The A-Word

by Peter Saint-Andre

2004-01-16

I continue to flirt with philosophical anarchism. I'm not there yet (partly because subscribing to any "ism" seems foreign to me now), but I do find much of the thinking behind anarchist thought to be appealing. (And no, of course I'm not talking about the bomb-throwing "anarchists" who are continually brought forward as exemplars of the theory -- we won't go into that historical scare-tactic here. But you could probably count on two hands the number of people who died at the hands of such "anarchists" in the 20th century, whereas the best estimates are that 200 million people died at the hands of the state in that same period.) Here are some recent essays of interest on the topic of a fully voluntary society:

Anarchy literally means "no ruler", but unfortunately most people seem to equate that with "no rules". Yet one can have rules (customs, laws, etc.) without having a strongman or big boss to act as the final arbiter and enforcer....


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