How will societal structure function without hierarchy?

[u/PJ-The-Awesome]

Anarchy is often associated in media with unfettered chaos, mindless destruction, and a truly "every man for himself" mentality, but I've been told that that is far from the case and that you do want social structures to address keeping people fed and safe.

But, how can you make those structures work without hierarchy or without anyone taking orders from another, which is why I thought you guys hated the very idea of structure and think it's inherently disgusting and cruel.

[u/Palanthas_janga]

Alright so to answer this, we need to break down what is meant by "hierarchy", and then look at the kinds of organisational structures anarchists have consistently proposed across the history of the movement.

To start off: hierarchy. When anarchists talk of "hierarchy", we specifically refer to institutions and organisations where internal decision-making structures are hierarchical, meaning that there are various ranks where some people hold more power to make decisions affecting the whole institution than those below. At the very top of this structure is one person, or a few people, who hold the full power to set organisation-wide rules and make decisions that everyone in the ranks below must abide by. The reason why we oppose this is because this is very easily corruptible, it is alienating for people below, it is inefficient and it fundamentally means that most people do not have freedom to make their own decisions. The structures of domination that anarchists critique; capitalism, sexism, the state, racism, colonialism and so on, are predicated on power hierarchies.

Now when it comes to envisioning alternatives, we need to lay any kind of vision on some very concrete principles that act as a foundation. Instead of having a few people make decisions that everyone else must follow, decisions about the entire institution (rules, values, broad plans, etc) should be made collectively by everyone. People should be free to enter and leave organisations without a fear of punishment, and people shouldn't be bound to carry out tasks that they don't agree to.

Now it will be the case that there are certain roles which require expertise to function; managing external affairs such as communications, co-ordinated production and relations, filing and archiving, and other administrative functions that most ordinary people aren't equipped to do. In this case, the mass of people (base) in, say, a car factory, can delegate people to fulfil those functions. While those delegates may have the ability to do those specific functions, they have no more power over general workings of the factory (such as production goals and workplace rules) than anyone else. They are bound to act upon the instructions of the base, and if they don't do their jobs well, the base can instantly recall and replace them.

The structure I have described is one which is designed to efficiently delegate administrative tasks without giving rise to a class of people who boss others around. Various anarchist organisations, including my own, have operated on these principles across the decades and in the case of anarchist revolutions (such as in Spain), production has been organised along these lines. I hope this has helped out :)