An excellent question that is raised by Jonathan Meades on his program about the architecture of Mussolini’s Italy. It seems, as Meades points out, to be a pointless neologism that applies to whatever the forces of anti-fascism believe at any particular time. In many ways, it’s akin to the state’s use of the word extremist, effectively denoting unpopular opinions as beyond the pale. This ironically develops into Orwellian conceptions of a fascist society, where words and thoughts are controlled by the centralised structures of popular culture and statism. Thoughts become unthinkable not by the direct oppression of the state, but through the movements and dynamics of popular political opinion and culture. Continue reading →

Modern markets are fundamentally unfree. Most libertarians and anarchists realise this, and see that centuries of systemic state intervention have created infrastructures that are wasteful, coercive and destructive. The majority of capitalist markets, rather than developing through spontaneous order, are in fact borne out these infrastructures, growing as deformed appendages that have some elements of competition and ground-up innovation, but mostly being suited toward government-created and subsidised corporations who are so capital intensive that they rely on and use these infrastructures to keep their profitability, and with it their monopoly status. Continue reading →

The conceptions of Jeffersonian governance pride equality before the law, the democratic will of the people tempered by intelligent argumentation and natural societal hierarchies, and a belief in limited, decentralised government. Within this tradition, governance should never truly invade the sensibilities and direction of succeeding generations, and should never supersede the choice of governance that one believes in. From such ideas came the Articles of Confederation, a decentralist set of ideas that gave significant autonomy and rights to the individual states of the Union. Further, Jefferson’s concept of sunset clauses naturally implanted within legislation and law-making[1] the decentralist idea of individual sovereignty and the right of the generation of the living to not be burdened by the collective irresponsibility’s of their ancestors. Continue reading →

The national minimum wage introduced in 1999 by the Blair government was seen as one of the best policies to tackle exploitative work and the conditions of low pay. What better than to create a floor under which no one can fall. Well it seems that floor was not so stable, as young people have borne the brunt of this misguided policy. Effects as serious as rising youth unemployment, significant underemployment and a range of masking effects have led to a situation of under-saturated labour markets and the continual need for young adults to seek other activities such as university education and government-based training schemes, or simply drop out of the labour market altogether. It has also had the effect of deskilling young people and making them reliant on the welfare state and low-skill, low-pay employment through Jobcentres and Jobseekers Allowance schemes.

One of the most challenging elements to a post-Brexit order is the organisation and understanding of law. Since our accession into the EEC, our laws have been increasingly harmonised with and even led by European Union directives and court judgments. Thus we’ve moved into the position of having legislation more dominant in legal acquiescence than precedent. This is not just the direction of the European Union, it has also been the direction of the British Parliament. Through parliamentary statutes and legislated actions, economic regulation has been led by the idea of one-size-fits-all legislation rather than its acceptance through the particularities of common law and the creation of contracts. Such a direction can also be seen in the dominance of human rights law in legal discourses. Instead of precedence taking the predominant position in questions of legality, human rights are defined a priori, thus leading to the situation of legal abstractions of equality of access and inalienable rights, all of which are ill-defined and based on the fluid decisions of particular judges. Continue reading →

Propertarianism is a particular ideological position within libertarianism. It bases economic and political characteristics around their voluntary acceptance in a world of legitimate contracts and real private property (not the state-guaranteed property that currently takes the name of “private property”). In this sense, boundaries can be created between particular individuals and communities as this is the remit of private property. At the individual level, this is as simple as preventing uninvited people onto your property. At a collective level, it means a contractual agreement among property owners to decide on particular policies and boundaries. “If fifty people decided voluntarily to set up an organization for common services or self-defense of their persons and properties in a certain geographical area, then the boundaries of that association, based on the just property rights of the members, will also be just”[1].

I’m sick of hearing from the Remain side that because older generations have voted to leave the EU, their future prospects have been ruined. Because of course it wasn’t the massive wage stagnation and growing youth unemployment developing over the course of the last 30 years. It wasn’t the phony free trade agreements which centralised power into the hands of large corporations and unaccountable government bureaucracies. It wasn’t the destruction of home-grown British industries in the 70s and 80s by the fake rhetoric of free markets and the provision of subsidies to large corporations and behemoth-like management networks. It wasn’t the belief in increasing indebtedness through consumerism and mortgages as a means to economic prosperity. None of this is seemingly relevant to these self-righteous youths. Continue reading →

The milieu of middle-class remain voters are bemoaning something that in their mind is akin to the Norman invasion or World War II or some other equally destructive event. Of course it isn’t, and these people really need to grow up and stop whining like 5 year olds. It is simply a large faction of working class and lower middle class people registering their dissatisfaction with fear mongering campaigns and the stupidity of our political classes. And in the end, it fundamentally changes nothing. Continue reading →

Agorism is the philosophy of counter-economic activity eventually overcoming the statist economic consensus. It’s not simply black market activity, but rather a whole alternative economy that operates just below the surface of state capitalism. While seen by some (including Rothbard) as a niche element to the state’s leviathan, Konkin himself noted that the counter economy encompasses a huge range of activity, from black market heavy industry in Burma to the cottage industry of medical marijuana in the United States. In the modern world, where regulation is more pernicious than ever before, and is enforced through a huge range of trade agreements, product directives and intellectual property law, agorism is more important than ever. New developments in technology and software are increasingly enclosed by corporate vested interests through the mechanisms of intellectual property and complex trade law.

Its the day of voting, and of course everyone is keen to make their views known and push forward their ideology and opinions. In that respect, I may as well say I’ll vote to leave, simply because potentially seceding from one unaccountable bloc of power may potentially lead to other such secession-based movements and ideas. That’s it. That’s the only reason I can possibly think to bother voting at all. Leaving one centralised power hopefully causes a whole raft of decentralisation. Continue reading →