From: bkMarcus
To: "2ley"
Subject: Re: Research question
Hi,
Thank you
for being willing to participate in my research paper. Let me
once more assure you that I have no desire to belittle you, your
organization (if appropriate), or your beliefs. The focus of my paper is
strictly on the possibility of civil insurrection and/or
revolution within
the United States.
While I may mention your position within the political
spectrum, as you define that position, I will not debate the
validity of
your position in the paper, nor will I expound on it beyond
anything you say
within your response.
In short, while I may or may not agree with your
political agenda, your beliefs, or your vision of the future, I
will respect
them and you within my work.
Let
me start by saying that I object to the assumption of a political
"spectrum". The left-right-and-middle model is an absurd,
one-dimensional attempt to map a multidimensional abstract space of preferences
and principles. Check out The World's Smallest Political Quiz -- http://www.theadvocates.org/quiz.html
-- to see a libertarian attempt to at least move to a two-dimensional map. Take
the quiz and you might well see the absurdity of the "spectrum".
For a good history of the terms "Left" and
"Right" in politics, check out "Neither Left Nor Right", by
Leonard E. Read, published in The Freeman, January 1956:
http://www.fee.org/vnews.php?nid=603
My thesis,
at this point, is that there is a definite possibility for
civil insurrection.
I doubt that a revolution itself is probable, given the
strength of the military and police, but revolutions are, by
their very
nature, unpredictable.
I see many factors that may lead to insurrections:
poverty levels increasing, unpopular military activities, loss
of freedoms,
class and/or race unrest, and other similar issues.
So, I look
forward to your response. I have
created this questionnaire
to be generic enough to cover many different groups, if a
question is
irrelevant please ignore it. Similarly, if you find a question too
intrusive, please ignore it. Please take as long as you need, although I
would like a response by the middle of November, if possible.
My thanks once more,
Philip Tuley
1.. Name
bkMarcus
2.. Organization
Name (if any)
I
don't represent any larger organized group, though I'm part of a larger,
decentralized movement.
My own website is
www.BlackCrayon.com
but that's not really a group; that's just a sort of "brand name" for
my personal brand of philosophical (libertarian/free-market) anarchism.
3.. How do you
describe your or your group's political theories?
(Nationalist, Libertarian, Socialist, Anarchist,
Socialist-Anarchist,
Nationalist-Socialist, etc.)
I
describe them as libertarian and as anarchist, but because different people
mean different things by those terms, I define both (and many others!) in the
BlackCrayon dictionary:
http://www.BlackCrayon.com/library/dictionary/definitions/
Libertarianism is based in the Non-Aggression Principle, which
formalizes a way of living that many people already believe in:
"No one has the right, under any circumstances, to initiate force against another human being, nor to delegate its initiation."
-- L. Neil Smith
I use the term 'libertarian' to mean the "principled
rejection of all proactive coercion, whether by individuals or by groups."
Since government is based in the proactive coercion of a group over
individuals, I reject government as incompatible with libertarianism. It is in
this sense that I am an anarchist.
4.. What is the
likelihood, in your opinion, of a major change or
revolution happening through the democratic process?
Without
a drastic change in the economic situation, or in the perception of the
economic situation, I don't see majoritarian democracy changing course. Even if
there is a drastic change in the perception of economics, the only
"revolution" I can imagine through the democratic process would be
its own self-destruction. If there is to be any real, significant, and lasting
change, it will either happen after democracy or it will happen despite
democracy.
The optimistic version would be a significant change in
infrastructure through revolutionary technology.
The pessimistic version would be an economic collapse, which is
too likely to be followed by despotism.
5.. What scenarios
do you think may lead some hypothetical group or groups
to commit civil insurrection?
I
don't know what you mean by civil insurrection. Were The Weathermen, back in
the 1960s, civil insurrectionists? Or just domestic terrorists?
I would like to think we've moved past that sort of violent
nonsense, but I'm not taking bets.
I think that on any military basis, the statists have the
anarchists beat. And I would venture to say that any non-governmental group
that is looking to fight the government head-on is likely to be a new set of
statists.
6.. Are there any
issues that are particularly compelling to you or your
group; that, hypothetically speaking, might cause your group
some vague
desire to become even more politically active? (I'm not asking what would
actually drive you to rebellion, but what are your/your group's
hot buttons
at this point?)
I
and "my group" if I have one are not interested in politics. We are
against politics. Politics is about how we should decide whom to coerce about
what. Perry de Havilland, of the Libertarian Alliance (a British libertarian
group) defines politics as "the control of the collective means of
violence-backed coercion." The most important thing to understand about
lowercase-L libertarians (as opposed to the Libertarian Party) is that we
oppose politics. The capital-L Libertarians believe that politics can be abolished
by political means. Lowercase-L libertarian anarchists reject political means
as well as political ends.
I see the initiation of civil insurrection or a violent revolution
as politics of the worst kind.
Those libertarians who do not reject all violence outright
(meaning those of us who are not pacifists) see only the defensive use of violence as legitimate.
It is difficult to have a purely defensive revolution, although the Agorists --
a group of free-market anarchists with whom I am very sympathetic -- see the
possibility of a combination economic/defensive revolution: first you organize
an underground economy, a truly free market that goes beyond the current black
market in supply, variety, and interconnectedness. You leave the government alone,
but you do not assume that the government will leave you alone. If force is
used against the underground economy, force can be used to defend ourselves.
This could be seen as a revolution, but you'll notice that it can't really be
classified as a violent political revolution or as any form of civil
insurrection.
It's possible that I just described the American War of
Independence, which began in 1775. At first, the colonists didn't attack
Britain, and didn't attack British troops. They just withdrew their economy
from British taxation, regulation, and military enforcement. When the British
tried to impose their rule by means of violent force, the Americans fought
back. Our history books refer to
this as The American Revolution, but it really wasn't a revolution in the
traditional historical sense. In contrast, for instance, with the French and
Russian revolutions, no one tried to take over the ruling government. When the
British retreated, we didn't try to follow them back over the ocean and take
over their government. We were just happy to be out from under their rule. It
wasn't a struggle for power: it was a struggle against power. I see libertarian anarchism as ideological
heir to the so-called American Revolutionaries -- though not to the Federalists
who later created a centralized government to replace the British. (It might be
worth noting that only 6 of the original 56 signers of the Declaration
of Independence
also
signed the Constitution. Another 15 were either dead or had fled the country.
That leaves 35 of the original signers who were in fact protesting the creation
of the Constitution, which they saw as a recreation of the kind of government
they had just fought for so long to abolish. My sentiments are with those 35
anti-Federalists.)
7.. How likely is
it, in your opinion, that civil unrest or insurrection
might occur in the next 5 - 10 years in the US? What do you see leading to
such occurrences?
(Please note that what I'm asking here is basically do
you see any potential for any group or groups to become so
agitated that
they might go beyond mere protesting. The group or groups might very well
be politically different than you.)
My
first reaction is to say that it is not very likely. But again, I'm not sure
how you're using your terms. Civil unrest has already happened on what's
becoming a regular basis in the anti-globalization movement. I suppose there is
a distant possibility that those same people could start a full-blown
insurrection, but I really doubt it.
8.. Do you
envision any scenario that might lead to an actual revolution
in the next 5-10 years here in the US?
No.
9.. Am I missing
anything? Is there anything you
feel might be relevant
to this research?
As
I indicated above, I think it's important to distinguish between the initiation
of force and the defensive use of force. This is important at the individual
level as well as at the group level.
I think it's important to distinguish between something like the
War of Independence/American "Revolution" and the French and Russian
Revolutions. Similarly, what's called "The Civil War" in this country
is not really a civil war in any consistent historical sense. A civil war is 2
or more parties fighting for the same position of power. What I think would most accurately be called The
War of Secession was not a civil war, strictly speaking.
When you look at questions about "civil unrest" or
"insurrection" or "revolution", etc., it's easy to be
misled by the terminology. What you need to ask is, Who is initiating violence?
What is their goal? Is their goal more power for themselves, or less power by
someone else over themselves. Do they want more government or less government?
Do you they want to become the government?
Of course, not all such group violence has to do with the
government, strictly speaking. Sometimes what is being explicitly opposed is an
economic system (which the opponents may or may not see as connected to government).
Sometimes what is being opposed is a social system, a culture, a caste system,
etc. (Again, the opponents may or may not see the government connected to these
forms of status quo.)
The main difference between anarchists and other fringe groups, is
that we see the organized use of force, a.k.a. government, as the central
problem. And we see different systems of voluntary exchange as the solution.
(For market anarchists, like myself, the voluntary system is a free market in
private property; for collectivist/socialist/left anarchists, the voluntary
system would be a decentralized network of communes or some other collectivist
organization.) I'm guessing that the non-anarchists you hear back from will see
government itself as potentially benevolent, and object only to some perceived
corruption in current government -- whether that corruption is capitalists, or
communists or blacks or whites or Jews or homosexuals ... (I'm guessing at what
other sorts of groups you've contacted with these questions) ... the belief is
that getting "those people" out of power will be half the solution,
and that getting "our people" into power will be the rest of the
solution.
We anarchists see political power as itself the problem.
We libertarians reject proactive insurrection as immoral, and we
reject the take-over of government as dangerous folly. We object to both the
means and the ends of political revolution.
laissez faire,
bk