>Date: Fri, 27 Apr 2001 11:17:13 EDT
>From: LeoCasey at aol.com
>Subject: Anarchism and Democratic Principles of Majority Rule and Minority
>Rights
>It seems to me that, as a body of political philosophy, anarchism does not=20
>recognize the democratic principle that the majority has a right to govern.=20
>It accepts liberal principles of individual rights, and thus, minority=20
>rights, but not the right of the majority to make laws.
As I said here in Ireland the majority decided that no women should have access to abortion in any circumstance. The courts then expanded this to prevent people providing 'abortion information' for women who wanted to travel to Britain for an abortion. In 1992 the courts took it a step further and attempted to injunct a 14 year old rape victim who wanted to travel to Britian for an abortion. (Known as the 'X' case).
Now to my mind either you oppose those of us who defied the majority in those years by _breaking their law_ and remian consitent with this idea of majority rule _or_ you say there are things that can over ride the idea of majority rule. Once you say that we enter a discussion of what those circumstances are.
There are _some_ anarchists who would attempt to argue that their should never be a majority decision that is binding on the minority . I'm not among them and most @ organisations I'm familar with use majority votes (sometimes as a last resort) within their organisation. If you read any of the classical anarchist texts you will find a huge quantity of discussion around these questions.
Broadly I think the real difference is that anarchists tend to avoid majority decisions and concentrate on the protection of minority rights whereas most other political movements avoid this issue.
>Date: Fri, 27 Apr 2001 11:21:11 -0400
>From: "Nathan Newman" <nathan at newman.org>
>No, I don't really count the Bolsheviks as socialists because they had
>little respect for democracy, except as opportunists.
Wow, something we can agree on
>Which is a case where the exception swallows the rule. And even in such
>cases, if the law has no meaning, then anti-racism or anti-sexism has little
>meaning, since much of it operates outside the law itself. Racists and
>sexists themselves have historically been the ones arguing against the
>majority binding them- whether in the name of "states rights", "private
>association" or "free contract."
I think your talking of your USA experience Nathan, the US is not the world. Here in southern Ireland the Catholic church had an unoffical veto over state policy into the 1970's and until the late 1980's and huge numbers of people actually voted the way their priest directed them on 'moral' issues. Our reality was that the church used this majority power to ban contraception (overturned 1986), abortion (still the case), divorce(overturned 1995 by a 50.5% to 49.5% referendum). Likewise gay sex was severly criminalised until the mid 1990's and if you go further back women were forced to resign public sector jobs when they got married (overturned early 1970's). The situation where the 'sexists are in power' is also the case of course in all North African countries today and large regions elsewhere in the world.
>Of course, majority rule in mass action is always more complicated. But
>your argument that a mass assembly makes things clearer ignores any idea of
>representative democracy, where those without the resources to be present
>might deserve a voice through their reps.
Surely Nathan you are aware anarchists think 'representative democracy' is a con except where the representatives are subject to mandate and recall on the issues they are supposadely representing on.
> But most of the anarchists who show up
>represent no one but themselves and are still not a majority of
>participants. Yet they still don't respect the (more) democratically agreed
>to tactics of the majority.
There are two issues here
1. When you say "(more) democratically agreed to tactics of the majority" you are making a big assumption that this 'majority' has in some way discussed the issue and found a way of making its opinions clear. I don't see this. What I see is a few self appointed leaders telling us they represent the 'majority'. With the exception of the union leaders most of these people aren't in any sense elected and the union leaders were not elected on the basis of what tactics were to be used at these sort of protests. Indeed in most cases they were elected before Seattle. So I see no reason to accept that they represent anyone on this issue
Looking at the reports from Quebec it is alsoo quite clear that large numbers of union members (particularly from CAW) choose to break away from the non-confrontational march and head to the fence. Others complained (somewhat naievely in my view) that the union leaders led them to an isolated stadium rather then the fence.
2. Even if this majority can be said to exist can it dictate what should happen in every corner of a city at one of these events? I think if it _clearly_ exists then the anarchists and other activists who want to confront the system have an obligation to make sure they are clearly seperated from the 'majority' both geographically and organisationally. Which is of course what happened anyway in Quebec and to a lesser extent in Prague.
As I said in my previous post the issue of confrontation if an issue around which a much bigger political debate (the question of majority rule and decision making) is happeneing.
Andrew
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