I made an attack on the Head of State because he is responsible for all the pale-cold and bleeding victims of the system that he represents and defends. Gaetano Bresci.

Simona Macellari
Nov 3 · 15 min read

The term Anarchy, which has always been subject to improper use, was introduced, for the first time with a propositional meaning, by the French philosopher Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809–1865) to connote his anti-authoritarian and libertarian thinking. “Anarchy” (etymologically: “absence of government”) comes from the ancient Greek αν-αρχία [an-arkhia]. This term has taken on a multifaceted theoretical path which, in the context in a mapping of ideas in the contemporary world, positions itself at the extremes of both socialism and liberalism, emphasizing the postulates of both those political cultures.

And so, in the course of almost two centuries, anarchism has qualified itself as the only political and social trend irreducibly aligned against the State and against power, in favour of equality but also of freedom.

The reason for this is that, according to the highly cited Bakunin aphorism, “…we are convinced that freedom without Socialism is privilege and injustice, and that Socialism without freedom is slavery and brutality”. This standpoint has, obviously, made the anarchist movement eternally unsuited to any party that has become autonomously communist throughout the 20th century.

Anarchism does not have a codified doctrine, a linear process of development, a solid “school of thought”. There is no degree course in anarchy theories, there is no other way than to study in order to give voice to the greatest of truths: man must be free.

Therefore, in order to define the evolution of anarchist thought, it is necessary to point out the contributions and distinctions of at least its most important historical exponents. In addition to the aforementioned Proudhon, famous for his essay Qu’est-ce que la propriété? (1840) opposing the ownership of large amounts of land and capitalists, but in favour of that of small farmers and craftsmen, the traditional reference figures, the most famous thinkers internationally were: the Englishman William Godwin (1756–1836), considered the main precursor; the Russians Mikhail Bakunin (1814–1876) and Peter Kropotkin (1842–1921). In reality, anarchy has a very branched, rich and cosmopolitan genetic code, from which, among other examples, they can be identified: the German Max Stirner (1806–1856), mathematician and promoter of individualist currents; the Italian revolutionary Errico Malatesta (1853–1932); the American anarchic-feminist Emma Goldman (1869–1940); the social ecologist Murray Bookchin (1921–2006), the greatest theorist of contemporary libertarian municipalism; but also the great antimilitarist pacifist writer Lev Tolstoy, as well as men of thought and action such as the Ukrainian Nestor Makhno and the Spanish Buenaventura Durruti, authentic military strategists and advocates of the rebellious approach, distinguished exponents of Jewish culture such as Gustav Landauer and Martin Buber, proponents of a social anarchism; up to the proto-anarchists, the English Diggers and the libertarian precursors of the French Revolution, and finally to the extraordinary self-management initiative of the Paris Commune.

At the end of the nineteenth century, somewhat like today, the mere mention of the word “anarchy” aroused terror and outrage among the bourgeoisie. Convinced that they were facing a criminal and inhuman ideology, to be fought and demonized before becoming its victims, the ruling classes of the world contributed in a certain way, with their phobias, their ignorance and by preparing boundless repressive and a priori police measures, to nurture the myth among the lower classes. This phenomenon is absolutely comparable, in intensity if not in duration, to that of the fear of “Communism”, which then spanned almost the entire twentieth century, and which still echoes in the depths of sovereignty. Not surprisingly, however, even the socialist and social-democratic movements themselves have historically collaborated in the “banishment” of anarchist theories, despite the common past of totalitarian harassment.

Anarchism has always been surrounded by a romanticized aura, but absolutely alien to political activity, in the twentieth century: Gaetano Bresci, Sacco and Vanzetti, the picturesque beards, the stereotypical bombers, the audacious tyrannicides, the epoch of the Spanish war and the international brigades, the subversive songs of quarrymen and miners united in the fight against the exploiting master, the black flags on the barricades of the French May, the youthful mottos, so full of idealism and so ineffective in moving, as well as the innocent people flying through the windows of the police headquarters.

More recently, the idea of anarchy presented to the collective imagination has resulted in media images of an aggressive and angry protest against the World Bank or the International Monetary Fund, the devastation of cash registers and black blocks. Until today, the arrival on the Web, the natural evolution and new battlefield of the struggle against power and control.

This representation of eternal volatility, almost of little effect, but accompanied by the association Anarchy=bombs is certainly a partial and simplistic view. In fact, libertarian thought and practices have outlined, in the course of history, paths and approaches that are egalitarian and supportive, aimed at the autonomous and bottom-up re-appropriation of social control, resolutely opposed to any form of domination. To “change the world without taking power” as the slogans of the movements inspired by Zapatista say today. And the Internet is today its clearest expression. To be clear: if anarchists have historically been accused of violence, it should also be contextualised.

On the relation between anarchism and violence, we quote the historian George Woodcock:

On closer inspection, the acceptance of violence by anarchists was largely due to their loyalty to traditions of violent popular action in the name of freedom, which they shared with other movements and groups of their time, such as the Jacobins, the Marxists, the Blanquists, the Mazziniani. the Garibaldini. There were, undoubtedly, specific situations, especially in Spain, Italy and Russia, countries where violence had long been endemic in political life and where anarchists, like other political groups, accepted the use of armed insurrection almost as a routine. However, among the celebrities of anarchist history, the heroes of violent action are in a clear minority compared to the paladins of speech.

For Landauer, for example, the State is not an institution that can be broken down by a simple revolutionary action. It is rather a “condition”, in other words, a particular and deleterious relationship between humans that can be annihilated only by adopting new types of alternative relations.

“Anarchy”, therefore, is a pluralist archetype and, despite the common and indispensable assumptions, the ideas and forms of organization that are reflected in it are diverse. A useful and synthetic map of anarchism is drawn by the pedagogue Francesco Codello, who points out that the various trends identified are almost always intertwined and contaminated with each other. Here are the names: anarcho-communism; propaganda of the deed, insurrectionalism; platformism; anarchist individualism; Tolstoyism, Christian and religious anarchism; libertarian educationism; anarcho-primitivism; anarcho-syndicalism; anarcho-feminism; anarcho-capitalism; contemporary youth movements; participatory economics; post-anarchism.

A first anticipation of the anarchist capitalist ideas is present in the thought of the Scottish liberal economists of the 18th century and, above all, of those French polemicists such as Bastiat (1801–1850) and Molinari (1819–1912) who, in mid-nineteenth century France, had strenuously defended the society of laissez-faire. Their option in favour of the market was so clear that it laid the foundations for further increasingly radical developments.

In the writings of Gustave de Molinari, there is a clear anticipation of that denial of the modern state that is at the heart of the new American libertarianism. It is sufficient to read a brief essay of 1849, De la production de la sécurité, to note that the premise from which the scholar springs relies on the idea that in a private and competitive market every asset (or service) is available at a better quality and at a lower price than what is the case under the monopoly regime.

It is not clear why, the economist adds, what is true for the production of wheat or medical care should no longer be true when dealing with the protection of the person and his/her assets from possible threats by malicious individuals. In clear and correct language, Molinari proposes the dissolution of politics in economics, that is, a Utopian society in which coercion gives way to private contracts, a political obligation to free association.

While the classic liberals had always considered law and security, justice and defence as areas that by their nature were taken away from the market and competition, Molinari breaks the fourth wall and announces a utopia of a society entirely liberal.

A theory evolved by one of the fathers of today’s anarchic capitalism, Murray N. Rothbard (1926–1995), inspirer of the state theory as “Criminal Band”.

Rothbard’s vision was well represented by a quote from Franz Oppenheimer, who had identified two ways to acquire wealth. The economic means to well-being consists in its enrichment through the voluntary exchange: creating some good or service for which other people willingly pay.

The political means, Oppenheimer said, consists “in the misappropriation of the work of others”. On this basis, Rothbard no longer places the state as the indispensable provider of law and order, or security, or other so-called “public goods”.

The State is therefore perceived and regarded as a parasitic institution that lives on the shoulders of its subjects, hiding its anti-social and predatory nature under a layer of public interests.

As Oppenheimer said, it is the organization of the political medium for the attainment of wealth. “The state is that organization in society which attempts to maintain a monopoly of the use of force and violence in a given territorial area; in particular, it is the only organization in society that obtains its revenue, not by voluntary contribution or payment for services rendered but by coercion”.

While other individuals or institutions obtain their income through the production of goods and services and through the peaceful and voluntary sale of such goods and services to others, the State obtains its income through coercion; that is, through the use and threat of imprisonment and weapons. Having used force and violence to obtain its revenues, the State generally continues to regulate and dictate other actions of its citizens as well.

The State provides a legal, orderly, systematic channel for the plundering of private property; it makes the continuation of parasitic caste within society certain, safe and relatively “peaceful”, and since production must always precede plundering, the free market precedes the State.

The State has never been created through a “social contract”; it has always been born through conquests and exploitation.

The top 1% of the top 1%. The guys that play God without permission… quote Elliot Mr Robot

Overcoming this oppression entails the transition from a monopolistic and coercive bureaucratic structure, where all the functions exercised today by the State, including education, the care of the sick, the construction of roads, the minting of coins, assistance to the poor, and even police and judicial functions, can be carried out, in an infinitely more moral and efficient way, by private agencies in competition with each other, through voluntary contracts stipulated with users and consumers, monitored by private courts of arbitration in a free market.

In such a society, therefore, there is no public sphere, no politics, no coercion. All relations between individuals are based exclusively on a contractual and voluntary basis.

Rothbard argues: “Unlike other currents of thought, whether left-wing or right-wing, we refuse to recognize the legal right of the state to do what would be considered illegal, immoral or criminal if done by someone else. Taxes, military service, war, are intolerable forms of violence by which some privileged groups impose on others their conception of the world. What we defend is the inalienable and fundamental right of everyone to protection from any form of external aggression, whether it comes from private individuals or from the State”.

These considerations should also sufficiently demonstrate the unfairness of the accusations made by left-wing anarchists against liberal anarchists that they are reactionary or “little concerned about freedoms other than those of capitalism”.

In fact, the opinion of Noam Chomsky, authoritative linguist and contemporary thinker, as well as militant anarchist, is in this sense very explicit: “Anarcho-capitalism, in my opinion, is a doctrinal system which, if ever implemented, would lead to forms of tyranny and oppression that have few counterparts in human history …”.

The extremisation of Rothbard’s ideas will lead to the development of a new anarchist current: agorism, the father of which and the top exponent is Edward Konkin III (who died in 2004). In his “The theory of the Agorist class” he theorizes the ideal solution to achieve a society where all relations between people are structured as voluntary exchanges resulting in a real free market.

The term derives from the Greek word “agora”, the square open to free trade, assemblies and the market in the Greek city-states.

The fundamental characteristic of agorism, which distinguishes it from other pro-market anarchist strands, is the path chosen to arrive at a free society. This road is called counter-economics, and consists in the natural passage of trade from regulated and taxed markets, to deregulated and untaxed markets, or the so-called “black” and “grey” markets.

Konkin argued that “Coherence for a libertarian does not mean abstraction, it does not mean the non-contradiction of a philosophy, but the coherence of theory with reality, of ideology and practice, of what should be done and what is being done. Conforming to laws and procedures is necessary for the political process; psychology is in tune with parliamentarianism, procedure and compromise, coalitions and betrayals, handshakes and backstabbing, intoxication for the ephemeral and approval of others rather than for one’s own personal achievement. This is how those who seek success through the State live”.

However, by directly pursuing free-market anarchy through counter-economics, psychology is in tune with the calculation of supply and demand, risk-taking, trading with people with similar interests, and therefore intrinsically reliable, and satisfaction with personal results (profits) or self-correction of the errors that led to losses. This is how a person can successfully organize themselves how to operate in the marketplace.

Coherence, or counter-economics, libertarian and agorist, does not suffer from any of the frustrations that derive from the contradictions of libertarian politics, thus party-dominated politics. The State loses something from every free transaction, committed in violation or evasion of its laws, regulations, and taxes; while it gains from every acceptance of, and payment to, its institutions. This is how agorism creates anarchy, and the party politics preserves the state.

According to another noble father of the anarchist capitalist doctrine, the Canadian economist Lemieux, the libertarian thought of the anarchist-capitalists “presents itself as the limit and the marriage of two doctrines: the freedom of anarchism extends to the economy and the capitalist freedom invades the social and basic conditions of life in society”. In other words, it is a conjunction of anarchism and capitalism.

Lemieux is also the flag bearer, in this case, the term has never been more correct, of the legislative battle for the legal possession of national flags.

“The flag is an international trademark of the Canadian government. It is used to identify federal institutions and is protected by the Trademark Act”. Words of Jan Ovens, an official in the Canadian Treasury to Pat Hagen, responsible for Canada at Forces, an international association that defends the rights of smokers, guilty of displaying the red and white flag on the homepage of the Canadian branch.

Lemieux, when he heard about it, immediately reported himself to the Treasury for violating trademark law. He wrote to Ovens to draw his attention to his website, where the Canadian banner is clearly visible, and specified that he had no intention of eliminating it.

He also urged him to take legal action against him. “This, he wrote, would give you a unique opportunity to publicly explain to Canadians that the Canadian flag is your flag and that I cannot use your symbols of oppression to express my views against you”.

The relationship between equality and freedom, the fight against all forms of exploitation and the overcoming of capitalism without passing through state socialism, still remain insurmountable limitations. The struggle for the freedom of the Internet, the last frontier of uncontrolled expression, joins these pivotal points today.

Errico Malatesta writes on this subject: “We want to radically abolish the domination and exploitation of humans over humans; we want people, driven by conscious and deliberate solidarity, to cooperate voluntarily for the well-being of all; we want society to be constituted in order to provide all human beings with the means to achieve the same possible well-being, the maximum possible moral and material development; we want food, freedom, love and science for all”.

The link between science, technology and anarchy is addressed in a visionary way by Orwell in 1984. In a society divided into three (Inner Party, Outer Party and the proles (the proletariat), which are the absolute majority) power is controlled by Big Brother through the telescreens, present in every public place, in every house, in every room where a member of the party can be found, and able to both transmit and receive. In a system where the only crime is the thought crime, the word is the weapon. Orwell’s passionate criticism of Ingsoc, the name of the doctrine dominant in the book and clearly inspired by totalitarian regimes, joins the absolute condemnation of domination over technology, no longer intended as cultural enrichment but as a means of war and oppression.

How far is today’s society from the one feared in 1949 by the socialist Orwell? A world divided into three was theorized, with almost total control by capital/State of the means of production and communication.

Has it ever happened to you to speak, for example, of the massacre of albinos for witchcraft reasons in Africa, and, opening a social network a few hours later, find as a post recommending a report on this subject?

Surely so. What’s the difference between the screen that monitors Winston’s life (without him knowing when or for how long) and the smartphone that spies on us to offer us a vacation?

There are at least four of them: as mentioned, Winston doesn’t know when or how much the screen is actually spying on him, while we are always being watched. The screen is everywhere, but it’s not portable. Winston is in danger of being accused of thought crime and consequently of being physically eliminated, but we are not. Winston still has money, not traceable. And with that, he buys his freedom, which cost him his life, through the diary made of paper.

The development of the individual-money-state relationship could not but be a fundamental argument in the evolution of anarchist theory.

In his 1988 “Crypto Anarchist Manifesto”, Timothy C. May introduced the basic principles of crypto-anarchism, encrypted exchanges that guarantee total anonymity, total freedom of speech and total freedom of exchange — obviously opposed by states, because it is an instrument that strongly delimits the role of the state, as we were taught in history books.

May, introduced a fundamental step, financial freedom and total freedom of exchange, anticipating the need to develop a language of value, over the open Internet protocol, that could ensure these freedoms.

Bitcoin was the cultural response to Timothy C. May’s manifesto before becoming monetary policy, store of value and technology.

Technology is manmade strings of code and the developers’ way of speaking.

“Technology is neutral by design. It’s all in whether you use it for good or evil.”

Bitcoin originates with an anarchic DNA and it is an animal of anonymity. Satoshi’s anonymity is symbolic of this. Bitcoin is ideologically and culturally designed to function outside the regulatory systems decided by the states, and technology has only forged it to pursue these goals.

It is not and can never be a cog in the central powers. The ANARCHICAL DNA is based on consensus. Who has power over the Bitcoin protocol? No one, only consensus, neither the miners nor the nodes can impose their own will or their own personal agenda.

It’s a system that “magically” and slowly aligns — thanks to John Nash’s game theory on which it relies. And, if there are strong, unresolvable differences, one has the freedom to abandon it to create something different ( #hard fork”, as in the case of Bitcoin Cash or Litecoin).

Bitcoin evolves and develops its immune system because THE COMMUNITY in its essence, shares the DNA of bitcoin and believes, like me, that the core aspects are preserving their privacy, being free to exchange value without third parties having to be guarantors of the trust between the parties and having the reputation and stamina to fight to make it happen.

The news that Russia is close to the launch of its national network, disconnected from the WWW and therefore fully controllable vertically, makes the filters imposed by States such as China and the UAE look like trivial censorship. The spasmodic need for power to control all forms of communication is sold as “security”, and in the name of this alleged guarantee, every voice against censorship becomes that of a dangerous subversive, or worse, an anarchist. Anonymity becomes the new frontier of personal freedom, the next bulwark to defend against government interference from organized crime. It is no coincidence that there are increasing violations against health care institutions, with the relative loss of the sensitive data of millions of patients.

Aware of this, and of how the Internet protocol has become a tool of mass monitoring, thanks to the development of metadata and artificial intelligence, as well as a means to influence minds, various anarchist currents have generated Crypto-anarchism, — κρυπτός kruptós, “hidden” or “secret”, a movement that uses information technology and cryptography not only to escape persecution but above all to protect values, which should be the inviolable rights of humanity, namely privacy, political freedom and economic freedom.

By dissociating the identity of users from their words or code, one avoids censorship — ex-ante or ex-post. Related identities voluntarily create new laws or, to be more precise, modes of social and decision-making management, also through the use of smart contracts. In this different situation, which is not without rules but shared ones, the determining factor is not the hierarchical structure, but the reputation — what today we would call skin in the game — meritocratic asset, which is recognized by our peers, and the decisions and actions are made according to the rule of consensus, very slowly and with care.


SPECIAL THANKS Giacomo for making me think of my WHY I am into Bitcoin, Devid Jegerson for the discovery , Gabriele Domenichini for patiently helping me in grasping the beauty of some advanced technology Claudio Levrini for mitigate my fierce passion while sharing the same DNA Francis Pouliot for being the devil advocate and always available . IT IS GOOD TO BE US

Simona Macellari

Written by

microslicer @ bhb.network libertarian, bitcoin maximalist and cypherpunk believer. Skin in the game is a mantra.

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