totalitarianism vs anarchy

I know that these are extremes and there are middle paths but I want to say a few words about them.

Totalitarianism has usually created tyrants. It seems that humans cannot be entrusted with power, because "power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely" (John Dalberg-Acton). I believe that most deaths attributed to communism were caused by totalitarianism. Of course, totalitarianism caused a lot of deaths in other systems too, such as in absolute monarchy. This does not mean that all kings were evil, some were decent and there were benevolent dictators too but the risk is too high for a tyrant to develop. I don't believe that anyone should be entrusted with so much power.

Anarchy is the opposite of totalitarianism, because nobody has power, nobody rules. Some years ago I was naive enough to think that people can behave decently in anarchy. One day I read an article about a police strike in Montreal and in the chaos that followed six banks were robbed and more than 100 shops were looted. (the article) After I read that article, my opinion on anarchy changed considerably.

This reminds me of a quote from H L Mencken: "People say we need religion when what they really mean is we need police." Also, Einstein said that: " If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed."

So we are a sorry lot indeed, because, without police, without fear of punishment, we behave worse than other animals.

There are some intelligent people out there who advocate anarchy. There are whole books dedicated to this. There are multiple forms of anarchy, but the most popular nowadays are anarcho-capitalism and anarcho-communism. I don't really know if they would work.

There are a few examples of anarcho-communism which seemed to work. Primitive hunter-gatherer societies were probably anarcho-communist, nobody ruled them and they shared food and other things, they were highly egalitarian. Early Christian communities seem to have been anarcho-communist.

There were some anarcho-communist territories during the Spanish Revolution and during the Russian Revolution. "The Spanish example, in which high levels of mobilization and swift improvements to production were implemented by anarchists, is often cited as an example of an anarchist-communist society which saw rapid improvements to both industrial and scientific output." (source)

Wikipedia and the Free Software movement are examples of anarcho-communist organizations.

I could not find examples of anarcho-capitalist territories. I would be interested to see how it works out, although I think it would degenerate rapidly. One example of an anarcho-capitalist sector is the software industry. I believe that the software industry is horrible. Just think about operating systems, where Windows has a monopoly, although in my opinion Linux distributions are much better. Proprietary software is wasteful because people always reinvent the wheel. Software patents are even worse because they hinder innovation.

I believe that capitalism is a self-destructive system and the only thing that keeps it from destructing itself is the government, which applies rules to the otherwise ruthless system. Capitalism is like a jungle and it's every man for himself (and every woman for herself).

Every time that capitalism is on the path to self-destruction (depressions), governments scramble to find solutions to save the dying system, so I believe that without governments, capitalism would long be dead and buried.

I'm trying to imagine an anarcho-capitalist society. If people payed the police to protect them, wouldn't there be people who would not want to pay? In fact, this could be the case with every social service. You would have the choice to pay a police company, a justice company to give laws, education companies, etc. Everything would be payed.

I'm amused by the idea of multiple justice companies, each having different laws. You could start a justice company in which killing is legal. Or imagine utility companies competing, you would have lots of water pipes and power cables. There would be a mess and a lot of waste.

Of course, you would have to pay for education too and some people wouldn't have the money to send their children to school, so illiteracy would increase. Unemployment being a constant in capitalism, wages would drop because desperate people are willing to work for less and with no minimum wage imposed by the government, it would drop as low as possible and the gap between rich and poor would increase even more.

I'm trying to imagine a company which cuts down the forests, being stopped by the police. The company spokesman would say: we have subscribed to a justice company which allows the cutting of the forests. And the police would answer: oh, that's all right, then.

War is also a highly profitable business and who would stop this business in anarchy?

Also, there would be nothing to stop monopolies from forming. If a company produces a lot, there is more efficiency and more profit, it can expand and invest in innovation, thus growing at the expense of others.

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It may seem that I'm biased towards anarcho-communism but I'm not. I don't believe that anarchy would work. Usually, anarchic territories have been quickly taken over by governments. Totalitarianism is not a solution either, as it breeds tyrants.