An anarchist does not drive on the opposite side of the road just because what side to drive on has a rule. But they might treat a red light as a stop sign when there's little or no traffic.

Like models, rules are never universally right, but some are useful. Good rules are guidelines, that help keep us safe. Not policies to be policed, regardless of the likely outcome.

Following rules because they're rules is recorded in history as "just following orders". We know where that leads.

(2/2)

A couple of days ago I posted about what being an anarchist means to me. Obviously given the way I defined it, I can't determine what it means for anyone else. A contradiction, yes. But one that holds space for flexible ways of understanding that can better respond to our constantly shifting situations.

One thing my freedoms-based definition didn't address though, was how I apply it to political economy. For example, do I believe that all legitimate anarchist politics is anticapitalist?

(1/?)

So one thing I want to clarify is that although I see "anarcho-capitalism" as just fascism with better branding (Peter Thiel being an archetypal example of where it leads), I do accept that a person can be right-leaning economically, and still be an anarchist.

But there are limits, beyond which this becomes a contradiction in ways that are universalizing, and inflexible (again think of the neoreactionaries defending the freedom to deny others freedom).

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When people claim that property is an inalienable right - like freedoms of expression or association are - then "property is theft", as Proudhon famously put it. But as long as they accept that property is a social agreement, subject to negotiation and consensus, then "property is freedom" (a lesser known quote from Proudhon).

Having said that, being open to the idea of a place for markets in a free society does *not* make an anarchist right-leaning. It just makes them not a Stalinist.

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@cy
> So markets both cannot exist in a free society and a free society cannot persist with any sort of market in place

David Graeber covered this in Debt, better than I possibly could. If you haven't read that, I recommend you do. If you have, maybe time for a refresh?

But one argument against what you say here is that it's ahistorical. In his book Life Inc. Douglas Rushkoff pointed out that the importation of the tradition of the bazaar into Europe had a profoundly liberating effect.

@cy
> The freedom to do business without government interference.

This is some serious reading out of context. Did you even read the thread you're replying to? By what tortured logic did you extract that conclusion from references to Graeber and Rushkoff FFS?

@light

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@cy Ok, now I've calmed down a bit, let me flesh out my point and see if it clarifies anything for you.

This turns on how we're defining "business". Does a subsistence farmer selling surplus veges in a bazaar-inspired medieval market, or a baker selling bread there, count as "business"? In the broadest sense, sure, but not in the sense that I think concerns you here.

For this explanation, I'll use 'bazaar' instead of 'market' to avoid confusion with other uses of 'market'.

@light

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Were medieval bazaars free from central government interference (ie the King and the Crown)? Yes, as most governance functions in the Middle Ages were more localised. Nation-state scale government didn't become practical until the emergence of tech like national train networks and reliable postal system, which were originally inseparable from them.

Were bazaars unregulated? certainly not. For a start they existed by the grace of the local landlord and church authorities.

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Within that, a bazaar was a commons, run by and for the community that bought and sold in it. Like any sustainable commons, this required regulation, eg to avoid having stallholders selling poisonous food or faulty goods, or people stealing from stallholders, or anything else that would threaten the market's reputation.

The modern equivalent would be a supermarket run as a multi-stakeholder co-op, where workers, producers and customers all have a stake in ownership and decision-making.