How to fight against the state

Let us imagine an ideal society. No taxation, no bureaucratic management, a free economy based on gold currency, free gun ownership, independent families, and healthy communities.

There is only one obstacle to this ideal: the modern state and its centralized power. The essence of the state is institutionalized aggression, and the effects of centralized government logically follow. The state destroys private property, wastes scarce resources, undermines local and traditional values, and destroys families by taking children away from their parents and by putting them under the degenerative influence and socialist indoctrination of public school teachers. If our principles mean anything to us, we must fight back.

A bottom-up reform

No state is invincible. Ultimately all government rests on popular opinion. Yet we must avoid the usual mistake: the top-down reforms, such as voting, being active in a political party, and attempting to influence politicians and government bureaucrats. Such a strategy only adds to the legitimacy of the state and is likely to hasten further centralization of power. What we need is something different. We need a localist, bottom-up reform. We cannot destroy the state in an all-out attack, but we can starve it with piecemeal withdrawal of support and resources.

There are several ways in which we, and our friends, and neighbors, can work against state power - and do it on a personal level and everyday basis. Carry your own gun to protect yourself and family. Organize neighborhood watches. Protect your privacy - your mail, your personal information, and your address. If possible, use gold instead of paper. Avoid public courts, and use arbitration instead. Homeschool your children. Defend the traditions of your hometown and the values of your family. Resist the degenerating influence of the egalitarian mass-- society, and defend the natural and civilizing hierarchies based on family and property.

Localism: a natural way out

Protecting our own lives and property is a fundamental step toward reform. However, it should only be the beginning. We can do more. We cannot shoot the state down, but we can make ourselves, our neighbors, and even our hometown communities independent from it. In order to starve the state, we need to divorce ourselves from it as much as we can. Our goal is simple: the creation of strong and independent localities - cities, towns,, neighborhoods - that want nothing to do with the central government.

This localist/secessionist strategy is simply and fundamentally compatible with human nature. It is only natural to mind one's own business and to nurture one's family and neighborhood. Localism can easily win the support of a large number of people irrespective of their specific ideals. Localists need not be libertarians. They only have to be decent, responsible, and hard-working men and women. Taking care of one's self, one's family, and one's neighborhood is what any decent person would do.

Our ultimate goal - secession - is the natural outcome of localism consistently carried out. There is no need for political activism: just take care of your own business, create a network of secessionist communities, and you will lay the foundation for a peaceful separation.

Such a decentralization of power would destroy the legitimacy of the state once and for all. Local decision-making would completely undress the emperor. Every sane person would now see the absurdity and immorality of taxing production and rewarding incompetence, indolence, and destruction. Most importantly, localities that would continue violating private property rights would see that their productive members vote with their feet and leave. The socialists would still stick to their policies in their own communities, but they would have to face the social and economic superiority of those communities which embrace free trade and private property.

Secession: is it possible?

The state is mighty, but vulnerable. Just as Communist Russia collapsed under economic failure, the social-democratic states of the West are struggling with economic mismanagement and huge public debts. The inevitable economic bankruptcy can only be hidden and postponed by massive inflation and further centralization; but it cannot be made to disappear.

Once the hard-working taxpayers begin to realize the true situation, a secessionist revolution will be underway. That is when the seeds of localism will bear fruit: neighborhood watches, gun-ownership, traditional values and secessionist ideals will become shared by every decent family and healthy community. The central state will undoubtedly try to demonize the secessionists, and undermine their position by economic blockades and covert operations. However, the state would find it hard to justify its actions against the separationists, once strong community support for secession was established in many locations. Just imagine a large number of independent free cities - a multitude of Hong Kongs, Singpores, Monacos, and Lichtensteins - strewn out over an entire continent! If we are strong and consistent in embracing our principles, then one day this scenario could become reality.

A war against the state - against political power, political exploitation, and political corruption - is a never-ending struggle between good and evil. However, as long as we respect the dignity of each individual; as long as we value private property; as long as we care about the freedom of our children, their children, and all the generations to come, we can never give up. We must fight back - and indeed we can.

[Editor's Note: Oskari was born in 1981 in Finland. This article was the winning selection in the 2002 Liberty Round Table Essay Content, ages 19 -- 21. Reprinted with permission of the author in an email of May 25, 2002.]

Copyright Voluntaryists 2nd Quarter 2003
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