Comments on: Making the State Irrelevant

By: fahree

fahree — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 13:52:27 +0000

So Bindner wants to centralize the decentralists? That sounds oxymoronic. “Individualists of the world, unite!” Whatever you get through such efforts, if not outright failure, is probably not decentralist.

Vanquishing government is indeed a coordination problem. The government wants a monopoly on coordination. Cheap information technology may allow coordination to happen cheaper in decentralized ways. In the end, David Brin’s “transparent society” may be what ends government, when citizens find that they don’t need it. So yes, stigmergic acquisition and use of information.

In the meantime, government is also using technology to spy on citizens, and its stranglehold on lower and higher education to spin its interpretation on the information that citizens may be getting even through uncontrolled channels. Breaking that stranglehold on “Truth” might be the next step towards dissolving government. The recent ClimateGate affair makes it blatant that official Climate “Science” is bunk and only a scam to raise taxes towards a Global Government; it will be interesting to see how stigmergic information (aka blogs) will or won’t manage to turn the tides on this global scam…

By: NCfraudandcorruption

NCfraudandcorruption — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 19:26:04 +0000

I would think, from my experience, that one can make the state irrelevant by being willing and persistent to call forth their inability to prove their claim.

For an example, see here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7E1hDaBWPhc

If you want more, the channel is full of examples.

Thanks

NCfraudandcorruption

By: tpuiatti

tpuiatti — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 18:26:21 +0000

Agree with you Kevin 100% and I reiterate your point about excessive corporate dominance being the result of the state’s presence NOT absence.

By: Kevin Carson

Kevin Carson — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 17:46:40 +0000

Steve, I don’t think spreading viral disobedience by itself would be enough, all other things being equal. But I believe we’re entering a unique period when a “perfect storm” of mutually reinforcing terminal crises are making the system materially unsustainable. They include the crisis of overaccumulation finally coming home to roost once and for all with the failure of financialization, the revolution in cheap miniaturized machinery exacerbating the crisis of overaccumulation, Peak Oil destroying the basis for long supply-distribution chains and globalization, the effect of the digital-network revolution on proprietary culture, and the novel contributions of network culture as a vehicle for resistance. All these things taken together don’t by any means inevitably result in statelessness. But they imply a serious hollowing out of the old centralized states, and a radical relocalization of the old corporate economy that depended on such states.

By: estebandido

estebandido — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 17:33:11 +0000

Kevin, I have to say that I’m somewhat relieved to hear you say you’re “mildly favorable” on running political campaigns, because, even as I’ve become increasingly libertarian, I’ve remained active in the Green Party. Of course, right now I think it’s too bogged down with internal bickering to have much effect, but just on principle, I know a lot of left libertarians reject political parties out of hand.

Having faced my paradox, let me touch on yours: you dismiss the idea of “one big movement,” but I know you’ve stated with some pride in the past that you are a member of the IWW, whose slogan is “one big union.” As a Wobbly myself, I have to say that I like my fellow Wobblies a lot, but I can’t seem to work up much enthusiasm for the organization per se. I belong to the second largest chapter in the country (not that I go to meetings), and it’s so small it suspended meetings for most of this last year. I’m much more enthusiastic about their/our workplaces, which are largely worker cooperatives.

And now, a question: you clearly have a lot of hope that the state will wither away, but I don’t see much sign of it. Granted, it needs constant shoring up, but each time it does, it grants itself a bit more power than it had before. Don’t the last eight years show that people, by and large, accept an ever-encroaching government? Sure, there are counter-examples, but they are still conspicuous by their uncommonness.

By: Kevin Carson

Kevin Carson — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 19:44:24 +0000

Well, homeless guy, I’ve argued repeatedly and consistently, with considerable effort to back it up, that the state is the main reason corporations like Time-Warner are able to survive in the first place. Giant corporations are dependent on massive government subsidies and massive government protections from competition (including regulatory cartels and “intellectual property”) for their very survival. The main thing the U.S. government does now, under both Democrats and Republicans, is serve the interests of the large corporations. Getting a politically viable supermajority of the whole society on the same page to change this will be far more costly (not to say impossible) than simply finding ways to live our lives outside the corporate-state nexus and starve both the government and the big corporations.

If Obama couldn’t get his agenda passed with the largest Democratic majority in 40 years and sixty seats in the Senate, what kind of filibuster threats and screaming townhall maniacs do you think Corporate America would bring out to thwart a repeal of (say) the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

By: thehomelessguy

thehomelessguy — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 16:49:34 +0000

Take away the state and another large and powerful entity will take its place. More than likely, that will be the Corporations. You can pledge allegiance to the USA or you can pledge allegiance to Time/Warner. Which of those two do you think is going to be interested in preserving your way of life?

By: negator

negator — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 03:20:37 +0000

ok.

i’ll do it.