It appears to have been a bad week for American mutualists given the US's election results. However, this makes this particular question topical. Did Proudhon have an analysis which believed that democracies, by their structure, tend to degenerate into autocracies? Do we have a good understanding of that analysis?

I was recently talking to someone about parecon, but I needed a bit of a refresher. So I did some googling and got curious what Kevin Carson and Shawn Wilbur had to say on it.

In one article written by Shawn I found this:

But Parecon is certainly very far from my ideal — and one of my aims in exploring that sort of collective compensation is the possibility it seems to open of freeing the market in other areas of the economy.

I'm curious, why is this the case? Why is parecon far from Shawn's ideal? Are there sort of mutualist/proudhonian critiques of it? I'd love to read them! Thanks!

Right now, I have a pretty solid understanding about how anarchist organization works. To reiterate it for anyone who was unaware, the basic idea behind is that its "free association at all scales" or "groups are formed around decisions, rather than forming groups that then make decisions".

Ex: I want to build a road in X area. I decide to form an association with others who also want to build a road in X area. Then we freely associate, in accordance with our interests and the needs of the project, into the different tasks required to build the road (excavating, grading, paving, etc.).

Determining what those tasks are is a matter of science, that is to say the plan is determined by whatever most efficiently achieves the project with available resources and labor as well as other external constraints (like avoiding negative externalities).

Concurrently with that free association of division of labor, conflicts that arise over the course of the project are dealt with through free association as well, with conflicting parties associating into groups (if there are multiple members) and dealt with by putting them into contact with each other to resolve their conflict through a mutually beneficial solution or compromise.

However, while this model makes sense, I struggle to connect it to other facets of anarchist ideas.

For example, what role do mutual banks play into all of this? How about associations external to this road-building association? What is their relationship? Let's say I wanted to build a school and there was already an association of teachers somewhere, how do they get involved? Or what about associations that maintain and act as stewards for fixed or productive assets like land, factories, tools, etc.? And how does the alegal character of anarchist society effect things? How does systemic coercion?

And, most importantly, how does Proudhonian sociology play a role into all of this. The idea behind Proudhonian sociology, to my knowledge, is the idea that we should organize ourselves in accordance to how society actually works (i.e. social science should inform social organization). How does that serve all of this?

Haven't been active on Reddit in a long while, but I wanted to share that a group of co-ops in Rhode Island is officially launching the RI Worker Cooperative Alliance (RIWCA) on November 14 in Providence.

The Alliance's activities will include:

• Worker Cooperative Education
• Advocacy
• Shared Services

I'm hoping I can convince the Alliance to start a mutual credit circle, but perhaps there are other ways to make a bigger impact. If you have any thoughts or recommendations, please comment.

I hope this post isn't too long or off topic for this sub (and I hope I'm not missing anything too obvious!).

There was a post on Anarchy101 yesterday (that I couldn't find today) that got me thinking about a potential issue with 'cost the limit of price'.

By the time I'd typed all this out today I thought I'd gotten my head round a potential answer - but I haven't - so posting it here for discussion if anyone is interested.

In a hypothetical anarchist economy that has embraced 'cost the limit of price'...

...and where everyone is actively seeking out productivity improvements and efficiencies to reduce the amount of time, effort or toil it takes to do a certain amount or type of work, or the amount of work they need to do to secure enough needs and wants to thrive;

...and where these productivity improvements lead to a decrease in cost and therefore to a decrease in the price of that work or product that is always passed on to the customer;

...and that these productivity improvements themselves are shared so that over time the price for a particular good or service returns to something approaching an average/equilibrium/market price;

...and this is happening across the entire economy;

...if I identify a productivity improvement that allows me to reduce my costs by 'x amount';

...and I share this improvement so that all my 'competitors' are also able reduce their cost/price by 'x amount' so demand for my work/product is unchanged relative to price vs. demand;

...given that it would be naive to think that every 'supplier' I use outside of making my product (e.g sourcing needs and wants) is also able to reduce their costs/prices by 'x amount' at exactly the same time as I do...

...then at that point - it seems that I would be financially worse off.

In this scenario my income would be less due to a reduction in cost without any guarantee that my expenses (i.e. other producer's costs) would be reduced accordingly.

Thoughts?

In Pierre Ansart's 'Proudhon's Sociology', in the section on Federalism, he mentions Proudhon's 'anarchist period' multiple times but doesn't give any context of what he means. e.g. "Proudhon’s statements on this topic in his more specifically anarchist period are still applicable..." and "Proudhon introduces a dialectic that he had rejected in his anarchist period...".

What or when is he referring to?

The terms personal and private property often get confused and are already loaded terms relavent to other economic systems.

Using the term commodity for anything owned, but that can't generate wealth and using the term capital to describe anything that is owned but that can also generate wealth helps better disambiguate the concepts.

It's also easier to describe how a commodity can become capital from either intentional market scarcity like housing, from limited access like a utility, or from the use of labor.

Explaining this helps describe why consumer cooperatives are needed to address exploitation from scarcity or limited access driven capital and worker cooperatives are needed for labor driven capital.

Many modern day scholars who advocate for creating a stateless society draw on real world stateless societies in the historical and ethnographic record for evidence about how such societies could look, as well as evidence of the possibility of society without a state in the first place. However, most of the ethnographic accounts of real stateless societies were published after 1900.

I know that Clarence Lee Swartz briefly discussed mining camps in the North American far west in What is Mutualism?, but I am curious to what extent earlier authors drew on historical or ethnographic accounts of stateless, or quasi-stateless, communities for inspiration. Did Proudhon discuss the topic at all in his work? What about Benjamin Tucker, Lysander Spooner, Dyer Lum, Josiah Warren, Stephen Pearl Andrews, or other, similar authors?

I understand that Warren and Andrews of course created intentional communities of their own to experiment in alternative forms of association, but did they discuss historical records of stateless societies as well?

Thanks in advance for your help.

Was Proudhon anti-positivist or pro-positivist? I recall he was pro-positivist at one point and became anti-positivist later. What changed and what was his understanding of positivism?

Proudhon's Sociology

"Anyone wanting to learn about Proudhon but perhaps daunted by the sheer bulk of Iain McKay’s wonderful Property is Theft! Proudhon anthology now has a book to read in advance that will light their way to engaging with Proudhon.”
Dr. Michael Tyldesley, Emeritus Honorary Fellow, Department of History, Politics, and Philosophy, Manchester Metropolitan University

Been looking for an introduction to Proudhon's ideas and particularly anything related to economics. This sounds like a good fit for me. Anyone here read it? Thanks.

So some nuts and bolts questions today

First off, I noticed something i hadn't noticed before when reading the Wikipedia page for Cincinnati Time Store

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnati_Time_Store#/media/File%3ALaborNote.JPG

In the above image you'll see a labor-for-labor note that was used in the time store (according to Wikipedia anyways)

What i noticed now that I didn't before is that the note is labeled "Not Transferable" at the top. So I suppose that means it doesn't circulate right? But then how did this sort of note system works? If we don't have circulation isn't this basically just barter, with all it's inefficiencies? I was under the impression these notes circulated. Did they?

The second question is somewhat related to the first.

What's the usual method for managing counterfeit in mutual credit schemes? It seems quite possible for me to print a note claiming that you own me 10 hours of labor when I did nothing for you or anyone else.

I would argue that today this isn't much of and issue because digital technology allows for much more rapid and up to date record keeping, but in the past it may have been difficult to update the records quickly and so paper currency would've been used, paper that can be counterfeit.

What was the approach for managing counterfeiting?

Tl;dr:

1. Did Josiah Warren's labor for labor notes circulate? If so, why is the one in the Wikipedia page labeled not transferable, and if not did warren just use barter?

2. What are the standard approaches to anti-counterfeiting in mutual credit and local currency schemes?

Can I have a simple explanation of the cost-price principle and mutual credit/banking?

The economics is one of the weakest areas in my anarchist theory.

When people talk about translations of Proudhon's writings they're often referring to things like letters, notes, correspondence, etc.

Given that some of these might be over 200 years old now - how much of his original source material is there? Who has it? What material do translators generally work from?

I know this sounds like a stupid question, but I find that there are some disputes about the exact definition of what constitutes “ownership.”

If there is a norm of respecting people’s personal possessions, would this be a form of “property?”

Does the social tolerance of occupancy-and-use qualify as an informal social permission or sanction?

Research into anarchy, anarchist social analysis, and anarchist organization is rather uncharted territory, we don't know too much about anarchist social organization aside from there being indications that it is possible and that assumptions that hierarchy is inevitable or necessary are completely unsubstantiated.

While the burden of proof of actually proving that hierarchy is inevitable or unnecessary is exceedingly high, thus we aren't going to get a good answer as to whether hierarchy is necessary or not for a very long time, there is always a level of uncertainty here and perhaps I have exaggerated the sort of certainty I have in the viability of anarchy, which I don't have much to substantiate. Anarchy, in its fullest sense, is difficult to really prove too though that may depend on how our experiments go.

Does anyone know how to deal with or overcome this uncertainty and how have you done so? Should be overcome at all? How can I say I am an anarchist if I cannot have certainty that anarchism is possible?

I don’t really understand federative organising or the concept of the external constitution.

I could also improve my knowledge on the economics side a bit more.

They intuitively seem like a neat way to reward those who give rather than those who own, and some have commented on unique economic advantages, but I don't have solid data to verify either of those. Another mutualist told me it was a bad idea because of the incentives it creates, but I don't remember exactly what they said and can't find where they said it. I'm specifically interested in achieving an economic system that incentivizes generosity--would time banking achieve this?

In this passage, with respects to the impossibility of achieving knowledge of the capital T truth, Volin says:

Third obstacle. – The most characteristic trait of life is its eternal and uninterrupted movement, its changes, its continual transformations. Thus, there exists no firm, constant and determined truth. Or rather, if there exists a general, complete truth, its defining quality would be an incessant movement of transformation, a continual displacement of all the elements of which it is composed. Consequently, the knowledge of that truth supposes a complete knowing, a clear definition, an exact reduction of all the laws, all the forms, all the combinations, possibilities and consequences of all these movements, of all these changes and permutations. Now, such a knowledge, so exact an account of the forces in infinite movement and oscillation, of the continually changing combinations,—even if there exists a certain regularity and an iterative law in these oscillations and changes,—would be something nearly impossible.

However, are there are not laws or fixtures to life which do not change like the sun rising and falling or the law of gravity? Is it our knowledge of those laws or fixtures limited that Volin is talking about or is he saying that there are no fixtures or laws to life?

I believe that Proudhon in What is Property made a distinction between ownership and possession.

Property would be the right of possession and use, as opposed to the mere fact.

“Absentee ownership” is then simply an emergent phenomenon of the mismatch between the fact and the right of possession.

Is the force/authority distinction then just derived from this deeper fact/right distinction?

I know a little bit about the libre milieux (basic stuff like there being no laws or authority and what not) but I don't know too much about the specifics. Is there any information available on the specifics of different communities, how they were organized, etc.?

Usually I hear the term “restorative justice” bandied around, but I’m always unsure whether the term is loaded with governmentalist or legalistic assumptions.

In an alegal social context, people might want a formal system of conflict resolution to solve their disputes peacefully, and may willingly choose to participate in certain non-binding processes in order to avoid undesirable forms of social war.

If such systems emerge, what would they look like exactly? What kinds of disputes might these systems be suited for handling?

For a hypothetical, basically functioning anarchist economy (i.e. not post-Apocalypse, not Sci-Fi Utopian) that was operating on a mix of gift, barter and some mix of currencies which, in turn, were based on a mix of time, labour, credit and commodities (preferably localised bundles of 'practical' commodities rather than e.g. gold, oil, etc.) and where the general economic incentive was towards circulation of currency rather than accumulation (or at least not oscillating between periods of spend and save) - and of course where the purely capitalist drivers of monetary inflation/deflation were gone...

...would (could?) monetary inflation still be a significant issue for anarchist economies?

I'm referring to 'monetary' inflation/deflation because the perceived/subjective value of individual goods and services might still change over time - but in a hypothetical economy like the one above - could that alone be enough to impact 'how much your money was worth'?.

Thanks.

Will there be an age at which an individual is recognised as an “adult”, or will adulthood become a more relative concept, being seen as a continuum, with the concepts of “youth” and “elder” being more comparative rather than thresholds one meets at a certain birthday?

TL;DNR: Founding document of “capitalism” fully read, implies Proudhonian mutualism (though retains its own errors).

Reading “Wealth of Nations,” we find Smith’s intention is to encourage competition between stockholders (capitalists, wholesale and retail sellers), and free choice among wage-earners between sellers, thus incentivizing lower prices to entice demand, eventually giving price reductions to the lowest possible levels. All of this was hoped by Smith to enable thrifty wage earners – he thought them so – to save their money and increase their wellbeing.

In book one, chapter eleven of “Wealth,” from Smith himself [!]: “The interest of the dealers [stockholders or capitalists] […] is always in some respects […] opposite to, that of the public […]. To widen the market may frequently be agreeable enough to the public; but to narrow the competition [between capitalists] must always be against it, and can serve only to enable the dealers, by raising their profits above what they naturally would be, to levy […] an absurd tax upon the rest of their fellow-citizens.”

(Everyone should read “Wealth of Nations” – but after Boswell’s “Life of Sam. Johnson,” for Smith’s circumstances, language, and opinions, e.g., the broad contempt for aristocrats and their “rents”; Johnson defends them only as a contrarian. Many, e.g., Milton Friedman, couldn’t read it – or misrepresented it knowing nobody would. Sometimes objectionable, there’s a fair bit of egalitarian “common sense” in it, too).

And, we can deduce mutualism from Smith’s conceit. If competition in stock reduces cost for consumers as a benefit, then absolute-maximum competition minimizes costs, for ultimate possible benefit. But maximum stock distribution occurs when everyone owns capital. And they then can also support themselves by the revenues of capital, not only labor.

This condition of ownership obtains, if all non-solo enterprises are organized as co-operatives. (Worryingly, Koch Inc., is privately owned – but its capital is not parceled in equal shares in one-to-one correspondence to its 120,000 employees – were it, they’d receive $1,041,623/year – therefore Koch is neither corporation, nor co-op).  Any reduction in revenue by such enterprises, is balanced by the stability from employees’ incentive to be conservative in the use of their sole – but also collective – capital. As competition, any “rival” co-ops in a market can challenge monopoly by lowering their prices. Even without a competitor, so long as workers are free to sell out of their own, to found a rival to a monopolist co-op’s inefficiencies at any time, only such inter-co-operative competition need be guaranteed to ensure consumer wellbeing. Those two collaborating to raise prices is disincentivised, as yet a third co-op could take market share from them at any time.

Corporations, using accumulated capital from shareholder’s investment to artificially depress prices and exterminate competition, then to raise prices monopolistically, as Smith abhorred, should certainly be eliminated, perhaps prior to the establishment of co-ops, so they and their good is encouraged.

As collective capital, certainly workplace democracy in co-ops is required. Conversely, corporations have either capital set aside to offset expected losses, or a venture fund (as with the first joint stock companies), so that capital is not distributed in a one-to-one correspondence of worker to a uniform tranche of capital; this implies corporations must be hierarchical, as will be detailed presently.

Now, a corporation is to eliminate competition, or in the original joint stock companies to raise funds for expansion into markets without competition. In the former case, per Smith himself this hurts the common good by artificially raising prices. In the latter case, it must be less responsive, so less efficient, than local businesses would be – or else has a bureaucracy, and acquires inefficiencies (and by the Iron Law of Oligarchy excludes workplace democracy) thereby. Or, if a foreign stock company “creates” a market – but then it diminishes local revenue resources, leading to inevitable reductions in local development. Therefore, corporations can never be the most efficient means of human development (vide also: Louis Brandeis’ “Other People’s Money”, passim).

Moreover, corporations and stock companies by definition do not parcel capital revenues only into equivalent shares given to each employee in one-to-one correspondence. Therefore, some employee must have more than another – and so, the ability to suborn the will of who has less (if only by buying up all the resources the latter needs, with reserve for one’s own needs), who in turn has no ability to ameliorate this condition, without directly aggressing against the better-resourced, which even libertarianism forbids. Therefore: corporations are inherently hierarchical, at least as greater capital-owner above lesser owner – and “ancap” as anti-authoritarian, yet permitting such capital hoarding and hierarchy, is thus definitely contradictory. Doubly so, since a monopolist, particularly of necessities, can deprive customers of their revenues at will, which plainly interferes with an individual’s property. “Ancap” permits corporate hierarchies that violate its own “non-aggression principle,” and violates its supposed anti-authoritarianism. “Ancap,” backhanded libertarianism, is a cruel, contradictory absurdity.

[This is part one. Probably no part two.]