I find very confusing to discuss anarchy as the opposite of hierarchy, since political Anarchy is an extremely hierarchical system of government. For example, here is a description of the social organization of CNT-ruled Catalonian villages:<p>> "The committee is the paterfamilias. It owns everything; it directs everything. Every special desire has to be submitted to it for consideration; it alone has the final say."<p>> "With the abolition of money, the collective held the upper hand since anyone wishing to travel had to get 'republican' money from the committee."<p>Hierarchy is not the opposite of anarchy, but of self-organization. To reject hierarchy is to be able to act independently, not to replace the manager with a committee.
One good uni friend of mine was an avid anarchist. We spent countless hours with him pitching Kropotkin and texts like the above (this was pre-Youtube). Then I had a chance to work for him: he still had anarchism thing going but was ruling his subordinates with steel grip and very much hierarchical way. Much later when I checked him on LinkedIn he was rising through Product Manager ranks on FB.
In human groups, hierarchy is inevitable due to human nature (we're social apes). Attempts to create hierarchy-free social settings only result in creating systems in which the dominant social hierarchy is implicit, unstated, officially unrecognized... and therefore impossible to regulate.<p><a href="https://www.jofreeman.com/joreen/tyranny.htm" rel="nofollow">https://www.jofreeman.com/joreen/tyranny.htm</a>
This is a just-so story without any empirical evidence.<p>The model of hierarchy is too simplistic. If you zoom in on the nodes you will see a more complex structure. It's not just one person but a host of people, operating in a semi-formal somewhat also anarchic structure. At every level of the hierarchy there is ample backup that will keep the system from collapsing.<p>Then there is also the dimension of efficiency that is completely missing from the discussion. Hierarchical systems might be more fragile but also much more efficient.
Ironically, but not surprisingly, in describing his alternative to hierarchy, the video essentially re-invents hierarchy. Anarchy is so fragile that even in a thought experiment by an anarchist, it can't even last 20 minutes.
Anarchy no matter what seems to still lead into hierarchy. Even if it ends up wherein land owners are top of hierarchy and everyone else is below.<p>But then there's the land owners who own enough land that they become the government. They have a security force. They have a sheriff. I think this is what people are dreaming about being when they want anarchy.
"Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear."<p>Excerpt from Nemik's manifesto from the excellent Andor <a href="https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/The_Trail_of_Political_Consciousness" rel="nofollow">https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/The_Trail_of_Political_Cons...</a>
I guess I don't know what antifragile means since Chaz took just a few minutes to descend into murderous chaos ruled by the guy with the biggest gun
Anarchy also has much lower baseline density. You can have anarchy between tribes in the Amazon or Far North, but not in a metropolis.<p>Be wary that many proponents of Anarchy may be the criminally inclined types, so they don't actually have any magical trick to make anarchy non-violent - it's just OK for them to live in violent society because they'll be on top. Think Makhno band.
For whatever reason, the anarchists I've known are generally all "anarcho-communists" and trans or trans-adjacent. Weird situation cause they'll say how they hate rulers but what they propose seems to be where they don't really get rid of "bosses", but instead empower every busybody around you to treat you like they were your boss. The hierarchy is much more insidious than any capitalist dystopia they describe, in my opinion.