The notion that a strong state is preferable to anarchy seems to be the conclusion drawn by many. Order, even if authoritarian, is preferable to a state of nature.
Some have made the case, which I reiterated at Risk&Progress that democracy works because it straddles a thin line between anarchic chaise and authoritarian inflexibility.
The key term for states is 'legibility'; the key term for capitalist markets is 'commodification'. Both involve imposing a simplified order in the service of extraction, just as grain-fields re-order an ecology in the service of extraction (reducing overall productivity but enabling the direction of surplus to a single end.
The notion that a strong state is preferable to anarchy seems to be the conclusion drawn by many. Order, even if authoritarian, is preferable to a state of nature.
Some have made the case, which I reiterated at Risk&Progress that democracy works because it straddles a thin line between anarchic chaise and authoritarian inflexibility.
Well, yes. But there are many choices between a strong state and anarchy.
The key term for states is 'legibility'; the key term for capitalist markets is 'commodification'. Both involve imposing a simplified order in the service of extraction, just as grain-fields re-order an ecology in the service of extraction (reducing overall productivity but enabling the direction of surplus to a single end.