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The nature of capitalism is criticized by left-wing anarchists, who reject hierarchy and advocate stateless societies based on non-hierarchical[1][2][3] voluntary associations.[4][5] Anarchism is generally defined as the libertarian philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary and harmful[6][7] as well as opposing authoritarianism, illegitimate authority and hierarchical organization in the conduct of human relations.[1][8][9][10][11][12] Capitalism is generally considered by scholars to be an economic system that includes private ownership of the means of production, creation of goods or services for profit or income, the accumulation of capital, competitive markets, voluntary exchange and wage labor, which have generally been opposed by most anarchists historically.[13][14] Since capitalism is variously defined by sources and there is no general consensus among scholars on the definition nor on how the term should be used as a historical category,[15] the designation is applied to a variety of historical cases, varying in time, geography, politics and culture.[16]
Anarcho-capitalists believe that capitalism is the absence of coercion and therefore fully compatible with the philosophy of anarchism; they claim that an effort to put a stop to what they consider "voluntary hierarchy" is inconsistent with the philosophical tradition of "freedom" present in anarchist thought.[17] Some argue that anarcho-capitalism is a form of individualist anarchism,[18][19][20] although this has been contested[21] or rejected,[22][23][24][25] including an individualist–socialist divide.[21] Many others deny that anarcho-capitalism is a form of anarchism at all,[26][27] or that capitalism is compatible with anarchism,[26][28] seeing it as a form of New Right libertarianism.[26]
Anarcho-capitalist author and theorist Murray Rothbard, who coined the term itself and developed such philosophy from the 1950s through the 1970s, stated that individualist anarchism is different from capitalism because the individualist anarchists retain the labor theory of value[22] and socialist doctrines.[29][30][31][32] Left-wing anarchist commentators do not consider anarcho-capitalism as a legitimate form of anarchism due to perceived coercive characteristics of capitalism. In particular, they argue that certain capitalist transactions are not voluntary and that maintaining the class structure of a capitalist society requires coercion in violation of anarchist principles.[33][34]
- ^ a b "Principles of The International of Anarchist Federations". Archived 5 January 2012 at the Wayback Machine International of Anarchist Federations. "The IAF - IFA fights for : the abolition of all forms of authority whether economical, political, social, religious, cultural or sexual".
- ^ Kropotkin, Peter. "Anarchism: its philosophy and ideal". "That is why Anarchy, when it works to destroy authority in all its aspects, when it demands the abrogation of laws and the abolition of the mechanism that serves to impose them, when it refuses all hierarchical organization and preaches free agreement — at the same time strives to maintain and enlarge the precious kernel of social customs without which no human or animal society can exist".
- ^ "B.1 Why are anarchists against authority and hierarchy?" Archived 2012-06-15 at the Wayback Machine. An Anarchist FAQ. "Anarchists are opposed to irrational (e.g., illegitimate) authority, in other words, hierarchy — hierarchy being the institutionalisation of authority within a society".
- ^ Woodcock, George. "Anarchism". Encyclopedia of Philosophy. "ANARCHISM, a social philosophy that rejects authoritarian government and maintains that voluntary institutions are best suited to express man's natural social tendencies".
- ^ Kropotkin, Peter. "Anarchism". Encyclopædia Britannica. "In a society developed on these lines, the voluntary associations which already now begin to cover all the fields of human activity would take a still greater extension so as to substitute themselves for the state in all its functions".
- ^ Malatesta, Errico. "Towards Anarchism". Man!. Los Angeles: International Group of San Francisco. OCLC 3930443.
Agrell, Siri (14 May 2007). "Working for The Man". The Globe and Mail. Archived from the original on 16 May 2007. Retrieved 14 April 2008. "Anarchism". Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Premium Service. 2006. Archived from the original on 14 December 2006. Retrieved 29 August 2006. "Anarchism". The Shorter Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy: 14. 2005.
Anarchism is the view that a society without the state, or government, is both possible and desirable
. The following sources cite anarchism as a political philosophy: Mclaughlin, Paul (2007). Anarchism and Authority. Aldershot: Ashgate. p. 59. ISBN 978-0-7546-6196-2. Johnston, R. (2000). The Dictionary of Human Geography. Cambridge: Blackwell Publishers. p. 24. ISBN 0-631-20561-6. - ^ Slevin, Carl (2003). McLean, Aiaun; McMillan, Allistair, eds. "Anarchism". The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics. Oxford University Press.
- ^ Goldman, Emma. "What it Really Stands for Anarchy". Anarchism and Other Essays. "Anarchism, then, really stands for the liberation of the human mind from the dominion of religion; the liberation of the human body from the dominion of property; liberation from the shackles and restraint of government. Anarchism stands for a social order based on the free grouping of individuals for the purpose of producing real social wealth; an order that will guarantee to every human being free access to the earth and full enjoyment of the necessities of life, according to individual desires, tastes, and inclinations".
- ^ Tucker, Benjamin. Individual Liberty. "They found that they must turn either to the right or to the left, — follow either the path of Authority or the path of Liberty. Marx went one way; Warren and Proudhon the other. Thus were born State Socialism and Anarchism. [...] Authority, takes many shapes, but, broadly speaking, her enemies divide themselves into three classes: first, those who abhor her both as a means and as an end of progress, opposing her openly, avowedly, sincerely, consistently, universally; second, those who profess to believe in her as a means of progress, but who accept her only so far as they think she will subserve their own selfish interests, denying her and her blessings to the rest of the world; third, those who distrust her as a means of progress, believing in her only as an end to be obtained by first trampling upon, violating, and outraging her. These three phases of opposition to Liberty are met in almost every sphere of thought and human activity. Good representatives of the first are seen in the Catholic Church and the Russian autocracy; of the second, in the Protestant Church and the Manchester school of politics and political economy; of the third, in the atheism of Gambetta and the socialism of the socialism off Karl Marx".
- ^ Ward, Colin (1966). "Anarchism as a Theory of Organization". Archived from the original on 25 March 2010. Retrieved 1 March 2010.
- ^ Anarchist historian George Woodcock report of Mikhail Bakunin's anti-authoritarianism and shows opposition to both state and non-state forms of authority as follows: "All anarchists deny authority; many of them fight against it". (p. 9) "[...] Bakunin did not convert the League's central committee to his full program, but he did persuade them to accept a remarkably radical recommendation to the Berne Congress of September 1868, demanding economic equality and implicitly attacking authority in both Church and State".
- ^ Brown, L. Susan (2002). "Anarchism as a Political Philosophy of Existential Individualism: Implications for Feminism". The Politics of Individualism: Liberalism, Liberal Feminism and Anarchism. Black Rose Books Ltd. Publishing. p. 106.
- ^ Heilbroner, Robert L. Capitalism. New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics, Second Edition (2008).
- ^ Tormey, Simon. Anticapitalism. One World Publications, 2004. p. 10.
- ^ Critical Issues in History. Lanham, Md: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999, p. 1.
- ^ Scott, John (2005). Industrialism: A Dictionary of Sociology. Oxford University Press.
- ^ Bernstein, Andrew (2005). The Capitalist Manifesto: The Historic, Economic and Philosophic Case for Laissez-faire. University of America. ISBN 0-7618-3221-1.
- ^ Bottomore, Tom (1991). "Anarchism". A Dictionary of Marxist Thought. Oxford: Blackwell Reference. p. 21. ISBN 0-63118082-6.
- ^ Outhwaite, William (2003). The Blackwell Dictionary of Modern Social Thought. "Anarchism". Blackwell Publishing. p. 13. "Their successors today, such as Murray Rothbard, having abandoned the labor theory of value, describe themselves as anarcho-capitalists".
- ^ See the following sources:
- Bullosk, Alan; Trombley, Stephen (ed.) (1999). The Norton Dictionary of Modern Thought. W. W. Norton & Company. p. 30.
- Barry, Norman (2000). Modern Political Theory. Palgrave, p. 70.
- Adams, Ian (2002). Political Ideology Today. Manchester University Press. ISBN 0-7190-6020-6, p. 135.
- Grant, Moyra (2003). Key Ideas in Politics. Nelson Thomas. p. 91. ISBN 0-7487-7096-8.
- Heider, Ulrike (1994). Anarchism: Left, Right, and Green. City Lights. p. 3.
- Avrich, Paul (1996). Anarchist Voices: An Oral History of Anarchism in America. Abridged paperback edition. p. 282.
- Tormey, Simon (2004). Anti-Capitalism, One World. pp. 118–119.
- Raico, Ralph (2004). Authentic German Liberalism of the 19th Century. École Polytechnique, Centre de Recherche en Épistémologie Appliquée, Unité associée au CNRS.
- Busky, Donald (2000). Democratic Socialism: A Global Survey. Praeger/Greenwood. p. 4.
- Heywood, Andrew (2002). Politics: Second Edition. Palgrave. p. 61.
- Offer, John (2000). Herbert Spencer: Critical Assessments. Routledge. p. 243.
- ^ a b Franks, Benjamin (August 2013). Freeden, Michael; Stears, Marc (eds.). "Anarchism". The Oxford Handbook of Political Ideologies. Oxford University Press: 385–404. doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199585977.013.0001.
- ^ a b Rothbard, Murray (1950s). "Are Libertarians 'Anarchists'?". Lew Rockwell.com. Retrieved 1 April 2020.
- ^ Wieck, David (1978). "Anarchist Justice". In Chapman, John W.; Pennock, J. Roland Pennock, eds. Anarchism: Nomos XIX. New York: New York University Press. pp. 227–228. "Out of the history of anarchist thought and action Rothbard has pulled forth a single thread, the thread of individualism, and defines that individualism in a way alien even to the spirit of a Max Stirner or a Benjamin Tucker, whose heritage I presume he would claim – to say nothing of how alien is his way to the spirit of Godwin, Proudhon, Bakunin, Kropotkin, Malatesta, and the historically anonymous persons who through their thoughts and action have tried to give anarchism a living meaning. Out of this thread Rothbard manufactures one more bourgeois ideology." Retrieved 7 April 2020.
- ^ Peacott, Joe (18 April 1985). "Reply to Wendy Mc Elroy". New Libertarian (14). June 1985. Archived 7 February 2017 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 7 April 2020. "In her article on individualist anarchism in the October, 1984, New Libertarian, Wendy McElroy mistakenly claims that modern-day individualist anarchism is identical with anarchist capitalism. She ignores the fact that there are still individualist anarchists who reject capitalism as well as communism, in the tradition of Warren, Spooner, Tucker, and others. [...] Benjamin Tucker, when he spoke of his ideal "society of contract," was certainly not speaking of anything remotely resembling contemporary capitalist society. [...] I do not quarrel with McElroy's definition of herself as an individualist anarchist. However, I dislike the fact that she tries to equate the term with anarchist capitalism. This is simply not true. I am an individualist anarchist and I am opposed to capitalist economic relations, voluntary or otherwise."
- ^ Baker, J. W. "Native American Anarchism". The Raven. 10 (1): 43‒62. "It is time that anarchists recognise the valuable contributions of individualist anarchist theory and take advantage of its ideas. It would be both futile and criminal to leave it to the capitalist libertarians, whose claims on Tucker and the others can be made only by ignoring the violent opposition they had to capitalist exploitation and monopolistic 'free enterprise' supported by the state." Retrieved 7 April 2020.
- ^ a b c Marshall, Peter (1993). Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism. Oakland, California: PM Press. p. 565. ISBN 978-1-60486-064-1.: "In fact, few anarchists would accept the 'anarcho-capitalists' into the anarchist camp since they do not share a concern for economic equality and social justice, Their self-interested, calculating market men would be incapable of practising voluntary co-operation and mutual aid. Anarcho-capitalists, even if they do reject the State, might therefore best be called right-wing libertarians rather than anarchists."; Sabatini, Peter (Fall/Winter 1994–1995). "Libertarianism: Bogus Anarchy". Anarchy: A Journal of Desire Armed (41).
{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link) "Within Libertarianism, Rothbard represents a minority perspective that actually argues for the total elimination of the state. However Rothbard's claim as an anarchist is quickly voided when it is shown that he only wants an end to the public state. In its place he allows countless private states, with each person supplying their own police force, army, and law, or else purchasing these services from capitalist venders. [...] [S]o what remains is shrill anti-statism conjoined to a vacuous freedom in hackneyed defense of capitalism. In sum, the "anarchy" of Libertarianism reduces to a liberal fraud."; Meltzer, Albert (1 January 2000). Anarchism: Arguments for and Against. AK Press. p. 50. ISBN 978-1-873176-57-3. "The philosophy of "anarcho-capitalism" dreamed up by the "libertarian" New Right, has nothing to do with Anarchism as known by the Anarchist movement proper."; Goodway, David (2006). Anarchist Seeds Beneath the Snow. Liverpool Press. p. 4. ISBN 978-1-84631-025-6.: "'Libertarian' and 'libertarianism' are frequently employed by anarchists as synonyms for 'anarchist' and 'anarchism', largely as an attempt to distance themselves from the negative connotations of 'anarchy' and its derivatives. The situation has been vastly complicated in recent decades with the rise of anarcho-capitalism, 'minimal statism' and an extreme right-wing laissez-faire philosophy advocated by such theorists as Murray Rothbard and Robert Nozick and their adoption of the words 'libertarian' and 'libertarianism'. It has therefore now become necessary to distinguish between their right libertarianism and the left libertarianism of the anarchist tradition."; Newman, Saul (2010). The Politics of Postanarchism. Edinburgh University Press. p. 53. ISBN 978-0-7486-3495-8.: "It is important to distinguish between anarchism and certain strands of right-wing libertarianism which at times go by the same name (for example, Murray Rothbard's anarcho-capitalism). There is a complex debate within this tradition between those like Robert Nozick, who advocate a 'minimal state', and those like Rothbard who want to do away with the state altogether and allow all transactions to be governed by the market alone. From an anarchist perspective, however, both positions—the minimal state (minarchist) and the no-state ('anarchist') positions—neglect the problem of economic domination; in other words, they neglect the hierarchies, oppressions, and forms of exploitation that would inevitably arise in a laissez-faire 'free' market. [...] Anarchism, therefore, has no truck with this right-wing libertarianism, not only because it neglects economic inequality and domination, but also because in practice (and theory) it is highly inconsistent and contradictory. The individual freedom invoked by right-wing libertarians is only a narrow economic freedom within the constraints of a capitalist market, which, as anarchists show, is no freedom at all". - ^ See the following sources:
- K, David (2005). What is Anarchism?. Bastard Press.
- Marshall, Peter (1992). Demanding the Impossible. Chapther 38. London: Fontana Press. ISBN 0-00-686245-4.
- MacSaorsa, Iain (2009). Is 'Anarcho' Capitalism Against the State?. Spunk Press.
- Wells, Sam (January 1979). Anarcho-Capitalism is Not Anarchism, and Political Competition is Not Economic Competition. Frontlines 1.
- ^ See the following sources:
- Peikoff, Leonard (1991). Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand. Chapter "Government". Dutton Adult.
- Doyle, Kevin (2002). Crypto Anarchy, Cyberstates, and Pirate Utopias. New York: Lexington Books. pp. 447–448.
- Sheehan, Seán M. (2003). Anarchism Reaktion Books. p. 17.
- Kelsen, Hans (1988). The Communist Theory of Law. Wm. S. Hein Publishing. p. 110.
- Tellegen, Egbert; Wolsink, Maarten (1998). Society and Its Environment: an introduction. Routledge. p. 64.
- Jones, James (2004). The Merry Month of May. Akashic Books. pp. 37–38.
- Sparks, Chris. Isaacs, Stuart (2004). Political Theorists in Context. Routledge. p. 238.
- Bookchin, Murray (2004). Post-Scarcity Anarchism. AK Press. p. 37.
- Berkman, Alexander (2005). Life of an Anarchist. Seven Stories Press. p. 268.
- ^ Martin, James J. (1953). Men Against the State: the State the Expositors of Individualist Anarchism. Dekalb, Illinois: The Adrian Allen Associates.
- ^ Tucker, Benjamin (1970). Liberty. Greenwood Reprint Corporation. 7–8. p. 26. "Liberty has always insisted that Individualism and Socialism are not antithetical terms; that, on the contrary, the most ... not of Socialist Anarchism against Individualist Anarchism, but of Communist Socialism against Individualist Socialism."
- ^ McKay, Iain, ed. (2012). "Section G – Is Individualist Anarchism Capitalistic?". An Anarchist FAQ. Vol. II. Stirling: AK Press. ISBN 9781849351225.
- ^ Carson, Kevin (2017). "Anarchism and Markets". In Jun, Nathan J. (2017). Brill's Companion to Anarchism and Philosophy. BRILL. p. 81. ISBN 9789004356894.
- ^ McKay, Iain (2007). "Section F - Is "anarcho"-capitalism a type of anarchism". An Anarchist FAQ, Volume I. AK Press. ISBN 978-1-902593-90-6. Archived from the original on 28 January 2012.
- ^ McKay, Iain; et al. (21 January 2010). "Section F - Is "anarcho"-capitalism a type of anarchism?". An Anarchist FAQ. Infoshop.org. Archived from the original on 5 December 2011. Retrieved 3 December 2011.