Introduction to Political Theory

the state’ have been abolished (Marshall, 1993: 286), he learnt that it takes more

than words to overthrow a despotic state, and, unsurprisingly, the rising was speedily

crushed. The point is that alliances must be formed; existing institutions utilised;

the people must be prepared and feel that such an action is justified; and the forces

of the opponent must be marginalised and neutralised – all the things which require

organisation and the acknowledgement of constraints are crucial if a political action

is to meet with hope of success.

Anarchism and the distinction between state and

government

The distinction between force and constraint translates into the opposition between

state and government, and by condemning both anarchists again leave themselves

open to the charge that they are being utopian without at the same time being

realistic.

The distinction between state and government is a crucial one to make. Anarchists

tend to regard the two as synonyms. Godwin finds that government is opposed to

society. It is static and oppressive – ‘the only perennial causes of the vices of

mankind’ – and looks towards its ‘true euthanasia’ (Marshall, 1993: 206–7).

Kropotkin makes a distinction between state and government, but considers both

equally oppressive and both should be abolished. Representative government is no

more than rule by the capitalists (Marshall, 1993: 325). It is not difficult to see that

this negative view of government, as well as the state, is linked to a failure to

distinguish between force and constraint.

Godwin saw public opinion as oppressive and irresistible as whips and chains.

Orwell is cited sympathetically as an anarchist who found Tolstoy’s pacifism

potentially coercive, while Gandhi’s doctrine of non-violence has coercive overtones

which Marshall sees as bullying and constituting a ‘totalitarian danger’ (Marshall,

1993: 650). It is one thing to warn (as J.S. Mill did) that public opinion can be

intolerant and needlessly intrusive, but it is quite another to suggest that moral

pressures are a kind of ‘coercion’ and as unacceptable as brute force. If the

constraints imposed by Mill’s natural penalties and the use of moral pressures are

deemed authoritarian, then constitutionalism and the rule of law have to be rejected,

even when these institutions operate in a purely governmental, as opposed to an

oppressively statist, way (Hoffman, 1995: 127).

Government, it could be argued, is inherent in organisation and relationships. It

involves the use of constraint in order to resolve conflicts that arise from the fact

that each of us is different from the other. For this reason, conflict is inevitable and

so is government, but just as a sharp distinction needs to be drawn between

constraint and force, so a distinction needs to be made between state and

government. To link the state and government as twin enemies of freedom is to

ignore the fact that stateless societies have governments, and that even in state-

centred societies, the role of government is positive and empowering. With the rise

of new liberal and socialist administrations, significant programmes of social reform

have been introduced; the power of the trade unions has been strengthened; the

health and security of the most vulnerable sections of society has been improved;

254 Part 2 Classical ideologies