To what extent do anarchists agree on the nature of a future society? (A Level Politics essay)

I wrote this as part of the ideologies part of my A-Level.

Although anarchists agree in the abolition of the state, believing it to be an unjustifiably coercive force upon the individual, there are substantial differences on what a future society should look like. Though there is agreement, to some extent, on the basis of human nature (since all anarchists believe that we are inherently rational), there is a stark difference between Stirner’s Egoistic view and the cooperative vision of humans outlined by Kropotkin’s Mutual Aid theory; this, in turn, leads to very different conceptions of what a future society would look like. Collectivists, for instance, advocate self-governing communities in the absence of capitalism, whilst anarcho-capitalists like Murray Rothbard believe in the replacement of government through private firms.

Nevertheless, anarchists still reject Lockean notions of a social contract that underpins a society based on consent to the authority of a state. Emma Goldman, for instance, thought that, far from a state being need to arbitrate disputes and protect us from the state of nature, we are capable of leading peaceful and productive lives unrestricted by external force. In ‘Living My Life’, she argued that the provision of education would develop those inherently social and curious aspects of humans, which would reduce the tendency within capitalism to cause us to compete rather than cooperate (what Einstein termed a ‘primitive’ state of development). Godwin similarly thought that we are capable of ‘perpetual’ reason, negating the need for external authority. Anarchists also agree on the tendency of religion to support unjustified authority. Stirner, an Egoist, rejected such belief systems on the grounds that they restrict the Ego, which is sovereign. Likewise, Goldman argued that the Church was just as oppressive as any state and stood in the way of human progress, since the concept of ‘the meek inheriting the earth’ perpetuated a ‘slave mentality’. In addition, both collectivist and anarcho-capitalists oppose taxation; collectivists, because it implies involvement in an alienating and exploitative capitalist system sanctioned through state violence and anarcho-capitalists such as Robert Nozick, because it’s akin to forced labour (in that it effectively constitutes time spent working for the government). Indeed, the pacifistic element within anarchism lead some, such as Henry David Thoreau, to oppose taxation on the grounds that it supported the bloody conflicts of the state (particularly, in Thoreau’s case, the Mexican-American War). However, such similarities stem from a radically different conception of human nature, and in reality the collectivist and anarcho-capitalist visions of a future society are starkly opposed.

Whereas collectivist anarchists assert a fundamentally sociable and plastic human nature, individualist anarchists like Ayn Rand believe that we are naturally rational, selfish and self-serving. In ‘Atlas Shrugged’, for instance, Rand asserts that greed is a ‘virtue’ and reflective of our selfish nature. In contrast, Kropotkin proposed, through his theory of mutual aid, that we are sociable - since those species that are cooperative are most likely to prosper, and cooperation is human’s most natural state, any future anarchist society should be constructed around the principle of collective ownership rather than competition. Murray Rothbard, in contrast, asserted that pursuing one’s own self-interest was not only natural, but also beneficial for economic prosperity. Rothbard envisaged a society of unregulated economic agents each acting according to the incentives of the free market, rather than, in contrast to Kropotkin, working in small economic communities where the means of production was collectively owned and taking according to need. This stark division on human nature extends to a contrasting attitude to individual liberty, since Stirner (an Egoist), rejected the notion of community at all (and anarcho-capitalists similarly envisage an atomistic conception of society) whereas anarcho-syndicalists and anarcho-communists see no contradiction between the collective - and the imposition of equality - and the individual. This, in part, assumes a plastic view of human nature, since capitalism necessitates selfish and individualistic behaviour. Kropotkin argued that, assuming a more holistic and rounded education, humans would display their true cooperative characteristics, so the need to restrict freedom in a Hobbesian sense would not exist. Though thinkers such as Emma Goldman perhaps act as a bridge between the individualist and collectivist strands, Stirner’s ‘Ego’ and Kropotkin’s ‘cooperation’ in reality lead to an irreconcilable conception of a future society.

Further, there are also differences within the collectivist anarchist tradition regarding the economy. Kropotkin, for instance, advocated a system of anarcho-communism whereby people would be free to join whichever community they wanted; these communities would, as far as possible, be self-sufficient. Bakunin, whilst accepting the abolition of capitalism and its replacement with a system of self-governing communities, placed more emphasis on the cooperation between communities based on the exchange of goods and services according to their true value. Proudhon differed from both, since in ‘What is Property?’ (1840), he not only advocated a ‘people’s bank’, which could recycle surplus funds to productive units, but also the voluntary engagement of workers into free contracts. Further, anarcho-capitalists have a radically different view of a future economy, since they advocate the unrestricted workings of the invisible hand to efficiently allocate resources. Rothbard asserted that all aspects of the state could be privatised; for instance, law and order could be run by protective agencies. However, Stirner’s future society differs from both anarcho-communists and anarcho-capitalists in that it views unrestrained Egos spontaneously coming together in the rational interests of all (rather than being constrained by social obligation and belief systems).

In conclusion, therefore, anarchists disagree on the nature of a future society far more than they agree. Not only do collectivist anarchists oppose capitalism on the grounds that it imposes a selfish, alienating system on fundamentally social beings, there are various mutually exclusive versions of what an anarchist society would look like. Although Egoists like Max Stirner, in addition to collectivists, oppose private property, and anarcho-capitalists could perhaps be better described as ‘minarchists’, the difference between the competing strands of anarchism stem from a fundamentally opposed view of human nature that sees the profit motive reflecting a selfish, individualistic streak, pitted against the sociable and cooperative nature that can be altered and made perfectible.

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