Anarchy Paradigm
Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology
David Graeber
PRICKLY PARADIGM PRESS CHICAGO
1
Anarchism: The name given to a principle or theory of life and conduct under which society is conceived without government—harmony in such a society being obtained, not by submission to law, or by obedience to any authority, but by free agreements concluded between the various groups, territorial and professional, freely constituted for the sake of production and consumption, as also for the satisfaction of the infinite variety of needs and aspirations of a civilized being. Peter Kropotkin (Encyclopedia Brittanica) Basically, if you’re not a utopianist, you’re a schmuck. Jonothon Feldman (Indigenous Planning Times)
© 2004 David Graeber All rights reserved. Prickly Paradigm Press, LLC 5629 South University Avenue Chicago, Il 60637 www.prickly-paradigm.com ISBN: 0-9728196-4-9 LCCN: 2004090746
What follows are a series of thoughts, sketches of potential theories, and tiny manifestos—all meant to offer a glimpse at the outline of a body of radical theory that does not actually exist, though it might possibly exist at some point in the future. Since there are very good reasons why an anarchist anthropology really ought to exist, we might start by asking why one doesn’t—or, for that matter, why an anarchist sociology doesn’t exist, or an anarchist economics, anarchist literary theory, or anarchist political science.
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3
So are academics just behind the curve here? It’s possible. Perhaps in a few years the academy will be overrun by anarchists. But I’m not holding my breath. It does seem that Marxism has an affinity with the academy that anarchism never will. It was, after all, the only great social movement that was invented by a Ph.D., even if afterwards, it became a movement intending to rally the working class. Most accounts of the history of anarchism assume it was basically similar: anarchism is presented as the brainchild of certain nineteenth-century
David Graeber
PRICKLY PARADIGM PRESS CHICAGO
1
Anarchism: The name given to a principle or theory of life and conduct under which society is conceived without government—harmony in such a society being obtained, not by submission to law, or by obedience to any authority, but by free agreements concluded between the various groups, territorial and professional, freely constituted for the sake of production and consumption, as also for the satisfaction of the infinite variety of needs and aspirations of a civilized being. Peter Kropotkin (Encyclopedia Brittanica) Basically, if you’re not a utopianist, you’re a schmuck. Jonothon Feldman (Indigenous Planning Times)
© 2004 David Graeber All rights reserved. Prickly Paradigm Press, LLC 5629 South University Avenue Chicago, Il 60637 www.prickly-paradigm.com ISBN: 0-9728196-4-9 LCCN: 2004090746
What follows are a series of thoughts, sketches of potential theories, and tiny manifestos—all meant to offer a glimpse at the outline of a body of radical theory that does not actually exist, though it might possibly exist at some point in the future. Since there are very good reasons why an anarchist anthropology really ought to exist, we might start by asking why one doesn’t—or, for that matter, why an anarchist sociology doesn’t exist, or an anarchist economics, anarchist literary theory, or anarchist political science.
2
3
So are academics just behind the curve here? It’s possible. Perhaps in a few years the academy will be overrun by anarchists. But I’m not holding my breath. It does seem that Marxism has an affinity with the academy that anarchism never will. It was, after all, the only great social movement that was invented by a Ph.D., even if afterwards, it became a movement intending to rally the working class. Most accounts of the history of anarchism assume it was basically similar: anarchism is presented as the brainchild of certain nineteenth-century