In the midst of a huge challenge, the Coronavirus pandemic, I’m forcing a dialogue between two seemingly opposite ways of thinking–advocacy for the state as the most useful way to address global challenges such as climate change, and an anarchist view that is skeptical, to say the least, about the possibility of the proper use of state power. I’m drawing from the writings of Robyn Eckersley, a political scientist and author of The Green State, and the anonymous author of Desert, or the Desert Manifesto. The author of Desert believes that the state is declining and will continue to decline in importance. Eckersley believes that the Green movement can and should revitalize deliberative democracy, replacing liberalism and making the state serve the needs of people and environment better. In this video I introduce the two authors and ask three big questions having to do with where we should place our time, energy and hope–in politics and the state or in local voluntary communities? And, is this choice a true choice, or is it possible for the two to coexist?
http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/anonymous-desert
https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/green-state
For more from me:
https://lauriemjohnson.com/
https://politicalphilosophy.video.blog/
Political Philosophy 