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Home , Distributism, Dorothy Day, Lysander Spooner, Voluntary society

Anarcho-: The Third Type of By W. J. Whitman

“I wanted, though I did not know it then, a synthesis.” —Dorothy Day1

Libertarian & Anarcho- We are constantly bombarded by the worthless dialectic of the political processes of Liberal . We are given false dichotomies of left-wing vs. right-wing, liberal vs. conservative, libertarian socialist vs. anarcho-capitalist. These dichotomies are largely fictitious. We must transcend this dialectic and come to some sort of synthesis. There is no necessary contradiction between the radical “left-wing” and the radical “right-wing.” There is no fundamental disagreement between and anarcho-capitalism. There is only an apparent contradiction due to a discontinuity of vocabulary—i.e. the same terms are being used by different people to mean different things. When the anarcho-capitalists condemn “socialism,” they are referring to -socialism of the Marxian-type. The libertarian socialists do not advocate any such “socialism.” When libertarian socialists criticize “capitalism,” they are referring to state-capitalism of the and John Maynard Keynes variety. The anarcho-capitalists do not advocate any such “capitalism.” In fact, the anarcho-capitalist ideas of , Friedman, and Hans- Hermann Hoppe are greatly influenced by the ideas of libertarian socialists such as , Pierre- Proudhon, and . Both anarcho-capitalism and libertarian socialism are rooted in the classical liberal tradition. They both advocate the free and the abolition of the state. When Rothbard introduced the term “libertarian” to the American right, he was consciously identifying himself, as an anarcho-capitalist, with the market of the libertarian socialists. For the most part, the libertarians of both traditions are really advocating the same thing; they are merely calling it by different names. Anarcho-capitalism is libertarianism and libertarian socialism is market anarchism. The anarcho-capitalist and the anarcho-socialist are both part of one libertarian tradition. They have the same roots in classical and free-market and they advocate most of the same ideas.

1 , , Part 1, § 6 Benjamin Tucker, one of the most prominent libertarian socialist theorists, says that “the bottom claim of Socialism [is] that labor should be put in possession of its own.” 2 Tucker continues: “The economic principles of Modern Socialism are a logical deduction from the principle laid down by Smith in the early chapters of his ‘Wealth of Nations,’—namely, that labor is the true measure of price. But , after stating this principle most clearly and concisely, immediately abandoned all further considerations of it to devote himself to showing what actually does measure price, and how, therefore, wealth is at present distributed. Since his day nearly all the political economists have followed his example by confining their function to the description of as it is, in its industrial and commercial phases. Socialism, on the contrary, extends its function to the description of society as it should be, and the discovery of the means of making it what it should be. Half a century or more after Smith enunciated the principle above stated, Socialism picked it up where he had dropped it, and in following it to its logical conclusions, made it the basis of a new economic . “This seems to have been done independently by three different men, of three different nationalities, in three different languages: , an American; Pierre J. Proudhon, a Frenchman; , a German Jew…. “From Smith’s principle that labor is the true measure of price—or, as Warren phrased it, that cost is the proper limit of price—these three men made the following deductions: that the natural wage of labor is its product; that this wage, or product, is the only just source of income (leaving out, of course, gift, inheritance, etc.); that all who derive income from any other source abstract it directly or indirectly from the natural and just wage of

2 Benjamin Tucker, , Ch. 1 labor; that this abstracting process generally takes one of three forms,—interest, rent, and ; that these three constitute the trinity of , and are simply different methods of levying tribute for the use of ; that, capital being simply stored-up labor which has already received its pay in full, its use ought to be gratuitous, on the principle that labor is the only basis of price; that the lender of capital is entitled to its return intact, and nothing more; that the only reason why the banker, the stockholder, the landlord, the manufacturer, and the merchant are able to exact usury from the labor lies in the fact that they are backed by legal privilege, or monopoly; and that the only way to secure labor the enjoyment of its entire product, or natural wage, is to strike down monopoly…. “It was at this point—the necessity of striking down monopoly—that came the parting of their ways. Here the road forked. They found that they must turn either to the right or to the left,—follow either the path of Authority or the path of Liberty. Marx went one way; Warren and Proudhon the other. Thus were born and Anarchism. “First, then, State Socialism, which may be described as the doctrine that all the affairs of men should be managed by the , regardless of individual choice. “Marx, its founder, concluded that the only way to abolish the class monopolies was to centralize and consolidate all industrial and commercial interests, all productive and distributive agencies, in one vast monopoly in the hands of the State…. “This brings us to Anarchism, which may be described as the doctrine that all the affairs of men should be managed by or voluntary associations, and that the State should be abolished. “When Warren and Proudhon, in prosecuting their search for to labor, came face to face with the obstacle of class monopolies, they saw that these monopolies rested upon Authority, and concluded that the thing to be done was, not to strengthen this Authority and thus make monopoly universal, but to utterly uproot Authority and give full sway to the opposite principle, Liberty, by making , the antithesis of monopoly, universal. They saw in competition the great leveler of prices to the labor cost of production. In this they agreed with the political economists. The query then naturally presented itself why all prices do not fall to labor cost; where there is any room for incomes acquired otherwise than by labor; in a word, why the usurer, the receiver of interest, rent, and profit, exists. The answer was found in the one-sidedness of competition. It was discovered that capital had so manipulated legislation…that almost no competition at all is allowed in supplying capital… “Proudhon and Warren found themselves unable to sanction any such plan as the seizure of capital by society. But, though opposed to socializing the ownership of capital, they aimed nevertheless to socialize its effects by making its use beneficial to all instead of a means of impoverishing the many to enrich the few. And when the light burst in upon them, they saw that this could be done by subjecting capital to the natural of competition, thus bringing the price of its own use down to cost,—that is, to nothing beyond the expenses incidental to handling and transferring it. So they raised the banner of Absolute ; free trade at home, as well as with foreign countries; the logical carrying out of the Manchester doctrine; laissez faire the universal rule. Under this banner they began their fight upon monopolies, whether the all- inclusive monopoly of the State Socialists, or the various class monopolies that now prevail.”3 The early anarchists (i.e. libertarian socialists) held that all monopolies rest upon special privileges granted by the state. The state itself is a monopoly—a monopoly on the “legitimate” use of violence (under the euphemism of “defense”), a monopoly on the “legitimate” use of theft (under the euphemism of “taxation”), a monopoly on the “legitimate” counterfeiting of money (under the euphemism of “expansionary monetary policy”). In order to achieve the free-market ideal of libertarian socialism, all monopolies have to be abolished. This means that the state itself (because it too is a monopoly) needs to be abolished in order for a to exist. Pierre-Joseph Proudhon writes: “As a variety of the liberal regime I have mentioned —the government of each by himself, self-government…. politically, the idea of anarchy is quite as rational and concrete as any other. What it means is that political functions have been reduced to industrial functions, and that social order arises from nothing but transactions and exchanges. Each may then say that he is the absolute ruler of himself, the polar opposite of monarchical absolutism…. anarchy is the ideal of the economists, who attempt strenuously to put an end to all governmental institutions and to rest society upon the foundations of and free labour alone.”4 As you can see, libertarian socialism is a form of market anarchism. Murray Rothbard’s notion of anarcho-capitalism is based almost entirely on the ideas of the libertarian socialists. Rothbard’s ideas are by no means original. He is merely a synthesizer of earlier views. He has taken a great deal from the libertarian socialists and mixed it with some of the ideas of the economists. On the topic of libertarian socialism, Rothbard writes: “I must begin by affirming my conviction that Lysander Spooner and Benjamin R. Tucker were unsurpassed as political philosophers and that nothing is more needed today than a revival

3 Benjamin Tucker, Individual Liberty, Ch. 1 4 Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, The Principle of , Part 1, § 2, 4 and development of the largely forgotten legacy that they left to . It was left to Spooner and Tucker to adumbrate the way in which all individuals could abandon the State and cooperate to their own vast mutual benefit in a society of free and voluntary exchanges and interrelations. By doing this, Spooner and Tucker advanced libertarian from a protest against existing evils to pointing the way to an ideal society toward which we can move; and what is more, they correctly located that ideal in the free market which already partially existed and was providing vast economic and social benefits. Thus, Spooner, Tucker, and their movement not only furnished a goal toward which to move, but they also greatly surpassed previous ‘utopians’ in locating that goal in already-existing institutions rather than in a coercive or impossible vision of a transformed mankind. Their achievement was truly remarkable, and we have not yet risen to the level of their insights.”5 It is not difficult to detect Rothbard’s admiration of the libertarian socialists here. He goes so far as to say that they are “unsurpassed as political philosophers” and that we need a “revival of their legacy.” Rothbard continues: “I am, therefore, strongly tempted to call myself an ‘individualist anarchist,’ except for the fact that Spooner and Tucker have in a sense preempted that name for their doctrine and that from that doctrine I have certain differences. Politically, these differences are minor, and therefore the system that I advocate is very close to theirs; but economically, the differences are substantial, and this means that my view of the consequences of putting our more or less common system into practice is very far from theirs.”6

5 Murray Rothbard, The Spooner-Tucker Doctrine: An Economists View (in Journal of Libertarian Studies, Volume 20, No. 1 (Winter 2006):5-15 6 Murray Rothbard, The Spooner-Tucker Doctrine: An Economists View (in Journal of Libertarian Studies, Volume 20, No. 1 (Winter 2006):5-15 As Rothbard himself admitted, the political differences between anarcho-capitalism and libertarian socialism are minor and both systems are very similar. However, Rothbard disagrees with some of the economic analyses of the libertarian socialists. Firstly, because Rothbard had studied the Austrian School of economics, he rejected Adam Smith’s in favor of Carl Menger’s subjective theory of value. Since socialism is based on the labor theory of value, Rothbard cannot be called a “socialist” even though he agrees with the libertarian socialists on nearly everything. It is an interesting fact that the subjective theory of value (a.k.a. the marginal theory of value), like the theory of socialism, was a conclusion reached by three different men, of three different nationalities, independently and simultaneously. The subjective or marginal theory of value was discovered independently by Carl Menger, William Stanley Jevons, and Léon Walras. Whereas the socialists carried the labor theory of value to its logical conclusion, the marginalists rejected the labor theory of value altogether. Instead, they maintained that the value of a good is ultimately determined by people’s subjective estimations rather than by the amount of labor expended in the production of the good. The cost of a good does not depend upon the amount of labor exerted in the process of production, but rather by people’s estimation of how much the product is worth. If you publish a book, you may put in a lot of work but that does not guarantee that the book will sell for a high price. If the content of the book is mediocre, then it is likely that the book will not sell for much. All prices are ultimately determined by subjective estimations of value. Supply-and-demand and the amount of labor expended in production are only secondary consideration that may affect prices. Today it seems quite obvious that the subjective theory of value is correct. No one in their right mind can still defend the labor theory of value in its original form. It is now a defunct theory. The labor theory of value is not held by a single credible economist today. In addition to Rothbard’s rejection of the labor theory of value, his knowledge of Austrian Economics gave him a far superior understanding of interest and banking than any of the libertarian socialists had. As a result, he also disagrees with their position on the question of usury. Furthermore, Rothbard disagrees with the libertarian socialist position on property in relation to land. He holds that the land-owner should have the right to sell his land (as long as the land was acquired in a fair way), whereas the socialists hold that land cannot properly be sold because property rights are intimately linked to use. So these are the three major points of disagreement between libertarian socialism and anarcho-capitalism: (1) the labor theory of value vs. the subjective theory of value, (2) the particular theory of how the economic phenomenon of interest works, and (3) whether or not a land-owner should have the right to sell his land for a profit.7 Since the libertarian socialists and the anarcho-capitalists do have very much in common, it seems to me that it would make sense for us to unite as partners in rebellion against “our common enemy, the state.” Could we not work together to establish an anarchist society and then work out the details later? We envision the same sort of system, free-market anarchism! Let’s work towards that goal together. We are in perfect agreement about the sort of system that needs to be put in place. The only substantial disagreement is about the economic consequences of the implementation of that system. of a free-market anarchist society will be our grand experiment. Who is right about the question of interest will be demonstrated by the experiment itself. If the socialists are right, interest will drop to nearly zero. If the anarcho- capitalists are right, it will not. Either way, we will be better off for having established a . Personally, I am not in full agreement with either faction. Due to the fact that I have studied economics fairly extensively, I reject the labor theory of value; therefore, I cannot be considered a libertarian socialist. Moreover, I adhere to the Austrian Theory of the Business Cycle, so I generally agree with Rothbard’s analysis of interest and credit. However, unlike Rothbard, I am opposed to the institution of usury. I see the institution of usury as a force that enslaves people—debt is a very real evil! I do not believe that such an institution could continue in an anarchist society. In an anarchist society, the people would always repudiate nefarious contracts. The absence of the state as the “right-hand man” of the banker would make it virtually impossible for the banking establishment to enforce contracts based upon high rates of interest. This would cause interest rates to be extremely low in an anarchist society. In this regard, my view is fairly close to that of the libertarian socialists. As far as the issue of property rights in relation to land-owning is concerned, my position is somewhere between that of the libertarian socialists and the anarcho-capitalists. Like the anarcho-capitalists, I believe that an individual should have the right to sell a piece of land that he has fairly acquired through labor or

7 As far as the labor theory of value is concerned, I will say that socialism is not based on the assumption that labor is the actual determining factor in prices. On the contrary, socialists assume that labor ought to be the determining factor. The libertarian socialist would agree with the anarcho-capitalist in saying that the amount of labor expended in production does not equal the cost of the product on the market. However, the libertarian socialist holds that it ought to be equal, and that it would be equal, to the cost if the market were truly free. trade. However, like the libertarian socialist, I hold that the right to maintain possession of the land ought to be contingent upon the individual’s maintenance and use of the land. Un-owned land can be acquired by an individual through the addition of labor in the process of cultivating the land. Once the land is acquired as property through labor, it can be voluntarily sold by the owner thereof and bought by another individual. However, if an individual purchases a piece of land and then makes no use of it, allowing the land to fall into disuse, he shall lose his title to the land and another person can come along and take possession of it through the addition of labor. God is the only true and ultimate owner of land upon the Earth. We are merely stewards. Our right to hold land as property is contingent upon our fulfillment of the commandment to “cultivate and maintain” the land. (Cf. Genesis 2:15) In other words, our possession of land as property is contingent upon our proper use of the land. If a man makes no effort to cultivate and maintain his land, or if he is a bad steward and pollutes the land, then he has no proper claim to the ownership of that land; therefore, he cannot claim it as his own . The bad steward and the idle capitalist are usurpers—their possession of land is illegitimate. My view on land can be classified as distributism. Distributism is a , an alternative to both capitalism and socialism. Like the capitalist, the distributist recognizes the right of the property owner to buy and sell land. Yet he does not recognize that as an inherent and absolute right. Like the socialist, the distributist holds that the right to possess land as property rests upon the proper use of the land. My political philosophy is anarcho-distributism; it is neither libertarian socialism nor anarcho-capitalism. It is a third way. Anarcho-distributism is the third type of libertarianism.

Anarcho- & Socialism There are a great many union-supporters that are utterly deceived about the economic consequences of the achievements of the labor unions. They falsely believe that it is a great victory for workers when the unions secure higher wages for them. In truth, it is folly for the unions to push for higher wages. If the unions succeed in getting wages raised, it will only result in inflation. As wages rise, the capitalists who own the industries will put pressure on the bankocrats, petitioning the central bank to relieve them of the “burden” of higher wages. As a result, the capitalistic bankocrats in charge of the central bank will implement an “expansionary monetary policy,” thereby devaluing the currency, and causing a reduction of real wages. While the unions may succeed in raising nominal wages, the real wages will fall because all goods on the market will become more expensive due to the devaluation of the currency. The end result is that it is as if the workers had received no raises at all. Even if the unions could somehow keep the central bank from devaluing the currency, the capitalists would raise prices to keep the higher cost of labor from cutting into their profits. The non-union industries would have to raise wages in order to keep from losing their best employees to the higher-paying competition (because the employees will naturally want to leave for the higher-paying jobs elsewhere). As wages rise across the market, all industries will raise their prices to prevent the additional cost of labor from cutting into profits. The cost of all goods will increase. With the increased cost of living, the purchasing power of the workers drops back down to the level it was at before the raises went into effect. The success of the union in securing raises for its members ultimately provides no lasting benefit to the workers. The only way that the unions could benefit the employees by securing an increase in wages, is if the unions could also convince the central bank not to devalue the money and convince the government to prohibit the industries from raising the prices of their products. In such a case, we would have artificially determined wage rates and artificially determined prices—Marxian-style state-socialism! If you are going to do that, then you might as well demonetize the economy (abolish money), hand over all property to the government, and have everyone directly employed by the state, with the government in complete control of the distribution of goods! The use of unions to help increase wages is a terrible practice. In my opinion, the unions are worthless unless they are being used as a means to achieve the abolition of the capitalist system.8 The only way to guarantee that the workers will not be exploited by the owners of industry is to make the workers themselves into the owners of industry. The recognition of this fact is one of the great contributions of the anarcho-syndicalists and guild socialists. The only way to protect the proletariat from the capitalists is to turn every proletarian into a capitalist! As long as the majority of people cannot own any for themselves, the majority will be forced to work for somebody else—they will be forced into wage-slavery. Their survival will totally depend upon employment in the wage-labor market. As put it,

8 Here I am using the term “capitalism” to mean a system wherein the owners of industry (capitalists) are distinct from the workers (proletarians), and the vast majority of people are forced into wage-slavery. “Anarchists of this tradition have always held that democratic control of one’s productive life is at the core of any serious human liberation, or, for that matter, of any significant democratic practice. That is, as long as individuals are compelled to rent themselves on the market to those who are willing to hire them, as long as their role in production is simply that of ancillary tools, then there are striking elements of coercion and oppression that make talk of democracy very limited, if even meaningful.”9 Corporations are not persons: they have no “unalienable rights.” The concept of the corporation is a capitalistic fiction. It is a scheme invented in order to separate the owners of industry from the industry itself—it was created in order to prevent the capitalists from having to take on the responsibilities and risks of owning a business in a free-market system. The corporation is a myth, it is invisible and has no real substance—it is really non-existent. Since the corporation is a non-entity, it is not theft for the workers to take over control of a corporate industry. The workers are real persons with property rights, whereas the corporation is not a person. The corporation lacks any natural or inherent rights. The goal of the unions should be to allow the workers to take over control of the industry, transforming the corporation into a workers’ guild. explains that after the abolition of slavery in Medieval , there was a transition phase in which (a more mild form of slavery) was practiced. Then, feudalism itself waned and a more distributist-style society arose for a while. One of the most important institutions in later Medieval times was the guild. Belloc writes: “Meanwhile, side by side with this emancipation of mankind in the direct line of descent from the old chattel slaves of the Roman villa went, in the , a crowd of institutions which all similarly made for a distribution of property, and for the destruction of even the fossil remnants of a then forgotten Servile State. Thus industry of every kind in the towns, in transport, in crafts, and in commerce, was organized in the form of . And

9 Noam Chomsky, Chomsky On Anarchism (edited by Barry Pateman), Ch. 4 “The Relevance of Anarcho- Syndicalism” a Guild was a society partly co-operative, but in the main composed of private owners of capital whose corporation was self- governing…. Above all, most jealously did the Guild safeguard the division of property, so that there should be formed within its ranks no proletariat upon the one side, and no monopolizing capitalist upon the other. “There was a period of apprenticeship at a man’s entry into a Guild, during which he worked for a master; but in time he became a master in his turn. The existence of such corporations as the normal units of industrial production, of commercial effort, and of the means of transport, is proof enough of what the social spirit was which had also enfranchised the laborer upon the land. And while such institutions flourished side by side with the no longer servile village communities, freehold or absolute possession of the soil, as distinguished from the tenure of the serf under the lord, also increased.”10 The guild functions as both a and a co-operative.11 The guild system not only eliminates the dichotomy between proletarian workers and capitalist owners of industry, it also gives all of the workers an incentive to do the best that they possibly can. Workers within a guild tend to be more enthusiastic about their jobs. If the average worker has an idea that will improve the product or services of the company, he is more likely to push the idea in a guild than in a capitalistic corporation. The guild worker is a partial but equal owner of the company. If the company starts to make more money, the worker will start to make more money too. Because the

10 Hilaire Belloc, The Servile State, § 1 11 Cf. E. Woods, Jr., What’s Wrong With “Distributism”: “Even granting the distributist premise that smaller businesses have been swallowed up by larger firms, it is by no means obvious that it is always preferable for a man to operate his own business rather than to work for another. It may well be that a man is better able to care for his family precisely if he does not own his own business or work the backbreaking schedule of running his own farm, partially because he is not ruined if the enterprise for which he works should have to close, and partially because he doubtless enjoys more leisure time that he can spend with his family than if he had the cares and responsibilities of his own business.” The objection raised by Dr. Woods is not a valid argument against distributism, as distributists do not intend to make everyone own their own private business. The distributist also wants guilds and co-operatives to be in place. While the member of a guild or a co-op would have the benefits of being a property-owner and would have more control over his industry, he would not have the burden of the high responsibility that goes with owning a private business. worker is a partial owner of the business, he has a vested interest in the success of the business. There are no “dead-end jobs” within a guild. By increasing the guild’s profits, you can always increase the wages of every member of the guild. The guild system was extremely successful historically. Today the guild system is making a comeback, proving that it can still work in the modern world. For example, a distributist by the name of José María Arizmendiarrieta helped to establish the as a workers’ guild in 1956. The Mondragon Corporation has since become the 7th largest business in Spain and the largest and most successful co- operative in the world. Another example of the success of the co-op/guild system would be the over 3,000 employee-owned businesses in the Emilia-Romagna region (an area in Italy smaller than the state of Massachusetts). Thanks to the distributist system in place there, the Emilia- Romagna region is one of the richest regions in Europe.

Distributism & Anarchism There has been a debate raging between distributists and anarchists for quite a while. The mainstream distributists within the Roman Catholic are quite critical of anarchism in general; and they denounce both anarcho-capitalism and libertarian socialism. The traditional Roman Catholic critique of both movements is based on ignorance. In order to accurately criticize a particular , one must read the works of the writers within that school of thought. This, however, the distributists seem to have failed to do. They frequently lump anarcho-capitalists in with state-capitalists; and they lump libertarian socialists (anarchists) in with authoritarian state-socialists. This shows that the distributist writers have failed to recognize that the libertarian schools of “socialism” and “capitalism” are altogether different from the authoritarian schools of “socialism” and “capitalism.” The distributists rightly denounce “capitalism” defined as a system of wage-slavery wherein the majority of the people are forced to work for a small capitalist minority, with the capitalists owning nearly all of the means of production and the average worker neither owning, nor having the ability to acquire ownership of, any means of production for himself.12 The

12 Cf. Hilaire Belloc, : “[Capitalism’s] main characteristic is the possession of the means of production, that is land and machinery, by a small number of citizens, while the great majority of citizens remain dispossessed not only of the land and machinery, but of the stores of food and clothing and housing, without which men cannot live.” Also, John C. Médaille, Toward a Truly Free Market, Chapter 5: “In capitalist economies, the typical distributist gathers arguments against this wage-slavery definition of “capitalism,” and continues from there to his critique of anarcho-capitalism. But anarcho-capitalism does not advocate “capitalism” in that sense. “Capitalism,” as defined by anarcho-capitalists, is merely an with a free market wherein property rights are respected and preserved. This particular definition of “capitalism” is totally different from the sort of “capitalism” that G. K. Chesterton and Hilaire Belloc were criticizing so long ago. When Chesterton and Belloc criticized “socialism,” they defined socialism as State- ownership of the means of production.13 When distributists criticize libertarian socialists, they start with the typical ChesterBellocian critique of socialism as state-ownership of the means of production, then conclude that libertarian socialists are wrong because “socialism” is wrong. But it is quite obvious that libertarian socialists do not advocate state-ownership of the means of production. On the contrary, libertarian socialists are anarchists! They advocate the abolition of the state altogether. If they are advocating the abolition of the state, then they certainly cannot advocate state-ownership of anything! Libertarian socialists are not “socialists” in that sense. They are socialists in a totally different sense. To the libertarian socialists, “socialism” means the abolition of state-capitalism in order to allow for a truly free market in which property will naturally be distributed in a more equitable fashion. This definition of “socialism” is almost synonymous with “distributism.” 14 The only major point of disagreement between the distributists and the libertarian socialists is on the topic of the state. Distributists want a more-or- less minimalist state, whereas the libertarian socialists want to get rid of the state completely.

vast majority of men are not capitalists; that is, they do not have sufficient capital to make their own livings, either alone or in cooperation with their neighbors, but must work for wages in order to live.” 13 Cf. Hilaire Belloc, Nationalization: “Those adhering to this sect (commonly known as Socialists) usually regard inequality, and always regard ‘exploitation’ as immoral; and to eliminate these two evils which they postulate as irreconcilable with any right living, they propose to eliminate private property in the means of production and to vest all that can be vested in the hands of the State.” The term socialism was coined in reference to the political philosophy of , Josiah Warren, and Pierre-Joseph Proudhon. Seeing that Warren and Proudhon were both opposed to the very existence of the state, it is quite obvious that their “socialism” (i.e. the original socialism) was certainly not synonymous with “state-ownership of the means of production.” Nevertheless, Belloc himself criticizes Proudhon and falsely asserts that he “postulated the ownership, management and control [of the means of production and the distribution of wealth] by officers of the State.”(ibid.) 14 Cf. Donald P. Goodman III: “This is the defining characteristic of Distributism: the widescale distribution of productive property throughout society, such that ownership of it is the norm, rather than the exception.”(An Introduction to Distributism, Part 1) & “The widespread distribution of productive property is the primary goal of Distributism.”(An Introduction to Distributism, Part 2) Also, consider the title of John Médaille’s magnum opus in defense of distributism—Toward a Truly Free Market. Additionally, libertarian socialism is based on Smith’s labor theory of value, whereas distributism is not. (Hence, I call myself an anarcho-distributist rather than a libertarian socialist because I do not accept the labor theory of value and, therefore, cannot properly be called a socialist.) It would be quite easy to synthesize the ideas of the distributists and the anarchists. I believe that something of the sort has already been done by Dorothy Day. She explains that the main reason that the distributists rejected anarchism was because they did not understand it. Dorothy Day writes: “Anarchism, according to the American Encyclopedia, is a vaguely defined doctrine which would abolish the state ‘and other established social and economic institutions and establish a new order based on free and spontaneous co-operation among individuals, groups, regions and nations….’ “Kropotkin and Tolstoi, the modern proponents of anarchism, were sincere and peaceful men…. “Kropotkin wanted much the same type of social order as , the artist, Father Vincent McNabb, the Dominican street preacher, G. K. Chesterton, Hilaire Belloc and other distributists advocated, though they would have revolted at the word anarchist, thinking it synonymous with chaos, not ‘self-government’ as Proudhon defined it. Distributism is the English term for that society whereby man has sufficient of this world’s goods to enable him to lead a good life. Other words have been used to describe this theory, , , pluralism, regionalism; but anarchism…best brings to mind the tension always existing between the concept of authority and freedom which torments man to this day.”15 It is about time for distributists to realize that anarchism and distributism are not necessarily contradictory doctrines. Surely, both Roman Catholic and Orthodox Christians will agree that the monastery is the ideal way of life. The monasteries the example of how society

15 Dorothy Day, The Long Loneliness, Ch. 1, § 7 should work. All monasteries operate on a totally voluntary basis. Could we not build up a Christian society modeled after the monasteries? Could we not build Christian agrarian as monasteries for the married? Fr. Georges Florovsky writes: “The early church was not just a for ‘religious’ purposes. It was rather the New Society, even the New Humanity, a polis or politeuma, the true City of God, in the process of construction. And each local community was fully aware of its membership in an inclusive and universal whole. The church was conceived as an independent and self-supporting social order, as a new social dimension, a peculiar systema patridos, as put it. Early Christians felt themselves, in the last resort, quite outside of the existing social order, simply because for them the church itself was an ‘order,’ an extra-territorial ‘colony of Heaven’ on earth (Phil. 3:20, Moffatt’s translation). Nor was this attitude fully abandoned even later when the , as it were, came to terms with the church. “The early Christian attitude was continued in the monastic movement, which grew rapidly precisely in the period of an alleged reconciliation with the world. Of course, was a complex phenomenon, but its main stream was always socially minded. It was not so much a flight from the world as it was an endeavor to build up a new world on a new basis. A monastery was a community, a ‘little church’—not only a worshipping community, but a working community as well. Great stress was laid on work, and idleness was regarded as a grievous vice. But it had to be a work for common purpose and benefit. It was true already of the early Pachomian communities in Egypt. St. Pachomius was teaching ‘the gospel of continued work.’ It is well said of him: ‘The general appearance and life of a Pachomian monastery cannot have been very different from that of a well-regulated college, city, or camp” (Bp. Kirk, The Vision of God). The great legislator of Eastern monasticism, St. in Cappadocia (c.330- 379), was deeply concerned with the problem of social reconstruction. He watched with a grave apprehension the process of social disintegration, which was so spectacular in his day. Thus his call to formation of monastic communities was an attempt to rekindle the spirit of mutuality in a world which seemed to have lost any sense of social responsibility and cohesion. In his conception, man was essentially a ‘gregarious animal’ (koinōnikon zōon), ‘neither savage nor a lover of solitude.’ He cannot accomplish his purpose in life, he cannot be truly human, unless he dwells in a community. Monasticism, therefore, was not a higher level of perfection, for the few, but an earnest attempt to give a proper human dimension to man’s life. Christians had to set a model of a new society in order to counterbalance those disintegrating forces which were operative in the decaying world. A true cohesion in society can be achieved only by an identity of purpose, by a subordination of all individual concerns to the common cause and interest. In a sense, it was a Socialist experiment of a peculiar kind, on a voluntary basis. Obedience itself had to be founded on love and mutual affection, on a free realization of brotherly love. The whole emphasis was on the corporate nature of man. Individualism is therefore self-destructive. “As startling as it may appear, the same ‘coenobitical’ pattern was at that time regarded as obligatory for all Christians, ‘even though they be married.’ Could the whole Christian society be built up as a kind of a ‘monastery’? St. , the great bishop of the imperial city of Constantinople (c.350-407), did not hesitate to answer this question in the affirmative. It did not mean that all should go into the wilderness. On the contrary, Christians had to rebuild the existing society on a ‘coenobitical’ pattern. Chrysostom was quite certain that all social evils were rooted in the acquisitive appetite of man, in his selfish desire to possess goods for his exclusive benefit. Now, there was but one lawful owner of all goods and possessions in the world, namely, the Lord Almighty. Men are but his ministers and servants, and they have to use God’s gifts solely for God’s purposes, i.e., ultimately for common needs. Chrysostom’s conception of property was strictly functional: possession was justified only by its proper use. To be sure, Chrysostom was not a social or economic reformer, and his practical suggestions may seem rather inconclusive and even naïve. But he was one of the greatest Christian prophets of social equality and justice. There was nothing sentimental in his appeal to charity. Christian charity, in fact, is not just a caritative emotion. Christians should be not just moved by the other person’s suffering, need, and misery. They have to understand that social misery is the continued agony of Christ, suffering still in the person of his members. Chrysostom’s ethical zeal and pathos were rooted in his clear vision of the Body of Christ. “One may contend that in practice very little came out of this vigorous social preaching. But one has to understand that the greatest limitation imposed upon the Christian preaching of social virtue was rooted in the conviction that the church could act only by , and never by violence and compulsion.”16 Fr. Matthew Johnson (an Orthodox Old Calendarist priest) writes: “Hence, the remnant of Israel, the True Orthodox, in order to live proper lives, must form economic and social synodia, pooling resources to the extent each family can allow, and organize themselves in separate communities from the corrupt ‘Egyptian’ society around us. The home should be a small monastery, as St. Nikolai Velimirovic states, tightly connected with the agricultural

16 Georges Florovsky, Christianity and Culture, Ch. 6, § 2 or labor association, seeking spiritual assistance as well as occasional financial assistance from the local monastery. This is the , the social life based on the cell of the extended family, and extending itself perfectly into the labor association, parish, and diocese, each under an elected synod, with elections based on holiness and truthfulness. Media and entertainments should also be based on such institutions, thus relieving Orthodox families from depending on the corrupt and oligarchic media system of the Regime…. “This brief treatment of complex ideas is written solely to provide some form of theoretic foundation for the restructuring of Orthodox society no matter what country in which one finds himself. As the capitalist system shows tremendous structural weaknesses, such as debt, and contradictions, such as the frantic extension of credit to move inventory, shocks to the system may well bring its collapse. In such a case, a ‘plan’ of sorts should be in place so that Orthodox people can live rational and holy lives outside of the mainstream society. Social stands for the building of alternative sub-cultural communities that slowly but surely develop in such a way that the state is rendered irrelevant. It stands for statelessness, but also for community, and a community governed by tradition and canon law, which is merely a crystallization of tradition and the experience of Orthodox generations throughout history. “The institutions of such a society are not ‘’ in the sense that they are something new, but precisely in the sense that those, such as Razin, the Cossacks or the Irish Republicans, are reaching to reestablish something that had existed before. In medieval Ireland, Serbia, within the Cossack host, the Haiduks and the Old Believer communities, such an ethno-anarchist model has been in existence for centuries. Reestablishing it, based on the Law of the Old Testament, is a necessity for the creation of rational structures in an irrational world.”17 Christians should rally together into small agrarian communities, centered around a local parish and a monastery. The idea of the Christian commune, which was historically of universal importance, should be reintroduced to the modern world. If the idea of the voluntary commune is not reintroduced, society is doomed. The existing system will soon no longer be able to support the needs of the people. Monocultural techniques practiced by large-scale industrial agriculture are steadily turning the American Midwest into a desert. The droughts that we have recently experienced are only signs of things to come. The destruction of large ecosystems leads to climate change and desertification. What happened to the Loess Plateau in China is happening to the Midwestern . We are watching our farmland become barren and desolate before our very eyes, but are delusional and unaware that we are the cause of it. Our foolish systems of farming are ruining the world. While monocultural farming techniques are devastating the land here, we are running out of oil over there. As oil becomes more-and-more scarce, and consequently more expensive, we will no longer have the luxury of shipping food over long distances. We will be forced to produce all of our food locally. In a short while, environmental and economic circumstances out of our control will force us to go back to older ways of farming; and community involvement in the production of food will become a necessity. The agrarian commune will once again be the cornerstone of civilization. The world monetary and banking system has been thrust into the beginning of chaos. The current world-system is on the verge of collapse. I do not know for sure whether it will last just five more years or another fifty years, but the chrematistic statist system is failing on an international level. There is a very real possibility that an anarcho-distributist, libertarian socialist, or anarcho-capitalist society will naturally arise from the ashes of this crumbling world-system. Let us hope and strive in that direction.

Influences Behind Anarcho-Distributism: There are certain people who have come very close to advocating anarcho-distributism. The two individuals who are closest to being anarcho-distributists are Dorothy Day and Fr. Raphael (Matthew Johnson); they are both anarchists and distributists. However, I believe that

17 Fr. Matthew Raphael Johnson, National Anarchism and the Old Faith (viewed on 8/24/2012) there is a distinction between what they have taught and what I am teaching. The political views of Day and Johnson are pretty much identical to libertarian socialism—neither of them make a clear distinction between socialism and distributism. I am the only true advocate of anarcho- distributism as a distinct and unique political philosophy. No one else has developed this line of thought in any systematic fashion. The other major influences behind my political philosophy are Fr. Georges Florovsky, St. Nikolai Velimirovic, Nikolai Berdyaev, St. John Chrysostom, and St. Basil of Caesarea. At the moment, however, it appears that I am the only real advocate of anarcho-distributism. I am hopeful that my writings might win some others over to my point of view, but I feel that I stand contra mundum for the moment. I am the founder and only advocate of this new political philosophy. If there is anyone out there that follows my arguments, understands my political ideas, and has been converted to the anarcho-distributist position through the force of my arguments, then let’s hope that they will take up the cause of propagating and spreading this doctrine.