this post was submitted on 21 Apr 2025
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Anarchy just shifts the problem from “people with the most money bully the people with less” to “people with the most guns bully the people with less”.
Did we read the same praxis?
What problems are there in: “Everyone should be armed! Money is theft!”?
Guns are not the only deterrent to intolerance, btw. We use bolt cutters too.
So, I have a question: how did kings and governments get the monopoly on violence?
From inaction and popular belief that they can give people safety. People gave the "defense" job to kings and goverments with belief that they could focus on other stuff, not realizing they are giving up their freedom. Soon, kings and gov start to violate people all around.
To be fair, the ancient world was wildly unsafe and governments did provide a modicum of safety. Not just against aggressions, but also in terms of reliable access to food.
"Reliable access to food" as in "rowing bands of bandits won't burn your crops, in exchange, you have to pay tax to the king"
But yes it was a slow getting-use-to, at first it was at eye level "we grow food, you fight". That slow progression can be clearly seen by the various stuff that nobility couldn't do in the middle ages. You could not, for example, remove peasants from their land, it wasn't so much illegal as not thinkable -- until you could. Capitalism, especially in today's world, has no "noblesse oblige" any more that's why it's so much harsher in pretty much all aspects. Sure, liberal democracy claws some of that back but that's not capitalism.
Not just that. Centralized settlements allowed for pooling resources, better grain storage, and easier production of high-calorie items such as bread.
I don't think that's how it came about. At first it was "we build our houses together and pool our grain so we can better defend ourselves against aggressors", then "oh those guys at the temple are pretty good at keeping count and dividing the food among us", then "oh this organization helps us produce surplus food so now we can have dedicated guards who train instead of growing food", then "oh the priesthood sure became powerful now that they control the guards", etc...
The monopoly on violence is an extremely modern concept which is easy to oversimplify, especially in historical contexts which can be very varied. The things you mention are really local to medieval Europe and don't necessarily translate well to other settings.