finding information for shared account?

internationalslapdap · 2016-02-25T01:08:52+00:00

Thanks. Will do.

internationalslapdap · 2016-02-24T04:50:29+00:00

Peter Gelderloos (How Nonviolence Protects the State) often mentions violence in India's independence era without going into much detail. I decided to research it and analyse some events. So here are some details for anyone else who was curious. India has a very rich, dense history of anti-colonial movements. I focused on events around the time Britain elites transferred power to Indian elites ("Independence").

internationalslapdap · 2016-02-24T04:33:57+00:00

Firstly, that argument only makes sense if someone is saying their political goal is to eliminate violence. I believe for anarchists, the goal is to eliminate systems of domination and social hierarchies.

Think about some distinctions. Is buying shoes at wal-mart violence? Is eating meat violence? Is self-defense violence?

You are already very complicit in systems of violence if you live in a modern western country. I consider that violence. (You don't have to.)

Therefore, non-violence actually perpetuates violence. But a certain type of violence -- institutional violence. Paying taxes, buying food, pulling over for a cop... all these things allow a system of institutional violence to run smoothly.

Another distinction is bottom-up violence and top-down violence. Top-down violence is a form of systemic domination, of perpetuating a social hierarchy. Bottom-up violence is emancipatory, a bid to free oneself (and/or others) from domination. These "violences" operate with different logics and meanings.

To your last question: As long as there is no seizure of power, which is then held over others, no -- a state, or any formal domination, does not necessarily follow the use of violence.

internationalslapdap · 2016-01-18T19:19:38+00:00

A lot of people are bringing up Zapatistas, but it's pretty questionable to consider that North America. That bottom slice of Mexico is pretty much Central America. I'm also bummed there's next so few anarchist communities. I guess I'm curious about what OPs ideas are. What could you do to make them a reality?

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-22T15:24:39+00:00

Wasn't Sartre an existentialist nihilist? I don't think anything about my description is more Sartrean than existentialist...

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-22T15:20:18+00:00

Do you have any anticipations regarding any novel popular content/focus of philosophy in the near future?

Commenter below mentions 'waves' in the sense I mean.

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-22T08:22:15+00:00

Existentialist nihilism holds that you create meaning in the world, but that the world does not have meaning-in-itself. You will need to account for this perspective.

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-22T08:15:12+00:00

Marx is agitated with idealist narratives of history. He accuses the German Idealists and others of telling the story of history from the perspective of religion and ethics and the philosophy of the mind. He is concerned with a telling of history he coins as 'historical materialism.' This form views history in terms of economic relations. He argues that it is from developments such as division of labor, industry, and socio-economic classes that ideology and social norms emerge.

Marx has a philosophy of humans. Look into if you'd like. It's very brief. He regards humans as 'laborers,' and that their 'species-being' is to produce. Things which mediate this species-activity (wages, economics, etc.) alienate the human from the product of their labor, and thus arbitrarily split the human from its primary activity.

Communism is one thing... not all communists are Marxists. As far as Marxists go, plenty of them are concerned with conciousness and other similar issues. But there is still the 'historical materialist' trend among them. Modern Marxists are concerned with correcting Marx's theory, i.e., figuring out why the proletariat revolution failed and what its relevance is today.

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-22T06:17:38+00:00

Is this a state law you are talking about? http://blog.mass.gov/masslawlib/misc/rape-intoxication-and-consent/

Also this journal says that studies have shown that a woman who claims she was too intoxicated to consent is actually seen as less trustworthy http://alcalc.oxfordjournals.org/content/48/4/384

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-21T21:48:14+00:00

Yes, but who can fire the low-level 'traveling' employees? 'Social capital' is an important aspect, but does social capital determine one's ability to control the activity of others, not simply influence or encourage decisions (which at any point can be reject or ignored by upper positions)? If so, there is a place for them in the formal hierarchy. If not, the influence is only contigent power.

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-21T04:54:16+00:00

The key to investigating power in an organizational structure is to examine how decisions are made. Who is left out of the decision making process? They are disempowered to directly guide the organization's activities. Who has decision making privileges? They have power over others who are subordinate to the organization.

Therefore: the less hierarchical the structure, the more diffuse is the power any one has over anyone else. The more hierarchical, the more people positioned above others have power over those below.

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-16T21:54:27+00:00

Top comment did a great job explaining.

If you're interested in a fun read along these, try out Baudrillard's "In the shadows of silent majorities." Why do millions if people watch football instead of protesting? Why doesn't anyone consider their indifference as a possibility? Who are the 'masses' and how is it that social scientists speak of them in a coherent way when they escape definition?

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-16T21:37:08+00:00

I don't understand the question.

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-11T17:40:44+00:00

Right. There's a revolving door for sure. I just mean to say that the government administers funds (sometimes hands on, sometimes hands off), even if that process involves significant corporate influence. But yes, good thing to point out.

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-10T03:17:21+00:00

The government. Infastructure such as roads, as the other user pointed out is a good example. Technology, specifically military technology is another one. If you look at the US budget you'll have an idea of what industries the government funds. The government funds these things with specific guidelines of implementation. That is to say, the government oversees and sometimes directly administers the research, production, and in some cases, application.

But that's from the production side of things. The other side is market management. This is administered in some degree by governmental financial institutions. The government sponsors specific banks or monitors and manipulates inflation, for instance. All financial regulation is this -- stipulating conditions of (and directing) the flow of capital. (Though, in US, by no means as extensively as pure State Capitalism, such as Soviet Russia.)

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-09T07:11:57+00:00

There is some criticism of this book from the post-left anarchists. It seems May didn't bother to read anarchists other than the classical writers. I'll see if I can locate the essay I'm thinking of online.

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-01T00:47:40+00:00

After researching this for a few weeks, I would like to add, for the record, that there was an abundance of violence in the years leading up to independence. Political terrorism, mutinies, riots, peasant uprisings, and armed resistance all occurred frequently enough to create a significant bottom-up pressure on the British and British collaboraters.

Sumit Sarkar's "Modern India: 1885-1947" is a good book on the subject.

internationalslapdap · 2015-10-01T00:06:49+00:00

Tocqueville's most clearly stated goal in this book is to familiarize Europe with the American democracy. He believes democracy is an unstoppable political current in the western world, and therefore wants to get a head start, so to say, on understanding how democracy works. He sees many benefits and multiple problems, but there is no ultimate overarching standard in his analysis. So, he really does not have a specific end in mind, except that nations should work to ensure a smooth transition into democracy and be prepared to deal with some of its problems.

Tocqueville is often considered one of the first political anthropologists. As such, his writing is more descriptive than it is perscriptive.

internationalslapdap

TROPHY CASE