ANARCHY AND THE CONFLICT BETWEEN STATES. Social Sciences Essay

ANARCHY AND THE CONFLICT BETWEEN STATES
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ANARCHY AND THE CONFLICT BETWEEN STATES
In order to have an answer to this question, we must first know what anarchism is. Well, in accordance with the definition of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2017), anarchism is a political theory that finds the justification of political power, or just any forms of authority and power, to be worthy of skepticism. It is commonly rooted in moral claims in regards to the importance of individual liberty and has inspired various forms of direct actions, practical efforts at establishing Utopian communities, and both radical and revolutionary political agendas. This kind of anarchism is called "philosophical anarchism," wherein it focuses on anarchism not as any form of political activism, but as a theoretical idea. Even though this philosophical anarchism describes a skeptical theory of political legitimation, anarchism is also a concept, an idea that has been used in both philosophical and literary theory to describe a sort of anti-foundationalism. For a political theory to be called as "anarchism" it has to meet four criteria, it must be consist of: (a) an ideal society, which should be noncoercive and nonauthoritarian; (b) criticism of the current society; (c) a human-centered view that rationalizes the hope for significant development towards the ideal; and lastly (d) a tactic for change involving the establishment of a decentralized, nonauthoritative, and noncoercive alternative; with this definition, an anarchist that met the four criteria is well-rooted to the fundamental ideal, but on the other hand, an anarchist that accepted the ideal yet suggests a different approach to attain its goal would have a more limited sense (Clark, 1978).
One thing to mention is that a difference can be made between anarchism as a fixed idea, or philosophy, and what anarchism essentially is. The essence of anarchism can be characterized as the rejection of all coercion and any form of authority as it not natural to humankind, and it has an inherent notion that men can have a good interaction with his fellow men without a need for hierarchy and authority. The philosophy of anarchism is based on this. In the 19th century, the advent of the philosophy of anarchism coincidentally aligned along with the dawn of modern state and the capitalism, and with the increasing importance given to the need of central control and hierarchical structure in all aspects of the day to day lives of people living in that era, this kind of philosophy gathered a numerous enthusiast in Europe along with their call for the tear-down of the hierarchy and centralization. Three notable men molded anarchism in this era; Michael Bakunin, Peter Kropotkin, and Proudhon; in which they are all agreed on specific principles that governed the orthodox of the philosophy of anarchism. Most followers of this philosophy cohere with the following; (a) man can be corrupted by the authority of politics, religion, and education, despite that, man is good by nature (either by inherent potential, or by birth); (b) man, as a social animal would instinctively cooperate with this fellowmen rather than compete against them, (c) any form of authority will hinder humanity's potential for development; (d) property owned privately as an establishment accompany the corruption of men done by his fellow men; (e) the state is unnatural and eventually corrupts, so individual's voluntary cooperation should be the means of the progress of society and not by any enforcement done by the government; (f) having no central form of control will allow cooperation between people, in contrast having a large and complex association will lead to the formation of hierarchy, as well as authority; (g) any changes done in the society must be in accordance with the feelings of the autonomous individual members of it, these changes must also be unprompted, uninterrupted, and consistent; (h) industrial society corrupts when machines takes over the place of people. This will stifle the creativity of the members of the society, along with their dehumanization and dissolution of their person (Bucci, 1971). Knowing the roots and its derivatives of what governs the ideals of anarchy should bring us a better understanding on what are the consequences, or rather, trade-offs, in practicing one in the more recent years and an international scale.
A central assumption of the mainstream approach to foreign relations was that the state system works in anarchical conditions. This shows that the notion that the highest authority is the state. One thing to be noted is that in an anarchical state, there will be no presence of any other factor that might tend to the state's needs and interests. Eventually, they will, with no other choice, to self-sustain and help themselves despite the probability of deprivation of resources. Now, if the international operates in this condition, there will be the tendency of one state to seek power will only be mitigated by competing with other states, implying that war and conflict cannot be avoided in this type of international system. The next concern would be the security of the state, as one of the most, if not always discussed topics on politics. Despite the domestic domain is stable and everything seems to be in order, the international domain is in the anarchical state, and therefore unstable, and out of this instability, there will be issues with threats and discussions of probable countermeasures. In the world of self-sustenance and self-help, it is not an exaggeration that all states are in the look-out for the other states analyzing and deliberating whether there the potential of threat from them is high. So each state must be capable of defending itself or wage war if a dire situation would present itself. Hence, national security always invests themselves in military power, knowing that the more power a state in terms of their military measures, the more secure it is likely to be. This military development and advancement in security measures, on each state, would bring about a seemingly competitive interaction with one another. This is often called a security dilemma. This only becomes...