To paraphrase the assessment of libertarian socialist Rosa Luxemburg a century ago, we face an imminent choice between freedom and barbarism. There are only two possible outcomes in the present struggle between the authoritarian institutions of state and corporation, and the emergent society of self-organized networks and other voluntary associations of free people:
The state will fail, and be replaced by a society in which people are free to pool their cooperative labor and skills as they see fit, and to exchange the products of their labor with their equals.
Or, the state will succeed — and create a technofascist empire that reduces humanity to serfdom and takes the biosphere down in flames. Now that the conflict is fairly begun, there is no going back to the status quo ante.
Vinay Gupta, whose many hats include specialist in security issues, argues that the passage of NDAA (with its provisions for indefinite detention without trial) and the shutdown of Megaupload without due process of law signal the emergence of the US as a full-blown fascist state.
And he suggests the possibility that, as governments implode in the face of networked resistance movements in countries like Spain and Greece, free information havens emerge in places like Iceland, and one domino after another in the global South begins to secede from the neoliberal order, the United States will become embroiled in a desperate World War of counterinsurgency, using air strikes, blockades, cyberwar, black ops, hunter-killer drones, and crowd-control technologies to suppress the emerging free order. The street fighting between riot cops and Occupy protesters was just a dress rehearsal, as Spain was for WWII.
Even if it comes to this, I believe the state — and the cluster of authoritarian institutions of which it is the core — will fail.
Because local nodes in self-organized networks are free to take action or innovate without waiting for permission from an administrative apparatus, and every other node in the network is similarly free to learn by example and adopt the innovations without permission, they fully exploit agility advantages of networked communications in ways that authoritarian hierarchies are unequipped to.
We saw this recently with the development of Firefox’s DeSopa circumvention utility before SOPA even came up for a vote, and Anonymous’s massive same-day DDOS attack in response to a federal takedown of MegaUpload that had been months in the planning. Last summer Tor developers released a workaround the very same day Iranian authorities thought they’d shut down the encrypted router network.
Other examples of this agility include the lightning spread of the Arab Spring across the Middle East and into Europe, and the mushroom global proliferation of Occupy camps to hundreds of cities in a matter of days. These networked movements react almost instantaneously to police repression in any one place. Local and national governments are typically so blindsided by the scale of resistance in their own domains, they’re able to offer little if anything in the way of support to other regimes falling victim to the same full-court press. The phrase “Two, three, many Vietnams” comes to mind.
The resistance is further aided by conflict between states, as the advantage shifts from hierarchies to networks. The hegemonic American state’s attempt to suppress networked uprisings comes up against a growing anti-American coalition of smaller states provoked by the Empire’s dominance. The technological advantage accruing to asymmetric warfare means even small states can develop effective hacks against American technologies of global domination, at comparatively little cost. Witness the American security state’s recent obsession with cheap “Assassin’s Mace” and “area denial” weapons that threaten its power projection capability.
As Gupta argues, the fundamentally evil nature of the American state’s counter-insurgency agenda results in cognitive dissonance among the rulers, as many soldiers and police become demoralized from an inability to face the truth of their missions, internal functionaries of the state (like Bradley Manning) become disaffected by the disjuncture between official propaganda and the testimony of their own eyes, and domestic populations’ access to unofficial news and streaming video undermines the official narrative. Because of this, the state leadership cannot trust the motives of its soldiers and other functionaries, or give them the full autonomy and the unfiltered knowledge of reality that effective networked warfare requires.
As Julian Assange points out, when authoritarian hierarchies are attacked from outside they respond by becoming more brittle and internally opaque to themselves.
The combination of networks’ quick adaptation to changing situations with hierarchies’ demoralization and internal opacity means networks generally stay inside what strategist John Boyd called the “OODA loop” of hierarchies: That is, they keep the enemy permanently off-balance, and repeatedly force them to react to situations instead of creating them.
In the long run, it’s no contest.
Translations for this article:
- Russian, О неизбежности крушения государства.
Citations to this article:
- Kevin Carson, Why the state will fail, Dhaka, Bangladesh New Age, 02/01/12
The Arab Spring didn't end the state, anywhere. In Egypt they asked for the military's help and predictably went from a dictatorship to a stratocracy. Morocco was mostly a change in leadership and Libya is still unknown, but anarchy is not on the table.
When one state falls and doesn't arise again, I'll believe that they all will fall. The closest thing we have right now is Somalia.
I'm still pessimistic.
The parasitic state could succeed in destroying itself and us. I know at least two ways it could happen.
Nuclear- I understand that the newer Hydrogen bombs are more than a thousand times more powerful than the ones dropped on Japan. I wonder how many it would take to destroy our atmosphere with radiation?
Biological- Some fast spreading, deadly germ that is unstoppable once released. Having governments in charge of these things reminds one of babies playing with matches.
The state will end when we walk away from it. We already have the tools to do it — powerful beyond the dreams of any generation before us — sitting right on the desk in front of us. We are already connected. When we learn to effectively use and coordinate our tools, resources and actions with other like-minded and -hearted individuals, we'll run rings around the lurching, lumbering dinosaurs that now rule our world.
We don't need so much to fight the power as to make it irrelevant!
" Now that the conflict is fairly begun, there is no going back to the status quo ante."
Kind of wish there were of course. There's no even pretending anymore (though many still do). NDAA passed with FULL awareness of what it meant by congress (they shot down all the amendments that would have weakened the indefinite detention) and the president (he of the signing statements).
I hope you are right about the direction of this. I fear you are wrong ….
A non state monetary system would be a death blow to collectivism. It would be impossible to tax (steal) without control of money/commerce. The net could make that possible. Even collectivists would stop paying (supporting) the state if given a choice. It's the same for war. Warmongers who openly support war would not pay for it as individuals if given the choice. Taxation is the lifeblood of the state.
I'm not really convinced. We have tools to fight back against the state, but the problem is that there are simply too many people who believe we need to have a state. Look at Egypt. They traded one government for another, and millions of people are happy with it. The most important thing is to spread the ideas of freedom while embracing counter economics.
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Why do "too many people" believe we need a state?
IMHO, it's because most of us *are*, by-and-large, dependent on some manifestation of the corporate-state for the basic needs of our life…food, shelter, clothing, energy, security, etc. (not to mention wages to pay for all of the above). Until there are DEMONSTRABLE and SUPERIOR alternatives to this dependence, most individuals, who are just trying to survive and to keep their families alive and safe, WILL NOT roll the dice on theory, no matter how attractive.
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The key is to stop looking at everything on a "macro" level and, instead, to take a "nano" perspective. Start building mutually beneficial relationships of trust with others, LOCALLY, to fulfill your and their own basic needs. Use your voluntarily combined skills and resources to substitute — piece by piece — healthy interdependence among equals for exploitative and debilitating dependency on hierarchies. Spread those networks until we NO LONGER NEED the hierarchies. THAT'S where our tools come in! EACH of us has direct access to tools for communications/networking, planning, logistics, creativity, etc., etc., etc., that the GREATEST KINGS and MAGNATES of the ages NEVER HAD. Yet, we sit and whine because someone else isn't delivering power to us on a silver platter.
Roll up your sleeves and get your hands dirty.
I find the comments here all centre from the thought that American is the world. You are a large country.You a warring nation and as such a pest to many countries around the world. I live in Thailand visit quiet a few others in this part of the world and can see with claritiy that America is a dying country full of old ideas with people who wish to control you lot. To be perfectly frank most of you lot are as thick as two short planks and could not possibly be on your own. Hence state control. A few, a very few are thinkers, may be 3% no more, you assume the fat unhealthy masses share your ideals, hopes and dreams. Sorry all they want is the telly and to fill their face with killer foods. good luck to you 3% ers . This new world here has little in common with you lot.
Good article; basically correct; less undefined abreviations & uncommon words would communicate better. My California vehicle plates are NO NWO*, used for many years in several western states (mobile business). Zombies, leaches, insiders, gov parasites, etc are all good descriptive names, but I believe one should repeat certain basic labels that have been around for decades or centuries such as: Insiders, Illuminatti, *New World Order (New Secular Order on the $1 bill since 1923), & several others. Derision from others about the use of these ‘old’ words merely defines the complainer as an Insider or brainwashed Insider appologist; its a very interesting fact that today’s dictionaries will define Illuminatti as ‘no longer extant’, while every dollar bill still tells you your money belongs to an All Seeing Eye at the top of a Masonic Pyramid inscribed ‘Novus Ordem Seclorum’! By the way, I’d be remiss if I did not point out that there is one person who lived an incredibly active life from around 1911 to 1986; in that time he wrote more words & had recorded more words than anyone, anytime, by a zillion, times on practically any subject that was lacking in some way. As a result, you will find there there are a lot more answers out there & a lot more hope for our fellow earthlings; one technology needed here & now available is the tech on the Suppressive Person: ignore it at your peril; use it & all falls into place. The guys name is Hubbard; same one that penned Dianetics; same guy the Insiders have been lying about & attempting to discredit ever since he refused to hand over the only workable science of the mind to the US Government so they could suppress it & use it to destroy & manipulate the minds of man; interestingly he used the exact tactic this writer is refering to: he took it to every English speaking part of the world & got it so well known that the Suppressives could not hide or alter it. Chris Marquis. Written in the Philippines.
Humanity''s bellicose nature lead me to believe that the transition will not go as peacefully as outlined above. I am convinced that national and state governments worldwide will fail, but as in previous cycles, wars will continue – but on a local level as towns attempt to conquer their neighbors. There will no doubt be a revival of serfdom. Human psychology being what it is, is motivated by greed and lust for power.
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EVERYONE needs to start talking to our police and military. Did you know most of the soldiers are backing Ron Paul? Our police need to know , 'We Know' what's going on and we support their oath to the Constitution. Get involved locally. Find out if your local sheriff's office plans to take federal funds for the exchange of following federal plans. Does your Sheriff always follow court orders or does he look at 'case by case' evictions. Find out what your state plans to do when people lose their apts and homes. Make sure all housing is fair, humane and non-intrusive. Socialism doesn't mean the state has the right to override the Bill of Rights. And Homeland Security needs to back off.
YOUR STATE has legal & Constitutional jurisdiction to decide for itself. DONT allow your city or town to accept a 'Town Manager', no matter how bad the finacial situation is…these 'managers' are nothing more than banker agents, hunting for more assets to steal. They think they have the legal right to override anything your city council decides AND call in federal agents/military whenever the banks want to make their move…think about it. Posse Comitatus is dead, in their eyes and motives.
Right on! Replacing the groupthink-based, top down hierarchical society with an individual-centric, one on one network of win-win relationships is what will ultimately outcompete the state. This is accomplished at the individual level, one individual at a time.
I don't consider myself a Polyanna, but I don't totally agree with your gloomy assessment. The fact that we've survived this long as a species is testament to our ability to recognize shared values and needs and to cooperate to fulfill them. This is IN SPITE OF the parasitical hierarchies that have bled us for millenia. If the majority of people (or even a sizeable minority) chose not to play nice, we'd have probably have gone extinct a long time ago. Anyway, I don't know about anyone else, but I don't need a law against shooting you and taking your wallet (or dumping dioxin on your land, for that matter) to keep me from doing it. That is a reflection of my VALUES. And I live and work with individuals EVERYDAY who, whatever our many other differences might be, share most of these same basic human(?) values.
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Are there sociopaths who ruin things for the rest of us? Hell yeah! In the past, they have been able to survive and thrive through deception, intimidation and the disorganization of their victims. Well, we're all in one big room, now. We, who have been suckered and used by the sociopaths are much more able to identify and isolate those who don't share our values, or to walk away from them and their machinations. Now, does that mean that power will give up without a fight? No. But, I truly believe that those who are driven by "greed and lust for power" ARE in the vast minority.
Screw 'em.
If you look at the world before the rise of territorial states, the level of local violence between communities was far less. Neighboring communities in stateless societies usually worked out all sorts of interesting customary arrangements for limiting the destructiveness of warfare. (Coup-counting, the Peace of God, etc.). The ethnic cleansings of recent years, in the Balkans and Rwanda, have typically been score-settling to deal with grudges over the legacy privileges some ethnic groups had received from imperial states, or resentments over imperial resettlements of populations. I doubt it was much of a problem when neighboring neolithic peasant villages spoke different languages. Large-scale bleeding and genocide generally result when decisions are made by hierarchies that can externalize consequences on the rest of society. You'll notice a drastic decrease in direct world wars between major powers when it became possible to put a nuke right down the chimney at the White House, 10 Downing Street or the Kremlin.
My recent post New Book in the Works
If you have a physical storefront, or even a US-based website or a US domain name, you can't avoid paying taxes by using Bitcoin.
There is a whole science dealing with the psycho- and sociopaths in our societies. They definately ARE in a minority and it is our duty to keep them away from power positions.
This science is called ponerology and deals with evil in a scientific manner. I can recommend the book “Political ponerology” by Andrew M. Lobaczewski to everybody interested in this topic…