I recently read a book, “Stealing From God” by Frank Turek and I highly recommend it. However, while Mr. Turek is an excellent apologist, arguing for the logic of theism, theistic creation and more, he still has a thing or two to learn about libertarianism/anarchism. In one chapter he makes a statement regarding Anarchists and their position of having “no rulers” where he presumes that they, Anarchists, have no answers as to “how to organize society” to which, I exclaimed out loud, “bull crap!”
Considering how critical Mr. Turek is of atheists who criticize the Christian/Jewish God and create a god with characteristics that are completely foreign to the God of the Bible, it’s pretty ironic that he commits a similar error with regards to Anarchists and their views.
So let’s answer the question for Mr. Turek — How would we Anarchists organize society? The problem in answering this question is that it’s the wrong question but nonetheless, let’s start by saying that “having no rulers” doesn’t automatically mean there’s going to be chaos and blood in the streets. Why do he and those like him, believe such a thing anyway? A better question would be why does he think that without rulers this would be the case? There are plenty of examples of groups of people who form all sorts of voluntary organizations that don’t have “rulers”. The keyword here is “voluntary”. People can live together just fine and do so all the time without having to resort to voting for others to rule over them and use the threat of violence to keep them in line.
There was a time in Israel’s history, in fact, when they had no rulers. They did have judges but there was no king. Their only King was God himself and he spoke through the prophets. There were also judges at that time who, with the people themselves, meted out justice and then, of course, there were the priests of the Tribe of Levi. The Jews did get a king but that was their idea, not God’s. In fact, God warned them that a king would make their lives hard as he would tax them and send their young men to war and all the things that kings do of course, but they wouldn’t listen, they wanted to be like their pagan neighbors who had kings. They got what they wanted and while it wasn’t all bad, everything that God had warned them about happened. Having rulers is not all that it’s cracked up to be and while many Christians seem to think that kings and rulers were God’s idea, it’s pretty clear that that’s not the case.
Anyway, societies, in a libertarian world would organize themselves however they choose. I would imagine that, just as it is now, people of similar interests, likes, dislikes, ethnicities, cultures, religion and the like, would end up in communities together since it’s only natural that people are more comfortable being around people who are like themselves and have common interests and values. This should be pretty self-evident. Contrary to what Turek and other Authoritarians contemplate, there would be rules but there would be no coercion, very much like what you see in a neighborhood association. People who want to live there agree, voluntarily to abide by the rules and if they don’t like the rules they’d simply choose another neighborhood or start their own association but nobody is ever forced to associate with anyone they don’t choose to and they certainly would not be extorted to pay for the fulfillment of the desires of others.
Most people, even living in the current oppressive government regimes of the world, operate on a day to day basis on a mostly voluntary basis. They trade with those whom they choose, they go to church where they want, they go to work voluntarily at their chosen vocation, they choose their entertainment, they buy and sell stuff and so on and so forth, all without having to be ordered around by people making rules and most of them do so without any coercion or violence. Why would it be any different without government? In fact, government mostly just gets in the way of people’s ability to live their own lives. Most people do not need the government to tell them how to live their lives, make a living or get along with their neighbors but for the handful that do have a problem and choose to use violence against their neighbors, there’s a solution to that and it doesn’t require a government that has a monopoly on the use of force and that solution is contained within the principles of libertarianism which is based upon the right of self-ownership, property rights and everyone’s right to be free of aggression against themselves and their property.