Anarcho-Communism and Conflicts

[trickster]

I'm part of a debate group, and this question came up recently.

In an anarcho-communist society, if 51% of people wanted to change something, and 49% if people opposed the change, and no compromise could be reached, what would happen? Would that 49% just leave and go to something else?

How would conflicts be settled in an anarcho-communist society. If I though my neighbor had wronged me, what would I do? My understand is that there would be a council there to handle disputes - is that accurate? Would this council act like jury duty?

[Q]

Regarding democracy: A communist society is a free association of producers. So, if the issue is important enough, both positions would probably be taken. That is in the abstract though, going to differ per situation.

Regarding disputes (and crime?): Of course it is impossible to predict what exact ways dispute settling is going to take, but communists are very much in favor of universal training in weaponry and militia's. Disputes can mostly be settled in local meetings though, this is already daily practice in many places.

[Tim Cornelis]

It would first of all depend on what the customarily accepted percentage of votes is required for a decision to be implemented. Decision making in communist society (I don't think there's such a thing as an anarcho-communist society) would be concerned with collective affairs. For instance, to use an unexpected surplus of the 'social fund' of social reserves, expressed in labour time, to expand a school-pedagogy institution or a library or park. In this instance, it's not realistically possible to 'opt out'. I doubt no compromise could be reached, but the resources would either be used for one purpose with the most votes or remain unused if there was no compromise. Since decisions in communism are not 'high politics' issues, heated disputes resulting in a stalemate are unlikely.

Conflicts would be resolved through dispute resolution processes (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_dispute_resolution ).

[Red Economist]

I'm part of a debate group, and this question came up recently.

In an anarcho-communist society, if 51% of people wanted to change something, and 49% if people opposed the change, and no compromise could be reached, what would happen? Would that 49% just leave and go to something else?

How would conflicts be settled in an anarcho-communist society. If I though my neighbor had wronged me, what would I do? My understand is that there would be a council there to handle disputes - is that accurate? Would this council act like jury duty? I think an anarcho-communist would challenge the question; why would 51% and 49% be unable to reach a compromise? This implies a conflict of interest or class antagonism and therefore private property. In an anarcho-communist society, the communal ownership of the means of production means that people have the same interests and share a common interest in reaching an agreement. hence people are biased towards wanting to make a consensus.
The way we own property defines how we relate to one another and therefore how we treat our ideas. i.e. private property means someone thinks in terms of 'my' idea and therefore identities there self-worth with that idea or cause 'winning'; whereas a system based on common property would necessarily assume ideas are held in common and that their power arise from group decision-making, not individual conviction. It would not be as adversarial as a debate such as between candidates from opposed political parties.

If you get someone who says "but human nature" and continues to pose the question, the 49% walking away and doing something else is kind of why (Non-anarchist) communist parties so often divide into factions, but that necessarily presumes that people are not organized into a 'state' attached to a territory/land/resources etc.

If you ended up with that position, and it was an urgent thing (which they couldn't shrug off and say, "well talk about it another time"), you'd end up with a civil war [which again presumes separate and private interests in conflict with one another]. So this is very much liberal assumptions being imported into a different ideology.

[Tim Cornelis]

I think an anarcho-communist would challenge the question; why would 51% and 49% be unable to reach a compromise? This implies a conflict of interest or class antagonism and therefore private property. In an anarcho-communist society, the communal ownership of the means of production means that people have the same interests and share a common interest in reaching an agreement. hence people are biased towards wanting to make a consensus.

In capitalism there are rival, conflicting class interests, but in communism there is still conflicting interests. What if people want to build a football stadium next to my house, but I don't like noise?

[Red Economist]

In capitalism there are rival, conflicting class interests, but in communism there is still conflicting interests. What if people want to build a football stadium next to my house, but I don't like noise?

In theory, such conflicts under communism are reconcilable as they are decided by reason rather than class struggle. the thing is, how far does your right to own your house ('my house') necessarily entail a right to control others activities because of their proximity to 'your house? In the case of private property you can say "turn that noise off, I'm trying to sleep!", but because the football stadium is privately owned- they have as much right to have the noise as you do to silence. (you could ring the police, but then you'd need a state). Communism softens the boundaries between these rights a bit.

So, you'd have to negotiate away some of your right to silence, to accept some of their right to have noise. It's not simply two private properties in conflict with one another, but a shared collective space shared by two users, with collective rights to make sure that space can continue to be used by both parties. If the noise interfered with your ability to sleep- in a communist society, the football stadium would have some obligation to be quieter (or else give you free permission to come in and party with everyone else or give you a free holiday- though that sounds like an exchange?)

It's a question as to how 'absolute' the conception of rights is. The more absolute the rights; the more conflicts that occur and go unresolved. The only question of course is in negotiating these rights that both parties are relatively equal- so the stadium can't force you out of your house because they have more power because they're run by a giant corporation/Stalinist bureaucracy that can get the cops to force you out.

[Tim Cornelis]

You're describing a process of mediating conflicting interests, not the absence of conflicting interests.

[ckaihatsu]

Usually these small-scale strictly *interpersonal* issues can be sidestepped / solved by the introduction of some kind of *technological* approach, as with this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_noise_machine


Sleep well. You're welcome.

[Rafiq]

Usually these small-scale strictly *interpersonal* issues can be sidestepped / solved by the introduction of some kind of *technological* approach, as with this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_noise_machine


Sleep well. You're welcome.

Ridiculous. What would be needed are strong structural foundations which are predisposed to dealing with small scale conflicts.

Which is why I am skeptical of any absence of a strong centralized power.

[ckaihatsu]

Ridiculous. What would be needed are strong structural foundations which are predisposed to dealing with small scale conflicts.

Which is why I am skeptical of any absence of a strong centralized power.


Okay, fair enough -- I wouldn't want to entertain political matters at the small-scale level, either, which is why I'd recommend technological approaches for such small-potatoes.

Care to elaborate?

[ckaihatsu]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_noise_machine


Sleep well. You're welcome.





The Following User Says Thank You to ckaihatsu For This Useful Post:

Tim Cornelis


If you're thanking me for the health-related info here, I can add more -- I recommend the following, at its default setting:


http://gnaural.sourceforge.net/

[Red Economist]

You're describing a process of mediating conflicting interests, not the absence of conflicting interests.

Yeah. I mean that conflicts based on private property are irreconcilable and therefore need a state to settle the result in favor of one party over the other, where as under communism, the definition of property and ownership is more elastic and therefore should not require a state to settle these conflicts (in an anarcho-communist model).

[FieldHound]

So, you'd have to negotiate away some of your right to silence, to accept some of their right to have noise....If the noise interfered with your ability to sleep- in a communist society, the football stadium would have some obligation to be quieter (or else give you free permission to come in and party with everyone else or give you a free holiday- though that sounds like an exchange?)

And if the football stadium collective refused to compromise, then what? To make it similar let's just say I have next door neighbours that play very loud music 24-7. I decide that a reasonable compromise would be to turn down the music lower between the hours of 11pm and 8am excluding weekends, or even alternating days (one day loud music can go on 24-7, and the next they compromise it somewhat). What if the other party simply insist that they have the right to 24-7 loud music and that I'd just have to deal with it? Not saying your conclusions are wrong, but it only seems to work under the assumption that everyone is willing to compromise and everybody agrees on what a reasonable compromise might be.

[Red Economist]

And if the football stadium collective refused to compromise, then what? To make it similar let's just say I have next door neighbours that play very loud music 24-7. I decide that a reasonable compromise would be to turn down the music lower between the hours of 11pm and 8am excluding weekends, or even alternating days (one day loud music can go on 24-7, and the next they compromise it somewhat). What if the other party simply insist that they have the right to 24-7 loud music and that I'd just have to deal with it? Not saying your conclusions are wrong, but it only seems to work under the assumption that everyone is willing to compromise and everybody agrees on what a reasonable compromise might be.Yeah. that is the issue with any communist system as it really is based on people recognizing it's a shared space. When you get anti-social individualism, the system is in trouble, particularly the more liberal and the anarcho-communist ones. Regrettably,the more authoritarian communist system actually reflect a very conservative view of 'human nature', in that people have to be forced to change, if selfishness/individualism is in built into people's psyche. An authoritarian system is therefore more likely to 'work' in the short-run because it requires people to change less. The question is how far can someone be free to express 'individuality' under a collectivist system before you come into conflict with the assumptions that make such a system work.
It really is reaching to change human behavior in a way that fundamentally redefines our sense of right from what it is today so that society can be self-regulating in an egalitarian way, rather than needing a 'state' to say whose has the right to do something, and who has to put up with it. So, I don't have a definite answer to your question, as fundamental as it is.

Edit: I'm using the 'utopian socialist' way of describing how a communist system would work , so communism becomes a 'choice' based on free will. In a Marxist philosophy- human behavior is (largely) determined by socioeconomic conditions and therefore people's behavior 'fits into' the pattern of communist social relations more. Under communism, labour is highly socialised so people have learned to work together in order to get things done. This behavior then follows into all other areas of social life as an 'ideology' which is conditioned into people spontaneously by their interactions. Hence these conflicts [I]shouldn't come up because people have become use to working together.

[FieldHound]

I agree with the Marxist concept of socioeconomic conditions and human behaviour too, was just curious about how a worst case scenario would pan out. I feel like even if the vast majority of people were conscious of these things and willing to cooperate you'd always get a handful of troublemakers. I remember when I was much younger and used to use a certain picture boards, and some people would anonymously cause trouble purely for the sake of stirring things up (signing up to an epilepsy forum just to post flashing images, for instance, is one particularly audacious example). Although I naturally am drawn towards utopian ideas and that humans are fundamentally good, with negative conditions influencing negative behaviour, I have a suspicion that even when things are working out perfectly, there will always be trouble causers that enjoy trouble/conflict for the sake of it, perhaps playing loud music 24/7 just to be provocative or whatever. This might be a somewhat negative outlook, but I also feel it might be naive to believe that everybody within a society will be considerate and what not, regardless of how perfectly that social model suits them. We can't know this of course, but its a thought in the back of my mind that has a gnawing persistence. It doesn't make authority appeal to me any more or anything.

[Red Economist]

I agree with the Marxist concept of socioeconomic conditions and human behaviour too, was just curious about how a worst case scenario would pan out. I feel like even if the vast majority of people were conscious of these things and willing to cooperate you'd always get a handful of troublemakers.

it's a varation on the human nature argument that there will 'always' be a group of trouble makers. But in practice, the issue is not a concept, but how socioeconomic conditions manifest in people's behavior. There is without question people in society would enjoy causing harm. How they got to that position, and how they get out of it/we deal with them are some of the hardest questions to ever ask, and philosophers and psychologists have struggled with the issue for the whole of human history. But as a communist, I'm optimistic that it's a question that can be answered- even if I don't know it for sure.

The worst case scenario is pretty much what happened in the 20th century. There were 'liberals' periods in communist regimes (the 1920's in russia had a large-scale utopian movement and a very liberal sexual revolution for example), but for the most part- it was awful for people to live in them. Communism showed the best and worst in people if I'm honest.


I remember when I was much younger and used to use a certain picture boards, and some people would anonymously cause trouble purely for the sake of stirring things up (signing up to an epilepsy forum just to post flashing images, for instance, is one particularly audacious example). ouch. That is screwed up. :unsure: The internet does often bring out the worst in people- I think it's called "deep net disinhibition". there's something hypnotic about staring at a screen that just makes people forget what there really doing and go a bit mental. I've said stuff and thought "oh, fuck- why did I say that?".


Although I naturally am drawn towards utopian ideas and that humans are fundamentally good, with negative conditions influencing negative behaviour, I have a suspicion that even when things are working out perfectly, there will always be trouble causers that enjoy trouble/conflict for the sake of it, perhaps playing loud music 24/7 just to be provocative or whatever. This might be a somewhat negative outlook, but I also feel it might be naive to believe that everybody within a society will be considerate and what not, regardless of how perfectly that social model suits them. We can't know this of course, but its a thought in the back of my mind that has a gnawing persistence. It doesn't make authority appeal to me any more or anything.I think you'll find most people- if they give themselves permission to feel it and not just say it's "unrealistic"- are attracted to utopian ideas. people want to be happy and being in a 'good place' (as utopias are supposed to be) is what most people would want. But it's never really that simple- as our ideas never wholly encompass the reality; we miss things because we can't know everything.

I think it is wrong to call it a 'negative outlook'; to be honest, it is now very common and is part of the culture that we grow up in that 'selfish' behavior is normal. Our society places alot of emphasis on 'positive thinking' (that if you think good things, good things will happen) and it's kind of delusional when taken to extremes. So I agree with you that it is 'naive' to think everyone will be nice or that changes will happen overnight. it's a question of balancing the idealist and optimistic side which wants to live in a better world where people are nicer, with the conservative side of recognizing were starting with 'what we've got' (which is a huge mess at the moment). Where that balance is, is probably a personal choice down to our experiences.

Communism (and anarchism) face a particular problem because- in one form or another- it begins with the assumption that people are by nature 'good' or in a more diluted form, inherently driven towards social activity as 'social animals'. [the latter is more dilluted because it recognises warfare and conflict are usually collective exercises with armies, states etc, not individual ones like terrorism].
The issue of course is how this 'nature' is perverted, warped and distorted into the kind of screw-ups that support authoritarianism, who kill on command, and enjoy hurting others. Being attracted to 'power' is not inherently a 'bad' thing as we all need it in some form if we are to do anything- but it is incredibly complex and often brings out the worst in people. we look to power for the easy answers of forcing people to do what what want rather than over-coming our fears, recognizing our differences and maybe accepting that what we want is impossible, destructive or otherwise bad for us or other people.
It's part of learning what it means to be free... and that's never easy. the difference between power and freedom, right and wrong are thin lines- not absolutes as we reassuringly told by the powers that be. it's up to us to figure out where they are and that can be pretty daunting when you consider what we are capable of- good and bad.

[Hatshepsut]

I feel like even if the vast majority of people were conscious of these things and willing to cooperate you'd always get a handful of troublemakers.


Regrettably,the more authoritarian communist system actually reflect a very conservative view of 'human nature', in that people have to be forced to change, if selfishness...is...built into people's psyche. An authoritarian system is therefore more likely to 'work' in the short-run because it requires people to change less.

And more than a handful of troublemakers. Communism will have to be taught over generations and people do have to be forced to change their ways, or else they don't change. Red Economist has a good handle on why the Soviet system likely failed. People can coast if they only have to change a little. The Soviet system got distracted by war and Cold War and a lot of things, but it also got lax on Communist education. It didn't implement unions and worker's soviets very fully as it was supposed to. It adopted state secrecy, allowing corruption to infiltrate to the top.

I already live with a noisy neighbor problem I can't do anything about. A nightclub opened, that has sidewalk parties all night long across the street from my apartment. There's a city ordinance against that noise, but it's a business so the mayor won't do anything. No lawyer will touch the issue, so I can't go to court and ask for an injunction no local judge would grant. So we have a rigged system.

While I think Communism will have to begin as an authoritarian system, I don't see why it has to be so authoritarian about workplace and municipal issues between citizens. In a Communist society, the town citizens would have a say about where a nightclub could be built in the first place, before it opened, and it would probably have to be a few hundred feet from anyone's house. The effective way of dealing with most troublemakers isn't shooting them, when you can shame them - if they've been educated during childhood to recognize Communist ideals.

[Red Economist]

Red Economist has a good handle on why the Soviet system likely failed.

I think that is the highest compliment you could pay a communist. many thanks. :)

[cyu]

In an anarcho-communist society, if 51% of people wanted to change something, and 49% if people opposed the change, and no compromise could be reached, what would happen?
That sounds more like a question for a majority-vote communist society, not an anarcho-communist society.

The kind of anarchist society I imagine would have a lot more freedom than voting. There would be some issues people get so riled up about that they are willing to kill for (and risk the expected retaliation). And there would also be issues where people might change back and forth a few times (like Wikipedia change-battles), then eventually give up and go do something more worthwhile.