Open Source Government
posted by Kevin Carson | 3:25 PM
Mutualist Blog: Free Market Anti-Capitalism
To dissolve, submerge, and cause to disappear the political or governmental system in the economic system by reducing, simplifying, decentralizing and suppressing, one after another, all the wheels of this great machine, which is called the Government or the State. --Proudhon, General Idea of the Revolution
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14 Comments:
fuck yeah
This is looking awesome so far, keep up the good work.
This looks really great. I can't wait until it is finished.
By the way, Kevin, have you seen this extreme example of Vulgar Libertarianism that is posted on LRC today?
http://www.lewrockwell.com/cooper/cooper39.1.html
David Kramer posted a follow-up on the blog that is perhaps even more vulgar:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/84037.html#more-84037
I would just like to confirm my support of Louis B's sentiment.
Thanks to all for the kind words.
Cody: Ah, yes, poor Wal-Mart. They can hang on a cross right next to BP. Re Kramer's comments, whether "the market determines the price of goods and services" in our corporatist economy is really the question at issue, so simply asserting that it does is sort of begging the question. Apparently Kramer has never considered the possibility that economically "irrational" behavior like paying people differentially based on gender or race has economic payoffs as a resulting of dividing workers among themselves and reducing their bargaining power. Oh, and I suppose the guy in the desert should be grateful to the only person who's willing to sell him a glass of water for $100.
It's one thing to say it's a shame that people are doing shitty things but that a market would punish them and that it's a necessary evil to wait for the market to do it DESPITE how shitty they are. It's another to actually praise people for how shitty they are and make fun of the people who object to it.
I really hope Kramer finds out firsthand what life is like for the "economically ignorant" folks out there. Stuff like that is a great way to relegate libertarianism to a philosophy for white middle class males clucking to themselves about how irrational all the "statist" women and minorities and poor people are.
Just steep time preference, you know. Hard to get good help these days. There goes the neighborhood.
"Stuff like that is a great way to relegate libertarianism to a philosophy for white middle class males clucking to themselves about how irrational all the "statist" women and minorities and poor people are."
When I have political conversations with people, I tend to be very reluctant to identify myself as a libertarian for precisely this reason. When most people hear the word "libertarian," they assume that I am a corporation-loving, misanthropic, Randian tool (and possibly a closet racist).
Of course, I cannot really fault people for making this assumption. Unfortunately, a lot of the prominent "libertarians" in the U.S. fit this description pretty well.
That Kramer link was nauseating. Like this lovely gem Really? SHE told her BOSS that SHE wanted a job promotion? Wow, is that how it works?
Really? Does HE not see the inequality there staring him in the face? The boss can demand whatever he wants lest you the worker be fired. When you make a demand of the boss, well, the result is usually the same. Now, given a real choice, what rational person would enter into an agreement where the other party holds 100% of the power?
Excellent to see a new book taking shape. Will you be publishing the finished version through AK Press?
Unfortunately, probably not. I'm likely to go POD again through CreateSpace, for all its faults. With my increasingly precarious job situation, I need something with a short lead time and ease of online marketing.
Despite my affection for AK Press (their 15 year sticker was the very first sticker to ever grace my laptop case), I think you are making the right move there by going POD. It's certainly in keeping with the theme of a lot of your work. Now, if the capability existed to truly self-publish, eg. to take the orders and print the books all on your own, that'd be the culmination of the Homebrew Revolution. And I'm sure the capability does exist; it's just a matter of the initial capital outlay.
Kevin, would you be willing to post your ODF files, as well as the PDFs? If I ever have any free time again, I'd like to take a crack at doing a bit of editing, and also getting an ebook version started.
Steve: I can send you some file attachments next time I'm in a place where they'll upload quickly.
The main reason I posted pdfs is that clicking "export as pdf" and then updating the Dropbox link is about the fastest and lowest hassle option for periodically updating the online text. I've tried linking to textfiles via Dropbox, but it didn't work.
I'm currently reading this draft, (just finished chapter 2) and finding it truly excellent, one of the best things I've read in a long time. The explanation of Stigmergy really clarified for me how networked groups work. Also, I was unfamiliar with the information of the US military, great stuff.
For me the book sits in context with Clay Shirky's books, Kevin Kelly's "What Technology Wants", Cory Doctorow's stuff, but pushes a lot further down the path of "and now shit gets serious". Thank you!
Do you have or have you considered something like a kickstarter project to help get this to completion? I couldn't be arsed buying a copy of a book, but I'd be more than happy to contribute to the writing of it, to at least the same dollar level and probably more, and I expect I'm not the only one.
Wow! Thanks a lot, Emlyn. Kickstarter's definitely among the things I need to consider as ways to support my writing.
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