the Internet and whatnot, it’s conceptually imaginable for sweeping movements to overthrow The Boot across large swathes of territory within a relatively short timespan - something like the Arab Spring but with black flags :p. Ultimately The Boot only works because it has successfully managed to convince everyone that it is necessary for everyone’s safety and either anything else doesn’t work or there simply isn’t and cannot be anything else. “Before you make revolution in the streets, you must do it in your mind”, as the old May '68 slogan goes. I mean, just the word “anarchy” is immediately associated in people’s minds with some Mad Max-ish post-apocalyptic vision, how’s that for successful propaganda ? 😃 > [@](#): > > Hard to say. What was the output compared to more stable areas? The percentage change doesn’t mean much if the production was still miserable before and after. Well the pre-war output was in stable-ish conditions, inasmuch as early 20th century Spain ever was stable. > [@](#): > > Sure. There are many alternatives and variations on the corporation. And small communes can be stable. But again, they depend on the state they’re embedded in. > > States are better able to organize armies and mobilize against their stateless neighbors. I don’t believe that’s true. We’ve all worked in structures where complete tools wound up in managing/control positions by virtue of relationships or office politics or corruption and so on, with strictly negative effects on the actual work or its output. The same is true of armies. The reason the Franquists won or Makhno lost or the Paris Commune was thoroughly crushed wasn’t because anarchists suck at fighting - it’s because God is on the side of big battalions. There is also a question of the definition of “better” - e.g. within a capitalist framework, Walmart is “better” enough that it succesfully smothers small businesses. But Walmart employees are much worse off, as are their customers in some regards. If the ultimate goal of a society is to maximize collective happiness, Walmart ain’t it. Or the United States of America, come to that. > [@](#): > > History is littered with examples, with nothing to the contrary as best I can tell. Well, where armies are concerned for example, in the Athenian military the troops (who were all volunteer, although there was also a whole wealth dimension to it since each soldier provided their own gear, meaning the poor were mostly relegated to rowing and slings and also slavery made any expedition possible to begin with so that’s not super great) not only elected their officers and generals ; they also had a say in grand strategic goals. There are even expeditions that stalled for a while because the grunts essentially striked mid-campaign. Athens did all right for itself nevertheless 😉 (naturally, the Athenian hegemony was far from uncoercive or non-hierarchical or peaceful more generally speaking - I’m deliberately focusing on one aspect of it to show that it can, in fact, work without some West Point idiot barking orders and enforcing them by force/jail/tribunals & so on) > [@](#): > > Maybe in the modern world, where developed nations are very reluctant to go to war with each other, it’s possible again to go stateless. But even then, it depends on the good will of their neighbors. Just one bad actor ruins it for the rest. Yup. And the “winners” of capitalism & established hierarchies won’t let themselves be removed nor have their exorbitant privileges stripped away without a fight. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 11:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/30 "2020-02-27T11:21:47Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > Yes, it is. > Helpful, innit ? Only if you’re in the argument sketch. Please, enlighten me, under what commonly-accepted definition of violence is shunning a violent act? ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 11:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/31 "2020-02-27T11:59:05Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Only if you’re in the argument sketch. > > Please, enlighten me, under what commonly-accepted definition of violence is shunning a violent act? It’s a form of structural violence, so you can start reading up on that. At a fundamental level, “do as we want you to do or we won’t trade with you, talk with you, help you in any way or let you live among us ; also we’ll keep telling you how shit you are” is just as coercive as “do as we want or we’ll kick you in the 'nads” ; and can cause crippling psychological damage. Ask any gay kid who made the mistake of being born in Fundie Central ;). ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/32 "2020-02-27T12:40:17Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > It’s a form of structural violence. I’m well aware of what structural violence is. I don’t dispute its existence or its effects in the slightest, either. I will dispute it falls under the “commonly-accepted definition” clause, though. I don’t, though, slip references to structural violence into ordinary conversation as something being “a form of violence”, because that would be very obfuscatory. I’d actually say “X is a form of structural violence” because the qualifier is important. Because that would make everyone involved in the conversation aware that I was _not_, in fact, using the common definition of violence. This assumes, of course, that your purpose _was_ to take part in dialogue, and not to obfuscate for whatever reason. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/33 "2020-02-27T12:59:15Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > I’m well aware of what structural violence is. I don’t dispute its existence or its effects in the slightest, either. I will dispute it falls under the “commonly-accepted definition” clause, though. > > I don’t, though, slip references to structural violence into ordinary conversation as something being “a form of violence”, because that would be very obfuscatory. I’d actually say “X is a form of structural violence” because the qualifier is important. Because that would make everyone involved in the conversation aware that I was _not_, in fact, using the common definition of violence. > > This assumes, of course, that your purpose _was_ to take part in dialogue, and not to obfuscate for whatever reason. Pedantic objection duly noted ? To me, the general word “violence” perforce includes every subtype or “shade” (for lack of a better word coming to mind) of the concept and specific qualifiers are only required when differentiating \*between \*said subtypes or their effects, causes etc… I’m not sure what’s “obfuscatory” about that, nor what you’re accusing me of - what would I be trying to obfuscate, exactly ? ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/34 "2020-02-27T13:15:50Z")
_Of course_ it’s obfuscatory to use a less common definition of a word without clarifying that you’re doing so. You yourself acknowledge this when you have to qualify with “To me” - because you’re well aware that’s _not_ how everyone else uses the word - most people will intend the “physical force causing damage, injury or death” sense absent any qualifications. As to what you’re trying to obfuscate? The actual sense in which you’re using the word, obviously. As to why, I don’t know, but if I _had_ to speculate, I’d say it was to score rhetorical points later, by whipping out the trump card of “Aah, no, _I_ mean this special term of art, person who is clearly less informed on these topics”. Since that’s what you actually tried to do. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/35 "2020-02-27T15:09:05Z")
Uh uh. OK, then. I’m going to slooowly walk three paces back without breaking eye contact now. Then I’m booking it. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/36 "2020-02-27T16:15:25Z")
No, no need to run away, there shouldn’t be any embarrassment to you just because your obvious rhetorical tactic was exposed. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/37 "2020-02-27T20:30:13Z")
_whispering_ guys. GUYS. Where do we keep the tranq darts ? ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2020, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/38 "2020-02-27T22:47:30Z")
> [@Aspidistra](#): > > One solution could be to simply stop insisting that all society’s decisions are made by the same group of people all the time. We could simply divide the kinds of things governments need to decide into a bunch of committees (education, health, defence, trade…) and let every voting citizen join exactly one of them, where they get to make decisions about whatever is the one thing that they themselves have decided is the most important. So when the education, health, defense, and trade committees each respectively decide that their committee’s mission is the single most vital thing in the whole society, who decides where to allocate more resources? ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2020, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/39 "2020-02-28T00:03:44Z")
> [@UltraVires](#): > > So when the education, health, defense, and trade committees each respectively decide that their committee’s mission is the single most vital thing in the whole society, who decides where to allocate more resources? Proportionally, by the number of citizens enlisted in each committee ? Seems like a workable start. Couldn’t be worse than “the one guy who gets money shoved into his pockets by lobbyists from each sector”, innit ? ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2020, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978/40 "2020-02-28T01:47:26Z")
Dead horse, thoroughly beaten. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarcho-syndicalism/847978.md?page=3)