i am considering writing an article for my organization about the "centralization vs decentralization" argument, after hearing the praises for "decentralization for decentralization sake" a few times and not having a great comeback immediately.
I guess the argument is the same as "centralization = bad", so it sounds similar to anarchist thinking. but what's the difference between political centralization and economic centralization?
what are your thoughts? is decentralization just a rehash of anarchist idealism, but now with Technology and Blockchain petty bourgeois nonsense? should I read TNS?
I would highly recommend checking out the work of Pierre Clastres ("Primitive Economy" chapter in Archeology of Violence) who was an anthropologist who posited 'primitive society' as 'society against the state' and besides that plenty of ethnographic facts do not agree with the old Marxish idea of 'primitive communism'. Communities are self-sustaining and autonomous (this is in fact their goal, economic autonomy and political independence are the same) but also trade with their neighbors. Might also want to check out Marcel Mauss' essay on gift. Clastres speaks of a paradigm of society vs state, centrifugal vs centripetal forces. Communities and households/kin groups within communities strive for autonomy in production but do not develop their productive forces. I would say that political centralization and economic centralization are the same. The political centralization ensures a balance of debt-power towards the state, while decentralization keeps the primitive chief or leader obliged to his community. I think blockchain and all sorts of technology could be 'liberated' post-capitalism but I do not want anything to do with people who would continue with those sorts of toys and games when society is no longer a labor camp.
Matthew Sanders
where did you get that photo of bookchin?
Liam Stewart
The only correct stance to take on this issue is that it's idiotic semantics and a useless concept for politics. Is it something geographic, with the way public administration is divided within a country?
Jose Brooks
kek
Kevin Long
pretty sure thats Lenin
thanks for the recommendation. i am super interested in primitive societies, i took a class in basic anthropology and learned about basic tribal structures and how it was not undemocratic and leaders were powerless.
could you explain? i'm actually tempted to agree, i agree with Lenin in S&R that discussing what communism will look like is pointless. while that could be the theme of my article, i'd like to at least try to summarize the arguments of both sides.
Same here basically. I didn't learn about powerless leaders (or forgot) but it was extremely eye-opening, obvious why they have to keep it out of lower-age education (they need to be fully dyed in the wool first). I'm not quite a primitivist but I think the ethnography is important if we're gonna think about non-capitalist social forms for ourselves. Also it BTFO's some of the budding I'm not going to call them vulgar Marxists here who believe in THE world-historic paradigm of production.
Connor Nguyen
could you expand on this, user?
do you have any references or books in mind? like i said, i'm super curious about ""primitive"" cultures.
