Anarchism: Means of production (owned by community or workers themselves)

[AnarchicSaint]

Like the title says, I just want to get some opinions on the points of each... Should the means of production be owned by the workers? Or would that put the community below the workers? Also, those being two different ideas, which schools of thought do each fall under?

[Blake's Baby]

In the end it comes down to what you mean by 'owned'.

Should workers have the right to refuse to let some of their labour be used to feed non-workers (maybe, the old or the sick)? No, I don't think so.

Should workers in one place be able to say 'we can make this and you can't so we're going to demand that you give us more of your stuff for our stuff'? No, I don't think so.

So in that sense the community would own the products of the labour, at least

But would the community be able to say 'you all have to work 80 hours a week to make us loads of ... whatever it is you make, so crank those machines up to 11'? No, I don't think that either.

So the workers should have control over the production process. Which kinda means that they own it.

So yeah, the whole notion of 'ownership' is tricky and in the end it comes down to what particular ownership rights you have in mind. Traditionally there are three in capitalism - usus, the right to use, abusus, the right to destroy or dispose of, and fructus, the right to derive benefit (or 'fruit') from.

usus I think should be invested in the workers. Probably abusus as well, because it's about production processes. But fructus I think should be a right held by society as a whole.

[Raúl Duke]

I believe it'll be a combination, hopefully a happy balance between the needs of the workers of the co-op and the needs of the collective of the commune.

Of course, that's in the ideal. Who knows how exactly a revolutionary and post-revolutionary society will look like.

[Tim Cornelis]

The means of production will be owned by society (common ownership). This means that we will have use-rights. Those who use the means of production control, but not own it.

Common ownership, workers' control.

[StalinFanboy]

woah woah woah, why are there still workers in this hypothetical communism? communism requires the self-abolition of the proletariat.

and as far as ownership of MoP goes, I think its more accurate, but maybe a little more confusing, to say that it is a question of non-ownership.

[robbo203]

Like the title says, I just want to get some opinions on the points of each... Should the means of production be owned by the workers? Or would that put the community below the workers? Also, those being two different ideas, which schools of thought do each fall under?

I think this is actually an extremely interesting and important question you raise. Personally I side with the view that the means of production will be owned in common by all which is actually another way of saying that the concept of ownership of the means of production will disappear.

I dislike using the expression "workers owning the means of production" becuase it can be so misleading. This way of looking at things derives - perhaps understandably - from a capitalist culture:

"Tell me about yourself, John"

*Oh Im a mechanic and what about you - what do you do?"

"Im a nurse"

Its as if the essence of a human being can be summed by their employment status under capitalism. I prefer to say there will be no workers in a socialist or communist society. Just free human beings who will be doing a huge variety of things out of their own volition.

There wold be nothing to stop an individual who likes repairing cars also helping out in their local hospital. In fact this is an important aspect of the counter argument to the ill-informed claims of those who say something called "human nature" forbids us to freely cooperate to produce the things we need without the whiplash of wage slavery to compel us to work. Who will do the dirty or dangerous work? The assumption is that there will only be a small pool of individuals to do a particular task as there is under capitalism today in which we are bound by employment contracts which effectively prevent others lending a hand. This is partly what Marx was on about in his critique of the division of labour under capitalism. In fact, in a communist. socialist or anarchist society we will all be able to do some of this work to the extent that we can or want to. There will be, if you like, a reserve labour force in depth to cover any particular job that needed doing - a productive advantage, amongst many others, that is simply not available to capitalist production

But I digress. There is another reason why I do not like talking of workers owning the means of production and that is that it leads us into the quicksand of Proudhonian mutualism - or the so called "free market anti-capitalism" of people loke Kevin Carsons today. This is regressive nostalgia , a harping back to a mythical era of small scale commodity production. Credit unions and worker coops while they certainly have distinct advantages over conventional capitalist forms of organisation are inherently limited and not going to lead us out of capitalism. They are historical dead ends from that point of view

The terms we use are important. They can sometimes unwittingly convey attitudes which hinder wider acceptance of the ideas we put forward. Workerist-type terminology is a case in point. We should be employing terms that hint at a kind of society in which there wll no longer be workers - or capitalists

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

"So in that sense the community would own the products of the labour, at least"
I *Highly* disagree comrade. The *Means* of Production should be State/Commonly (depending on whether we are talking about a respectively, underdeveloped "State-Monopolist-Capitalist 'Socialist'" country or already highly advanced post capitalist socialist society) owned, but the Production should be under the control of the people who produce it; as well in Socialism i.e. "The Dictatorship of the Proletariat", there would be the control over planning by the majority of either Wage earners or Producers of Material Wealth, this is left open within the Soviet or Council or Council system.

[Zulu]

Should workers in one place be able to say 'we can make this and you can't so we're going to demand that you give us more of your stuff for our stuff'? No, I don't think so.

What's going to stop them?

[robbo203]

What's going to stop them?

The sense of mutual dependence built into a system of generalised reciprocity

[Zulu]

The sense of mutual dependence built into a system of generalised reciprocity

That sounds smart. How that sense will be built in there?

[robbo203]

That sounds smart. How that sense will be built in there?


Its a practical fact of life that we all depend upon each other. This is not difficult to comprehend. The computer keyboard you used to type out your post was not manufactured by you but in some factory somewhere. Production is an essentially socialised process in which even the most simple object - like a pencil - is literally, directly and indirectly, the product of millions upon millions of workers technically cooperating right across the globe. In fact, if you want to be strictly literal about it, every human artifact we see around us is the product of the global workforce applying their human energies to nature-given materials

Socialism (or communism or anarchism if you prefer) is the proposition that we bring our social relations of production into line with the socialised nature of the production process itself. Private property in the means of production is incompatible with the reality of socialised production. In theory it arbitrarily strives to break up reality into millions of tiny little bits: I made this, therefore it is mine. No. Nobody, no individual. stictly made "this". We all made it just as we are ourselves all socialised beings.

The rugged individualist is a bourgeois myth and in practice "rugged individualists" turn out be rather well heeled hypocrites who confortably live off the labour of others to whom they condescendingly preach the virtues of being a so called "self made" man (or woman). Those po-faced absurd "individualists" who began life drawing freely on their mothers milk would no doubt prefer that things should be otherwise arramnged by contractural arrangement with the milk marketing board. This marketised outlook on life is a form of mental illness, in my opinion

This is what socialism is essentially about, then: we recognise that we depend completely on each other and with that goes the recognition that the welfare and wellbeing of others are our concern too . Not just in the self interested sense that we ourselves may benefit when the circumstances of others improve ("happier workers are more productive workers") but because others have value in themselves.

This is the altruistic aspect of a socialist outlook. It is what lies behind the idea of "generalised reciprocity". From each according ability to each according to need. There is no longer any kind of quid pro quo set up that would apply in an exchange economy - I give you this provided you give me that. No . In socialism/communism/anarchism there is simply the generalised expectation that we should all do our bit to make society work because we ALL benefit as a result and not just you or me as individuals

[Zulu]

Its a practical fact of life that we all depend upon each other. This is not difficult to comprehend. The computer keyboard you used to type out your post was not manufactured by you but in some factory somewhere. Production is an essentially socialised process in which even the most simple object - like a pencil - is literally, directly and indirectly, the product of millions upon millions of workers technically cooperating right across the globe. In fact, if you want to be strictly literal about it, every human artifact we see around us is the product of the global workforce applying their human energies to nature-given materials

Socialism (or communism or anarchism if you prefer) is the proposition that we bring our social relations of production into line with the socialised nature of the production process itself. Private property in the means of production is incompatible with the reality of socialised production. In theory it arbitrarily strives to break up reality into millions of tiny little bits: I made this, therefore it is mine. No. Nobody, no individual. stictly made "this". We all made it just as we are ourselves all socialised beings.

The rugged individualist is a bourgeois myth and in practice "rugged individualists" turn out be rather well heeled hypocrites who confortably live off the labour of others to whom they condescendingly preach the virtues of being a so called "self made" man (or woman). Those po-faced absurd "individualists" who began life drawing freely on their mothers milk would no doubt prefer that things should be otherwise arramnged by contractural arrangement with the milk marketing board. This marketised outlook on life is a form of mental illness, in my opinion

This is what socialism is essentially about, then: we recognise that we depend completely on each other and with that goes the recognition that the welfare and wellbeing of others are our concern too . Not just in the self interested sense that we ourselves may benefit when the circumstances of others improve ("happier workers are more productive workers") but because others have value in themselves.

This is the altruistic aspect of a socialist outlook. It is what lies behind the idea of "generalised reciprocity". From each according ability to each according to need. There is no longer any kind of quid pro quo set up that would apply in an exchange economy - I give you this provided you give me that. No . In socialism/communism/anarchism there is simply the generalised expectation that we should all do our bit to make society work because we ALL benefit as a result and not just you or me as individuals
Yes, I know all that, but what about the individuals (quite a bunch of them) who don't give a rat's ass about it and are willing to take all they can at the expense of others?

The key ideological difference between anarchists and communists is that the latter acknowledge for that fact, while the former don't.

[Blake's Baby]

If you think that's the major difference between Anarchists and Communists, I'd suggest you have very little understanding of either.

So, anyway on the question of what is ownership and your earlier question to me... what is to stop the workers in one factory or other place of production - farm let's say - going 'if you don't give us 300 tractors and 50 speedboats and 10 kilos of cocaine and some Nubian Slave Girls and a helicopter made of gold and a DVD boxed-set of the Complete Sherlock Holmes, we're not making you any (bicycles electricity bread blankets whatever else)'?

I agree with Robbo. The main thing stopping people is a realisation that wer're part of an interdependant system. I can't see why the working class would even have made a revolution if all it wanted to do was screw over other workers, surely it could remain inside capitalism if the idea was for other people to get screwed. The very process of the revoltion both presupposes and creates solidarity and fellow-feeling. Yes it is a truely dialectical relationship betweeen the individual and society, being and consciousness and all that.

The products that the workers make are not 'owned' by the workers at that factory or farm. They're 'owned' by society as a whole and society as a whole has the right to decide where they're dsistributed.

Species Being: there are still 'workers' because
a) not everyone is capable of work (old, children, infirm);
b) we're positing people at one place of production in contradistinction to everyone else (including people at other places of production);
c) I suspect we're actually talking about the Dictatorship of the Proletariat not socialism.

[Tim Cornelis]

woah woah woah, why are there still workers in this hypothetical communism? communism requires the self-abolition of the proletariat.


Yep. "Workers" are not a class. "Workers" are simply those who engage in productive activities, whether we call this "work" or "free-play" or whatever is really just semantics as the fact of the matter is that they work and are thus workers.

[robbo203]

Yes, I know all that, but what about the individuals (quite a bunch of them) who don't give a rat's ass about it and are willing to take all they can at the expense of others?

The key difference between anarchists and communists is that the latter acknowledge for that fact, while the former don't.



Well this is precisely why I have been banging on about the indispensable need for a majority to want and understand socialism/communism/ anarchism before you can have such a society. You cannot impose it on people via some ridiculous Leninist-style Vanguard party. People who think along these lines haven't got a clue frankly.

The kind society we are talking about needs people to understand and accept the basic rules of the (new) game so to speak. This is not just a question of awareness, but also a profound shift in values


You ask what about those individuals (quite a bunch of them) who don't give a rat's ass about it and are willing to take all they can at the expense of others?. Well depending on what you mean by "quite a bunch of them" this could indicate that we had not yet arrived at a position of majoritarian socialist consciouusness. In short, it would still be premature to consider introducing socialism

But if you are talking abstractly about a few individuals once a socialist society has been set up, well then lets look at this. In socialism ww will have free access to the basic means of living. Why would I want take more than I need? How many houses can i live in at the same time? How much food can i stuff into face without gagging at the thought of another morsel?

One of the most important motivational factors inside a capitalist society is the striving after status through the conspicuous consumption of wealth. There is a whole class of goods in economic theory called "status goods" (or Veblen goods after Thorstein Veblen) which seem to contradict everything marginalist economic analysis has to say about prices and demand and supply. Higher prices in the case of status goods actually serve to idrive up demand rather than reduce it as one might normally expect.

Point is in socialism the whole idea of gaining status through consumption would simply cease to exist. It would become meaningless, If everyone else can get things for free then how you disitnguish yourslef from them in status terms? In fact the only way you could earn the respect of your fellows in a socialist socialist society is logically through your contribtoon to that society and not what you took out of it


Of course, it might argued that socialism could not provide enough of everything and this might provide an incentive for some individuals to behave in the way you suggest. This is the scarcity-causes-greed argument. Whatever the the case I think it is is pretty apparent that, taking into account that most of the work we do today is socially useless and simply exists to keep the money system the system ticking over (meaning all this socially usefulless labour and the resources that go with it could be rediverted into socially useful prpduction) we could substantially increase the amount of real wiealth available in a socialist society by comparison with today

As Gandhi saidm there is enough around to satisfy everyone's needs but not their greed. I think he was right

[Zulu]

Well this is precisely why I have been banging on about the indispensable need for a majority to want and understand socialism/communism/ anarchism before you can have such a society. You cannot impose it on people via some ridiculous Leninist-style Vanguard party. People who think along these lines haven't got a clue frankly.

The kind society we are talking about needs people to understand and accept the basic rules of the (new) game so to speak. This is not just a question of awareness, but also a profound shift in values


That's another difference between the anarchists and communists (stemming from the first one though). The former would like to have their anarchy here and now, while the latter generally acknowledge that a transitional period needs to take place. The classics thought that one generation might be enough, but now figures such as "hundreds of years" (10+ generations) are not uncommon. And without attempts to introduce any novelty, no change will ever happen at all. Just like the Christian church was deliberately establishing new order on the ruins of the Roman Empire during the transition to feudalism, just like the bourgeois intellectuals were deliberately making up new rules to live by during the transition to capitalism, a vanguard communist party is now needed to guide the humanity to the next social formation.

[theblackmask]

I think I should note that there are some anarchists that would like to abolish the means of production, and are against production itself...just saying :D

[robbo203]

That's another difference between the anarchists and communists (stemming from the first one though). The former would like to have their anarchy here and now, while the latter generally acknowledge that a transitional period needs to take place. The classics thought that one generation might be enough, but now figures such as "hundreds of years" (10+ generations) are not uncommon. And without attempts to introduce any novelty, no change will ever happen at all. Just like the Christian church was deliberately establishing new order on the ruins of the Roman Empire during the transition to feudalism, just like the bourgeois intellectuals were deliberately making up new rules to live by during the transition to capitalism, a vanguard communist party is now needed to guide the humanity to the next social formation.

I really dont get this difference you keep harping on about between anarchists and communists. I would call myself an anarcho-communist and I would contend that the transitional period you speak of is what we are already in . There is nothing in between capitalism and communism anymore than there is between a state of being pregnant and not pregnant. Its one or the other

If you want to make sure that a communist society never comes about then go ahead and rely on your so called "vanguard communist party". One thing is for sure - the moment it seizes power it will by default have to administer a capitalist society, given that the majority do not yet grasp and support an alternative to capitalism. That being so, your vanguard would be obliged to operate capitalism in the only way it can be run - in the interests of capital against wage labour.

Soon enough your vanguard communist party will drop all pretensions to being communist at all and will become like, well, Tony Blair's government or maybe Gorby's version of the same. And i dont need a crystal ball to tell you that this is absolutely certain

[Zulu]

If you want to make sure that a communist society never comes about then go ahead and rely on your so called "vanguard communist party". One thing is for sure - the moment it seizes power it will by default have to administer a capitalist society, given that the majority do not yet grasp and support an alternative to capitalism. That being so, your vanguard would be obliged to operate capitalism in the only way it can be run - in the interests of capital against wage labour.


There is even better way to make sure of that: hope that some day everybody will magically become fond of the idea of generalized reciprocity and no one will ever again try to game the system.

Isn't it obvious that it's far more likely that some people will be realizing that at any particular moment of time, while others won't, so if those realizing exercise political control it will be easier for the rest to get accustomed to the idea at least... The trickiest part is, of course, keeping the "unconscious" out of the party.

In any case, if that's such a Catch-22 situation, it can't get any worse with the vanguard than without, so why not have it, on the oft chance it works?

[Amal]

Yep. "Workers" are not a class. "Workers" are simply those who engage in productive activities, whether we call this "work" or "free-play" or whatever is really just semantics as the fact of the matter is that they work and are thus workers.
You view is totally different from proper Marxist view. As per Marx, a worker is a human being who sold his/her power to labor to others and don't have any right to take any kind of decision regarding production. As per your terminology, even a peasant is a worker because he/she is engaged in production. As per you, the experts under "guild" during the middle ages are also "workers" and I don't have any idea what kind of scientific sociological theory supports this.

[Tim Cornelis]

You view is totally different from proper Marxist view. As per Marx, a worker is a human being who sold his/her power to labor to others and don't have any right to take any kind of decision regarding production. As per your terminology, even a peasant is a worker because he/she is engaged in production. As per you, the experts under "guild" during the middle ages are also "workers" and I don't have any idea what kind of scientific sociological theory supports this.

..it has absolutely nothing to do with Marxism or "scientific sociological theory", whatever that may be. It's semantics, language, communication.


Definition of WORKER
1
a : one that works especially at manual or industrial labor or with a particular material <a factory worker> —often used in combination

(emphasis added).


Definition of WORK
to fashion or create a useful or desired product by expending labor

Will a communist society produce useful and desired products? Yes. Who will produce them? People. Those people are thus workers.

Yes, even a peasant is a worker. I don't see why not.

wikipedia:


A peasant is an agricultural worker who generally works land owned or rented by/from a noble


1. A member of the class constituted by small farmers and tenants, sharecroppers, and laborers [i.e. workers] on the land where they form the main labor force in agriculture.

[robbo203]

There is even better way to make sure of that: hope that some day everybody will magically become fond of the idea of generalized reciprocity and no one will ever again try to game the system.

Isn't it obvious that it's far more likely that some people will be realizing that at any particular moment of time, while others won't, so if those realizing exercise political control it will be easier for the rest to get accustomed to the idea at least... The trickiest part is, of course, keeping the "unconscious" out of the party.

In any case, if that's such a Catch-22 situation, it can't get any worse with the vanguard than without, so why not have it, on the oft chance it works?


Look - nobody is saying mass socialist consciousness appears suddently out of the blue. Obviously, socialist consciousness grows incrementally and progressively modifies the environment in which it manifests itself. Until there is a majoirity, the minority holding socialist ideas can be considered a "vanguard" of sorts but only in the limited sense of being on the cutting edge of change - a prefiguration of the future.


But we both know this is NOT what I am talking about and it is significant that Leninists should typically tend to confuse these two quite different understandings of the term vanguard, sneaking in their own, wholly unacceptable, interpretation of the term in Trojan horse fashion under the cover of an acceptable interpretation (above).

The unacceptable interpretation Im taking about is the Leninist theory of the Vanguard Party which says something vastly different to what i have described. It urges that a small minority - the aforementioned vanguard possessing socialist ideas, supposedly - should actually capture political power in advance of the the majority becoming socialist and should, from this elevated postion, allegedly steer the majority in a socialist direction.


It is that idea that I am attacking as utter nonsense and foredoomed to failure. It is that idea that you seemed to be advocating- if I am not sorely mistaken - when you say "a vanguard communist party is now needed to guide the humanity to the next social formation" - though I will allow that might not mean by this what i assume you mean. Please correct me if I am wrong

If I am not wrong then i assert that what you are advocating will not
lead to a new social formation; it will simply entrench the existing social order in the form of state run capitalism and will, moreover, make the possiblity of a revolutionary transformation of society even more difficult to accomplish by associating attempts to effect such a transformation with bitter failure and the cynicism of a corrupt odeioogy that mouths high minded sentiments while it screws the workers for all it is worth

[Raúl Duke]

Yep. "Workers" are not a class. "Workers" are simply those who engage in productive activities, whether we call this "work" or "free-play" or whatever is really just semantics as the fact of the matter is that they work and are thus workers.

I would like to add that in a revolutionary/post-revolutionary society...

Workers may not exist as a class (especially considering that class is always arranged in dichotomies, and post-revolution there will be no bourgeoisie which defines what it means to be a worker in a capitalist society, i.e. someone who sells their labor to capital) but there will still be "work" to be done by people (at least until we got robots/machines to do everything for us, if that time ever comes).

[Ocean Seal]

Guys I'm going to be honest, no one actually knows who owns the means of production in communism or what the fuck communism will actually look like. Attempting to guess is interesting but ultimately an exercise in futility.

[robbo203]

Guys I'm going to be honest, no one actually knows who owns the means of production in communism or what the fuck communism will actually look like. Attempting to guess is interesting but ultimately an exercise in futility.


Actually, it is part of the very definition of communism that the means of production are owned in common.


We can speculate about the finer details of a communist society - and I urge that this is what people ought to be doing - but to suggest that we cannot know in advance the basic structural characteristics of a communist society - such as its classless stateless moneyless nature - is quite absurd.

In fact the very realisation of communism depends on a general acceptance beforehand of what these characteristics are and the desire to bring them into existence

[AnarchicSaint]

I appreciate all the responses and I agree with some that it should be a mixture of both, but with certain boundaries that society would hopefully fall into without having to 'force' them. But, I guess to be more specific, which schools of thought do these fall under?

I thought that workers controlling the means of production and the community controlling the means of production each fell into different Anarchist schools of thought?

[TrotskistMarx]

By the way, i have a question related to this topic of an anarchist-communist system. I would like to know how will goods and services be provided to society. Since there will not be money, or debit cards or credit cards. How will people get the food, cars, clothes, and personal goods and services that they need. I mean will people literally be able to walk into a provider of food and grab the food that they need?

I have another psychological question related to this? Will there be a sort of psychologic evolution toward more honest individuals, toward more altruist individuals in that very advanced anarchist-communist political system? Because you know today humans are like too egocentric, too barbaric for an anarchist-communist system without money, without police, without a government to work.

Do you that the the dictatorship of the working class, which is the stage between the end of capitalism and the begining of communist-anarchism be used to help humans evolve into more altruist, honest and more psychologically advanced individuals maybe with the help of transhumanism technology?

thanks


.



The means of production will be owned by society (common ownership). This means that we will have use-rights. Those who use the means of production control, but not own it.

Common ownership, workers' control.

[Blake's Baby]

Most of us communists believe that what you describe as 'anarchist communism' is just 'communism'.

[Bostana]

Well it's not techincally owned by anybody. It's run by the workers but owned by no one.
But I think that the workers of the Community decide how to run it and they usually help the Community. All-in-all it's a good question. I don't even fully understand it.

[Brosa Luxemburg]

The means of production should be run by the workers but community institutions should be allowed to make regulations for the factories, farms, etc. The community and workers should work together in solidarity to further the common cause of building socialism. People like Murray Bookchin don't like the left "fetish" over the workers and thinks that workers control would put the workers above the community as a whole. While this is a valid argument, I don't agree as long as the community as a whole has a limited say in the running of the factories, farms, etc. but the workers who work these areas should have the most control over production.

[Brosa Luxemburg]

I appreciate all the responses and I agree with some that it should be a mixture of both, but with certain boundaries that society would hopefully fall into without having to 'force' them. But, I guess to be more specific, which schools of thought do these fall under?

I thought that workers controlling the means of production and the community controlling the means of production each fell into different Anarchist schools of thought?

Well, most communists, even Stalinists, would agree with the idea of workers control over production. The type of control just takes place in different ways with the different theories.

I won't say what I think the method of Trotskyists, Stalinists, etc. for the running of the workplace because I am not a Trot or a Stalinist. I'll leave it to them to tell you what they think.

As a council communist, I think the workers should control the factories and means of production through direct democratic councils. The community would have the same type of institutions to make decisions involving the community and could institute regulations for the factories based on direct democratic means. That is how I would view it, and most anarchists and even Trotskyists and Stalinists would probobly agree with this view (although, I am not a Trot or Stalinist so I don't know).

[Lanky Wanker]

By the way, i have a question related to this topic of an anarchist-communist system. I would like to know how will goods and services be provided to society. Since there will not be money, or debit cards or credit cards. How will people get the food, cars, clothes, and personal goods and services that they need. I mean will people literally be able to walk into a provider of food and grab the food that they need?


Well we would need some way of tracking what people take so we know how much is being consumed, and from that how much needs to be produced. I don't know about other countries, but in the UK they've introduced self-check out things which in itself would cut down on a lot of work. Depending on the item, there may be a limit to what you could take, but this is the sort of thing we could probably only work out when the problem presents itself.



I have another psychological question related to this? Will there be a sort of psychologic evolution toward more honest individuals, toward more altruist individuals in that very advanced anarchist-communist political system? Because you know today humans are like too egocentric, too barbaric for an anarchist-communist system without money, without police, without a government to work.


Well the first thing you have to understand is that an anarchist revolution and transition will be led purely by the people, so for those same people to do counter productive things (e.g. taking more than they need, mugging old ladies, dissolving into lawlessness and so on) would make no sense. A lot of anti-communists tend to mistake the dictatorship of the proletariat for totalitarian rule which will force its ways on the non-revolutionary majority, and therefore use points like this in their arguments against us. Anarcho-collectivists, from what I understand (I might be wrong), basically sound like anarcho-communists who believe that, even under true anarchism, we should have a wages system which will probably eventually die out over time as people develop a greater sense of unity. I think we can all agree though that wages are both counter productive and backwards for our movement, so I don't see how the very people carrying themselves towards a communist society would not want to make it work. "Great job fighting off those counter-revolutionaries, comrade, now let's go take as much shit from the supermarket as we can!"



Do you that the the dictatorship of the working class, which is the stage between the end of capitalism and the begining of communist-anarchism be used to help humans evolve into more altruist, honest and more psychologically advanced individuals maybe with the help of transhumanism technology?


Well as I said, the people carrying the revolution shouldn't need to be re-educated on every single aspect of life to make it work. The dictatorship of the proletariat isn't to establish authority over the proletariat and crush them under the state's boot, but quite the opposite; the dictatorship of the proletariat is for the proletariat to establish authority of its own.

And by the way, if you are referring to the end result of a revolution and successful transition, the word 'anarchism' becomes redundant. Anarchism is simply a form of organisation to carry society to communism (in the context of anarcho-communism, that is, not anarcho-mutualism or anarcho-capitalism or whatever else).

Hope that helped to some degree...

[Rooster]

By the way, i have a question related to this topic of an anarchist-communist system. I would like to know how will goods and services be provided to society. Since there will not be money, or debit cards or credit cards. How will people get the food, cars, clothes, and personal goods and services that they need. I mean will people literally be able to walk into a provider of food and grab the food that they need?

Yes, exactly. If you need a new tv you just go to the tv depot and pick one up. It's basically legalised shop lifting. In regards to keep track of things, then surely that's up to the staff taking a stock check and does not require money at all for this process.


I have another psychological question related to this? Will there be a sort of psychologic evolution toward more honest individuals, toward more altruist individuals in that very advanced anarchist-communist political system? Because you know today humans are like too egocentric, too barbaric for an anarchist-communist system without money, without police, without a government to work.

I don't think there needs to be. Most people conform to society and if society is based on a common ownership of the means of production then I think most people would conform to the values that would create. And I do think most people are already honest and altruistic. And, most people get on fine without the police and the government for the most part. It's not as if they are a constant presence in society right now, constantly parked outside your house. I think a lot of the ills in society come from the destitution, the demoralisation and the humiliation of living in a capitalist society.


Do you that the the dictatorship of the working class, which is the stage between the end of capitalism and the begining of communist-anarchism be used to help humans evolve into more altruist, honest and more psychologically advanced individuals maybe with the help of transhumanism technology?

Well yeah, it can help, but I'm rather more under the impression that we have to get to the point of a mass concious change first before we even get to the DotP.

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

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