Introduction
At present, we are experiencing a time of corporate downsizing. This cyclic phenomenon, a product of market driven capitalism, is nothing new. This article will not address the logic of downsizing and restructuring. A paper on this topic alone would constitute a major work. Instead, we will consider the applicability of rational anarchist economic theory to minimizing the destruction left in the wake of such logic.
A Gift Economy Response
Most individuals entangled in the horror of corporate downsizing and restructuring respond with moral outrage. There is a general consensus among the victims and potential victims that mechanisms should be employed to minimize the personal impact of such processes. Usually, the general perception is that the corporation instigating the action or the government should take action to assist the newly unemployed. The impulse behind this perception is based upon beliefs concerning power relations and perceived wealth combined with the belief that the stronger, by ethical reasoning, should help the weaker.
While the rational anarchist can agree that it would be ethically positive for the stronger to help the weaker, the rational anarchist cannot endorse the belief that the stronger must help the weaker. The forced assistance of the weaker by the stronger would reduce the stronger to a means to the ends of the weaker. This arrangement is classical exploitation. Whenever one set of individuals is reduced to a mere means to the ends of another set of individuals exploitation is attained.
Victims of downsizing and restructuring should reject the notion that the ethical onus to help in times of need falls only upon the shoulders of the stronger. Instead, such victims should place this onus upon their own shoulders.
Individuals who wait for the grace of others to relieve their disenfranchisement foolishly surrender their freedom and agency to those with a demonstrable disregard for the interests of the former. The only noble and dignified response to disenfranchisement is self organization. The victims and potential victims of downsizing and restructuring, collectively, have it within their potential to become their own means to mutual support. Political philosophies that place the disenfranchised into the role of noble beggar fail to acknowledge the potential for mutual support within the ranks of the disenfranchised themselves. The implementation of a gift economy is the logical first step in the elimination of dependency. Through the elimination of dependency, the disenfranchised can create their own structures of mutual support.
Creating a Gift Economy
Individuals within a corporation share bonds of friendship and familiarity. In times of crisis, it would be of profound utility to have constructed a network of mutual supports outside of the corporation. Such a network could serve to eliminate the alienation that workers feel when they are separated from the corporation, provide a mechanism for those who are still employed to help their unemployed associates, provide a mechanism for the interchange of mutually beneficial information, and create a mechanism whereby workers who are no longer unemployed (i.e. those who have found new employment) can extend opportunities to those who are still looking for work (or may be looking for work in the future).
There exist many mechanism from which such a network can be constructed. The most promising mechanism is the Internet. Various providers permit the creation of free discussion groups. These discussion groups can be used to organize individuals, exchange information, and collect data useful to members. Optionally, any individual can obtain a domain and create a website devoted to the same purpose. Individuals able to contribute housing, money, or services to their unemployed associates can use such groups to post offers of help. Individuals in need of help can use such groups to post requests for help. Help can be provided directly, thereby eliminating the need for a governing body.
Each worker who has benefited by being a member of such a mutual aid network, should construct such a network upon gaining new employment. The new network, devoted to the aid of workers at the new company can then engage in cross network support with other networks. Each worker who has left one place of employment and joins another becomes a link between the two networks simply by being a member of both. A network of networks is then formed. Mutual aid can span networks by providing opportunities for employment. The newly employed individuals can inform the individuals of the other networks of which they are a member of employment opportunities in their new corporation.
Emergent Properties
Such networks for mutual aid, the author predicts, will realize emergent properties. For example, once a means of connection exists between individuals with known properties, virtual collectives of these individuals could form in response to opportunities too complex for any one individual to address. If an individual of such a network identifies a need within society or within the economy, the individuals of the network can consider configurations of individuals with the skills and knowledge to meet the need, thereby facilitating the emergence of collectives whose members are maximally configured to turn the need into an opportunity. An emergent property of such a network, therefore, could be the production of self employment.
Conclusions
Workers have within their grasp the opportunity to provide a mechanism of mutual support in times of crisis. Such a network can reproduce throughout society, in virus like fashion, as employees join other corporations. The existence of such networks is likely to result in emergent properties that empower employees to become independent of their corporations.
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