The Meaning of the Black Flag.

"Why is our flag black? Black is a shade of negation. The black flag is the negation of all flags. It is a negation of nationhood which puts the human race against itself and denies the unity of all humankind. Black is a mood of anger and outrage at all the hideous crimes against humanity perpetrated in the name of allegiance to one state or another. It is anger and outrage at the insult to human intelligence implied in the pretences, hypocrisies, and cheap chicaneries of governments . . . Black is also a colour of mourning; the black flag which cancels out the nation also mourns its victims the countless millions murdered in wars, external and internal, to the greater glory and stability of some bloody state. It mourns for those whose labour is robbed (taxed) to pay for the slaughter and oppression of other human beings. It mourns not only the death of the body but the crippling of the spirit under authoritarian and hierarchic systems; it mourns the millions of brain cells blacked out with never a chance to light up the world. It is a colour of inconsolable grief.

But black is also beautiful. It is a colour of determination, of resolve, of strength, a colour by which all others are clarified and defined. Black is the mysterious surrounding of germination, of fertility, the breeding ground of new life which always evolves, renews, refreshes, and reproduces itself in darkness. The seed hidden in the earth, the strange journey of the sperm, the secret growth of the embryo in the womb all these the blackness surrounds and protects.

So black is negation, is anger, is outrage, is mourning, is beauty, is hope, is the fostering and sheltering of new forms of human life and relationship on and with this earth. The black flag means all these things. We are proud to carry it, sorry we have to, and look forward to the day when such a symbol will no longer be necessary."

["Why the Black Flag?", Howard Ehrlich (ed.), Reinventing Anarchy, Again, pp. 31-2]

Staten Skaber Kapitalen.

Enhver systemkritik af kapitalismen, som er andet end blot overfladisk, må tage udgangspunkt i en analyse af hvad der overhovedet muliggør kapitalismen. Kapitalismen opstod ikke i et tomrum, men var fra første færd – og fortsætter med at være – indlejret i statslige strukturer. Det er derfor vigtigt, at man ser på hvilken rolle staten spiller i kapitalismen dvs. på hvordan eksistensen af staten hænger sammen med kapitalismens eksistens.

En bærende søjle i kapitalismen er den (oftest forfatningsbaserede) private ejendomsret. En ejendomsret der ikke blot garanteres juridisk men også fysisk af statens monopol på legal voldsanvendelse. Den private ejendomsret formuleres i moderne tid juridisk i kontekst af borgerskabets revolutioner i Frankrig og De Forenede Stater. I sidstnævnte tilfælde lagde man kimen til kapitalismen ved skabelsen af denne bærende ejendomsretslige søjle, idet ejendomsbesiddende (og ofte slaveholdende) hvide mænd, skabte en forfatning hvori den private ejendomsret indgår som et centralt element.

Ligeledes central er idéen om det frie marked. Det er dog mestendels blevet ved idéen, da markedet som kapitalismen fungerer indenfor, aldrig har været egentlig frit. Det har derimod altid været indlejret i statslige strukturer som gennem lovgivning og voldelige former for magtpraksis har gjort begrænsende indgreb i markedet, ganske ofte til kapitalisternes fordel. Allerede ganske tidligt i De Forenede Staters historie indførte man således protektionistisk lovgivning, idet man allerede under den første amerikanske præsident, George Washington, indførte The Tariff Act (1789), der havde begrænsning af import og således beskyttelse af den hjemlige produktion, som sin underliggende logik.

To af måderne hvorpå staten har virket som støttehjul for kapitalismen er altså protektionisme og den forfatningssikrede ejendomsret. Sådanne ejendomsretslige juridiske tiltag er senere blevet mere mangfoldige, hvorfor vi nu kender til fænomener som intellektuel ejendomret, herunder lovgivning som giver nogle patenter og ophavsret og forbyder andre at krænke disse. Som den amerikanske intellektuelle Kevin Carson så rammende har formuleret det, er staten “jernnæven bag den usynlige hånd.”

I begyndelsen var ejendomsretten noget mere håndgribelig end i retten til idéers tilfælde (læs: intellektuel ejendomsret), idet der typisk var tale om ejerskab af noget langt mere fysisk, nemlig land. I det nordamerikanske tilfælde var der som oftest tale om ejendom man havde fået fingrene i, ved massemorderisk fortrængelse af den indfødte befolkning og/eller gennem slaveriets udbytning af ufrie menneskers arbejdskraft. Den forfatningsgaranterede private ejendomsret var således intet mindre end en legtimering af udplyndring og udbytning, skrevet af tyvene selv. Det er derfor også ganske rammende, at ordet privat - i begrebet privat ejendomsret - har sine sproglige rødder i det latinske ord privare som kan oversættes til berøve.

Også i England spillede staten en central rolle i den centralisering af magt som affødtes af, at nogle gjorde indhug i den nedarvede fælles ejendom (jorden). Mellem 1760 og 1844 vedtog man over 4000 enclosure acts som på mindre end hundrede år forvoldte, at omkring halvfems procent af jorden i England faldt på en lille minoritets hænder. Den arbejdende landbefolkning blev frarøvet muligheden for at operere på de tidligere fællesejede åbne enge, idet disse nu var på private hænder. Dette var blandt hovedårsagerne til, at bønderne fandt sig tvunget til at flytte til byerne for at finde arbejde i fabrikkerne. Statsmagten skabte således det juridiske grundlag for en omfattende berøvelse og udbytning af arbejderklassen, samt grundlaget for industrien, qua den forsyning af arbejdskraft til de kapitalistiske fabrikker, som fulgte i kølvandet på indhegningen og privatiseringen af den fælles ejendom.

I sit essay “English Enclosures and Soviet Collectivization: Two Instances of an Anti-Peasant Mode of Development” beskriver den libertarianske historiker Joseph R. Stromberg hvordan denne legalistiske udplyndring af den fælles ejendom fandt sted:

“The political dominance of large landowners determined the course of enclosure….[I]t was their power in Parliament and as local Justices of the Peace that enabled them to redistribute the land in their own favor.

A typical round of enclosure began when several, or even a single, prominent landholder initiated it … by petition to Parliament.… [T]he commissioners were invariably of the same class and outlook as the major landholders who had petitioned in the first place, [so] it was not surprising that the great landholders awarded themselves the best land and the most of it, thereby making England a classic land of great, well-kept estates with a small marginal peasantry and a large class of rural wage labourers.”

Idéen, at nogen kunne eje jorden på samme måde som man kunne eje en hestesko man selv havde smedet, blev allerede tidligt kritiseret af en af oplysningstidens mest markante intellektuelle. I sin Afhandling om Oprindelsen og Grundlaget for Uligheden Mellem Mænd (Discours sur l'origine et les fondements de l'inégalité parmi les hommes) kaster filosoffen Jean-Jacques Rosseau sig ud i en sønderlemmende kritik af denne idé:

“Den første, der indhegnede et område og fandt på at sige: Dette er mit, og fandt nogen, der var dumme nok til at tro på ham, var den sande grundlægger af det borgerlige samfund. For hvor mange forbrydelser, krige, mord, for hvilke ulykker og rædsler ville ikke den mand have sparet menneskeslægten, som havde fjernet grænsepælene eller fyldt grøften op og råbt til sine fæller: Lyt ikke til denne svindler; I er fortabte, hvis I glemmer, at jordens frugter tilhører alle og jorden ingen.”

I et interview med den amerikanske systemkritiske intellektuelle Derrick Jensen i bogen Resistance Against Empire, forklarer den demokratiske økonomiske teoretiker J. W. Smith, hvori den fortabthed som Rosseau omtaler, består:

“If someone were born into our culture with the fully developed intelligence of an adult, but without our social conditioning, one of the first confusing realities she or he would face is that all of the land belongs to someone else. It’s a crazy situation. Before this person could legally stand, sit, lie down, or sleep, much less gain sustenance, she or he would have to pay whoever owned that piece of land. Now it’s one thing to own something that you’ve built—a chair, perhaps, or a table, or shoes—but land, air, and water are entirely different categories. They nurture life, are necessary to life, and were here before we were born (meaning they’re not our creation). Depriving others—all living beings, not just humans—access to land is to have the ability to kill them.” [min kursivering]

Kapitalister som ønsker staten afskaffet er der ikke mange af. Selv neoliberalister som ønsker et minimum af statslig indblanding i markedets virke ønsker ikke selve staten afskaffet. Årsagen er den simple, at staten også i det neoliberalistiske tilfælde spiller en central rolle. Den britisk-amerikanske marxistiske forfatter David Harvey beskriver statens (begrænsede) rolle i neoliberalismens tidsalder, i sin bog A Brief History of Neoliberalism:

“Neoliberalism is in the first instance a theory of political economic practices that proposes that human well-being can best be advanced by liberating individual entrepreneurial freedoms and skills within an institutional framework characterized by strong private property rights, free markets, and free trade. The role of the state is to create and preserve an institutional framework appropriate to such practices. The state has to guarantee, for example, the quality and integrity of money. It must also set up those military, defence, police, and legal structures and functions required to secure private property rights and to guarantee, by force if need be, the proper functioning of markets. Furthermore, if markets do not exist (in areas such as land, water, education, health care, social security, or environmental pollution) then they must be created, by state action if necessary. But beyond these tasks the state should not venture. State interventions in markets (once created) must be kept to a bare minimum because, according to the theory, the state cannot possibly possess enough information to second-guess market signals (prices) and because powerful interest groups will inevitably distort and bias state interventions(particularly in democracies) for their own benefit.” [min kursivering]

Når staten ofte opfattes som et bolværk imod kapitalismen er årsagen med stor sandsynlighed en manglende forståelse af, at staten, snarere end at forsvare os imod kapitalismen, faktisk er blandt de væsentligste årsager til, at kapitalismen overhovedet har kunnet opstå - og stadig består. Uden den centrale rolle som staten spiller i kapitalismen er det svært at se, hvordan kapitalismen skulle kunne fortsætte med at eksistere som global økonomisk orden. Kampen mod kapitalismen må derfor af nødvendighed også være en kamp imod staten.

Autoritær socialisme er statskapitalisme.

Begrebet socialisme synes at implicere, at der er tale om et prosocialt snarere end om et asocialt fænomen og det er derfor nok på sin plads, at forsøge at komme med et gangbart bud på hvad begrebet social implicerer. Ordet kommer af det latinske socialis som knytter sig til det ligeledes latinske socius der betyder følgesvend, men fortæller de etymologiske rødder os noget om, hvad det sociale er indbegrebet af?

Mellem to følgesvende er der snarere tale om et nogenlunde lige forhold, end der er tale om et forhold karakteristisk ved, at den ene part dominerer den anden og påtvinger denne sine meninger og præferencer. At følges ad implicerer noget jævnbyrdigt, mens at følge efter, eller at følge ordrer, nok nærmere implicerer det modsatte.

Ordet social har altså derfor sine sproglige rødder i noget der nok ikke ligger væk langt fra hvad de fleste vel mener når de taler om, at en person er et meget socialt væsen. For når vi synes at nogen handler socialt, mener vi vel i reglen, at vedkommende handler på en måde som er opretholdende for det sociale forhold, ved at give plads til den anden, i stedet for at dominere ham eller hende. Modsat mener vi vel ofte, når vi taler om at en person handler asocialt, at vi har at gøre med et menneske som ikke giver plads til sine medmennesker, men som i stedet forsøger at påtvinge dem sine egne egoistiske præferencer. Den asociale handler altså på en måde der er ødelæggende for det sociale forhold, mens den sociale opretholder og styrker det.

Ovenstående forsøg på en indkredsning af hvad der kendetegner det sociale, som et kendetegn ved socialisme, er imidlertid vanskeligt foreneligt med det meste af den statsindlejrede og autoritære socialisme vi har været og fortsat er vidner til. Den autoritære, statsopretholdende - eller endda statsekspanderende - variant af socialismen er en selvmodsigelse.

Ønsker man, som mange venstreorienterede påstår, at destruere klassesamfundets indbyggede sociale uligheder, er svaret derfor ikke mere stat, men mindre. I et samfund hvor staten overtager alle produktionsmidlerne bliver alle - undtagen de som styrer staten - gjort til proletarer og man har således ikke forringet, endsige destrueret, klassesamfundets uretfærdige og asociale dominansstrukturer, men derimod gjort dem endnu mere omfattende qua proletariseringen af alle. Den herskende kapitalistiske klasse er godt nok blevet sendt hen hvor peberet gror, men erstatningen, i form af en herskende statslig klasse, kan ikke siges at have elimineret kapitalismens indbyggede autoritære og derfor asociale uretfærdighed. Uretfærdigheden har blot fået et andet navn.

Hvis socialismens mål er etableringen af gunstige, frigjorte og sociale forhold for arbejderne på deres arbejdspladser, realiseres dette derfor ikke ved at udskifte et autoritært og således asocialt forhold med et andet, for hvilken frigørelse fra det autoritære og asociale klassesamfunds snærende bånd skulle man derved have opnået? Arbejdernes fælles ejerskab af produktionsmidlerne står altså derfor i skarp kontrast til et statsligt ejerskab af disse. I første tilfælde ejes og forvaltes produktionsmidlerne kollektivt af arbejderne selv i en ikke-hierarkisk og horisontal organisationsstruktur. I det andet ejes og forvaltes produktionsmidlerne af nationalstaten i en hierarkisk og vertikal organisationsstruktur, idet disse er statens organisatoriske kendetegn. Når arbejderne kollektivt ejer og forvalter produktionsmidlerne på en ikke-hierarkisk og horisontal måde er der endvidere tale om en strukturel decentralisering, mens der i det nationalstatsejede tilfælde, i modsætning hertil, er tale om en strukturel centralisering, da staten per definition er et centralistisk fænomen.

Nationaliseringer af produktionsmidlerne kan derfor ikke siges at være prosociale, men må snarere siges at være asociale, idet der er tale om en styrkelse af det autoritære og socialt ulige forhold som den autoritære og vertikale stats organisatoriske struktur implicerer. Overtager staten produktionsmidlerne foretages der derfor ikke et egentligt opgør med kapitalismen. Det er blot tale om et skift fra en privatejet kapitalisme til en statsejet. Statssocialismen kan derfor vanskeligt siges at leve op til den ligebyrdige socialitet som begrebet socialisme synes at implicere, men må snarere siges at undergrave denne ligebyrdighed ved at fortsætte den asociale, hierarkiske og dominansorienterede kapitalisme, blot med andre midler og under andre ejerskabsformer.

Tænk hvis....

Tænk hvis alle centrale magtformer var blevet sendt hen hvor peberet gror i 1900. Det kan let tænkes at verden i så fald ville have været lykkeligt foruden rigtig mange sørgelige fænomener og begivenheder. Uden centrale magtformer...

- Ingen grænser.

- Ingen verdenskrige, kold krig eller andre statsligt funderede krige.

- Ingen atomvåben og mutually assured destruction.

- Ingen subsidiering af våbensektoren og sandsynligvis meget mindre oprustning.

- Ingen arbejds- og udryddelseslejre.

- Ingen Holocaust, Halabja eller Hiroshima.

- Ingen stalinisme, maoisme, nazisme, fascisme eller neoliberalisme.

- Ingen systematisk tortur begået i statsligt regi.

- Ingen magtfulde efterretningstjenester og politistater.

- Ingen topstyrede militære organisationer.

- Ingen administrativ uigennemsigtighed.

- Ingen centrale statslige propagandaorganer.

- Ingen centralbanker eller centraladministrationer.

- Ingen politikere eller embedsmænd.

- Ingen kriminalisering af offerløse handlinger.

- Ingen tvangsskoling, tvangsaktivering eller værnepligt.

- Ingen EU, NATO eller Amerikansk imperialisme.

- Ingen OPEC, Verdensbank, IMF eller WTO.

- Ingen transnationale selskaber eller globaliseret kapitalisme.

"In most important ways you are probably already an anarchist — you just don’t realize it."

Are You An Anarchist?

by David Graeber.

Chances are you have already heard something about who anarchists are and what they are supposed to believe. Chances are almost everything you have heard is nonsense. Many people seem to think that anarchists are proponents of violence, chaos, and destruction, that they are against all forms of order and organization, or that they are crazed nihilists who just want to blow everything up. In reality, nothing could be further from the truth. Anarchists are simply people who believe human beings are capable of behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to. It is really a very simple notion. But it’s one that the rich and powerful have always found extremely dangerous.

At their very simplest, anarchist beliefs turn on to two elementary assumptions. The first is that human beings are, under ordinary circumstances, about as reasonable and decent as they are allowed to be, and can organize themselves and their communities without needing to be told how. The second is that power corrupts. Most of all, anarchism is just a matter of having the courage to take the simple principles of common decency that we all live by, and to follow them through to their logical conclusions. Odd though this may seem, in most important ways you are probably already an anarchist — you just don’t realize it.

Let’s start by taking a few examples from everyday life:

If there’s a line to get on a crowded bus, do you wait your turn and refrain from elbowing your way past others even in the absence of police?

If you answered “yes”, then you are used to acting like an anarchist! The most basic anarchist principle is self-organization: the assumption that human beings do not need to be threatened with prosecution in order to be able to come to reasonable understandings with each other, or to treat each other with dignity and respect.

Everyone believes they are capable of behaving reasonably themselves. If they think laws and police are necessary, it is only because they don’t believe that other people are not. But if you think about it, don’t those people all feel exactly the same way about you? Anarchists argue that almost all the anti-social behavior which makes us think it’s necessary to have armies, police, prisons, and governments to control our lives, is actually caused by the systematic inequalities and injustice those armies, police, prisons and governments make possible. It’s all a vicious circle. If people are used to being treated like their opinions do not matter, they are likely to become angry and cynical, even violent — which of course makes it easy for those in power to say that their opinions do not matter. Once they understand that their opinions really do matter just as much as anyone else’s, they tend to become remarkably understanding. To cut a long story short: anarchists believe that for the most part it is power itself, and the effects of power, that make people stupid and irresponsible.

Are you a member of a club or sports team or any other voluntary organization where decisions are not imposed by one leader but made on the basis of general consent?

If you answered “yes”, then you belong to an organization which works on anarchist principles! Another basic anarchist principle is voluntary association. This is simply a matter of applying democratic principles to ordinary life. The only difference is that anarchists believe it should be possible to have a society in which everything could be organized along these lines, all groups based on the free consent of their members, and therefore, that all top-down, military styles of organization like armies or bureaucracies or large corporations, based on chains of command, would no longer be necessary. Perhaps you don’t believe that would be possible. Perhaps you do. But every time you reach an agreement by consensus, rather than threats, every time you make a voluntary arrangement with another person, come to an understanding, or reach a compromise by taking due consideration of the other person’s particular situation or needs, you are being an anarchist — even if you don’t realize it.

Anarchism is just the way people act when they are free to do as they choose, and when they deal with others who are equally free — and therefore aware of the responsibility to others that entails. This leads to another crucial point: that while people can be reasonable and considerate when they are dealing with equals, human nature is such that they cannot be trusted to do so when given power over others. Give someone such power, they will almost invariably abuse it in some way or another.

Do you believe that most politicians are selfish, egotistical swine who don’t really care about the public interest? Do you think we live in an economic system which is stupid and unfair?

If you answered “yes”, then you subscribe to the anarchist critique of today’s society — at least, in its broadest outlines. Anarchists believe that power corrupts and those who spend their entire lives seeking power are the very last people who should have it. Anarchists believe that our present economic system is more likely to reward people for selfish and unscrupulous behavior than for being decent, caring human beings. Most people feel that way. The only difference is that most people don’t think there’s anything that can be done about it, or anyway — and this is what the faithful servants of the powerful are always most likely to insist — anything that won’t end up making things even worse.

But what if that weren’t true?

And is there really any reason to believe this? When you can actually test them, most of the usual predictions about what would happen without states or capitalism turn out to be entirely untrue. For thousands of years people lived without governments. In many parts of the world people live outside of the control of governments today. They do not all kill each other. Mostly they just get on about their lives the same as anyone else would. Of course, in a complex, urban, technological society all this would be more complicated: but technology can also make all these problems a lot easier to solve. In fact, we have not even begun to think about what our lives could be like if technology were really marshaled to fit human needs. How many hours would we really need to work in order to maintain a functional society — that is, if we got rid of all the useless or destructive occupations like telemarketers, lawyers, prison guards, financial analysts, public relations experts, bureaucrats and politicians, and turn our best scientific minds away from working on space weaponry or stock market systems to mechanizing away dangerous or annoying tasks like coal mining or cleaning the bathroom, and distribute the remaining work among everyone equally? Five hours a day? Four? Three? Two? Nobody knows because no one is even asking this kind of question. Anarchists think these are the very questions we should be asking.

Do you really believe those things you tell your children(or that your parents told you)?

It doesn’t matter who started it.” “Two wrongs don’t make a right.” “Clean up your own mess.” “Do unto others...” “Don’t be mean to people just because they’re different.” Perhaps we should decide whether we’re lying to our children when we tell them about right and wrong, or whether we’re willing to take our own injunctions seriously. Because if you take these moral principles to their logical conclusions, you arrive at anarchism.

Take the principle that two wrongs don’t make a right. If you really took it seriously, that alone would knock away almost the entire basis for war and the criminal justice system. The same goes for sharing: we’re always telling children that they have to learn to share, to be considerate of each other’s needs, to help each other; then we go off into the real world where we assume that everyone is naturally selfish and competitive. But an anarchist would point out: in fact, what we say to our children is right. Pretty much every great worthwhile achievement in human history, every discovery or accomplishment that’s improved our lives, has been based on cooperation and mutual aid; even now, most of us spend more of our money on our friends and families than on ourselves; while likely as not there will always be competitive people in the world, there’s no reason why society has to be based on encouraging such behavior, let alone making people compete over the basic necessities of life. That only serves the interests of people in power, who want us to live in fear of one another. That’s why anarchists call for a society based not only on free association but mutual aid. The fact is that most children grow up believing in anarchist morality, and then gradually have to realize that the adult world doesn’t really work that way. That’s why so many become rebellious, or alienated, even suicidal as adolescents, and finally, resigned and bitter as adults; their only solace, often, being the ability to raise children of their own and pretend to them that the world is fair. But what if we really could start to build a world which really was at least founded on principles of justice? Wouldn’t that be the greatest gift to one’s children one could possibly give?

Do you believe that human beings are fundamentally corrupt and evil, or that certain sorts of people (women, people of color, ordinary folk who are not rich or highly educated) are inferior specimens, destined to be ruled by their betters?

If you answered “yes”, then, well, it looks like you aren’t an anarchist after all. But if you answered “no”, then chances are you already subscribe to 90% of anarchist principles, and, likely as not, are living your life largely in accord with them. Every time you treat another human with consideration and respect, you are being an anarchist. Every time you work out your differences with others by coming to reasonable compromise, listening to what everyone has to say rather than letting one person decide for everyone else, you are being an anarchist. Every time you have the opportunity to force someone to do something, but decide to appeal to their sense of reason or justice instead, you are being an anarchist. The same goes for every time you share something with a friend, or decide who is going to do the dishes, or do anything at all with an eye to fairness.

Now, you might object that all this is well and good as a way for small groups of people to get on with each other, but managing a city, or a country, is an entirely different matter. And of course there is something to this. Even if you decentralize society and puts as much power as possible in the hands of small communities, there will still be plenty of things that need to be coordinated, from running railroads to deciding on directions for medical research. But just because something is complicated does not mean there is no way to do it democratically. It would just be complicated. In fact, anarchists have all sorts of different ideas and visions about how a complex society might manage itself. To explain them though would go far beyond the scope of a little introductory text like this. Suffice it to say, first of all, that a lot of people have spent a lot of time coming up with models for how a really democratic, healthy society might work; but second, and just as importantly, no anarchist claims to have a perfect blueprint. The last thing we want is to impose prefab models on society anyway. The truth is we probably can’t even imagine half the problems that will come up when we try to create a democratic society; still, we’re confident that, human ingenuity being what it is, such problems can always be solved, so long as it is in the spirit of our basic principles-which are, in the final analysis, simply the principles of fundamental human decency.