With elections around the corner, various parties and their members will be out seeking your vote, your support, or at least your attention. “It’s the time for you to have a say in how the country is run”, as the adverts say. You might also hear a rather different message from some corners, namely ‘anarchist’ ones. Not only do they say “don’t vote”, but they follow it up with “organise!” So what does that actually mean? If voting is the only way to have your say, why would anarchists question it? And what does the vague cry of ‘organise’ entail? While there are many reasons why anarchists think voting and parliamentary representation is a bankrupt way of directly looking after our many needs and wants — and advocate alternatives that would truly involve everyone in ‘having a say’ — these debates are not the main focus of this wee text (those arguments can be found at my website, or a more in-depth analysis check out www.anarchistfaq.org). What I want to try and illustrate here is the ‘organise’ part of the critique — the ways of doing things anarchists refer to as direct action, self-management, direct democracy, and importantly, the idea of federalism. To do this, I’m going to thrash a particular analogy to the extreme. So, let’s go shopping!

Things like politics, political parties, and our system of parliamentary democracy all rely on ‘representation’. Politicians are meant to represent us and our interests, and in exchange, we give them the power to make decisions that we think will benefit us — in short, to govern us. We do this because we are led to believe that this is the most logical and efficient way of doing things. This means the power to make laws, to regulate and control society, are in the hands of those in power (politicians), and are binding on you and me. Because we agree to pass on these responsibilities (or let those above us handle it), we advocate a system of hierarchy — a pyramid-like structure with a few at the top, and the rest of us at various levels below. If those at the top don’t do a good job, we are
allowed the right to replace those politicians who failed to meet our needs, by voting in another bunch of people at the top every three years. This is a very basic run down of things, but it will do for here.

For anarchists, it is this very kind of hierarchy and imbalance of power that causes most of the problems in today’s world, because it means some people (politicians, corporations, or countries), have more power, more say, and more control than others. This leads to things like greed, divisions, and poverty — people being exploited by those with power, whether it be economic, social or political. Anarchists propose that a better way to do things would be to ensure that no one has more power than another, that everyone was equal and had an equal say in their direct affairs, and that together we should decide how we work, how we live, and how we relate to each other. “Anarchism is a theory for social change based on the essential belief that no person has the right to have power over another person. When you accept the notion that every person has their own personal freedom, it becomes clear that our present social structure does not allow people equal footing. It does not allow us control over our own lives.” So, how do anarchists think this could be changed? And how do they think that ‘bigger’ tasks such as ‘running a country’ could be done, without falling back into structures of unequal power, control and hierarchy? How do you ensure all decisions are made fairly, democratically, and directly, in all aspects of life — local, national and international? One way, they reply, is the idea of horizontal forms of decision making connected with everyone involved — a process which is integrated with a system known as Federalism.

Far from advocating chaos, anarchists are strong believers in organisation — in particular, ways of organising that are as non-exploitative as possible. Anarchists don’t just wont to flip the ‘pyramid’ upside down, so the bottom becomes the top and the top becomes the bottom — they would rather do away with the pyramid all together! Instead, horizontal and equal forms of decision making would replace it, making the most out of non-hierarchal systems that would function — not up or down — but from the outside edges-in, from the periphial to the centre. Sound weird? In fact, we do this in some aspects of our lives already. Take, for example, the weekly task of going grocery shopping for the house or flat. A few of the flatmates are entrusted with carrying out the task of getting the groceries agreed to earlier by the whole flat (the dreaded shopping list), and it’s then their job to administrate (or do) the tasks set out (the shopping). We expect them to stick to the list we all agreed on, and this would make sense, because they helped create it too. They are part of the group and the decision making process, so to change it effects them also. They might come back from the shopping with suggestions on how to do it better next time, but these are only suggestions, to discuss together as a group. The key here is the nature of power and representation. The ‘delagates’ of the task put forward by everyone (in this case, the grocery shopping) are temporary, administrative (doing) in nature, and do not have any power to make binding or final decisions. If they really sucked at the shopping, and spent all the flat money on booze and chips (not bad, some might say), then obviously the next time around the group would decide on different delegates to have a go. In fact, we all know the task of getting groceries swaps around, as it’s fairer that way. Anarchists say, why not take this kind of logical system further, and apply it our wider, bigger tasks? They point out the key aspects of this system (federalism) of being the fluid and temporary nature of delegation, the delegates to be direct involved in and from the group, the equal balance of power and decision making, and the non-existence of an exploitative hierarchy. It is in this way, through the unique and organic process of federation, that the direct democracy and self-management of ‘the shopping’, (the community, our workplaces, and industry) takes place — meaning everyone can have the maximum input in what directly effects you. When this process joins together with other groups doing the very same thing, federalism on a larger scale takes place, following the same structures, and the same principles.

Still not sure if this is a better way of doing things? Lets bash this shopping analogy out even further, and see how ‘shopping’ would take place under the current system of ‘representation’. The people who you ‘elected’ to go shopping — and who promised they would ‘stick to the list’ — have decided to not only stay and live at the supermarket, but try and control everything else about the flat from there too. They try to make sure you’ve got the right groceries from where they are, as they say it’s more efficient than making trips back and forth. So, the flat trusts that those in the supermarket will somehow know what the flat needs each changing week, from a position seprate and removed from the flat. If they start to get it wrong, and become completely out of touch with the flatmate’s and their various needs, then all you can do is wait three years to vote in another group — who, funnily enough, also happen to live at the supermarket! And finally, if you decide to go out and actually do the shopping yourself, and at a different supermarket, they send out the trolley boy’s after you!

Sound familiar? The analogy is terribly cheesy (as is this pun), but when it comes down to it, it’s sadly accurate. The representative system is far from efficient — in fact, its corrupt, illogical, and completely divorced from our everyday lives. That’s why anarchists advocate direct action, direct participation, and a system of inclusive, equal, federalism. That’s what it means when they say, “don’t vote — organise!”