I – What Is Anarchy. The statesman, intent on schemes to compromise principles and tide over clamorous demands for justice, says it is disorder and spoliation. New taxes are then levied to defend the state, to repress incendiary talk, and protect privileged prerogatives. Or false and surface issues are prepared to distract attention, to embroil citizens in partisan quarrels,…

Governance, Agency and Autonomy: Anarchist Themes in the Work of Elinor Ostrom [PDF] This paper is intended as one in a series, to be read along with my previous one on James C. Scott, on anarchist and decentralist thinkers whose affection for the particularity of local, human-scale institutions overrides any doctrinaire ideological labels. The Governance…

In my last blog post; I discussed some criticisms of Roderick T. Long’s, An Open Letter to the Peace Movement, by a non-anarchist or non-libertarian friend. This post continues that discussion. It contains responses to a part of my friend’s response not previously dealt with. The earlier comments will be given a second look in…

Durante tutta la durata della “chiusura” del governo americano, i politici democratici hanno paragonato i loro rivali repubblicani ad “anarchici”, dicendo che la “chiusura” dimostra la necessità di un governo. Un esempio è un recente intervento al senato della senatrice Elizabeth Warren, democratica. I fraintendimenti del suo intervento sono rampanti. Confonde cooperazione e governo dicendo: “Nella nostra…

So last Sunday in the midst of a second wave of blockades of tech company buses in San Francisco and Oakland, a bus window was broken by some anarchist activists and the action immediately sailed to the top of countless news sites. Activists had been trying to draw attention to how the buses (collectively termed…

“To be governed is to be watched over, inspected, spied on, directed, legislated at, regulated, docketed, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, assessed, weighed, censored, ordered about, by men who have neither the right, nor the knowledge, nor the virtue. … To be governed is to be at every operation, at every transaction, noted, registered, enrolled, taxed,…

Während den späten 1880ern brach eine heftige Debatte über Egoismus vs. Naturrecht im Anarchismus in der libertären Zeitschrift „Liberty“ aus. ( Die verschiedenen Beiträge zu dieser Debatte werden vielleicht in der Online Bibliothek des Molinari Institute verfügbar werden,  in der Zwischenzeit kann man sich für Details Frank H. Brooks „The Individualist Anarchists: An Anthology of Liberty (1881-1908)“…

During the late 1880s, a fierce debate broke out in the pages of the libertarian periodical Liberty over egoistic versus natural-rights approaches to anarchism. (The various contributions to this debate will eventually be available in the Molinari Institute’s online library; in the meantime, for details see Frank H. Brooks’ The Individualist Anarchists: An Anthology of Liberty (1881-1908) or Wendy McElroy’s The Debates of Liberty:…

In passato, ho dibattuto contro l’autorità sia in termini di principi che di conseguenze. Istituzioni come lo stato non hanno autorità legittima su di te perché nessuno possiede nessun altro, e tu non puoi delegare ad un’istituzione un’autorità che non hai, affinché la eserciti in tuo nome. A livello pratico, l’autorità conduce a irrazionalità e…

Alliance of Austin Agorists first networking party: An interview/Q&A with Charles W. Johnson. Due to some technical difficulties we were only able to capture three out of the ten questions that were actually conducted that night.

They don’t create oppression; they just make it possible What I’m about to say may surprise you, but I assure you it’s the honest truth: in my personal experience, cops are overwhelmingly decent folks. They almost always conduct themselves “professionally” and have generally treated me with respect. I’m not saying stories of law enforcement abuse haven’t…

In Commonwealth, Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri observe that, because of network communications and radically cheapening production technology, capital accumulation is becoming “increasingly external to the production process.” But rather than working with this trend and exploiting the opportunities it offers, they argue, the Social Democratic approach is “to reintegrate the working class within capital.”…

On the popular anarchist facebook page Anarchist Memes, an admin decided to exercise his private property rights in vocalizing his opinion that in a stateless society, unpopular opinions will not be dealt with peacefully. Status: “You think anarchism means we should all have some sort of right to say whatever you feel like? So let…

Em Washington, D.C., o ativista James Babb, da Associação do Júri Plenamente Informado, colocou cartazes informativos nas estações de metrô perto dos tribunais. Esses cartazes informam os passantes acerca da nulificação pelo júri, o velho direito dos jurados de julgarem tanto os fatos quanto a lei. Essa doutrina tem longa e venerável história; o direito dos júris…

C4SS Fellow, Jason Lee Byas, joins the podcast team of Rachel, Eamon, and Mark of the The El Paso Liberty Hour. They discuss Market Anarchy, the Center for a Stateless Society and the Anarchist movement within Libertarianism. Check Out Politics Conservative Podcasts at Blog Talk Radio with Be First In Media on BlogTalkRadio  

Destroying the Master’s House With the Master’s Tools: Some Notes on the Libertarian Theory of Ideology [PDF] We commonly look at ideology from the perspective of the ruling class, as a legitimizing tool. But ideology serves the purposes of the ruled, as well—as a guide to action in their class interest. The respective ideologies of rulers and…

Criminality, Counter Economics and the Silk Road, or We’re All Illegalists Now! At this point in time, it seems of little doubt to most that Ross Ulbricht was none other than a Dread Pirate Roberts (DPR). According to files obtained by the feds off of Ulbricht’s computer, it also appears that he is the first…

A friend of mine recently shared a blog post by a friend of his on liberty and guns in the Republic of Georgia. In the post, the author, Neal Zupancic, argues that people who need to be armed in order to feel safe cannot be said to be free or safe, and by implication that…

From the Markets Not Capitalism audiobook read by C4SS fellow Stephanie Murphy.

Today marks Transgender Day of Remembrance. On this day, transgender and gender non-conforming people join with our allies to mourn and memorialize the transgender and gender non-conforming people who have been killed for who they are.  There’s a lot at stake here. Trans* people, particularly transgender women of color, face horrendous bigotry, violence, and murder….