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If it were possible, to create a stateless society in one, in a peaceful manner, how would one go about this change in a gradual manner?
I'm curious if members of this site would help me figure a timeline or a methodology of how anything close to utopia should/could be created from our current world.
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i don't believe it is possible to "create a society," to "create a stateless society," or for society to change dramatically "in a peaceful manner."

also, utopias suck. people don't go according to plan.
(i, for one, like that about us...)
trying to create a society, gradually, using timelines and methodologies, sounds to me like a job for hierarchies.

regarding utopia, i like these words by wolfi landstreicher...

"i am utopian in continuing to dare to spew out my words of doubt and rebellion, in acting against a situation I cannot tolerate and in dreaming that something different is possible, immediately, for those who dare to think, act and dream their greatest desires and aspirations."
The real question is if it's even possible and how a stateless society would come about?  is that what you meant?
The REAL question is should anarchists do anything besides argue semantics and mentally masturbate?
or canaanchris, if you are not satisfied with people's responses, you could address that more specifically, instead of accusing others of random things?

silly me.
canaanchris, what do you mean by 'real questions,' and 'should?' Ah, hell. fapfapfapfapfapfap...

1 Answer

+4 votes
I'm currently on a western/eastern contrast binge, so I'll approach this question from that.

To say "how would someone create a stateless society" implies that SOMEONE would create a stateless society. Western thinking places cause within things as opposed to the relationships and space between things. And it leads to errors: for example the foundation of this question.

Societies come from conditions: the past, the present, the people, their values, their conflicts, their resources, etc etc. If we go down this rabbit hole then it turns out that every moment before is responsible for every moment after. Not a helpful way to look at things, but an interesting one for sure.

So a stateless society would come because there weren't apt conditions to create or maintain a state. Perhaps global warming destroyed a territory, waters wars diverted the state's attention to conflict with other states, and then the weakness of the state in that area caused people to liberate themselves from it and create an autonomous territory.

So tl;dr answer: a combination of conditions will cause stateless societies to appear. What conditions is highly relevant to where you are and what the history and culture of that area is, among a multitude of other things we probably have no understanding of. I haven't read it but from what I've gathered the book "The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia" seems to provide real life answers to your question.

Does that help?
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