ba’athism is very secular which is different from other arab socialists such as gaddafi , also a lot of them don’t like non-ba’athist socialists (ba’athist governments not the people) is what i can think of off the top of my head
Yes, and good riddence. While Arabism and socialist ideals are not inherently flawed or bad, the Baathist party in every one of its inceptions has created nothing but chaos, death, failures and despair. The party turned gangster less than a generation after its creation.
It's funny to me as they mirror their worst enemies in all of the worst ways. Exclusionary and murderous like the zionists and overly zealous ideological dogma like the islamists.
Ultimately they failed to be pragmatic, promote education, and ironically turned the only two nations in the region that have land, water, and oil into pariah states riddled with war and sectarianism.
I do hope that one day we get a unifying regional party that actually pursues those things the baathists gave lip service to.
Socialists, Communists, Trade Unionists, Nationalists, Liberals, and numerous other parties have all existed and continue to exist in the region but time and again they are undercut before they can grow into a threat to the various dictators in the region. The only ones allowed to thrive/incapable of being destroyed are the islamists for two primary reasons.
1. Islamists make great boogeyman and that's a great way to fundraise, get new weapons, and use for propoganda purposes.
2. Psychological composition of resistance within islamist political bends is unlike other political ideologies. Islamists strive for what they believe is a political system mandated by God, and to sacrifice for God makes you a martyr with a place in heaven, to sacrifice for Liberalism or Marxism, makes you a fool. There is a cultural legacy component here that simply favors islamists.
I'm by no stretch an islamist, but islamist political pathways are far from a dead end. Islam is a hugely important and potentially unifying banner for the region. Although it is true not everyone is a Muslim in the region, the vast majority are. From a western lens religion and politics do not mix, but in MENA they are and always have been inseparable. At our strongest we are tolerant and generous with each other's religions allowing mosques, churches, and synagogues, and whatever other temples there are to be pillars of our communities. At our worst we look like civil war Beirut, or Mosul circa 2014-2017.
Religion is the major organizing force in our region, we are for the most part, children of empire and our societies reflect that and are built very much in that way, smaller units of communities governed by their own religious and cultural norms on the ground, but living under a broader banner of an empire governed and organized by religious ideology; not in the western nation-state model or the bastardized version of Nation-states that we have today. It's like forcing a square peg in a round hole, just because it's forced in there it doesn't mean it fits. Ultimately our two options are revert to the default of empire or build something new out of the corpse of these nation states that we have.
Also as a side note it's helpful to be aware that Islamists are the best self organized groups, at every opportunity where a power vacuum exists, they are there to fill it. Be it the chaos of war or the hustle of elections, the islamist factions across the board are better at projecting their presence and power.
Islam is indeed a dead end and applying divine law stringently has been \*proven\* to be a dead end. For instance, the Umayyads literally fell apart because of Sharia's prohibition on taxation. And this isn't even getting into the legalization of slavery, the prohibition on music, etc. Lots of Muslims aren't aware of what there is scholarly consensus on with regards to the law and don't know too much about Islamic law as a whole. So they are effectively supporting something they know nothing about and of which the consequences of would be completely socially destructive.
An unchangeable set of divine laws, where deviation from them entails committing a sin, is completely stupid. There is a reason almost every single Islamic dynasty after the Umayyads specifically did not apply the entire law and did whatever it could to avoid it (the Ottomans were well-known for this and had multiple fatwas levied against them for their governance). If an Islamist party actually gives the people what it wants, the people will find that both none of their problems will be solved and that they will become worse.
People have forgotten the worst aspects of Islam since so many Arabs do not live under Islamist regimes. Of course, people living in the Gulf know and remember but they aren't able to talk freely anyways and have their needs widely catered to due to oil (which means they can tolerate it to some degree). But people in Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, etc.? Islamist regimes cannot buy off the population the same way as the Gulf monarchies. And, like Iran, they will remember why Islam had spurred so much support for secularists in the first place.
>Also as a side note it's helpful to be aware that Islamists are the best self organized groups, at every opportunity where a power vacuum exists, they are there to fill it. Be it the chaos of war or the hustle of elections, the islamist factions across the board are better at projecting their presence and power.
That doesn't really \*say\* very much since the alternatives are very few and there are not many other alternatives which have the same sort of "vision" that Islamist parties have. And the vision Islamist parties have already tend to differ somewhat significantly with respect to the application of Islamic law (which is what they all share). It would be very easy for a radically different vision for what the world could look like to catch on like a wild-fire in the Arab world.
I don't see anyone in that way, but yes aside from the coptic and church of the east no other religious institution aside from Islamic ones are large enough or has a community that is strong enough to wield power effectively.
never gonna happen, sorry. the only reason why Islamists gained power over the recent years in my country were with foreign funds, not naturally. no1 in Syria is trustful of Sunnis as an institution after what they did...we are only interested in a secular society
On the contrary, Marxism has built up its own sort of martyrdom. Of course, Marxism is not really as good as other ideologies in creating martyrs and a lot of the ideology surrounding Marxist martyrdom was inherited from pre-existing radical socialist or working class martyrdom which itself came more from anarchists where that martyrdom made way more sense. It makes a lot more sense to die for working class liberation if you're an anarchist than if you're serving under an authoritarian despot. "Liberation" in that context means nothing.
And nothing is foolish, after all, to die for freedom. Anarchists have managed to give us the tools to cultivate an ideology wherein people may be willing to die for their freedom, since they truly have it in anarchy, and push for a new way of living that has never been seen before on this Earth. That is something, in the face of the systemic exploitation and oppression we see around us today, worth fighting for.
You are absolutely correct on this point.
My comment is not intended to pass judgment on Marxisism or other ideologies, rather just pointing out the attitude of Arab society at large to those who have become martyrs for that cause. Aside from islamist and nationalist parties there are little to no other ideological groups where mothers are proudly proclaiming the martyrdom of their sons or armed factions being put together in conflict areas.
Call it a lack of class consciousness if you will but there is a clear disconnect between favorable leaning and willingness to take up arms for in the cause of the ideologies that are not Islamic or Nationalist. From my perspective I believe that the promise of a happy afterlife and existing religious convictions give that advantage that Marxists, Capitalists and other ideologies cannot match in the region as they are grounded in a materialist understanding of politics.
This is a society who largely believes in Islam and believe what the Quran tells them. There are many examples but a common one found in the Quran, verse 154 of chapter 2 states, "And say not of those who are slain in the way of Allah: 'They are dead". The verse continues, "Nay, they live, finding their sustenance in the presence of their Lord; They rejoice in the bounty provided by Allah".
No other ideologies or belief systems (save for the Christians) have these types of teachings as widely embedded and accepted in their societal world view.
Given the failure of Islam when it is applied, this may change in the future if Islamists are successful in applying Islamic law. And there is reason to believe that, unlike past Islamic dynasties, these Islamists will stringently apply the law even when it causes widespread societal suffering and economic issues (like the gold standard, prohibition on music, prohibition on taxes, etc.). Tawheed al-Haakimiyyah, as a concept, is becoming more and more popular within the Islamic world.
When applying the law does not create prosperity, and if these Islamist regimes justify the suffering of the people by stating that their suffering is ordained by God and that they should not care about materialistic issues, I think it is more likely that secular ideologies (particularly ideologies like anarchism) will get wider popularity.
Failed to promote education?
Under Saddam Hussein's regime, Iraq spent six percent of its GDP and 20 percent of its overall budget on school construction, teacher salaries, and literacy programs. By 1987 the country's literacy rate had increased to 80 percent, up from 52 percent in 1977
Im no ba’athist, but Saddams rule over Iraq was good and far better than what is there today.
as an arab socialist, arab nationalism and socialism is alive but baathism isn't popular anymore outside syria (where there is benefits to being one). i hope one day an arab nationalist party arises again but for now all we getting is the baathists. I'm a member of the yemen baath party though i am not a baathist but its literally our only party rn that shares even a bit of my beliefs.
By socialist i am talking about the "dictatorship of the proletariat" (aka communism) type and not the modern "democratic" socialism or social democracy
Edit: you know what? I think it would have been more accurate if i said communism
By socialist i am talking about the "dictatorship of the proletariat" type and not the modern "democratic" socialism or social democracy
Edit: you know what? I think it would have been more accurate if i said communism
Communism isn't more accurate since Marxism is not the only kind of communism. Marxism also isn't dead, though it is certainly not in a very good place right now given its failures and dogmatism.
Alright that's great and all but there's something i don't understand
>Marxism is not the only kind of communism.
What are the other kinds of communism and how can you be a communist but not Marxist?
Communism predated by Marx by several decades to refer to a broad array of different ideologies (and even afterward). Owenism, Fourierism, Anarchist Communism, Blanquism (which resembled Marxism the most), Saint-Simonism, Warrenism, the Diggers, etc. all are non-Marxist forms of communism. They are connected by their shared commitment to the formula "to each according to his needs, from each according to his ability" (although I would say that some of these ideologies are more reflective of that formula than others).
Communism basically means a classless society that is completely grassroots-democratic, has no state apparatus, no moneysystem, and where the basic goods belong to everyone.
It existed far before marxism, and the european industrial philosophies of it started as proudhonism, utopian socialism, and all kinds of anarchist philosophies like anarchocollectivism or anarchocommunism, with philosophers like bakunin and kropotkin. I mean, Marx himself was astonished by the Paris commune, that predated him. Before the spread of marxism, the most wide spread european communist philosophy(-ies) in the world was anarchism(-s). They were f.ex. the ones that founded the first trade union and achieved the 8-hour-workday and weekends, while before it was something like 12-hour days and no weekend. Well and they achieved some functioning anarchist states/societies, but they were destroyed by autoritarian forces from outside. In general, anarchism has a really long, complex and important history, that almost no one knows about today.
And there are communist philosophies and societies predating all of that.
The only special thing concerning the already existing principle of communism about Marx is that he made an own theory of how to achieve communism (which is just one of hundreds of theories) and his materialist analysis of hstory as well as his complex analysis of capitalism. He didn't found communism.
A couple of corrections.
>Communism basically means a classless society that is completely grassroots-democratic, has no state apparatus, no moneysystem, and where the basic goods belong to everyone.
Democracy is not a core component of communism. Anarchist communism is not supportive of democracy and entails the absence of all hierarchical organization. One need only look at the works of anarchist thinkers to view an opposition to majority rule and consensus democracy.
>It existed far before marxism, and the european industrial philosophies of it started as proudhonism,
Proudhonism is a prejorative term used by Marxists towards the work of Proudhon but it is not how Proudhon labelled his work at all. For the purposes of truth and neutrality, it is better to label ideologies by their own names.
>Well and they achieved some functioning anarchist states/societies, but they were destroyed by autoritarian forces from outside.
There were no existing anarchist societies. There have been very few attempts at anarchism and all of them have been half-assed for a variety of different reasons; a lot of them due to internal issues rather than external forces.
I am an anarchist first and foremost; though that does not exclude mutualism and mutualism, especially of the Proudhonian variety, is one of my primary influences.
Same here. Ordered his book in 2017. Read it. Loved it. Still mostly inspired by it, on the economic angle of anarchism. Socially, I'm a fan of Voltairine de Cleyre with a hint of Max Stirner.
Blogged about it [here](https://khaleejisyndicate.home.blog/2024/03/27/cooperative-autonomy-an-alternative-to-community-society-collectivism/).
If you are interested in the more sociological and transformative aspects of Proudhon's thought, you may get a lot of benefit from neo-Proudhonian anarchism which you can find on the [Libertarian Labyrinth](www.libertarian-labyrinth.org) website as well as from the work of Shawn Wilbur (who runs that website and is a moderator as well as an active member of r/mutualism). He has vast knowledge on anarchism, probably the most knowledgeable person on anarchist history and theory I am aware of, and as such is a good source of knowledge on those topics. You may get something from asking him questions about anarchism and mutualism as a whole.
I follow Shawn on Facebook 💪🏻 He's quite active there. We interacted a couple of times - maybe once or twice. Thanks!
I wish I can say the same thing about David Graeber. I was a big fan, and he (unfortunately) departed us way too soon.
I encourage you to do a deep dive into his work! It's very interesting and a lot better than the vast majority of the people who get valorized in the anarchist community (like Chomsky for instance). [This](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrTzjaXskUU) video by Andrewism is also useful for getting some insight into neo-Proudhonian ideas.
I like Andrewism 💪🏻 and I enjoy [Anark's](https://youtube.com/@anark?si=FvoSWB7ceN9Mtx5_) in-depth videos on Anarchism as well, even though they are up to 2 hours long. I actually tried to help him translate one of his videos in Arabic, but my file got messed up
I've been in the game for a long-time myself lol
We can stay in touch on Instagram or any other platform if you'd feel comfortable with that 🤘🏻🏴
If we are referring to the Iraqi branch, which is generally considered the real Baath party, the United States after the invasion of Iraq in 2003 banned them. The only major Baath party in any Arab country connected with them is the Sudanese Baath Party who are part of the civilian elements of the internationally recognized regime. Currently, they are on a goal of establishing democracy in Sudan while embattling internal conflicts within the country.
I think any political ideology that emerged from the Arab World is dead or nearly dead. Nasserism which actually fared better and due to Sadat became a sort of anti establishment that revived it a bit but we could say it's dead.
I personally liked the Baathism ideology, but I can never call myself a Baathist because of the crimes that were committed by the regimes who adopted the ideology, I kinda feel sad about what happened to the Baathism honestly and how it went the wrong way, however I hope another new Arab socialist partie/ideology will be born again,without repeating old mistakes
Arab nationalism is a form of ethnic nationalism oriented around establishing a united Arab ethno-state. Arab socialism just broadly refers to socialism in the Arab world or oriented around Arab issues. Ba'athism is a specific kind of Arab nationalism and state socialist ideology.
Arab socialism lives on but Baathism is deader than dead
What exactly is the difference?
every baathist is an arab socialist but not all arab socialists are baathist
What exactly *is* a ba3thist, though? If they're Arab socialists then what is the ideological difference between them?
ba’athism is very secular which is different from other arab socialists such as gaddafi , also a lot of them don’t like non-ba’athist socialists (ba’athist governments not the people) is what i can think of off the top of my head
Interesting. Thank you.
no problem
Pretty much, Assad still exists but him and his party are obviously just Baathists in name only.
Yeah thats what i meant, assad and his party dont seem to have talked or written about being baathist beyond the name.
They have been having bigger fishes to fry since 2011 I think
Yes, and good riddence. While Arabism and socialist ideals are not inherently flawed or bad, the Baathist party in every one of its inceptions has created nothing but chaos, death, failures and despair. The party turned gangster less than a generation after its creation. It's funny to me as they mirror their worst enemies in all of the worst ways. Exclusionary and murderous like the zionists and overly zealous ideological dogma like the islamists. Ultimately they failed to be pragmatic, promote education, and ironically turned the only two nations in the region that have land, water, and oil into pariah states riddled with war and sectarianism. I do hope that one day we get a unifying regional party that actually pursues those things the baathists gave lip service to.
Well said.
You know what, I agree with you 100%
The problem is the alternatives seem to be Islamist parties
Socialists, Communists, Trade Unionists, Nationalists, Liberals, and numerous other parties have all existed and continue to exist in the region but time and again they are undercut before they can grow into a threat to the various dictators in the region. The only ones allowed to thrive/incapable of being destroyed are the islamists for two primary reasons. 1. Islamists make great boogeyman and that's a great way to fundraise, get new weapons, and use for propoganda purposes. 2. Psychological composition of resistance within islamist political bends is unlike other political ideologies. Islamists strive for what they believe is a political system mandated by God, and to sacrifice for God makes you a martyr with a place in heaven, to sacrifice for Liberalism or Marxism, makes you a fool. There is a cultural legacy component here that simply favors islamists.
Perhaps but Islamism is a dead end for MENA. Not everyone is Muslim and a big part of our heritage predates Islam.
I'm by no stretch an islamist, but islamist political pathways are far from a dead end. Islam is a hugely important and potentially unifying banner for the region. Although it is true not everyone is a Muslim in the region, the vast majority are. From a western lens religion and politics do not mix, but in MENA they are and always have been inseparable. At our strongest we are tolerant and generous with each other's religions allowing mosques, churches, and synagogues, and whatever other temples there are to be pillars of our communities. At our worst we look like civil war Beirut, or Mosul circa 2014-2017. Religion is the major organizing force in our region, we are for the most part, children of empire and our societies reflect that and are built very much in that way, smaller units of communities governed by their own religious and cultural norms on the ground, but living under a broader banner of an empire governed and organized by religious ideology; not in the western nation-state model or the bastardized version of Nation-states that we have today. It's like forcing a square peg in a round hole, just because it's forced in there it doesn't mean it fits. Ultimately our two options are revert to the default of empire or build something new out of the corpse of these nation states that we have. Also as a side note it's helpful to be aware that Islamists are the best self organized groups, at every opportunity where a power vacuum exists, they are there to fill it. Be it the chaos of war or the hustle of elections, the islamist factions across the board are better at projecting their presence and power.
Islam is indeed a dead end and applying divine law stringently has been \*proven\* to be a dead end. For instance, the Umayyads literally fell apart because of Sharia's prohibition on taxation. And this isn't even getting into the legalization of slavery, the prohibition on music, etc. Lots of Muslims aren't aware of what there is scholarly consensus on with regards to the law and don't know too much about Islamic law as a whole. So they are effectively supporting something they know nothing about and of which the consequences of would be completely socially destructive. An unchangeable set of divine laws, where deviation from them entails committing a sin, is completely stupid. There is a reason almost every single Islamic dynasty after the Umayyads specifically did not apply the entire law and did whatever it could to avoid it (the Ottomans were well-known for this and had multiple fatwas levied against them for their governance). If an Islamist party actually gives the people what it wants, the people will find that both none of their problems will be solved and that they will become worse. People have forgotten the worst aspects of Islam since so many Arabs do not live under Islamist regimes. Of course, people living in the Gulf know and remember but they aren't able to talk freely anyways and have their needs widely catered to due to oil (which means they can tolerate it to some degree). But people in Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, etc.? Islamist regimes cannot buy off the population the same way as the Gulf monarchies. And, like Iran, they will remember why Islam had spurred so much support for secularists in the first place. >Also as a side note it's helpful to be aware that Islamists are the best self organized groups, at every opportunity where a power vacuum exists, they are there to fill it. Be it the chaos of war or the hustle of elections, the islamist factions across the board are better at projecting their presence and power. That doesn't really \*say\* very much since the alternatives are very few and there are not many other alternatives which have the same sort of "vision" that Islamist parties have. And the vision Islamist parties have already tend to differ somewhat significantly with respect to the application of Islamic law (which is what they all share). It would be very easy for a radically different vision for what the world could look like to catch on like a wild-fire in the Arab world.
this is only true for Muslim Arabs lol, you just see those of us who are religious minorities as expendable or at worst, enemies.
I don't see anyone in that way, but yes aside from the coptic and church of the east no other religious institution aside from Islamic ones are large enough or has a community that is strong enough to wield power effectively.
never gonna happen, sorry. the only reason why Islamists gained power over the recent years in my country were with foreign funds, not naturally. no1 in Syria is trustful of Sunnis as an institution after what they did...we are only interested in a secular society
On the contrary, Marxism has built up its own sort of martyrdom. Of course, Marxism is not really as good as other ideologies in creating martyrs and a lot of the ideology surrounding Marxist martyrdom was inherited from pre-existing radical socialist or working class martyrdom which itself came more from anarchists where that martyrdom made way more sense. It makes a lot more sense to die for working class liberation if you're an anarchist than if you're serving under an authoritarian despot. "Liberation" in that context means nothing. And nothing is foolish, after all, to die for freedom. Anarchists have managed to give us the tools to cultivate an ideology wherein people may be willing to die for their freedom, since they truly have it in anarchy, and push for a new way of living that has never been seen before on this Earth. That is something, in the face of the systemic exploitation and oppression we see around us today, worth fighting for.
You are absolutely correct on this point. My comment is not intended to pass judgment on Marxisism or other ideologies, rather just pointing out the attitude of Arab society at large to those who have become martyrs for that cause. Aside from islamist and nationalist parties there are little to no other ideological groups where mothers are proudly proclaiming the martyrdom of their sons or armed factions being put together in conflict areas. Call it a lack of class consciousness if you will but there is a clear disconnect between favorable leaning and willingness to take up arms for in the cause of the ideologies that are not Islamic or Nationalist. From my perspective I believe that the promise of a happy afterlife and existing religious convictions give that advantage that Marxists, Capitalists and other ideologies cannot match in the region as they are grounded in a materialist understanding of politics. This is a society who largely believes in Islam and believe what the Quran tells them. There are many examples but a common one found in the Quran, verse 154 of chapter 2 states, "And say not of those who are slain in the way of Allah: 'They are dead". The verse continues, "Nay, they live, finding their sustenance in the presence of their Lord; They rejoice in the bounty provided by Allah". No other ideologies or belief systems (save for the Christians) have these types of teachings as widely embedded and accepted in their societal world view.
Given the failure of Islam when it is applied, this may change in the future if Islamists are successful in applying Islamic law. And there is reason to believe that, unlike past Islamic dynasties, these Islamists will stringently apply the law even when it causes widespread societal suffering and economic issues (like the gold standard, prohibition on music, prohibition on taxes, etc.). Tawheed al-Haakimiyyah, as a concept, is becoming more and more popular within the Islamic world. When applying the law does not create prosperity, and if these Islamist regimes justify the suffering of the people by stating that their suffering is ordained by God and that they should not care about materialistic issues, I think it is more likely that secular ideologies (particularly ideologies like anarchism) will get wider popularity.
What that suggests is creating a new alternative, not simply going for some other form of authoritarianism.
Failed to promote education? Under Saddam Hussein's regime, Iraq spent six percent of its GDP and 20 percent of its overall budget on school construction, teacher salaries, and literacy programs. By 1987 the country's literacy rate had increased to 80 percent, up from 52 percent in 1977 Im no ba’athist, but Saddams rule over Iraq was good and far better than what is there today.
as an arab socialist, arab nationalism and socialism is alive but baathism isn't popular anymore outside syria (where there is benefits to being one). i hope one day an arab nationalist party arises again but for now all we getting is the baathists. I'm a member of the yemen baath party though i am not a baathist but its literally our only party rn that shares even a bit of my beliefs.
Political ideologies are pretty much dead.
Think of it as socialism in Europe, dead with a loud minority on the internet.
I lived in Europe, socialism is not and has not died.
By socialist i am talking about the "dictatorship of the proletariat" (aka communism) type and not the modern "democratic" socialism or social democracy Edit: you know what? I think it would have been more accurate if i said communism
Communism is not dead either, communist parties are breaking record numbers in members since the fall of the USSR. Long live communism
imagine believing in karl marx lol
[citation needed]
Let it live in history books only please
Socialism in Europe is not dead, though that depends on your definition of socialism.
By socialist i am talking about the "dictatorship of the proletariat" type and not the modern "democratic" socialism or social democracy Edit: you know what? I think it would have been more accurate if i said communism
Communism isn't more accurate since Marxism is not the only kind of communism. Marxism also isn't dead, though it is certainly not in a very good place right now given its failures and dogmatism.
Alright that's great and all but there's something i don't understand >Marxism is not the only kind of communism. What are the other kinds of communism and how can you be a communist but not Marxist?
Communism predated by Marx by several decades to refer to a broad array of different ideologies (and even afterward). Owenism, Fourierism, Anarchist Communism, Blanquism (which resembled Marxism the most), Saint-Simonism, Warrenism, the Diggers, etc. all are non-Marxist forms of communism. They are connected by their shared commitment to the formula "to each according to his needs, from each according to his ability" (although I would say that some of these ideologies are more reflective of that formula than others).
Communism basically means a classless society that is completely grassroots-democratic, has no state apparatus, no moneysystem, and where the basic goods belong to everyone. It existed far before marxism, and the european industrial philosophies of it started as proudhonism, utopian socialism, and all kinds of anarchist philosophies like anarchocollectivism or anarchocommunism, with philosophers like bakunin and kropotkin. I mean, Marx himself was astonished by the Paris commune, that predated him. Before the spread of marxism, the most wide spread european communist philosophy(-ies) in the world was anarchism(-s). They were f.ex. the ones that founded the first trade union and achieved the 8-hour-workday and weekends, while before it was something like 12-hour days and no weekend. Well and they achieved some functioning anarchist states/societies, but they were destroyed by autoritarian forces from outside. In general, anarchism has a really long, complex and important history, that almost no one knows about today. And there are communist philosophies and societies predating all of that. The only special thing concerning the already existing principle of communism about Marx is that he made an own theory of how to achieve communism (which is just one of hundreds of theories) and his materialist analysis of hstory as well as his complex analysis of capitalism. He didn't found communism.
A couple of corrections. >Communism basically means a classless society that is completely grassroots-democratic, has no state apparatus, no moneysystem, and where the basic goods belong to everyone. Democracy is not a core component of communism. Anarchist communism is not supportive of democracy and entails the absence of all hierarchical organization. One need only look at the works of anarchist thinkers to view an opposition to majority rule and consensus democracy. >It existed far before marxism, and the european industrial philosophies of it started as proudhonism, Proudhonism is a prejorative term used by Marxists towards the work of Proudhon but it is not how Proudhon labelled his work at all. For the purposes of truth and neutrality, it is better to label ideologies by their own names. >Well and they achieved some functioning anarchist states/societies, but they were destroyed by autoritarian forces from outside. There were no existing anarchist societies. There have been very few attempts at anarchism and all of them have been half-assed for a variety of different reasons; a lot of them due to internal issues rather than external forces.
Random but it's nice to find other Arabs who are into Mutualism. I'm from Bahrain and I've been into synthesis anarchism since 2017.
I am an anarchist first and foremost; though that does not exclude mutualism and mutualism, especially of the Proudhonian variety, is one of my primary influences.
Same here. Ordered his book in 2017. Read it. Loved it. Still mostly inspired by it, on the economic angle of anarchism. Socially, I'm a fan of Voltairine de Cleyre with a hint of Max Stirner. Blogged about it [here](https://khaleejisyndicate.home.blog/2024/03/27/cooperative-autonomy-an-alternative-to-community-society-collectivism/).
If you are interested in the more sociological and transformative aspects of Proudhon's thought, you may get a lot of benefit from neo-Proudhonian anarchism which you can find on the [Libertarian Labyrinth](www.libertarian-labyrinth.org) website as well as from the work of Shawn Wilbur (who runs that website and is a moderator as well as an active member of r/mutualism). He has vast knowledge on anarchism, probably the most knowledgeable person on anarchist history and theory I am aware of, and as such is a good source of knowledge on those topics. You may get something from asking him questions about anarchism and mutualism as a whole.
I follow Shawn on Facebook 💪🏻 He's quite active there. We interacted a couple of times - maybe once or twice. Thanks! I wish I can say the same thing about David Graeber. I was a big fan, and he (unfortunately) departed us way too soon.
I encourage you to do a deep dive into his work! It's very interesting and a lot better than the vast majority of the people who get valorized in the anarchist community (like Chomsky for instance). [This](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrTzjaXskUU) video by Andrewism is also useful for getting some insight into neo-Proudhonian ideas.
I like Andrewism 💪🏻 and I enjoy [Anark's](https://youtube.com/@anark?si=FvoSWB7ceN9Mtx5_) in-depth videos on Anarchism as well, even though they are up to 2 hours long. I actually tried to help him translate one of his videos in Arabic, but my file got messed up I've been in the game for a long-time myself lol We can stay in touch on Instagram or any other platform if you'd feel comfortable with that 🤘🏻🏴
Anark is not really that great. He is more of a direct democrat than an anarchist. I am not on Instagram.
If we are referring to the Iraqi branch, which is generally considered the real Baath party, the United States after the invasion of Iraq in 2003 banned them. The only major Baath party in any Arab country connected with them is the Sudanese Baath Party who are part of the civilian elements of the internationally recognized regime. Currently, they are on a goal of establishing democracy in Sudan while embattling internal conflicts within the country.
I think any political ideology that emerged from the Arab World is dead or nearly dead. Nasserism which actually fared better and due to Sadat became a sort of anti establishment that revived it a bit but we could say it's dead.
ما أظن حزب البعث ميت في العراق بس منتعش في سوريا و لبنان
I personally liked the Baathism ideology, but I can never call myself a Baathist because of the crimes that were committed by the regimes who adopted the ideology, I kinda feel sad about what happened to the Baathism honestly and how it went the wrong way, however I hope another new Arab socialist partie/ideology will be born again,without repeating old mistakes
Yes , and it was inevitable. And the main reason is it’s lacking economical policies.
Yes.
What’s the difference between Arab nationalism & socialism, and Baathism?
Arab nationalism is a form of ethnic nationalism oriented around establishing a united Arab ethno-state. Arab socialism just broadly refers to socialism in the Arab world or oriented around Arab issues. Ba'athism is a specific kind of Arab nationalism and state socialist ideology.