I have a theory. (technically I have many but today I’m talking about this one.) Well actually it’s more of a visualization. As an anarchist I have spend a lot of time pondering on anarchist society and it’s relation to the archic one. This pondering led me to this scale. The Chaos-Order scale. It position political systems on a single point depending on the amount of chaos a society deems acceptable.
I decided to divide the scale into 4 sections. There could be more but i wanted clearly defined borders between them.
- Total chaos
- Anarchy
- Democracy
- Authoritarianism (Authy)
These sections are defined by clear boundaries (marked with #):
- The minimum required order for society
- Anarchy-Democracy border
- Democracy-Authorotarianism border
The arrows signify how every section can be entered.
It should be noted that anarchy and total chaos are separated by an impassable border. #1 The minimum order for society. This is because total chaos can only exists for a moment between archic systems collapsing and the formation of an extremely authoritarian society (The rule of violence). True anarchic systems should be immune to this collapse as it requires the complete breakdown of the social bonds between people.
The second border is the anarchy-democracy border. This border is defined by having any form of hierarchical society. It is passed when an anarchist revolutionary class takes control of the entire functioning of society or when an anarchic society collapses back into archy.
The third is the democracy-authy border. This is defined by having some form of democratic control over society. Essentially free elections. Most people should already be familiar with the concept.
I think there is chaos on the very right too, but it’s riots and genocide
The very right represents complete order. Absolute power of the state. in such an environment all riots would be suppressed.
Genocide is a very orderly affair. I doubt you found much chaos during the “one that everyone knows”. What’s scary about it is how orderly it was.
This isn’t a standard left-right divide. That’s why it’s called the chaos-order spectrum. not chaos-order on the left-right spectrum.
I’m not using the left side of the spectrum as the political left. I’m using it as the chaos side of the spectrum. It wouldn’t make any sense to use a standard left-right divide as a lot of (historically called) leftist exist within the authoritarian section on the graph: Soviet union, China, etc. These were incredibly ordered societies and would exist within the red section on this spectrum.
More thoughts:
This spectrum applies to both Left and Right wing politics. Although I don’t know how/if Right-wing anarchy works.
It’s main purpose however is to just analyze society on a different metric than the classical Left-Right model.
How’s north korea doing?
Why would they be any different to the other examples?
Your graph presents them as being very orderly. They are far from it, unless you count murdering anyone who doesn’t fit in as order
Yes. Murdering people causing chaos is very orderly. I am an anarchist. I exist in that green-blue part on this graph. I do not think societal order is a good thing. It means disorderly people need to be disposed of. I view the ability to cause disorder synonymous with freedom. Chaos is needed for growth, progress, innovation. Totalitarianism is the definition of order. “anyone who doesn’t fit” is “people who create chaos”.
Police create order by arresting troublemakers. Totalitarian police create it by killing. Both are order, and, in my eyes, both are evil.
Yea, that chaos bit should be on both sides of that chart. Extremes are almost never good
This post really does one hell of an awful job of presenting a non-left/right idea
My mind does not immediately think that every scale on the internet that is connected to politics is a left-right one. I think the left-right divide is actually quite bad. There isn’t a lot of similarity between Communists and anarchists, and to group them together is in my opinion quite dumb.
Not to mention what’s considered left is widely different depending on who you talk to. In america it’s essentially used for the center-right. For me the best definition is worker-owned means of production but even that disqualifies all of the Communists so IDK.
Why post a graphic misrepresenting that?
How would you recommend displaying this graphic instead? horizontally? I guess it would work. This is just how I saw it in my mind so I drew it, and considering no-one else has commented I think most people get it.
Well, chaos will arise both from full freedom and full authoritarianism
But that’s not what this graph is presenting. It’s presents chaos as a lack of authority, and doesn’t acknowledge there can be too much authoritative control
Chaos should be at both ends of that bar
Are chaos and order not opposites of each other? If I make a scale from chaos to order should I not have complete order on one side and complete chaos on the other? Is that not how scales work?
order and disorder are opposites. But you’re right, chaos usually is very disordered. But this scale doesn’t go towards order, it goes towards authoritarianism. North Korea would be on that end