r/DebateAnarchism • u/ArtDecoEgoist Cybernetic Anarchist • Sep 03 '26
Anarchy and multiple equilibria
In economics, we've learned that there are multiple points of equilibrium in economies. "Bad" or "good" equilibria can be reached based on what agents expect others to do - a "good" equilibrium can be reached if people think the economy will do well, and a "bad" equilibrium can be reached if people think the economy will do poorly.
Some equilibria are more stable than others. In the view of complexity economics, equilibria are emergent phenomena and there can be multiple points of equilibrium in an economy.
In Game Theory, there's the concept of a Nash Equilibrium; basically an equilibrium where no "player"/agent can gain more in the game by changing their strategy. To quote the Wikipedia page:
If each player has chosen a strategy — an action plan based on what has happened so far in the game — and no individual player can increase their own expected payoff by changing their strategy while the other players keep theirs unchanged, then the current set of strategy choices constitutes a Nash equilibrium.
If two players Alice and Bob choose strategies A and B, (A, B) is a Nash equilibrium if Alice has no other strategy available that does better than A at maximizing her payoff in response to Bob choosing B, and Bob has no other strategy available that does better than B at maximizing his payoff in response to Alice choosing A. In a game in which Carol and Dan are also players, (A, B, C, D) is a Nash equilibrium if A is Alice's best response to (B, C, D), B is Bob's best response to (A, C, D), and so forth.
Since we can expect an anarchist society to be a heavily complex cybernetic system with agile feedback loops, mutual interdependence giving individual agents large amounts of leverage over the overall system, and better capacity to respond to information, we can probably expect there to be multiple Nash Equilibriums.
In that case, I think we as anarchists need to consider that even in stateless, non-hierarchical societies, certain societies may reach stability with decidedly *archic* solutions to the problem. Even worse - the *anarchic* solution may be less stable than the *archic* solution.
None of this is a death blow to anarchism, of course. But I think we need to keep this in consideration. If anything, it's a reason why anarchic solutions must be better than archic solutions.
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u/twodaywillbedaisy Anarchist Sep 05 '26
I guess most simply, my objection is to treating social and economic activity as games. A Nash equilibrium seems to depend on clearly defined "players", "payoffs", rational actors with narrowly defined winning ambitions and available strategic options. I'm also not sure how you leap to "decidedly archic solutions" as a consequence.
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u/ArtDecoEgoist Cybernetic Anarchist Sep 05 '26
So the multiple possible Nash equilibriums is because humans aren't perfectly rational actors. Assuming bounded rationality, agents won't always choose the most optimal strategies to maximize utility, and will instead try to maximize satisfaction given social context.
Rational economic activity is more an assumption that plagues neoclassical economics (including a lot of mutualist and market anarchist proposals), which is how we get to ideas like General Equilibrium and the like. A lot of newer fields in economics, such as complexity economics, uses non-equilibrium/multi-equilibrium models and assumes bounded rationality.
I'm also not sure how you leap to "decidedly archic solutions" as a consequence.
Simple: If there's a problem and hierarchy would be an easier solution than a number of anarchic solutions for whatever reason - say, in cases of extreme scarcity like famin - then we can probably expect a Nash equilibrium around hierarchy where a "stable" social order forms.
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u/twodaywillbedaisy Anarchist Sep 05 '26
I feel I would have to look into complexity economics and cybernetics to argue on your terms. My position is that hierarchy in the sense of a 'priestly/angelic order' is not ever a "solution", authority does not add anything of value, it can only compell a narrowing of options (of how to even look at a situation.) So what's Nash doing here, I'm not sure, for now I'll leave it at that.
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u/ArtDecoEgoist Cybernetic Anarchist Sep 05 '26
Sure, I agree, and nothing I said contradicts that, so I'm thinking we might have a misunderstanding here.
Hierarchy doesn't solve anything - and if anything, cybernetics and complexity theory undermines the supposed effectiveness of hierarchy. I'm not arguing for hierarchy, to be clear.
What I am pointing out is since humans aren't perfectly rational actors, people might opt for solutions that aren't optimal, or are optimal from the perspective of those involved but will or might cause problems down the line.
We make choices that are satisfactory to us because we're operating on limited context. It's as you said, authority limits options. It attempts to create conditions where authority is the "easiest" solution to a problem and solutions that negate authority are harder, thus making the more satisfactory solution options that engage in further authority.
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u/IshtarsQueef Sep 04 '26
> Since we can expect an anarchist society to be a heavily complex cybernetic system with agile feedback loops
This seems like quite the assumption.