44 lines
2.7 KiB
Plaintext
44 lines
2.7 KiB
Plaintext
Review by Jeff Stein of three tracts by the Australian anarchist Graham Purchase
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(_Libertarian_Labor_Review_ 14 [Winter 1992-93]):
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"In _Anarchist_Organisation_, Purchase makes an even more emphatic case for
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the addition of 'economic regionalism' as a component of any future society.
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While suggesting that there would still be a possibility for communities and
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workplaces to federate for cultural and economic reasons, Purchase insists
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that 'political space' should also be demarcated by 'Changes in (a) species
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distribution, (b) climate, (c) drainage and rainfall and (d) physiography
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[and] the empirical data needed to produce a more or less scientifically
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arrived at picture of natural or bio-regional boundary.' (p. 20)
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"'Bio-regionalism' has a nice ring to it. It implies not only decentralism,
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but a concern for the ecology of an area as well. Yet, contrary to Purchase,
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one suspects that 'bio-regionalism' would deliver neither in practice. To
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divide up human society into political units basedupon the prevailing flora
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and fauna in the area makes no more sense and is just as arbitrary as
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politicians drawing straight lines on a map. It is a contradiction of the
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anarchist principles of voluntary association and self-management, since it
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would take away the right of people to federate according to their
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self-perceived common interests and instead force them into boundaries
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dictated by so-called 'environmental scientists.'
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"Nor is there any reason to suppose that once forced to live in these
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'scientifically' contrived bio-regions, people would acquire any more concern
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for the surrounding ecology than they had before. Worse yet, bio-regional
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politics might even produce the opposite effect: an anti-environmentalist
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backlash against what people would see as a paternalistic attitude by the
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bio-regionalists.
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"Undoubtedly in some cases, communities do have strong ecological reasons for
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federating. All the communities in a river valley ringed by mountains, for
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example, would have a common interest in coordinating their industries to
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control air and water pollution and soil erosion. On the other hand, a
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multitude of communities spread out over the Russian steppes or the plains of
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the midwestern United States, not sharing the same water resources and having
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less of an air quality problem, would not have as great a degree of common
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ecological concerns, even though they were all part of the same 'bio-region.'
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Rather than dictate to people what political units they must live in, it would
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be better to allow communities to decide these things for themselves. Where
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common ecological interests are important, we can assume they will federate
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without needing to be told to do so."
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