> Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com>
>> And doesn't this take 100% consensus? In a crowd of 1000, all you
>> need is one wiseguy to cause trouble. Suppose you have a crowd of 300
>> who don't agree with the other 700? This model of anarchism sounds
>> like a fantasy of perfect transparency and harmony - a completely
>> impossible fantasy.
>
> If I may translate your argument, I think it can be stated
> more simply as "There will be sociopaths, and we need a
> government to control them." (I take it you are not talking
> about simple disagreements and misunderstandings, for which
> there are obivously other possibilities of resolution than
> government force.)
Forgive the interjection, but the problem seems to have less to do with sociopaths than with people who disagree with each other irresolvably. The argument thus looses something crucial in the translation. Moreover, even if your gloss was acceptable, your implication would hardly be less alarming. Seen from one perspective, the characterisation of criminals or people who don't feel like accepting consensus as sociopaths seems to be quite a dangerous one.
I have a lot of time for anarchist arguments, but this appears to me to be a particularly weak spot in the doctrine. Without wanting to sound to acerbic, I have felt that anarchists often pursue consensus at the price of ostracising potential dissenters; casting the psychiatric net over them seems like another step backwards.
Thiago
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