Tag: capitalism
Mr. President, Friends and Fellow Citizens: He who could address this audience without a quailing sensation, has stronger nerves than I have. I do not remember ever to have appeared as a speaker before any assembly more shrinkingly, nor with greater distrust of my ability, than I do this day. A feeling has crept over…
“The issue which has swept down the centuries and which will have to be fought sooner or later is the people versus the banks.” – Lord Acton Jeff Olson, a 40 year old Californian Occupy activist was just acquitted after facing 13 years in prison for scrawling anti-bank chalk messages outside of three San Diego branches…
Brazil is in a state of revolt. Demonstrations have been taking place all across South America’s largest country in over 350 Brazilian cities. Demonstrations against political corruption, poor education, poor healthcare, police violence, public transit costs and more are taking place on the streets. The public demonstrations are so large in scale that the nations political ruling…
There’s an occupational category called “futurist,” which involves attempting to guess the likely future based on extrapolations from current trends and their interactions. Now, many people can spot the major currents of change in our time. It’s when a number of those currents intersect, producing all kinds of whorls and eddies and butterfly effects, that…
Are you concerned about overpopulation? If you live in a city, or Asia, it is easy to feel justified. But strictly speaking, the Earth has plenty of land, air, food and water for billions more. The limit is energy and the true crisis is poverty. Billions live in a world of destitution brought about by state-augmented…
“The Fourth Estate,” as a nickname for the press, is anecdotally attributed to Edmund Burke, when the House of Commons was opened up to press reporting in the 18th century. The idea is that the press is another branch of government without official recognition, representing the interests of civil society as a whole, and acting…
Legend tells us that healthy newborn infants aroused the envy and hatred of evil spirits. In the absence of the proud mothers, the evil ones stole into the houses, kidnapped the babies, and left behind them deformed, hideous-looking monsters. Socialism has met with such a fate. Young and lusty, crying out defiance to the world,…
To most Americans Anarchy is an evil-sounding word — another name for wickedness, perversity, and chaos. Anarchists are looked upon as a herd of uncombed, unwashed, and vile ruffians, bent on killing the rich and dividng their capital. Anarchy, however, to its followers actually signifies a social theory which regards the union of order with…
We must get rid of the Anarchists! They are a menace to society. Does not Hearst say so? Do not the M. & M. and the gentlemaen of the Chamber of Commerce, who have also declared war on Labor, assure us that the Anarchists are dangerous and that they are responsible for all our troubles?…
Direct action — peaceful, dignified, civil disobedience — is practiced when one wishes to purposely break the law for a social, economic or environmental purpose. It is proper, even necessary, to disobey the law when human rights are at stake. It is proper to challenge the status quo. It is proper to challenge power structures and it is…
É importante, ao ouvirmos os formadores oficiais de opinião na mídia, perguntarmo-nos o que eles realmente querem dizer com as palavras que usam. Como Orwell destacou em “A Política e a Língua Inglesa,” aqueles no poder usam a linguagem para obscurecer o significado, mais amiúde do que para torná-lo inteligível. Bom exemplo é a recorrência…
In a recent piece that got lots of replay from the online liberal commentariat, Michael Lind (“The Question Libertarians Just Can’t Answer,” Salon, June 4) posed what he considered an unanswerable question to libertarians: “Why are there no libertarian countries?… If libertarianism was a good idea, wouldn’t at least one country have tried it?” If anything, Lind’s…
Anarchists tend to look embarrassed when the subject of economics comes up. Or we mumble something about Proudhon and then sheepishly borrow ideas from Karl Marx. It has always struck me as ironic that anarchism began largely as an economic theory, think only of Josiah Warren, Proudhon and Tucker, but then abandoned the field to…
It’s important, when listening to the official shapers of opinion in the media, to ask ourselves what they really mean by the words they use. As Orwell pointed out in “Politics and the English Language,” those in power use language to obscure meaning more often than to convey it. A good example is the recurrence…
This essay, originally published by Red Lion Press in 2001, was one of Carson’s first ground-breaking contributions to the revival of Mutualist ideas within today’s anarchist and libertarian milieus. It has been re-issued in a beautiful new printing by ALL Distro.
Last week Michael Lind asked a silly question (“The question libertarians just can’t answer”): if libertarianism is so great, why hasn’t any country tried it? The question is silly because the libertarian answer is obvious: Libertarianism is great for ordinary people, but not for the power elites that control countries and determine what policies they…
From the Markets Not Capitalism audiobook read by C4SS fellow Stephanie Murphy.
O sistema de medicina dos Estados Unidos é corrupto, ineficaz e desnecessariamente caro. Esses resultados decorrem da violência do estado em favor da elite politicamente bem relacionada (especificamente seguradoras privadas, médicos, empresas farmacêuticas e de equipamento médico). Escassez artificial, superfaturamento, má alocação de financiamento de pesquisa e supressão de terapias alternativas (não patenteáveis) podem ser…
In the late 19th century, the decentralizing potential of the Second Industrial Revolution — the introduction of electrical power into industry — was a common theme in social analysis. The idea was that electrical power was destroying the technical rationale for large factories. The main reason for the Dark Satanic Mills of the First Industrial…
There are a growing number of complex wicked problems facing natural ecosystems and human civilization. In recent years we have seen that social movements can advance and uphold public welfare, seek justice and progress society. Throughout history, people’s movements have challenged institutions and power structures. Today these movements are beginning to address our most urgent…
