In history, is it even possible to have a stable society without the State?

look at the question
>is it even possible

Revolutionary Catalonia, Free Territory, and Medieval Iceland are all examples.

>Revolutionary Catalonia
Could they have survived Stalin's and Franco's attacks if they centralized?

No. In fact, the incidence of violence the average person experiences has dropped every time a state has extended it's reach, and risen again when that state collapses or fails. The bigger the state, the more stable and peaceful it is for the average citizen.

The problem with arachism is that even tho it's true that most people want to cooperate and live in peace, some people are psychopathic or have some other related condition and will simply abuse and exploit whoever they can, and the only way for normies to protect themselves is to band together into ever larger states.

Probably not. Either way, what's being discussed is whether or not there has been a stable stateless society.

Totalitarian states have surely been extremely peaceful :^)

>is it even possible to have a stable society without the State?

Depends on how you define the state to be quite frank.

I sincerely doubt there has existed a society wherein there has not been a de facto monopoly of violence for example, because if anyone can use force without any communal arbitration or punishment, than I can't see how it can be defined as a "society".

How can you have justice without arbitration between disputes, and isn't whomsoever has the role as the arbitrator the de facto State, or at least government?

Seems to me that way at least.

Centrally organized states can field bigger and more effective armies than a tribe that bands together their warriors when the need is there.
Therefore the first form became dominant. Not because of their superiority as a form of society, but their more effective methods of inflicting violence upon other humans.

Psychopaths are not an issue on the social level.
When they rely on their own power they are not very dangerous, compared to alcohol, mosquitos, etc.
The problems start when people band together under a psychopath.

If the arbitrator doesn't make or enforce rules then he's no government.
If anyone can be an arbitrator, then there's no state, as it needs to be separate from society as a whole to exist in this sense of the word.

You don't need a ruler for moral and justice.
You can have simple rules e.g.
>don't steal, don't kill, don't lie
that are accepted by everyone.
If someone inflicts violence upon you, you have the right for self defence.
For violations of the moral code, you can have an elected and trusted judge or jury to decide about penalty and compensation.
No needs for someone owning or ordering anyone or anything here.

>If the arbitrator doesn't make or enforce rules then he's no government.

Arbitrating disputes, presupposes enforcement of rules, else there would be no way to reach a conclusion to a dispute.

If it didn't, then no justice existed in tribal society, and if no justice existed it was literally bellum omnium contra omnes, and hence cannot be called "society".

Enforcement can be voluntary, or shared by the whole community, in which case there still is no central authority that you could call a state.

And justice is not the alternative to conflict. Justice as an institution is organized conflict. It presupposes disputes, crimes and violence. Without them you don't need it.

Anarchy, by definition, is more ordered than a lawful society.

>Enforcement can be voluntary, or shared by the whole community

Sure, it could, but unless you had some punishment for not adhering to the conclusion of the arbitration, the whole process was pointless to begin with.

>community member violates tribal code
>call in gathering
>discuss violation
>agree on punishment/ compensation

where do you need a state for this process?

The point is that someone needs to *enforce* that punishment, even in a tribal setting, else he can just flap his arms and say fuck you.

>group just decided that the accused violator is guilty and his hair is shaved to mark his as dishonoured
>who's got a sharp knife?
>who's good at shearing?
>we need two people to hold him down

again, why you need a state for that?
is it just that you like to be on your knees?

Yes, but the state is simply an outsourcing of that same action.

Doesn't change my original estimation that a monopoly of violence needed to exist, in order to have anything that could be called "society".

Even if just three random guys took it upon themselves to shave his head, and throw him out of the village, those three, by the collective authority of the village was seeded the legitimate right to use violence, which is literally the definition of the state.

Yes and no. You can't have a socialist society without a state.

This. An-caps are the only true anarchists because they value volunteerism above all else.

no, the state is an institute of monopolised violence and hierarchy that sees other human beings as their property
you do not need this for a society to work
you can condemn violence as whole
>violence = violation of somebodys rights
you have the right to defend yourself with defensive force against violence
>defensive force =/= violence
a verdict atones for the violence that was initiated by the accused, the punishment restores the status quo and further violence is allowed to be inflicted upon any member of the conflict

no hierarchy needed
no state needed
society: working

>the state is an institute of monopolised violence and hierarchy that sees other human beings as their property

Yes, The State is a legitimized institution that uses it's monopolized violence to stop wrongdoers in the tribe, just like the three guys who held the hypothetical wrongdoer down and shaved his head.

But that doesn't mean it "sees other human beings as their property".

no
the three people just execute a verdict
they do not have any form of monopolized violence
they do not have any superior rights than any other member of the tribe

>the three people just execute a verdict

Yes by being legitimized by the tribe to use violence. The modern state is just an extremely advanced version of the same thing.

with the difference that a state has a priori "right" for violence, while executing an verdict presupposes an act of violence