Post
Topic
Board Politics & Society
Re: If Anarchy can work, how come there are no historical records of it working?
by
Biomech
on 01/06/2013, 01:09:49 UTC
You, your source material, Rudy, and Ron don't, according to me, get to to exclusively decide how an agenda driven 'standard english' works.
Nor was I trying to. "freedom" has a meaning, agreed up on for many, many years:
Quote
free·dom 
/ˈfrēdəm/
Noun
  • The power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint.
  • Absence of subjection to foreign domination or despotic government.
This can be "distilled" down to a very simple phrase: "absence of coercion."

Quote
an·ar·chy 
/ˈanərkē/
Noun
Absence of government and absolute freedom of the individual, regarded as a political ideal.

Quote
cap·i·tal·ism 
/ˈkapətlˌizəm/
Noun
An economic and political system in which a country's trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit.
These meanings do not sufficiently convey the depth of the subject matter they are intended to encapsulate and limit.
Then you're trying to cram too much meaning into the word. This is why new words are created, to hold the excess meaning, when the old word is insufficient to convey the concept. Or clarifying words can be added, for instance, your concept of "capitalism" is more properly "State capitalism" and edges into the "new" words "corporatism" or "fascism."

"Anarcho-capitalism" is much easier to write than "free market anarchy with strong individual property rights," but it conveys the same meaning, because capitalism is a free market system, with strong property rights, and adding "anarcho-" to that indicates that indicates that it is an anarchy, and thus all rights are held by the individual..
I agree with this. For a while on YouTube I used the term market anarchist, but it doesn't convey the meaning nearly as well. Besides, I got tired of trying to please people rather than making my point.

But back to the title question, there have been several anarchic or nearly such societies in history. Three I can think of off the top of my head. Medieval Iceland and Ireland, and surprisingly, given my experience living here, Pennsylvania prior to the establishment of the Commonwealth.

However, lack of full historical precedent is a pretty weak argument as to whether or not it should be tried. I am on a mobile device @ the moment, but when I have a proper keyboard I am going to start a thread on that very subject.