. @hjbentham. #order. #startrek. #sciencefiction. #alternatives. #sociology.
An exclusive article from the Order
I agree with every point you make and, even further, I believe welfare including the implementation of universal basic income and free healthcare is also essential to human survival. De facto chaos would not be in anyone's interests and a form of order that is also aligned with equality and justice is in our best interests.
We must keep in mind that antistatism is a broad category and includes not just anarchism but also diverse forces that even clash among each other like separatism, devolution, libertarianism, globalism, anti-borders activism, migration, stateless communism, the science fiction utopia depicted in Star Trek, and so forth: all of these at some time said they oppose what the state has been.
For me, it would be more accurate to say that I oppose the Nineteenth Century nation-state, and it is my view that authorities should not necessarily abolish themselves but re-examine their declining legitimacy and govern based on human interests rather than bogus "national interests". Such national interests, I see as obsolete in the same way that monarchy became obsolete in Europe and the Americas. When I say antistatism, I mean anti-nation-statism (all modern states are nation-states, so state has become shorthand for nation-state in much academic discourse). Good governance is necessary, especially when it meets global, human interests. We shouldn't forget that global governance saved the ozone layer from depletion and is the only hope to save us from climate change, which makes it essential to human survival.
I believe there should be authorities, and that someone who calls for abolishing authority doesn't understand what authority is, because such a person would be actually relying on their own de facto authority (even if they lack a de jure position or rank) in order to make that call and expect anyone to listen. As such, I don't think anarchists are capable of plunging humanity into chaos even if they possessed vast wealth and power, because they would welcome forms of welfare and global governance, or even futuristic alternative models of "state" as beneficial alternatives, and the things they attack and criticize are usually only things like police brutality, monarchy, the church, and laws that aren't in the public interest. Anarchists remain a significant pressure group and intellectual school in Europe and America and we should see them mainly as a pressure group, like animal rights activists and others. I support animal rights, but that has no effect on my diet. Agreeing with some of a pressure group's current pressure against an institution shouldn't mean we belong to their group or ideology. I also agree with certain drug legalization, but I don't use drugs or see that anyone else should. Although I used to ignore anarchism and saw it as irrelevant, C4SS is an anarchist think tank I sometimes reprint, and has a lot of good theses I agree with.
By Harry J. Bentham - More articles by Harry J. Bentham
