The Anarchist Library (Mirror) Anti-Copyright Anarchism: Utopian or scientific Wayne Price Wayne Price Anarchism: Utopian or scientific 2006 The Utopian Vol. 5 (2006), p. 62. Retrieved on 2020-04-07 from www.utopianmag.com usa.anarchistlibraries.net 2006 Bookchin, Murray (1986). The limits of the city. Montreal: Black Rose Books. Buber, Martin (1958). Paths in utopia. (R. F. C. Hull, trans.). Boston: Beacon Press. Draper, Hal (1990). Karl Marx’s theory of revolution; Vol. IV: Critique Contents of other socialisms. NY: Monthly Review. Engels, Frederick (1954). Anti-Dühring; Herr Eugen Dühring’s revo- lution in science. Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House. Marxism and Utopianism .................. 8 Geoghegan, Vincent (1987). Utopianism and Marxism. London & The Limits of Marxist Inevitablism . 12 NY: Methuen. The Rejection of Scientific Socialism . 15 Goldner, Loren (2000). Ubu saved from drowning: Class struggle and A Revival of Utopian Socialism and Its Class Limitations . 17 statist containment in Portugul and Spain, 19741977. Cambridge Utopianism or Science…or Both? . 23 MA: Queequeg Publications. References .......................... 25 Goodman, Paul (1962). Utopian essays and practical proposals. NY: Random House. Hahnel, Robin (2005). Economic justice and democracy; From compe- tition to cooperation. NY/London: Routledge. Kolbert, Elizabeth (2005, May 9). The climate of man—III. What can be done? The New Yorker. Pp. 52–63. Kropotkin, Peter (1975). The essential Kropotkin. (Emile Capouya & Keitha Tompkins, eds.). NY: Liveright. Malatesta, Errico (1984). Errico Malatesta; His life and ideas. (Vernon Richards, ed.). London: Freedom Press. Marx, Karl, & Engels, Friedrich (1955). The communist manifesto; Manifesto of the communist party. Northbrook, IL: AHM Publish- ing Corp. Morse, Chuck (2001). Theory of the anti-globalization movement. The New Formulation; An Anti-Authoritarian Review of Books. Vol. 1, no. 1, November. Pp. 22–31. Wood, Ellen Meiksins (1998). The retreat from class; A new “True” Socialism. London: Verso. 26 3 dividually to be on the automatically winning side or to be on the guaranteed losing side. That’s it. Such a view is presented in the Left Behind novels, expressing a conservative interpretation of Christianity. In a secular fashion, it also appears in the mainstream interpretation of Marxism (and also in aspects of Kropotkin’s an- archism). In comparison, Buber says, the prophets of the Old Tes- tament presented the people with a collective choice. Disaster was looming, the prophets warned, but it could be averted. To do so, the people would have to change their ways and follow an alter- nate path. Prophesy was a challenge, not an inevitable prediction. Human choice could make a difference. Leaving theology aside, today there is a prophetic challenge. It is both “utopian” and “scientific.” Humanity faces probable disas- ters: increasing wars (including eventual nuclear wars), ecological and environmental catastrophe, economic decline, and threats to democracy and freedom. But an alternate society, a utopian goal, may be envisioned, with a different way for humans to relate to each other—if not a perfect society than one that is much better. There exists the technology to make it possible. There exists a social class whose self-interest may lead it to struggle for this goal, along- side of other oppressed groupings. Those who accept this analysis, and who believe in the values of this goal, may chose to take up the challenge—and to raise it for others. It is a matter not only of prediction but of moral commitment. June 2005 References Albert, Michael (2003). Parecon: Life after capitalism. NY: Verso. Biehl, Janet (1998). The politics of social ecology; Libertarian munic- ipalism. (with Murray Bookchin). Montreal: Black Rose Books. 25 I reject having to chose between either utopianism or science (us- Together with the revival of anarchism in the last decades, there ing “science” to mean an analysis of society, done as realistically as has been an increased interest in Utopia. This is largely due to the possible, and not an attempt to treat society as if it were chemistry). crisis in Marxism, long the dominant set of ideas among the radi- I will not chose between raising moral issues and appealing to the cal left. After the Soviet Union imploded and China turned toan self-interest of oppressed people. I reject the alternatives of either openly market-based capitalism, Marxism became discredited for a moral vision or a practical strategy. I refuse to chose between many. This resulted in a revived interest in Utopia from two appar- Utopia and support for workers’ class struggles. ently contradictory directions, for and against. What these views What is the Utopia of socialist anarchism? It has many inter- have in common is that they take utopianism seriously. Utopianism pretations, but some things seem central: It includes a coopera- must be taken seriously if socialism is to get out of the dead end it tive economy with production for use, which is planned democrat- has reached through established Marxism, but what revolutionary ically, from the bottom up. It means the end of the division (in socialists need is much more than simply a return to Utopia. industry and in society as a whole) between mental and manual la- On one side, there has been an increased desire to find utopian bor, between those who give orders and those who carry them out. aspects of socialism, including Marxism (Geoghegan, 1987). This in- This would be part of a complete reorganization of technology to cludes looking at the the work of Walter Benjamin or Ernst Bloch. create an ecologically sustainable society. It includes an economy There is a greater concentration on Marx’s critique of alienation and polity managed by direct democracy, in assemblies and coun- and of his scattered hints of what a communist society might look cils, at workplaces and in communities. It has no state, that is, no like, as in his Critique of the Gotha Program. More and more, so- bureaucractic-military machine with specialized layers of police, cialists refer to the utopian meanings of their socialist faith, the soldiers, bureaucrats, lobbyists, and politicians, standing above the original vision of a liberated humanity. From this point of view, rest of the population. If defense of the people is needed,this would the failure of pseudosocialism in the Communist-run countries was be done by the people— the armed people—in a popular militia. In- supposedly due to their downplaying utopianism. stead of a state, local councils would be federated at the regional, Recognition of the value of utopianism was made by the national, continental, and international levels, wherever needed. In reformist Marxist, Michael Harrington: “Utopian socialism…was this freely federated world, there would be no national borders. The a movement that gave the first serious definition of socialism as socialist vision has always been that of a classless society and the communitarian, moral, feminist, committed to the transformation most exploited class has an interest in winning this. Whether the of work, and profoundly democratic. If there is to be a 21st century working class will seek this vision remains an open question, in my socialism worthy of the name, it will…have to go 200 years into the opinion—neither a guaranteed outcome not a guarantee that it will past to recover the practical and theoretical ideals of the utopians” not. It is a choice, not an inevitability. (quoted in Hahnel, 2005, p. 139). In his Paths in Utopia, the Jewish theologian Martin Buber (1958) Especially interesting has been the revival of the utopian project, compares two types of eschatological prophecy. One is the predic- that is, the effort by radicals (influenced by both anarchism and tion of apocalypse, an inevitable end of days which is running on humanistic Marxism) to work out how a libertarian-democratic so- a strict timetable. God and the devil will fight and God will win. cialism could work—what a post-capitalist society might look like Human choice is reduced to a minimum…people may decide in- without either markets or centralized, bureaucratic, planning. This 24 5 includes the “libertarian municipalism” of Murray Bookchin and into open rebellion but mostly kept at a low simmer. From time his “social ecologist” followers (Biehl, 1998; Bookchin, 1986) and to time there have been great eruptions when workers rose up Michael Albert and Robin Hahnel’s “participatory economics” or and demonstrated the possibility of overthrowing capitalism and “parecon” (Albert, 2003; Hahnel, 2005). its state, of replacing these institutions with the self-management On the other side, there are those disillusioned ex-Marxists and of society. I will not review the history of workers’ revolutionary ex-socialists, who blame the totalitarianism of the Marxist states on upheavals here, but workers have shown more ability to struggle a supposed utopianism. The goal of Marxist socialism was of a class- in the brief history of industrial capitalism (about 200 years) than less, stateless, cooperative, society, with production for use rather any other oppressed class in history. Without slighting other op- than profit, without alienated labor, without national boundaries pressions, the struggle of the workers should be a major focus of or wars—the realization of solidarity, equality, and freedom. This any revolutionary strategy. goal (which is the same as socialist anarchism) is condemned as an impossibility, a Utopia, which contradicts inborn human nature. Utopianism or Science…or Both? Humans are supposedly naturally competitive, aggressive, and un- equal. Attempts to force them to fit a cooperative, benevolent, so- In Utopianism and Marxism, Geoghegan concludes, “The distinc- ciety, it is said, can only be done by totalitarian means. Therefore, tion between utopian and scientific socialism has, on balance, been by this view, the failure of socialism was due to its utopianism. So an unfortunate one for the Marxist tradition” (1987, p.