Compulsory Education
Everyone loves learning. The thing is that not everyone likes studying and what’s even more frustrating is to be told how we should study, why we should study etc. Making education available to everyone is benevolent but making education compulsory for everyone is something that we are so used to that we do not see…
Trump’s Toxic Aggrieved-Nation Shtick
The key to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign — the feature that explains nearly everything else about that toxic dump — is his aggrieved-nation shtick. Just about everything Trump says (when he’s not adoring himself or belittling others) is about how the once-great American nation has been humbled by the rest of the world. To hear…
The Individualist Anarchist Wears No Clothes
Introduction: Who Was Emile Armand? Emile Armand (a pseudonym for Ernest-Lucien Juin) is at the center of the collection Individualist Anarchism – Revolutionary Sexualism: Writings by Emile Armand (2012) published by Pallaksch Press and distributed by Little Black Cart. Armand was a French egoist/individualist anarchist, arguably an early proponent of polyamory within the anarchist scene…
Supranationalism: The EU as Extortion Mechanism
Supranationalism and the EU The polymath philosopher, activist and Nobel laureate Bertrand Russell was a radical left iconoclast who made major contributions to mathematical logic and nearly every other discipline he touched. Many libertarians admire him, but one major disagreement stands out: In his later years he advocated world government in order to prevent the…
Anarchism: What It Is and What It Is Not
Anarchism: What It Is and What It Is Not by Joseph A. Labadie So you want me to tell you what Anarchism is, do you? I can do no less than make the attempt, and in my own simple way try to make you understand at least that it is not what the uninformed and…
The Semantics of “Good” and “Evil”
The Semantics of “Good” and “Evil” by Robert Anton Wilson The late Laurance Labadie once told me a parable about a king who decided that every time he met somebody he would kick them in the butt, just to emphasize his power. My memory may have elaborated this yarn a bit over the years, but…
The Natural Right of Cryptographic Governance
In the wake of the recent terrorist attacks in Paris and around the U.S., sentiment among the governing class is turning powerfully against encryption. Reuters reports an impending “crackdown” on Bitcoin in the EU. Other reports suggest France could inhibit Tor and free wi-fi at will. U.S. officials have taken the opportunity to go on…
The Attractions of Geo-Mutualism
The Attractions of Geo-Mutualism Appraisers Begone! I am neither a philosopher, nor an economist, nor a political scientist, and so I’ve found myself a bit out of my scholarly depth in this symposium. Prior to these exchanges, I had only slight understanding of Georgist land use proposals, and it had not occurred to me that…
Are We All Mutualists?
Are We All Mutualists? Some General Comments on Occupancy-and-Use It falls to me, in this opening salvo in a symposium on occupancy-and-use land tenure, also known as usufructory property, to write a defense of it. Theoretical advocates of it go back, in some form, at least to Godwin and Paine in the Western tradition. I’m…
Occupancy and Use: Potential Applications and Possible Shortcomings
Introducing the November 2015 Mutual Exchange Symposium Discourse on Occupancy and Use: Potential Applications and Possible Shortcomings “It’s a shame there’s even a need to say this, but ‘property’ is a word that’s used by different people to mean different things,” reckons Kevin Carson in his opening salvo. Carson’s statement neatly summarizes C4SS’s November 2015…
Gandhi the Anarchist
A complex man with a controversial legacy, Mohandas Gandhi remains one of the pioneers of civil disobedience as a political weapon and a giant in 20th century anti-colonialism. An individualist anarchist who motivated millions to fight to liberate themselves from British rule, his success showed a potentially powerful application of libertarian ideas during a major…
Markets Not Capitalism — Introduction
Ρу́сский: Рынки, не капитализм — Введение Türkçe: Kapitalizm Değil, Piyasalar – Bir Giriş Indonesia: Pasar Bukan Kapitalisme Español: Mercado, no capitalismo – Introducción Italiano: Mercato, non Capitalismo Português: Mercados não capitalismo — Introdução The individualist anarchist tendency is alive and well. Markets Not Capitalism offers a window onto this tendency’s history and highlights its potential…
Why I Am an Anarchist
by Voltairine de Cleyre It was suggested to me by those who were the means of securing me this opportunity of addressing you, that probably the most easy and natural way for me to explain Anarchism would be for me to give the reasons why I myself am an Anarchist. I am not sure that they…
The Way of Love: Dorothy Day and the American Right
Introduction by Gary Chartier Americans are likely to be thinking more about Dorothy Day than usual just now, in the wake of Pope Francis’s affirming reference to her in his address to the US Congress. But people unfamiliar with Day’s life and work will find it easy to imagine that ​she was, in the unfortunately…
Illuminating Discord: An Interview with Robert Anton Wilson
Illuminating Discord: An interview with Robert Anton Wilson By Jane Talisman and Eric Geislinger (Columbia Region New Libertarian Alliance) (Originally published in New Libertarian Notes/Weekly 39, September 5, 1976; reprinted at RAWillumination.net) CRNLA: Tell us a little about your background. RAW: I was born into a working class Irish Catholic family in Brooklyn 44 years…
Rebel Governance: In Defense of the Common Sector
Life is pretty good here in the Volunteer State. As an East Tennessean I am particularly fond of the great Smoky Mountains, my scruffy little city of Knoxville, the University of Tennessee and surrounding colleges, a multitude of markets (including a rising craft beer scene) and an array of state parks. Just the other weekend…
Carson’s Rejoinders
1. “Rejoinder” to Murray Rothbard This is not, properly speaking, a rejoinder — obviously, since Rothbard’s article predates my book. But since it was chosen to set the tone for this symposium issue, and includes some comments on individualist anarchism in general, I’ll make a few remarks anyway. On the land issue, I reserve comment, since that is also…
Clinton’s College Plan: Reinventing a Very Old Wheel
In the farcical, technocratic future society of Vonnegut’s Player Piano, you have to have at least a bachelor’s degree to do even the most menial service jobs — of which there aren’t a lot left. The great majority of jobs have been automated out of existence, and the ranks of the still employed are dominated…
Freedom is Slavery?
Freedom is Slavery: Laissez-Faire Capitalism is Government Intervention: A Critique of Kevin Carson’s Studies in Mutualist Political Economy By George Reisman [1] Kevin Carson’s new book Studies in Mutualist Political Economy centers on the incredible claim, self-contradictory on its face, that capitalism, including laissez-faire capitalism, is a system based on state intervention, in violation of…
Capitalism Smothers the Sharing Economy
Russia may have finally caught up with the rest of the world’s governments in cracking down on ridesharing services like Uber. Russia’s Federation of Car Owners (FAR), like any good oligarchy, has complained to Russian state authorities that “rogue” elements such as Uber, Gett, and Yandex represent a “threat to society.” Exactly what kind of…
Anarchy and Democracy
Fighting Fascism
Markets Not Capitalism
The Anatomy of Escape
Organization Theory