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Title: Democracy
Author: Post-Comprehension
Date: Video version uploaded: January 20th, 2021.
Language: en
Topics: democracy, Direct Democracy, critique, Breadtube
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSy77xvbf0o&t
Notes: This is the written version of Being’s Democracy video. Link for the Democracy video: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSy77xvbf0o&t) Link for the Fascism video: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6U8SAvTscs&t)

Post-Comprehension

Democracy

Part 1: People Rule

The Word Democracy comes from the Greek words, dēmos ‘people’ and Kratos

meaning force, power, strength, or rule which is the most commonly

interpreted meaning and so we get people’s Rule. Although, People’s

power, People’s force, and people’s strength are possible

interpretations but for now, let us stick to the interpretation that

Kratos means rule. Now, who are these “people” and what is the “rule”?

More specifically, how are they supposed to conduct a sense of rulership

that exemplifies that of those people? Well, the framework of which can

often be thought to encompass certain principles such as:

Freedom of assembly, speech, inclusiveness, and equality.

Membership: The actors involved serve as a type of membership, be it

through citizenship in relation to a nation, or simply a member through

involvement in the decision-making process.

Consent, the people involved have agreed to the decision-making

process.

Voting, which can be taken as simply punching in a hole on a piece of

paper or able to have standing in the decision-making process as an

active unit in it. Those unable to vote would be the actors that cannot

actively possess active influence in such processes.

Right to life, the belief that a being has the right to live, and

shouldn’t be killed by another entity.

Minority Rights, can either mean rights to those in minority power

standings or minority in relation to population or simply disagreement

in relation to the majority.

These are thought to guide the processes known as people rule, or simply

democracy. The details of which and even the deepening meanings behind

the notions of people’s rulership is extremely complex as the semantics

behind which hold many implications and weights, many of which we will

explore in the video.

Part 2: Decisions and Proportions

Many forms of democracy exist, in fact, too much for a video to cover,

or at least for this video to cover, so we will be focussing on three

major types and dissect them, asking whether these forms do in fact

exemplify the people’s rule or are in fact exemplifying none of that. So

in the previous part, we discussed the definition of the word democracy

lightly, as no actual consensus exists as to what it really means and

the possible principles encompassing them. The arguments on the exact

meaning of people’s rule result in many different variations depending

on how people have interpreted the incredibly vague notion. Arguments

on:

Who is allowed to participate? What are the criteria for participation

in decision-making? Is it ethnic, religious, cultural, gender, tied to

citizens, or open to all?

How is authority shared amongst this participation? Do decision-makers

vote on representatives who then create legislation or do the

decision-makers vote directly on legislation?

What is the mechanism that decides a decision? How do the

decision-makers reach a decision? Is it through majority, supermajority,

or consensus?

The common three resulting democratic forms that come from these

questions are:

- Minoritarian Democracy, decision-making vested in a concentrated

minority, be it representatives or limiting those that can participate

in the decision-making process to a small segment of the population.

- Majoritarian Democracy, as opposed to constitutional democracy, refers

to democracy based upon the majority rule of a society’s citizens.

- Consensus Democracy, a decision-making structure that involves and

takes into account as broad a range of opinions as possible, as opposed

to systems where minority opinions can potentially be ignored by

vote-winning majorities.

Firstly, Minoritarian Democracy is often justified through the notion of

the “Tyranny of the Majority” and or the “Dumb Masses”, and so a

centralized and external body is to mediate the decision-making process

between the general population and legislation. This is the common

framing behind Representative Democracy in places like the United

States, as well as the framing behind Authoritarian Democracy, which

originated with Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès’ maxim of “confidence from below,

authority from above”, in which Sieyès claimed there must be an

enlightened authority that is responsive to the needs and clamor of the

people.

What’s interesting about Sieyes’s conception of democracy is that it

exemplifies a lot of the theory around Liberal Democracy, how it

detested monarchical and aristocratic rule but at the same time hated

mass rule, or more specifically direct mass rulership, in Sieyes “What

is The Third Estate?” This reasoning is found.

The Pamphlet argued that the clergy and aristocracy, which constituted

the first and second estate, were unneeded “dead weight” and instead the

state should be ruled by representatives of the people which made up the

third estate.

However, just as the clergy and aristocracy were a dead weight on the

people, so too are the business class and the state itself. The “Fourth

Estate” is the centralized representative, as the previous estate of the

aristocracy has remade itself in capitalism. A lot of liberal arguments

against the monarchy and its aristocracy can be pulled even further to

be presented against the authorities liberalism tries to justify.

Minoritarian Democracy rests on this line of reasoning, that the

majority cannot govern themselves, and thus that majority must be

governed by a superior minority. As Madison once famously remarked in

the federalist papers, arguing against an inclusive democracy out of

fear of agrarian reform, “Landholders ought to have a share in the

government, to support these invaluable interests and to balance and

check the other. They ought to be so constituted as to protect the

minority of the opulent against the majority. The senate, therefore,

ought to be this body; and to answer these purposes, they ought to have

permanency and stability.”

Fascists are another group that likes to justify “authoritarian

democracy”, as we’ve exhaustively covered before on this channel, video

linked below.

Fascists argue that the most “qualified” should rule instead of a rule

by numbers. Maurice Barrès, a great influence of fascist policies,

claimed that authoritarian democracy involved a spiritual connection

between a leader of a nation and the nation’s people, and that true

freedom did not arise from individual rights nor parliamentary

restraints, but through “heroic leadership” and “national power”.

Italian Fascists argued for a corporatist form of Authoritarian

Democracy, where state-sanctioned corporate groups would act as

representation for the interests of the general will of the nation and

thus this was considered a form of popular rule.

In both Liberal and Fascist cases of Minoritarianism, the popular rule

is substituted and mediated away from the people themselves, as a

centralized institution is pulled in be the ultimate filter and guide to

make sure that any popular will is deteriorated and refocused away and

supplanted with the states will instead, which I would consider being

the ultimate source of a democratic deficit.

If you wouldn’t call an oligarchy a democracy then there’s not any

reason to consider any type of Minoritarian rulership as one. At best

this type of “Democracy” is simply a guided Democracy.

In which the government controls elections so that the people can

exercise all their rights without truly changing public policy. While

they follow basic democratic principles, there can be major deviations

towards authoritarianism. Under managed democracy, the state’s

continuous use of propaganda techniques prevents the electorate from

having a significant impact on policy.

Be it the state, corporations, and often both, concentrated power

centers organize and distribute propaganda that will help in securing

their continued existence. Representative Democracy, especially the kind

that’s meant to protect the opulent, will do everything it can to

control public opinion through the media that they consume. Of course,

I’m referring to the process of Manufactured Consent, which I’ve

mentioned and further expanded on in my violence video, link below.

Secondly, Majoritarian Democracy, which has an odd contradiction of

forms in place whenever a centralized structure claims to be beholden to

“Majority rule”, as David Graeber once remarked:

“Majority democracy, we might say, can only emerge when two factors

coincide:

A feeling that people should have equal say in making group decisions,

and

A coercive apparatus capable of enforcing those decisions.

For most of human history, it has been extremely unusual to have both at

the same time. Where egalitarian societies exist, it is also usually

considered wrong to impose systematic coercion. Where a machinery of

coercion did exist, it did not even occur to those wielding it that they

were enforcing any sort of popular will.”

In order to maintain some sort of popular will and a majority

government, it has to exist within the framing of an egalitarian society

that does not impose coercion on the minority, as that coercion creates

the conditions for undoing those egalitarian principles. Oppressing the

minority creates stratification and further consolidation of power

relations that result in propping up a centralized power source that

undoes popular will.

As that centralized power source exists to maintain its position of

status over those below it, so whenever a state calls itself a

“Majoritarian Democracy”, often this is just Minoritarian rule posing

itself as the Majority’s Will.

Arguably, some standard for maintaining the majority part in said

Majority Will is important and that’s why respecting minority rights is

key here.

Although, there is a democratic paradox to this. If the minority or

majority seek to overturn their own will then what process is to stop

that? Certainly not the addition of inequality to step in and oversee,

as any established Centralized institution to do so would ironically do

the opposite to reinforce the maintenance of the people’s rule.

So paradoxically, intolerance to an undemocratic will must be maintained

but it ought to come from the people themselves. Of course, what counts

as “undemocratic” is its own Pandora’s box of deconstruction. The

solution to which is some form of defensive democracy, the philosophy

that members of a democratic society believe it necessary to limit some

rights and freedoms, in order to protect the institutions of the

democracy.

As with the paradox of individual freedom, in order to maintain it,

there must be some limitation such as the individual’s ability to

infringe on others individual freedom, of course, exceptions to this are

things like self-defense but the general point still stands. The

prevention of centralized and undemocratic institutions is how one

maintains democracy, even when the majority wills it.

Lastly, Consensus Democracy, which strives to take into account the

broadest range of opinions within the decision-making group to reach a

consensus. In a way, Consensus Democracy is neither Majoritarian nor

Minoritarian. However, if such a consensus cannot be found then what?

Well, interestingly Malatesta gave an answer to this question in his

work “between peasants”, with Characters as stand-ins for questions and

answers.

“Bert: But if in a village or association people didn’t all see things

the same way, what would happen then? The greatest number would win,

wouldn’t they?

George: By rights, no, because where truth and justice are concerned

numbers don’t count, and often one person alone can be right against one

hundred or a hundred thousand. In practice one would do what one could;

everything is done to reach unanimity, and when this is impossible, one

would vote and do what the majority wanted, or else put the decision in

the hands of a third party who would act as arbitrator, respecting the

inviolability of the principles of equality and justice which the

society is based on.”

When consensus is impossible than another form of reaching a decision is

made, be it majority or arbitration, a fluidity of forms is implied in

this. Not one form of decision making, rather many corresponding to the

problem itself and to those involved. This multi-methodology approach

also helps in solving many different types of problems instead of trying

to apply a singular and hegemonic approach to group problems.

A strict focus on consensus can disincentivize dissensus and leave many

left wanting. Critique is just as important as Agreement and oftentimes

more so as it can help to recognize the individual in the group instead

of obsessions with hegemonic agreement over that individual’s voice.

Harsha Walia goes much deeper into the issues with strict consensus and

ways to solve the issues with such a system, and even coming to a

similar conclusion to Malatesta:

“A common abuse of consensus, however, is a dogmatic attachment to the

structures and forms with which it is associated, which can sometimes be

as exclusive and alienating as the systems it seeks to replace. If this

is happening, the response should not be ‘Well this is how consensus

works!’ Instead, it is our collective responsibility to delve into the

dynamics that might be creating these negative reactions.

There are five common problems with consensus that can create

frustration. First, consensus often reproduces majoritarian rule by

creating sectarian camps of those in agreement versus those who are

blocking. Contrary to popular belief, consensus does not necessarily

mean unanimous agreement. This misconception causes us to wrongly view

dissent as a distraction or obstacle, and increases the pressure toward

homogenizing opinions. Second, a few voices can dominate the discussion,

a problem that tends to perpetuate power imbalances around race, class,

gender, and education level. Third, there is often a faulty assumption

that silence implies consent, which can end up stifling broader

discussion and the consideration of alternative proposals. Fourth,

facilitators have an unfortunate tendency to exercise covert forms of

power-over rather than power-with by steering the conversation based on

their own biases.

The fifth problem with consensus is more fundamental and structural.

Ironically, the seemingly benign notion that all voices are equal can

hide the uncomfortable truth of systemic inequality. Almost inherently,

the consensus process can absolve us of actively examining how privilege

and oppression shape our spaces.

In an effort to address these problems, many communities and collectives

use modified forms of consensus — for example, prioritizing and taking

leadership from women, people of color and those directly affected by

decisions being made; facilitating small break-out groups to ensure more

engaged participation; encouraging more debate and discussion rather

than just asking for blocks; and actively incorporating anti-oppression

principles to prevent harmful opinions from further marginalizing

historically disadvantaged peoples.

Consensus can be beautiful and transformative, but only when the

structures and processes are meeting the needs and desires of those

engaging in it. Otherwise, it can be just as shackling as more

conventionally authoritative decision-making systems. Remember,

consensus is a means to an end, not an end unto itself.”

Part 3: Popular Will and Mass Participation

David Graeber once remarked on the origins of democracy, saying: “We are

usually told that democracy originated in ancient Athens--like science

or philosophy, it was a Greek invention. It’s never entirely clear what

this is supposed to mean. Are we supposed to believe that before the

Athenians, it never really occurred to anyone, anywhere, to gather all

the members of their community in order to make joint decisions in a way

that gave everyone equal say?”

Long before the conceptions of liberalism forms of democracy existed,

the earliest known versions were in hunter-gatherer tribes. Taking the

form of small community face-to-face discussions in a council, or with a

leader backed by elders, or some other cooperative form of government.

Other forms of rule, monarchy, tyranny, aristocracy, and oligarchy

flourishing in more urban centers with often concentrated populations.

Democracies oldest known conceptualization is in Aeschylus’ “The

Suppliants”, 463 B.C.E., with the line sung by the chorus: dēmou

kratousa cheir, which translates as the “people’s hand of power”, with

the context of the play it acts as a counterpoint to the inclination of

the votes cast by the people, which means that the authority as

implemented by the people in the Assembly has power.

Traditionally it’s thought that the concept of democracy and

constitution as the government was first developed around the 6^(th)

century B.C.E., Athen city-states, as they had a direct democracy but it

was exclusive to women, slaves, and Non-Athenians, as they were not

allowed to participate. It should be noted that a Direct Democracy is

simply acting directly on legislation, how this direct action is taken

is another matter, as it can be majoritarian, consensus, or in this case

patriarchal. The main distinction is the absence of representatives

acting as a substitute for direct participation in said legislation.

Immediately we should recognize the exclusive nature of Athenian

democracy which I would argue fosters inequality, as a large portion of

the population was left out of the process. This is also discounting the

rights of the minority, another principle often thought to exemplify

democracy. It seems that the first democracy or at least the first

traditionally known doesn’t seem to truly be all that democratic when

faced with these modern charges but unfortunately at the same time, this

supposed democracy is more democratic than most nations proclaiming

themselves to be. As any people elected from this process would resemble

and recreate the inequalities within the assemblies. From Athens, we can

leave behind the patriarchy, slavery, and other such inequality but with

it, we can take forward the Popular Assembly.

Speaking of, Popular assemblies seem to be the most universal expression

of democracy and often used outside of the state with many revolutionary

movements using them. Arguably this is Democracy in its purest form,

found outside of the state and in the organizations that seek to rebel

against its inability to address the people’s grievances. It’s actually

odd to consider any state a “Democracy” when the Structure of such an

institution exists to oppose the people and their popular will. To quote

Morpheus, no not the matrix character rather the author behind an

interesting piece called “A Brief History of Popular Assemblies and

Workers Councils”:

“The phenomenon of popular assemblies and workers’ councils has appeared

many times throughout history. These organs of self-management usually

spring up spontaneously during a crisis or revolution when ordinary

people begin to organize their own lives. Popular assemblies are

meetings of ordinary people which organize against the dominant

hierarchical institutions (states, corporations, etc).”

Whenever a revolution birthed from popular will does overtake the state

it takes one of two roads. Reinventing the State and thus reinvention

the suppression of popular will. The other road is an endless revolution

that isn’t just waged against the state but any and all attempts at

rebuilding it. This is through reinventing not the state but the

people’s will through constant deconstruction and reconstruction of

Assemblies and Councils.

We can see this in many revolutionary movements, including Frances,

Russia’s, Mexico, Ukraine, and many others. Small glimpses in time in

which popular assemblies and worker’s councils existed.

To quote Morpheus again: “The most famous systems of mandated &

recallable delegates are the workers’ councils, which are confederations

of worker assemblies. This system of decentralized direct democracy is

the embryo of an anarchist society. An anarchist society would be

organized by voluntary non-hierarchical associations, such as these

assemblies & councils, rather than through authoritarian institutions

like corporations and the state.” These worker councils and assemblies

acted as a foundational floor for a bottom-up organization. Even today

we see this form of organization in the Zapatistas, the Autonomous

administration of north and east Syria, Federation of Neighborhood

Councils-El Alto, and many other movements.

The best quality of Democracy comes from its ability to spring forward

from outside minority rule and find itself in the margins, within the

voices and minds of those oppressed. The coordination of these voices

universally is often in these Assemblies and Councils, or in something

less formal and far simpler like in Affinity Groups. It seems that

sometimes when a lack of centralized power is present a form of

horizontal, inclusive, and loose census decision-making is created among

the community.

In essence one could say then when a democratic deficit has emerged,

oftentimes the people demand Horizontalism as an answer. Horizontalism,

as mentioned a few times before, is a social relationship that advocates

the creation, development, and maintenance of social structures for the

equitable distribution of management power. These structures and

relationships function as a result of dynamic self-management, involving

the continuity of participation and exchange between individuals to

achieve the larger desired outcomes of the collective whole. Or, as

Marina Sitrin summarizes:

“horizontalism, the use of direct democracy, the striving for consensus”

and “processes in which everyone is heard and new relationships are

created.”

One of the definitions for democratization is “the action of making

something accessible to everyone.” Which opens up access to broader

participation, and in the way introduces the realm of democracy into a

much wider range. Open-source software in a sense is a digitized version

of the popular assembly with a far greater degree of individual

autonomy. With anyone being able to have access to a forum of

information and materials with seemingly endless replication and even

more endless ways to communicate and cooperate with that replication of

resources.

This would be an example of an E-democracy, which is the use of

information and communication technology (ICT) in political and

governance processes. More specifically, this is the direct democracy

variation of it. As it can be applied to other types since something

simple as voting on your phone is considered an example. In fact,

technological development can help to facilitate greater individual

autonomy so that when collaboration occurs it has less potential for

coercion. Making any democratic actively remain participatory and less

likely to be co-opted by centralized forces.

The mechanisms of Stigmergy are at play here as they are creating paths

towards a better democracy. Stigmergy is a mechanism of indirect

coordination, through the environment, between agents or actions. The

principle is that the trace left in the environment by an individual

action stimulates the performance of a succeeding action by the same or

different agent. Agents that respond to traces in the environment

receive positive fitness benefits, reinforcing the likelihood of these

behaviors becoming fixed within a population over time.

Stigmergy is basically a form of self-organization. Producing complex,

seemingly intelligent structures, without need for any planning,

control, or even direct communication between the agents. As such it

supports efficient collaboration between extremely simple agents, who

may lack memory or individual awareness of each other.

As open source allows for a far greater degree of this mechanism to take

place, as people endlessly build onto previous work. Applying tons of

different altercations and applications to pre-existing materials. Each

creating its own structure that can work on itself. The Popular Assembly

is transformed into interpersonal and extrapersonal autonomous relations

that are constantly building and recreating networks of fluidity.

This as well as advancement in telecommunications has helped to

coordinate mass movements and increase the fluidity of information and

with it opened up educational opportunities to more people. A common

liberal argument against direct democracy was the “ignorance of the

masses” and therefore the “educated minority” should rule them. However,

applying this centralized power structure to information stagnates it

and reinforces the tyranny of obscurance, the people are ignorant, not

because of some inherent biological flaw but because of the conditions

in which that information is accessible.

The internet itself offers the potential for mass, open, and autonomous

self-education. The state, corporations, and other centralized systems

have to prevent these things in order to maintain their position of

power. If you lessen the fruits of information and you lessen the range

in which people can mentally defend themselves and make critical

decisions about said information. Hopefully, Being isn’t retreading too

much here, as I’ve discussed the liberatory potentials of this

technology in my Anarcho-Transhumanism video.

Again, we see democracy finding itself outside of the government and

among the people in new forms of coordination through technological

means. “The real origin of the democratic spirit — and most likely, many

democratic institutions — lies precisely in those spaces of

improvisation just outside the control of governments and organized

churches.” — David Graeber

Part 4: Anarchy vs. Kratos

“Democracy is a lie, it is oppression and is in reality, oligarchy; that

is, government by the few to the advantage of a privileged class. But we

can still fight it in the name of freedom and equality, unlike those who

have replaced it or want to replace it with something worse.” — Errico

Malatesta

The relationship between Democracy and Anarchism is complex, especially

when it comes to defining one to the other. If we are Defining Democracy

as a Majoritarian Government then the immediate conflicts to anarchism

arise. Questions such as are the majority able to oppress the minority?

If so then the coercion of the Majority on the Minority is in conflict

with Anarchism.

Malatesta is probably one of the most famous of Anarchist thinkers to

critique democracy, as you could tell from the quote used at the

beginning of this part but also the quote from him far earlier denotes a

peculiar distinction. Malatesta both hates democracy and yet, also

advocates for many of its forms without directly addressing them as

such. I think Zoe Baker best explains this peculiarity:

“When historic anarchists like Malatesta critique democracy they mean

representative democracy or systems of government based on majority

rule. They don’t mean systems of voluntary decision-making based on each

person in the group having a vote. They in fact advocated and

implemented such decision-making systems. For example, in Malatesta’s

pamphlet between peasants he writes that people will aim for ‘unanimity,

and when this is impossible, one would vote and do what the majority

wanted.

The difference between these systems of decision-making and what they

called democracy is that they are based on free association. If a

minority doesn’t like a majority decision they are free to leave or not

participate in it. Confusingly modern anarchists often now call these

historic anarchist systems of decision-making direct democracy. This

represents a change in language but the ideas are the same.”

The Anarchist critique of Democracy is the opposite of the Liberal one,

instead of the Collective imposing equality onto the privileged, the

collective is imposing inequality on the unprivileged.

So the critique around democracy is often one of two scenarios involving

it:

Collective Inequality Argument, The people hold inequalities from

within the collective that undermines that popular will, or subdues a

minority within that will, which deteriorates that will into tyranny

that quickly concentrates into a new minority leadership thus

dismantling that popular will in the first place.

Collective Equality Argument, the people demand equality at the risk

of dismantling those who benefit from inequality, for example, the

general will, the majority always being those at the bottom demanding

resources from the minority at the top. If left unchecked, this majority

rule will create a more equal position thus destroying the privileges

gained from inequality.

Both arguments say, “the majority will present inequality to a minority,

(be it a privileged minority or an underprivileged minority.” Now, the

liberals’ conclusion to their Collective Equality argument is we should

implement an institution of unequal standing to prevent this inequality

from affecting the minority.” If you think about it you could boil this

down to, “in order to prevent inequality, we must create more

inequality”, which doesn’t solve the initial problems but rather

inflates them.

The issue is a grievance of power relations, by worsening that grievance

by creating more of an imbalance you’ve essentially recognized a few

things, you understand that the power you hold is at a detriment to the

majority, and you also understand that in order to maintain that power

you must increase it thus creating more detachment to that majority.

(Congratulations, you suck and are worse for knowing that and doing

nothing to better but in fact, worsen that quality of not only yourself

but to impress that onto the rest of humanity)

The conclusion to the Anti-Democratic Anarchist argument of Collective

Inequality Argument is to not have democracy, since the obsession with

collectivity and community is a source of tyranny, William Gillis

remarks: “Democracy’s focus on majorities, rough consensus, and ‘the

community’ is a blunderbuss of violent simplification that deprives

individuals of agency and everyone of the full extent of cooperation

possible.”

Gillis and many Anti-Democratic Anarchists do make fair observations

that obsessions with “community” and “masses’ ‘ can often hide

reactionary elements from within it. Especially the particular sentiment

Gillis made about changing our focus away from those obsessions.

I admittedly do not entirely agree with Gillis but at the same time, I

cannot deny many of the observations he makes do intrigue Being. But at

the other end, I think lessening those inequalities within those groups

would help. As any group that oppresses a minority is a collection of

individuals that hold within themselves that bigotry. Again, though, we

should try as much as possible to decentralize relations so that

individual bigotry cannot so easily grow into institutional bigotry.

Arguably, some form of group decision-making and consensus will be

necessary for certain activities, so is Gillis against these concepts

completely?

Well, In another essay, Gillis’s response to this question: “I should

also clarify that I have nothing against unanimity, indeed it is often a

desirable end. My point was that the way we presently handle consensus

process overemphasizes the value of affiliation in a persistent

collective organization at the cost of a truer emphasis on freedom of

association. Consensus process (done right) encourages people to

disassociate and reassociate fluidly. Consensus should ideally be a test

applied that dissolves associations and discourages persistent groups

just as much as it facilitates the discovery of affinities or detentes.”

So what If we were to define democracy loosely within the bounds of a

free association as just another term for group decision making then

it’s possible to see no conflicts, but, the type of democracy involved

would have to be immediate, fluid, and not bound to any external

government by which any disaffected individual can leave freely, I would

like to label this form of democracy as Free Democracy. Even still some

semantic problems do arise, Democracy means people rule, Anarchy means

without rule. Another Anti-Democratic Anarchist Critique being this

semantic relationship.

So any form of organizational decision-making has to abide by both

without rule and possess the rule of the people. As you can see we have

a contradiction unless we discuss what “people ruling” means and what

the absence of a rule is.

When we decentralize power relations we’re creating the means of

self-governance, a condition of self-rule, so people ruling becomes

self-rulership of all and at the same time an absence of rulership. In

this relation of free association still comes the necessity for group

decision making and in that, I would like to propose a new type of

democracy founded within these conditions,

Free Democracy, a non-coercive form of group decision-making formed

around a free association, with respect to free disassociation, either

through majority, consensus, or dissensus, so long as any disaffected

individual is able to freely disassociate. As Free Association also

means free dissociation.

How this would work exactly is hard to directly comment on but it would

follow from the principle of Associationalism, a political movement in

which “human welfare and liberty are both best served when as many of

the affairs of a society as possible are managed by voluntary and

democratically self-governing associations.” Of course, Being is

referring to this in relation to Anarchism and not some of its historic

role in liberalism.

Also using the pluralistic methodology Malatesta and Walia gave in their

works, forming a weak consensus of sorts. Instead of strict obsession

with hegemonic agreement strides should be made to account for the

complexities in individuals through the use of other decision-making

methods mentioned before.

Finally, I would also like to mention that this form of democracy is

based on the broadest definitions of both democracy and anarchy. It

seems that to me, democracy in its purest form is the most decentralized

relation of power, and anarchy is the abolition of all power, and from

these observations, they find themselves in a beautiful harmony of

contradiction. If power is “abolished” then it is merely translated to

all and equalized in its supposed absence, as the source of this power

is in the people themselves and in no one else, or put simply, this is

the truest form of the People’s Power.