(Part 2) Best products from r/Anarchy101

Grab yourself a copy of Anarchy and Christianity by Jaques Ellul. The guy is brilliant and lays out the how and why of being a Christian and an Anarchist, and will give you some serious ammo when you have to explain it to people.

He covers it from both the perspective of being an Anarchist, and not so much trying to convince the Anarchist to be a Christian, but why they should allow Christians among their ranks, and why it makes sense that Christians should be Anarchists, and illustrates the Bible as the source for Christian Anarchy. It's quite well written and it's one of my favorites.

It also contains an interpretation of Romans 13:1-2 by Karl Barth in favor and Anarchism, which should give even the most staunch theological scholar you come across something to chew on. You would be very hard pressed to find someone willing to flat out say Barth is wrong.

And yeah, time. Time is pretty much the only thing that will prove to others it's not a phase.

Karen Ho's "Liquidated: An Ethnography of Wall Street" explains how the meritocracy is racist, even though the idea is used to cover up that perception. Check it:

>On Wall Street, “economic outcome” is seen as constituted through skill, merit, and education, not such “externalities” as race, class, and gender.

>...

>The singular pursuit of the bottom line serves as a deterrent against any residual flare-ups of institutionalized racism, sexism, and classism, sweeping the specter of bias onto the terrain of other institutions.

 

But here's how the "meritocracy" actually works:

>The complete equating of smartness with these institutions, the identification of historically white colleges as global, universal institutions, as well as the wholesale erasure of the white upper-class male privilege embedded in these universities are part and parcel of how excellence is understood. Central to Wall Street’s construction of its own superiority is the corollary assumption that other corporations and industries are “less than”—less smart, less efficient, less competitive, less global, less hardworking—and thus less likely to survive the demands of global capitalism unless they restructure their cultural values and practices according to the standards of Wall Street. In a meritocratic feedback loop, their growing influence itself becomes further evidence that they are, in fact, “the smartest.”

Wall Street will recruit mostly from Princeton and Harvard and Yale, and then recruit a bit at other less prestigious schools within a certain quota.

>Instead, Princeton and Harvard recruits bring to the table just the right mix of general qualities and associations: they are not too technical or geeky (MIT), not too liberal (Yale), not too far away (Stanford), and their universities carry more historical prestige than the remaining Ivies (Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, University of Pennsylvania). Possessed of a combination of traditional cachet, class standing, and pedigree, they can show prima facie evidence of their “excellence” by virtue of their schools’ (presumably) exclusive selection processes; and they demonstrate a constant striving for further “excellence” by virtue of their participation in the intense process of recruiting and their evident desire for a high-status, upper-crust lifestyle.

>Finally, Wall Street maintains pinnacle status and differentiates between elite schools by utilizing quota systems and other divisive mechanisms that reproduce Wall Street/university hierarchies.

 

So, yeah...meritocracy is racist because it favors whites through a complex system of hierarchies. And that's only on Wall Street. Sara Ahmed is currently doing a project on complaints in institutions that confronts racism and sexism in institutional life, often the primary means of proving one's merit in our economy based on skilled labor.

I don't even know why I bothered typing this out. But it's too late, I'm committed and I'm pressing Enter!

Anarchists tend to leave this pretty vague and open-ended, because it's difficult to create a blueprint that will work in all cases for all communities (which speaks to one of the reasons why anarchists don't like the state). Generally speaking, anarchists tend to roll with the principles behind Restorative Justice.

There are lots of examples of alternatives to learn from too, including indigenous societies (taking care not to fetishize them), past anarchist experiments, and other attempts to find a more humane path to justice.

AFAQ, for example, holds up juries as a good starting point:

> In terms of resolving disputes between people, it is likely that some form of arbitration system would develop. The parties involved could agree to hand their case to a third party (for example, a communal jury or a mutually agreed individual or set of individuals). There is the possibility that the parties cannot agree (or if the victim were dead). Then the issue could be raised at a communal assembly and a "court" appointed to look into the issue. These "courts" would be independent from the commune, their independence strengthened by popular election instead of executive appointment of judges, by protecting the jury system of selection of random citizens by lot...

Kristian Williams talks about alternatives to policing in his book Our Enemies in Blue (PDF). He adapted a few chapters from it for publication elsewhere, including:

• A Look At Feminist Forms Of Justice That Don't Involve The Police, which looks specifically at community response and prevention around assault, abuse, and rape
  
• Civil Rights with Guns, which looks at alternatives to police from the Black Freedom Movement
  

Fellow market socialist here. There are a number of problematic assumptions underlying the question.

In the first place, you needn't accept the premise that risk-taking is inherently good and therefore "deserves" some sort of reward.

Nevertheless, let's contrast risk taking under capitalism with its market socialism counterpart. Under a capitalist model, if the owner's risk-taking succeeds, he may either pocket the success or recapitalize as he deems necessary. If he's a particularly benevolent owner his employees may, on a good spirited whim, see some reward, but this is unlikely and indeed, rightly so, says the capitalist--labor knew the terms of their wage agreement from the outset.

Now, if his risk-taking doesn't pay off, his employees will be the first to bear the consequences (think layoffs, relocations, pay-cuts, etc.), mitigating against any negatives he may incur. At the very worst, his risk-taking may land him squarely in the working class, on equal footing with his former employees (who are now also unemployed because of his risk-taking).

Alternatively, in a market socialist enterprise where ownership is shared among and managed by the workers themselves, those who take the risks and those who bear the consequences (good and bad) are the same.

As for innovation, which is a different matter than risk-taking, it's often, and today almost entirely, the result of collective endeavor and collaboration, built on the backs of the research of previous generations. The thought that there are singular, genius innovators who owe nothing to anyone and therefore deserve everything that their idea alone may potentially beget is idealist and Hollywood. This sort of thinking also mistakes what actually motivates innovators (autonomy, purpose, mastery). You can look to contemporary open source communities, or even public institutions, for evidence of this.

Venezuela likely has the most mobilized and organized population in the world aside from perhaps Rojava. Each group within this kaleidoscope of social movements maintains varying degrees of autonomy from the state.

We should seek out and support those leftist organizations which advocate keeping the revolution independent from the government. We can be critical of the Chavez/Maduro-run state without throwing away all the legitimate progress made by millions of people there. And of course we must totally oppose US imperialism.

A great book on this subject (though a bit dated now) is We Created Chavez. Another good one is Venezuela Speaks! Voices from the Grassroots.

I can recommend Anarchism and the City by Chris Ealham for its good on-the-ground accounts of the exploitative nature of capitalism that might challenge his point of view, unless of course your friend thinks the slaves who built the pyramids enjoyed amicable conditions.

edit to correct hot link, and numerous typos.

The ABC's of Political Economy: A Modern Approach

From Chapter 1: Economics and Liberating Theory:

>The liberating theory presented in this chapter attempts to transcend historical materialism without throwing out the baby with the bath water. It incorporates insights from feminism, anti-colonial and anti-racist movement, and anarchism, as well as from mainstream psychology, sociology, and evolutionary biology where useful. Liberating theory attempts to understand the relationship between economic, political, kinship and cultural activities, and the forces behind social stability and social change, in a way that neither over nor underestimates the importance of economic dynamics, and neither over nor underestimates the importance of human agency compared to social forces.

And then he uses liberating theory throughout the book, but it definitely has a focus on economics.

Would absolutely recommend. It actually changed my mind on a few things.

Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism by Peter Marshall - Lengthy but nice, not terribly difficult and kind of fun. Though I've never finished it.

Also, I highly recommend this book Anarchy Explained to My Father. Anarchy Explained to My Father https://www.amazon.com/dp/1554201373/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_fZJoDbZHSPH2T It talks about how libertarianism used to be more synonymous with Anarchy before the definitions slowly changed and democracy as a definition changed as well. I would say this book is part of why I really buy into Anarchism. Nonetheless, hope you get the time to check it out.

On Anarchism by Noam Chomsky might be a good place to start. You can even get the audiobook for free off Amazon if you don’t have an account with Audible yet.


https://www.amazon.com/Anarchism-Noam-Chomsky/dp/1595589104/ref=nodl_

Yup, also if you have time, Marx had a manuscript for the fourth volume of Kapital that critiqued theories of surplus value. Karl Kautsky published it as a full three volume edition, I'd at least read the first one. Here's an amazon link, although you should obviously buy it somewhere else if you can find it. Or try to find a free online source.

Check out David Barker's "Welcome to Free America". He worked for the Federal Reserve as an economist: http://www.amazon.com/Welcome-Free-America-David-Barker/dp/1105111393

A friend told me about this a while back and said it was very helpful, I've been meaning to get around to it https://www.amazon.com/dp/1844673596/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_awdb_IMf6yb5Y7QKAN

If you're interested in the anarchist movement of Ukraine/Crimea beyond Nestor Makhno's faction (which only comprised only a small faction of the broader anarchist resistance in Ukraine), I highly recommend Atamansha: The Story of Maria Nikiforova and [Siberian Makhnovschina: Siberian Anarchists in the Russian Civil War] (http://www.amazon.com/Siberian-Makhnovschina-Anarchists-Russian-1918-1924/dp/1926878086).

Well, the classic would be Orwell's Homage to Catalonia. Beyond that, I suppose you could also check out Our Word Is Our Weapon and The Zapatista Reader. I've linked to Amazon simply for the summaries; you should be able to get both from any university or large public library exchange. The EZLN aren't anarchists per se, but they're close enough as to make no difference in my view.

There is also History of the Makhnovist Movement (1918–1921), by Peter Arshinov, that's definitely worth a read.

Here is the flag image that has/is being flown in our community. Yes I know this link goes to Amazon.

Here is a Wikipedia article on many of the Anarchist symbols and flags.

Here is a personal favorite, a comedic take on explaining a few of the different Anarchist flags.

And you're right, the "base" flag can be seen as the solid black flag, which is more so an anti-flag and a sign of dissent than it is an actual "flag." The color(s) you choose to add to that black flag are up to the individual, and simply express what strand of philosophical thought you focus your Anarchism through.

For instance, I am constructing a blue and black flag to express my anarcho-transhumanism.

If I misinterpreted your question or didn't give enough examples, let me know and I'll correct my mistakes.

Anarchic communities that excite me--historical and contemporary-- include squatter towns, radical trailer parks, the more egalitarian maroon communities, some pirates, evasive tribal/band societies, and Graeber's description of the Malagasy. I'm also stoked on experiments in gift economies and alternative exchange, hacking and subversive use of technology, various anti-work strategies, ect.

So far, attempts at large scale anarchist revolutions have been disastrous. I can only hope that the marginal self-organized communities we have to work with can chip away at structure of control until they no longer exist. If not, creating as much cooperative autonomy as possible as soon as possible is a valuable end in itself.

An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution of the United States by Charles Beard. It's seminal history text that does just what you're looking for.

https://www.amazon.com/Economic-Interpretation-Constitution-United-States/dp/0029024803