The Case for Anarchy

Professor Mark Leier of the Simon Fraser University Centre for Labour Studies (in Canada) wrote a biography on Mikhail Bakunin called Bakunin: The Creative Passion. Bakunin was a Russian revolutionary who is known as the father of modern anarchism.

Charles Demers of Tyee Books interviews Leier, and they talk about the book, covering some interesting topics along the way. Most pertinently to this blog is the first question/answer, where Demers asks Leier what it's like trying to talk to people about anarchy - when most people don't know what the word means, or don't know what it means in the political context:

Charles Demers: The other day, I caught an Entertainment Tonight-like segment about the new film, Children of Men, which depicts a fascist near-future in Britain, replete with ubiquitous cops and army, refugee camps and mass deportations. The announcer -- who pronounced tyranny as 'tie-ranny' -- called it 'anarchy.' To what extent are you starting at less than zero in terms of public awareness of your subject matter?

Mark Leier: No question, the word anarchy freaks people. Yet anarchy -- rule by no one -- has always struck me as the same as democracy carried to its logical and reasonable conclusions. Of course those who rule -- bosses and politicians, capital and the state -- cannot imagine that people could rule themselves, for to admit that people can live without authority and rulers pulls out the whole underpinnings of their ideology. Once you admit that people can -- and do, today, in many spheres of their lives -- run things easier, better and more fairly than the corporation and the government can, there's no justification for the boss and the premier. I think most of us realize and understand that, in our guts, but schools, culture, the police, all the authoritarian apparatuses, tell us we need bosses, we need to be controlled "for our own good." It's not for our own good -- it's for the good of the boss, plain and simple.

The rest of the interview has some good stuff, too.

p.s. If I can ever tell the difference between the use of the words 'anarchy' vs. 'anarchism', it'll be nothing short of a miracle. So don't worry your pretty little head over it. I don't.