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For 2011: Five practical demands on which anarchists, libertarians, and Marxists should agree

9 comments

Posted by Jehu on Dec 31, 2010 in A Case Against Government, Anarchism, Anti-War, direct action, Libertarianism | 9 comments

While it can be argued that anarchists, libertarians and Marxists have a huge ideological chasm between their various views and visions of a future society, it is obvious that on significant issues they share a common perspective. One question for the new year, and the run up to the 2012 elections, is will these diverse ideologies continue to allow their difference to stand in the way of real practical common action on those things which they agree?

Libertarians have elected several of their supporters in the last election cycle; Ron Paul is poised to take an important chairmanship in the house; and, the GOP is vulnerable to a libertarian challenge in the 2012 presidential sweeps. Marxists have committed disciplined cadre capable of playing a significant role on the ground should they find some common points of agreement with the libertarian rebellion now unfolding within the Party of Wall Street. Anarchists have the extraordinary ability to move between these two factions while remaining relatively free of the ideological prejudices of either group.

Can the strengths of each be turned to a singular focus on a set of demands that move progressive and conservative majorities in both parties along a different path? I am not sure, but I offer these demands below in hopes that a discussion can begin among libertarians, anarchists and Marxists toward some practical cooperation in 2011:

End the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan; and withdraw all US military forces from overseas.

This demand is simple enough: we want all United States military forces withdrawn from Iraq and Afghanistan and all bases operating in foreign countries dismantled and the troops brought home.

End all Washington fiscal and monetary stimulus; and, reduce the work week until everyone who wants to work has a job.

We want Washington to end its wasteful and incompetent attempts to stimulate the economy to generate job creation and economic growth. There is enough work at present to go around if the work week is reduced until unemployment is eliminated. All fiscal and monetary stimulus is nothing more than the imposition of hidden taxes on society by Washington, and its attempt to grab more resources for itself at the expense of society.

End all Federal, state and local deficit spending and accumulation of public debts.

Public deficit spending and the creation of new debt through bond issues are another form of hidden tax on the population. By issuing new debt, government at all levels is able to garnish the future income of its citizens to enlarge itself at their expense. We should demand all levels of government spend only the revenue they raise through taxes to end the hidden accretion of government power.

Abolish the Federal Reserve Bank and the fractional reserve system; end the bailout of the too big to fail banks.

This is a no-brainer: the control of the nation’s money, its supply of currency, and its monetary policy should never have been delegated to a private cartel of banking interests in the first place. Washington must also end the ongoing bail out of the too big to fail and shut them down immediately.

End the prosecution and imprisonment of all persons convicted of nonviolent offenses; dismantle the Department of Homeland Security; and, abolish the Patriot Act and other repressive laws.

Again, another no-brainer: The growth of state power is clearly evident in the swollen population of American prisons and clogged courts as state authorities prosecute and imprison thousands of people each year for nonviolent offenses from drug possession to illegal entry into the United States. Additionally, our movements are being subjected to constant state surveillance, routine invasive searches of our persons, tracking of our correspondence and public and private conversation.

*****

Is it possible to gather such diverse voices as those within the libertarian, anarchist and Marxist communities into a single chorus around these or a similar list of demands? I would imagine there is not a single true libertarian, anarchist or Marxist who disagrees with the above list, but getting to “Yes” on any common set of demands runs into heavy opposition from the forces of the State, who do not want to see such a coalition, and from petty disagreements among these diverse groups who have their own agendas for what comes next.

We must make an effort however, and I pledge to fight for unity among all libertarians, anarchists and Marxists on these issues during 2011.

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  • Anonymous

    I’m with you on 4.5, but reduce the work week? What, pray, shall be the penalty for working more than some threshold you prefer, or for employing someone for more than that?

    • http://pogoprinciple.wordpress.com Jehu

      Admittedly this might be a tough point for libertarians and Marxists alike to swallow, but bear with me:

      Give consideration to this fact: most people in our society have no income except what money they can earn from hiring themselves out to others in exchange for wages. Now, if you want, you can substitute for this hiring some form of government employment — in which case government will simply tax you and use the proceeds to hire them to work at the TSA. Or, government can tax you and pay them to sit at home and do nothing. Or, government can tax you and use the proceeds to pay for their imprisonment on charges of vagrancy for hanging out in front of your house begging for spare change.

      One thng should be clear, however, since we do live in the real world: We are talking about reducing government spending on the order of a tenth of GDP. The moment Washington stops spending trillions of dollars in stimulus to artificially maintain the present level of economic activity, the economy is going to contract rather viciously. Tens of millions of persons who are currently employed only because of this spending suddenly will be out of work. Most of these people vote, and a mass of starving unemployed will vote for the guy who will feed them. Now, add to this number several hundred thousand demobilized troops if we can successfully end the wars.

      So, you can risk a social outburst like this because, in principle, you oppose all government action, or you can seek to find a way to avoid this explosion WITHOUT enlarging government, and practically show people a way to have zero unemployment without Keynesian/neoliberal economic policies.

      I also would point out that reduced hours of work call for no more government action than exists presently in the form of the forty hours legislation. All we need do is reduce those hours to some lower figure — say, 32 or even 24 hours. While, on the other hand, we can end trillions of dollars in government spending on fiscal stimulus and monetary debasement.

    • Anonymous

      “All we need do”…

      I see what you’re saying, but who is the “we” here, and by what mechanism shall “we” achieve what you propose?

      • Jehu

        Hey Mike,
        I tried to answer your questions here: http://tinyurl.com/2u9gxsq

        • Danielshays1787

          If anything, I’m not seeing anything in your answers that indicates you aren’t totally for the state and its power being used in exactly the sort of coercive, command economy manner that libertarians and minarchists like myself violently and vehemently oppose.

  • http://www.gonzotimes.com/ PunkJohnnyCash

    I won’t oppose anything there. I think it’s good that we can keep delving into our common goals. I tend to fall under every category mentioned though in some way. I think with the shorter work week, I would love it, but I think it may be a better goal to try and syndicate corporations that are out there. I know this is one many may not agree with me on. I love the idea of syndicates running existing corporations. I also like the idea of ending stuff like patents & copyrights which tend to keep the corporate bind that exists. Without those my local taco bell could be worker owned and could break free of the larger corporate interest. The workers could make a livable wage and they could own the product of their labor and could receive more of the profit from the product of their labor. I do see this as a way to begin to accomplish something like that. I see a communist streak in my proudhonian property rights. “property is theft” “property is Freedom”. I do feel that the current way of ownership is closer to the theft, while I feel syndicates portray the property is freedom more. But I am going to write much more going into that, hopefully soon. After I finish the racism, sexism, classism stuff & some reviews and articles on Mutualism. And… I’m rambling again.

    • http://pogoprinciple.wordpress.com Jehu

      I hear you. I was trying to stay as practical as possible when looking at the kinds of things that anarchists, libertarians and Marxists could jointly work on in the coming period. My intention was not to define what a new society will look like — something I always avoid — but what we have in common and might work on in the next two years.

      For instance, there is an upcoming vote to raise the debt ceiling in the Spring. The debt ceiling vote is necessary to actually authorize the deficit spending package agreed to by the President and congressional Republicans. If we can jointly agree to fight for a “No” vote to raise the debt limit, we can increase the political cost to both Democrats and Republicans of a “Yes” vote. A “Yes” vote on the debt ceiling is also necessary for continued funding of the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.

      Beyond that, Ron Paul will be in charge of the committee overseeing the Federal Reserve. We need to gather all the forces we can to make hearings on the FRB worthwhile. I think Bernanke will be required to address the committee twice next year, and it will offer us an opportunity to build public opinion to shut those bastards down.

      Out on the longer term horizon, the possibility of a challenge to the Republican establishment by a libertarian rebellion in the GOP seems like our best shot for this election cycle. I expect progressives to fall meekly in line behind Obama, and for the Democratic Party establishment to use every scare tactic and wedge issue in their arsenal to make the Republican right into monsters, and keep their base on the bandwagon for Obama.

      Given the expected torrent of wedge issues next year, I thought laying out some minimal ideas on points of possible joint action between and among anarchists, libertarians and Marxists might serve as guiding principles to keep us all oriented away from the deliberate distractions.

  • http://www.gonzotimes.com/ PunkJohnnyCash

    Oh, and by the way, my libertarian foundation is the non-aggression axiom. Based on what I believe I do not see much support in the LP and none from anyone in congress. I do think I agree more with a few democrats I’m a fan somewhat of Kucinich. I also like Sanders & I do like Ron Paul. I can’t stand Rand. But still I’d say I agree with only a fraction of any of those given senators.

  • Danielshays1787

    I take issue with the reduction of the work week idea. How is this anything other than state power usurping an individual’s right to work as often as he wants without state interference at the job of his choosing? I’m not a pragmatist, so utilitarian arguments don’t work here for me. If I budget my household expenses according to my projected income from my job (and I do, unlike a lot of Americans), then I don’t see how it is that you can propose the government stepping in and essentially pursuing an overreach of power that could conceivably turn my economic reality upside down.

    And what, exactly, do you mean by saying that individuals convicted of non-violent offenses should be released? I’d go in the opposite direction, to be honest. If you’re a financier or banker of any stripe who profited from the rampant mortgage fraud, and you knew or should have know what was going on, your ass ought to be in jail right now, even though your offense involved no direct physical violence to another human being. The actual cost to our working and middle class has been so severe as to equal an assault on that entire group. Their retirement savings have been demolished, their homes foreclosed, and their futures have been reduced to uncertainty. I’d support the release of anyone convicted of drug possession, but if you stole from or defrauded anyone, your ass should stay in jail.

    In regards to Jehu’s most recent comment, I’d say this…”or, the state can recognize that its interference in the economy through regulation, deregulation, and the pendulum thereof got us into this mess, along with its politicizing of mortgage issuance and its obfuscation of anything resembling a free market economy…and the state can realize that it should get the hell out of the economy altogether, cutting its role in our lives by eliminating all entitlements, most government agencies, and letting the market work. There’s a demand for jobs, but there’s no supply because the government and the Federal Reserve have locked the credit markets up so badly. Eliminate incorporation, limited liability, and other government creations like anti-trust exemptions, while cutting capital gains and corporate taxes to zero, and businesses and investment will come back to the United States. Eliminate the Federal Reserve’s role in our banking system, and allow diseased institutions to finally expire, and a lot of these bad assets will be unwound naturally as a fire sale on the open market occurs. You’ll see the return of real valuations on assets, while their artificially inflated securitized value perishes. Oh, and we’ll follow the existing law for all of those houses banks don’t hold a clear title to…because under that law, the banks can’t foreclose. Homeowners own the property outright, end of story.”

    That should set just the sort of deterrent precedent we want for future generations of financiers who think that they can get away with sloppiness and fraud in their business practices and record keeping.