Anarchy in the Sixth World Options

[Socinus]

What is the state of the anarchist movement in the Sixth World?

I've been combing books but I cant find more than a mouthful from Loose Alliances about groups like Black Star.

Is there any more current material? Any other material PERIOD?

[MADness]

The book about lawless towns (the name escapes me atm) has several bits in the Chicago section.

[Halinn]

The book about lawless towns (the name escapes me atm) has several bits in the Chicago section.

Feral Cities.

[Wakshaani]

Neo-Anarchy's kinda faded over the past few years. It used to run through all the books, but Crash 2.0 thumped things upside the head. When the 'voice' moved from SHadowland to Jackpoint, you lost a lot of that. There're only two anarchist-flavored Jackpointers, for example, and professionalism is the order of the day. Add to that how more nd more runners and games have shifted from "Dirt poor guy" to "High-end jet-setter", and, well, Neo-Anarchy got squeezed out.

Doesn't help when Berlin got rolled, then everyone accused them of being part of the ... shoot. Geneva? Zurich? There's a city in Switzerland whose Matrix went sideways and is all chaos, and I can't for the life of me recall the right name.

At any rate, they went from being heroes to villains in the eyes of the public, and have just kinda ... vanished ... from the books.

[Blade]

There used to be a pretty visible "Neo-Anarchism" movement in earlier SR editions. Some of the books were written (in-game) by Neo Anarchists (Neo-Anarchist Guide to North America and Neo-Anarchist Guide to Real Life").

Neo-anarchism isn't exactly a "leftist" anarchist movement. It's a movement based on micro-economics theory (Pareto efficiency, perfect competition and welfare economics, etc.). In that theory, having a few megacorporations dominating the world (an oligopoly) leads to an ineffective economy. That's why they're against megacorporations and want a anarchist system where anybody can enter any market. For example, this means no patents, no A/AA/AAA status giving an Edge to a few corporations and so on.

Many authors probably didn't realize this and just considered that neo-anarchists were just people who rioted and listened to punk-rock in an attempt to tear down any kind of authority.

As for the rest of the anarchist movement, I don't remember reading much about it.

[SpellBinder]

Wish I could say I've come across a lot of material on the Neo-As. They are one of the more prominent factions in the Manhattan season missions, but there really isn't a whole lot of detail about them. Just a few jobs you do for a Neo-A fixer and other little things you could do for them on the runs, not all quite as bad as you might expect them to be.

[Sengir]

When the 'voice' moved from SHadowland to Jackpoint, you lost a lot of that. There're only two anarchist-flavored Jackpointers, for example, and professionalism is the order of the day.

Jackpoint is pretty straightforward crypto-anarchism, and IMO Shadowland was not exactly a hardcore anarchist hangout. The lack of anarchism is the result of a gradual shift in tone over the course of 20 years, not something that happened overnight.

Doesn't help when Berlin got rolled, then everyone accused them of being part of the ... shoot. Geneva? Zurich? There's a city in Switzerland whose Matrix went sideways and is all chaos, and I can't for the life of me recall the right name.

Geneva, although that seemed to be more related to TMs/Dissonants...before the whole plotline was forgotten...

[Tias]

Neo-anarchism isn't exactly a "leftist" anarchist movement. It's a movement based on micro-economics theory (Pareto efficiency, perfect competition and welfare economics, etc.). In that theory, having a few megacorporations dominating the world (an oligopoly) leads to an ineffective economy. That's why they're against megacorporations and want a anarchist system where anybody can enter any market. For example, this means no patents, no A/AA/AAA status giving an Edge to a few corporations and so on.

Many authors probably didn't realize this and just considered that neo-anarchists were just people who rioted and listened to punk-rock in an attempt to tear down any kind of authority.

I, er.. No. I'm sorry, but this is wrong.

While I haven't read the old Neo-Anarchists Guide to X, Loose Alliances and excerpts from sympathizer like Umsturz in 4E, does paint a picture of anarchist rad-groups as "classical anarchists", anti-state AND anti-capitalist market. Unless I see more to go on, I would assume Shadowrun anarcho rad-groups also are for abolishment of capitalism, and it's replacement by decentralized planned economies.

[Blade]

First chapter of NAGNA.
But I think no other author who wrote about neo-A ever read it, or paid attention to what it said.

[Tias]

First chapter of NAGNA.
But I think no other author who wrote about neo-A ever read it, or paid attention to what it said.

If that is the case, then they should probably get someone who knows about anarchism to write about, this sort of "blackwashing" doesn't do anyone any good.

A few bloopers aside, I can recommend the write-up in Loose Alliances, it seems to be by someone who actually knew a bit about the movement as it is.

[Sengir]

I, er.. No. I'm sorry, but this is wrong.

While I haven't read the old Neo-Anarchists Guide to X, Loose Alliances...

Loose Alliances, p. 23:
The libertarian “neo-anarchists” hope to transform market capitalism according to a complex (and in our humble opinion, impossible) mathematical formulae to achieve equity in a money-based economy. They play a prominent role in anticorp groups such as Equity.

[Critias]

I've got a pretty die-hard Neo-A from some fiction I put together for an upcoming product, but it's my understanding that the piece won't be used for word count/layout reasons -- I'll likely end up tossing it onto some forums or something, just for fun. This particular technomancer is...pretty far left. Heh.

[fexes]

German article about "Neo-Anarchismus" (neo-anarchism and other directions). I took every info I've found: Neo-Anarchist's Guide to North America, Corporate Shadowfiles, Feind meines Feindes (german Loose Alliances) and some historical info by wikipedia. The main part about the economics of neo-anarchism are a complete translation of NAGtNA. Still missing some information by other/newer publications and sourcebooks about germany (Deutschland in den Schatten I + II, Brennpunkt ADL, Berlin Sourcebook....).

[Sengir]

I've got a pretty die-hard Neo-A from some fiction I put together for an upcoming product, but it's my understanding that the piece won't be used for word count/layout reasons -- I'll likely end up tossing it onto some forums or something, just for fun. This particular technomancer is...pretty far left. Heh.

Too bad we just established that neo-anarchism is not exactly what you'd call "far left" (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Stahlseele]

*makes himself more unloved*
we got a complete german book on berlin.
it's still half corp and half experiment in anarchy.

[hermit]

There're more than just Neo-Anarchists in the Shadowrun Anarchist movement.

Also, Fexes, the Berlin book is almost required reading, it has some good info on (Neo-)Anarchism in practice (and it's limitations). Great writeup though. Walzer, Punks and Chrom&Dioxin also feature local Austrian and Swiss anarchist projects (and Berlin's End).

Further, some novels - Night's Pawn IIRC - have some information that might be relevant too, about the background of Europe's Anarchism movement.

[Critias]

Too bad we just established that neo-anarchism is not exactly what you'd call "far left" (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

The things most Neo-As fight for are much closer to leftist ideologies than right. But in this instance, I was also using the phrase as shorthand for "far out in left field," a phrase hinting that someone's no longer entirely sane.

[CanRay]

The problem with Neo-@s is trying to find their leadership to find out what they want. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[Sengir]

The things most Neo-As fight for are much closer to leftist ideologies than right.

Ron Paul-style capitalism is not exactly a classic left ideology. Other schools of though like anarcho-syndicalism are closer to the common definition of "left".

But in this instance, I was also using the phrase as shorthand for "far out in left field," a phrase hinting that someone's no longer entirely sane.

...and the pun does not really work when the person in question is not "left".

[Critias]

Ron Paul-style capitalism is not exactly a classic left ideology. Other schools of though like anarcho-syndicalism are closer to the common definition of "left".


...and the pun does not really work when the person in question is not "left".

I really don't feel like doing this today. So you win, okay?

[Tias]

With respect for your day (hope it ended better than it was at the moment you posted!), there really is something resoundingly wrong with calling anything connected to the center-right or pro-capitalism (such as Ronpaulism etc.) anarchist.

The anarchist position, as defined by the anarchist movement with roots in the socialist labour movement circa the 1860s, is both anti-statist (which is well and good, so is a lot of other things) and pro-socialist and anti-capitalist. While historians have attempted to lump in other people - like Godwin, a rationalist extremist, Stirner, a brutal sociopath, and Rothbard, Tucker and Proudhon (all pro-market ideologues) - with "real" (in my analysis) anarchists like Kropotkin or Bakunin, it simply makes no linguistic or ideogical-historical sense.

If any of this, admittedly dry, subject interests any of you, the book Black Flame: The revolutionary class politics of syndicalism and anarchism, makes this point in extremely well-researched detail. It can downloaded for free from the authors, just google the title!

Edit: To provide context, I'm sure the creators of "Neo-Anarchism" mean well, but there's just no ideological merit to the idea that anarchism is about the free market - It makes even less sense that Berlin, haven of insurrectionist social anarchism in the present day, should turn into that kind of shape.

[Warlordtheft]

The problem with Neo-@s is trying to find their leadership to find out what they want. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

Yeah there is that.....et Tu Canray? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[Nath]

While historians have attempted to lump in other people - like Godwin, a rationalist extremist, Stirner, a brutal sociopath, and Rothbard, Tucker and Proudhon (all pro-market ideologues) - with "real" (in my analysis) anarchists like Kropotkin or Bakunin, it simply makes no linguistic or ideogical-historical sense.

As far as Murray Rothbard is concerned, I think he was the one who branded his own theories as "anarcho-capitalism". He can be denied the use of the term by historians or people who consider themselves as The True Heirs or the Founding Fathers of Anarchism, I wouldn't expect a RPG book to be the place the debate is settled.

[Sengir]

He can be denied the use of the term by historians or people who consider themselves as The True Heirs or the Founding Fathers of Anarchism, I wouldn't expect a RPG book to be the place the debate is settled.

No the scientific debate as it occurs in real life. But in the world of SR there seems to be a pretty solid definition of what constitutes neo-anarchism, which is accepted both by its proponents (NAGNA) and those trying to differentiate their beliefs from it (Loose Alliances).

[CanRay]

I seem to remember some Shadowtalk arguments about what Neo-@ was about, and found out that Anarcho-capitalism exists!

Seems most Shadowrunners would fall into that area be default.