GenZhouArchive

u/aimixin - originally from r/GenZhou
I haven't seen Hakim's video in awhile, I'll give a basic response to Thought Bat's and just assume he's representing it accurately.

(1) "Hakim doesn't give a definition of authoritarian and libertarian which leads to confusion. I identify libertarianism as decentralism and authoritarianism as centralism."

Libertarianism and authoritarianism are indeed incredibly vague. But, let's go with this definition for the sake of argument. The problem with libertarians is they argue for decentralization on moral grounds while Marx demonstrates centralization arises objectively as an inevitable result of industrialization. So morality is irrelevant to the question. Libertarians also conflate centralization with top-down vertical hierarchies. You can have whatever opinion you want on hierarchies and vertical power structures, but these are fundamentally different from the concept of centralization. Centralization can also be in the form of flat horizontal power structures. But, let's get into the next point.

(2) "Authoritarianism is a means to an end and libertarianism is an end in and of itself."

No. If we're defining authoritarianism as centralization, centralization does not go away even in the higher phase of a communist society. The means of production would still be controlled by society as a whole, not by decentralized collectives. We may expect there to be less bureaucracy and for hierarchies to flatten out a bit, but that doesn't entail decentralization.

(3) "Libertarians want to establish a state that doesn't infringe on people's rights, authoritarians are fine with curtailing rights as long as they move us towards the end goal."

Well, most Marxists are not believers in the liberal conception of individual rights in the first place. But putting that aside, the core of their argument here is utilitarianism vs moralism. If you had to kill 1 person to save 1,000 innocent people, then a utilitarian would say you should kill that 1 person. A moralist would instead say you should spare the 1 person because killing is morally wrong.

In a sense, yes, most MLs tend to lean more towards utilitarianism. Maybe not pure utilitarians, there are definitely some means which don't justify the ends and would be condemned even by MLs. But in comparison to anarchists, they do tend to lean more utilitarian, preferring actual results and improving people's lives than fitting arbitrary moral principles. That's, ultimately, why Marxists believe in centralism in the first place. Not because we find it morally good or some ideal, but because it's objectively what the evidence shows is the result of industrialization. That's also why Marxists are willing to use market mechanisms, like the Soviet Union did, as well as modern China. Even though we may not love markets, we understand from a scientific perspective they can be used positively. Anarchists (as well as some ultraleftists) oppose this on principle.

The problem with "on principle" moralist arguments, though, is that they can be used to justify anything. Neocons argue we had to invade Iraq because Saddam was a "brutal dictator", that we had to invade "on principle". When you point out the consequences were far worse than just leaving him alone, they don't understand this, and accuse you of being a "Saddam apologist". As much as anarchists pretend to be fully opposed to utilitarianism, in reality, they aren't. Catalonia had their own version of Gulags. Some even defend the US government intervening in Syria to protect the libertarian socialist leaning Rojava. Clearly they will even violate their own principles at times to achieve a goal.

(4) "Engels equates violence to authoritarianism in On Authority."

Engels's point is more than just violence. He's making a point of a political body enforcing a hierarchy above another through violence. This body is a centralized body. Engels actually explicitly defines authoritarian as this centralized force which subordinates another.

Authority, in the sense in which the word is used here, means: the imposition of the will of another upon ours; on the other hand, authority presupposes subordination.[...]Thereafter particular questions arise in each room and at every moment concerning the mode of production, distribution of material, etc., which must be settled by decision of a delegate placed at the head of each branch of labour or, if possible, by a majority vote, the will of the single individual will always have to subordinate itself, which means that questions are settled in an authoritarian way.

Anarchists have a weird tendency of flip-flopping between criticism of hierarchy and criticism of centralism, which are, again, not the same things. "On Authority" is defending the centralized body enforcing a hierarchy (class rule) through violence.

It doesn't speak much of why centralization exists in the first place, but this is already a debunked viewpoint in plenty of their other writings.

(5) "Centralized states are bad because they are oppressive and the 20th century proves us correct."

Boo hoo. Again, the argument for centralization is an objective, not a moral, one.

(6) "Marxists have failed to achieve their theoretical goals."

lol... coming from an anarchist.

(7) "I advocate for socialism to be managed by the workers themselves and not the state."

Word salad. The state is made up of workers.

(8) "Capitalism is not defined by competition in a market."

Sure. But markets, if they are not subordinated under a dominant public sector (i.e. some sort of socialist market economy which is fundamentally different from market socialism), inherently give rise to capitalism. Competition is driven surplus, and a top-down private enterprise simply is more capable of extracting surplus from the workers. Of course, an anarchist also doesn't advocate for a central state, so there is no way to enforce a co-operative model. They just rely on the good will of the people to enforce it, kind of like the anarcho-capitalist "non-aggression principle". They create an economic system that incentivizes one thing, but then claim that thing won't happen because of the good will of the masses.

(9) "Unless Marxists can show that market socialism would give rise to capitalist relations, then they don't have an argument."

I mean, yeah, Marx totally didn't write tons of economic theory showing how capitalism arise. Engels did not specifically address how decentralized ownership would lead to restoration of capitalist relations in Anti-Durhing. Stalin totally did not criticize this viewpoint in Economic Problems. Che Guevara totally did not criticize decentralize ownership leading to a capitalist superstructure in his Apuntes críticos a la economía...Okay, sure, maybe Hakim himself didn't address the issue enough, but it's literally been addressed in some form by most Marxists.

(10) "Mutual-aid networks would work because flat hierarchies mean people live in their communities and thus have an incentive to give to it in order to lower crime."

Incoherent. Mutual-aid can only work if it's specifically between communities. It's economically impossible for my local community where I live to produce literally everything I need, from health care, to transportation, to education, to food, to entertainment, etc. I will inevitably end up going to other communities to get things I need that my community does not produce. Someone who lives miles away who produces something I need is not going to care about crime within my local area any more than a capitalist would care.

(11) "Yugoslavia failed for other reason other than being market socialist and was a bag example of market socialism."

I find it funny this video opened with accusing MLs of never achieving their goals, and the one example of a market socialist country that had at least some successes, he dismisses as not a good example of it because the state was too controlling. Fact is, you'll need a controlling state to maintain decentralized co-operative ownership, because markets themselves incentivize commodity production.

(12) "MLs should engage in better faith dialog and here are some books to read."

If you read anything from Marxists ever, you'd know the argument against market socialism isn't a moral one but one of historical materialism, which is objective. He addresses this purely from a moral perspective, arguing that MLs are utilitarian and anarchists are moralists and anarchism is just more moral, and then doesn't even address the objective arguments against market socialism. Sure, he could argue Hakim didn't address it and this video is largely just a response to Hakim, but the video still comes up lacking by not even mentioning historical materialism and the Marxist argument for centralization.

(Conclusion)

The video ends, and really just confirms all my criticism of anarchists. They have no arguments besides "anarchism is morally good and states are morally evil." He started with the premise that authoritarian = centralism yet never in the entire video criticizes centralism or why Marxists believe in centralism.