I have a personal rule — I think you should never review a book that you strongly disagree with or strongly agree with. If you entirely agree, then a “review” would be nothing more than an echo. But if you strongly disagree there’s also little point to writing a review, the disagreements cannot be isolated…
Anarchists have always paid a lot of attention to feedback loops. Seemingly small actions, small arrangements, small evils tolerated, can rapidly or inexorably build up to systematic and seemingly omnipotent power relations. Things that, in isolation don’t seem that bad, can lead to the formation of states or make those states even more authoritarian. Certain…
While it is true that syndicalism and illegalism can diverge from and even sometimes butt heads with agorism, there seems to be much use in such alliances. It was within this spirit that Nathan Goodman offered critiques of each possible tactic and alliance and while some of the points speak for themselves, others require some…
Download a PDF copy of Kevin Carson’s full C4SS Study: Center for a Stateless Society Paper No. 20 (Spring 2016) Techno-Utopianism, Counterfeit and Real (With Special Regard to Paul Mason’sPost-Capitalism) I. Capitalist Techno-Utopianism from Daniel Bell On II. Categories of Leftist Techno-Utopianism III. Other Non-Capitalist Techno-Utopianisms John Holloway Michel Bauwens Accelerationism IV. Analysis: Comparison of the Two…
C4SS Feed 44 presents Shawn P. Wilbur‘s “Limiting Conditions and Local Desires” read and edited by Tony Dreher. If we are to find a social order that more closely resembles emergent harmony them armed peace or open war, what are we to do? If we cannot take, then perhaps we can give. We know the…
Out of the Streets, Into the Community A Review of Karl Hess’s Community Technology Introduction: Who was Karl Hess? Karl Hess isn’t someone who’s often talked about or recognized in the modern day libertarian movement. And contrary to other forgotten figures in history, Hess has been forgotten in spite of his accomplishments, not because of them….
Land Allocation Rules are Necessary Kevin Carson’s Rejoinder to William Gillis As an alternative to what Will regards as the typical approach in advocating for a set of property rules — basically a sales pitch promoting the features of one compared to all the others — he proposes “one where we don’t exclusively compare prefigurative…
Karl Hess: Presidential Speechwriter Turned Homesteader Interview by Anson Mount (Mother Earth News) (Originally published in Mother Earth News, January/February, 1976 issue) Introduction It was so easy back then — during the 1950’s and early 60’s — to be a Right Thinking Citizen of the United States. Easy because we all knew who wore the…
Megan Erickson’s article on techo-fixes for education (“Edutopia“) in the March issue of Jacobin is an excellent critique of corporate-driven education “reform” efforts like those of the Gates Foundation and IDEO. As a critique of attempts to build an alternative educational model around decentralizing technology in general, it’s… not so excellent. The immediate object of…
C4SS Feed 44 presents “Two Words on Privatization” from the book Markets Not Capitalism, written by Charles Johnson, read by Stephanie Murphy and edited by Nick Ford. There is something called privatization which has been a hot topic in Leftist circles for the past 15-20 years. It has been a big deal in Eastern Europe, in third world countries…
C4SS Feed 44 presents Uriel Alexis’ “Anarchists United” from the Students for a Stateless Society‘s Volume 1, Issue 3 of THE NEW LEVELLER read by Dylan Delikta and edited by Nick Ford. With the growth of the producer’s network and the mutual trust relations promoted by the mutual bank, a truly revolutionary potential is unleashed. Increasingly more complex production processes…
It’s no secret that economists and libertarians have developed a bad habit of assuming things about history and other societies on first principle without actually checking archaeological or anthropological findings. On occasion the divide can be quite stark. David Graeber’s Debt: The First 5000 Years gets a lot of momentum by attacking a widely circulated…
June has been a great month for the Center for a Stateless Society (C4SS). We were able to publish more commentaries in June than in the previous three months. If you are a regular donor, then I would like to thank you for your continued enthusiasm and support. If you are interested in supporting our mission…
May has been an interesting month for The Center for a Stateless Society (C4SS). We have added some new features and people to the roster and reached a couple of milestones in our development. If you are a regular donor, then I would like to thank you for your continued enthusiasm and support. If you are…
The following article was written by Colin Ward. The split between life and work is probably the greatest contemporary social problem. You cannot expect men to take a responsible attitude and to display initiative in daily life when their whole working experience deprives them of the chance of initiative and responsibility. The personality cannot be successfully…
Download [PDF]: Industrial Policy: New Wine in Old Bottles I. The Unsustainability of the Existing System II. The Seeds of the New System III. What Stands in the Way Sloanism, not to mince words, is as dead as Elvis; the corpse just hasn’t started to stink yet. The kind of industry that emerges on the other side of the Time…
Naomi Klein, to a casual reader, might seem to hate the free market. Or at least she hates what most people think of as the free market, based on the conventional use of that term by mainstream politicians and journalists. And the usual vulgar libertarian suspects (see here and here and here) have reacted with exactly the kind of by-the-numbers polemics you’d…
Kevin Carson: I’m not calling for “anarchist politicians” to run for office and exercise political power. Our involvement in politics should take the form of pressure groups and lobbying, to subject the state to as much pressure as possible from the outside.
The focus will be on new technology, new infrastructure, new models and new processes that replace the vulnerable ones that are the causes of so many of today’s global problems — and ensuring that these replacements are Open Source, and stay in the hands of all the world’s people.
Darian Worden: Which way will we go as states adapt to a changing world?
