Arguments Against Anarchism

1. People are not interested in engaging in politics on a daily base.

Recently I read an interview with Cohn Bendit, the revolutionary activist known from the Paris revolution of 1968, who said he was no longer a supporter of a revolution because his mistake had been to presume that people are willing to involve in politics as much as direct democracy requires.

2. A planned economy is not going to work - history has proven this. (PenW)

A much heard argument, often in relation with equations of stalinism/leninism with marxism.

This argument is nonsensical, as any modern history student could tell you (especially because of the enormous technical and social changes that have happened since the mess in the USSR).

See EconomicSystems for a discussion on alternatives.

3. Anarchism sounds great in theory, but it will never work because of human nature

An even more often heard outcry against anarchism. See HumanNatureAndFreedom for a discussion of this topic

I concur on parts. However:

http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=06/09/16/2032251
http://www.bgu.ac.il/~danbaron/Docs_Dan/genocidal%20mentalities.doc

Those two articles give more fruit for thought I guess.

And the following two I could only obtain in abstract. Please inform here if those documents are found!

The Heart of the Defiant Man: Its Genius for Good and Evil
Leonidas Cheliotis
This paper attempts to trace the capacities individuals must have to resist over-regulatory and often inhumane structural pressures. It is argued that the way individuals respond to structural pressures is contingent not only upon differing temporal, spatial and power conjunctures, but also upon varying degrees of moral courage, individual reflectivity and the ensuant subjective conceptions of agentic possibilities of resistance–a tripartite set of human qualities, capacities, or dispositions that Moore (1978: 91) calls ‘iron of the soul’. It is also suggested that, despite ultimately serving given goals according to a plan that is objectively rational, acts of resistance need not
axiomatically be the outcome of genuinely conscious deliberations and scholastic ratiocinations. Instead, following Bourdieu, they may be viewed as spontaneous ripostes to social stimuli, rooted deep within an embodied practical reason. Admittedly, however, deviance from structural prescriptions is not inherently innovative, nor are struggles
against the established order intrinsically creative and positive. With reference to reflectivity, a further attempt is thus made to distinguish between what could be respectively termed empathy-induced altruistic resistance (where actors, driven by empathic emotions that lead to altruistic motivations, hold true to their chosen worldviews and
value commitments) and narcissistic resistance (e.g., professional resistance to organisational reforms with the aim to reaffirm one’s self-esteem or position as member of a union or syndicate, in front of, and in relation to, colleagues). The intention here is to stress that the emergence, yet also the benefits, of narcissistic resistance can
only be precarious, if not highly improbable. It is not simply that the occurrence of narcissistic resistance is contingent upon the existence of unconventional or recalcitrant significant others; for one’s narcissistic urge to be channelled into the avenues of a resistance pursuant to the objective needs of society, significant others must also
espouse truly progressive values and beliefs. Reflectivity, however, is not only about being able to assess the degree of artificiality or authenticity of one’s motives. It is also about being able to detect those particular structural forces that may actually facilitate the delivery of deontological, humanitarian goals. Much in accord with Hegel’s
concept of Aufhebung (or sublation), the paper concludes by arguing that progress or reform can be reached through a dialectical process of preserving positive contours of the present, whilst at the same time negating the negations that block human potentialities.
Leonidas Cheliotis is a doctoral candidate at the Institute of Criminology, University of Cambridge. He was awarded
the Manuel López-Rey Graduate Prize in Criminology for 2004. His postgraduate studies are funded by St John’s College–Cambridge University, the Economic and Social Research Council, the Cambridge European Trust and the George and Marie Vergottis Fund and the Cambridge Institute of Criminology (Manuel López-Rey Scholarship Fund). Amongst other outlets, his research work has recently appeared in Punishment & Society, Criminology & Criminal Justice, the British Journal of Criminology and the International Journal of Law and Psychiatry.

If someone is able to get that paper, I could not find it!

And also this one:

Did We Really Get Rid of Commands? Thoughts on a Theme from Elias Canetti

Andrea Brighenti1 Contact Information
(1) Andrea Brighenti, via Franz Kafka, 8, 38066 Riva del Garda, Italy

Abstract Neither in contemporary sociology nor in legal theory is much attention paid to the theoretical object of commands. This paper explores some features of commands that tend to remain largely invisible in social action, as well as largely under-theorized in the scholarly literature. The analysis draws on early reflection by Elias Canetti and tries to clarify the dynamics of the relationship between law and commands from a sociological perspective. The main claim is that command cannot be reduced to a linguistic entity, but has to be considered in the more complex frame of a direct relationship among subjects and their bodies within a shared space. Explanation of commands is made even more difficult by the fact that they take place in a space that is located ambiguously in between the realm of the subjective and that of the objective, in between passions and institutions.

Further research interests?:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crowd_psychology
http://www.gmw.rug.nl/~vdsande/

Be well!

J. Zijlstra