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Autarky is the characteristic ofself-sufficiency, usually applied to societies, communities, states, and theireconomic systems.[1]
Autarky as an ideology or economic approach has been attempted by a range ofpolitical ideologies and movements, particularlyleftist ones likeAfrican socialism,mutualism,war communism,[2]communalism,swadeshi,syndicalism (especiallyanarcho-syndicalism), andleft-wing populism, generally in an effort to build alternative economic structures or to control resources against structures a particular movement views as hostile. However, someright-wing ones, likenationalism,conservatism, andanti-globalism, along with even somecentrist movements, have also adopted autarky, generally on a more limited scale, to develop a particularindustry, to gain independence from other national entities or to preserve part of an existingsocial order.
Proponents of autarky have argued for national self-sufficiency to reduce foreign economic, political, and cultural influences, and to promote international peace.[3] However, economists are generally supportive offree trade;[4] there is broad consensus among economists that protectionism has a negative effect oneconomic growth and economic welfare while free trade and the reduction oftrade barriers has a positive effect on economic growth[5] andeconomic stability.[6]
Autarky may be a policy of a state or some other type of entity when it seeks to be self-sufficient as a whole, but it also can be limited to a narrow field such as possession of a keyraw material. Some countries have a policy of autarky with respect to foodstuffs (such asSouth Korea), and water fornational-security reasons.[7] Autarky can result fromeconomic isolation or from external circumstances in which a state or other entity reverts to localized production when it lacks currency or excess production to trade with the outside world.[8][9]
The wordautarky is from theAncient Greek wordGreek:αὐτάρκεια, which means "self-sufficiency" (derived from αὐτο-, "self", and ἀρκέω, "to suffice"). InStoicism the concept of autarky represents independence from anything external, including independence from personal relationships, so as to immune one from vagaries of fortune. The Stoicsage is autarkic by being dependent only on his ownvirtue.[10] InEpicureanism the concept of autarky represents having the fewest possible requirements for living a life of pleasure, free of pain (aponia).[11]
Lexico, whose content is provided by the same publisher as that of theOxford English Dictionary, says thatautarky is a variant spelling of and pronounced the same asautarchy[12] and thatautarchy is another term forautocracy.[13]
Early state societies that can be regarded as autarkic includenomadic pastoralism andpalace economy, though over time these tend towards becoming less self-sufficient and more interconnected. The lateBronze Age, for example, saw formerly self-sufficient palace economies rely more heavily on trade, which may have been a contributing factor to the eventualBronze Age Collapse when multiple crises hit those systems at once. After that collapse, the ideal ofautarkeia formed a part of emerging Greek political culture, emphasizing economic self-sufficiency[14] and local self-rule.
The populist Chinese philosophy ofAgriculturalism, prominent in theSpring and Autumn andWarring States periods, supported egalitarian, self-sufficient[15] societies as an antidote to rampant war and corruption.
During theLate Roman Empire, some rebellions and communities pursued autarky as a reaction both to upheaval and to counter imperial power. A prominent example is theBacaude, who repeatedly rebelled against the empire and "formed self-governing communities" with their own[16] internal economy and coinage.
Medieval communes combined an attempt at overall economic self-sufficiency through the use of common lands and resources with the use of mutual defense pacts, neighborhood assemblies and organized militias to preserve local autonomy[17] against the depredations of the local nobility. Many of these communes later became trading powers such as theHanseatic League. In some cases, communal village economies maintained their own debt system[18] as part of a self-sufficient economy and to avoid reliance on possibly hostile aristocratic or business interests. The trend toward "local self-sufficiency" increased[19] after theBlack Plague, initially as a reaction to the impact of the epidemic and later as a way for communes and city states to maintain power against the nobility.[20]
There is considerable debate about how autarkic cultures that resisted the spread of early capitalism were.Golden Age pirate communities have been dubbed both heavily autarkic societies where[21] "the marauders...lived in small, self-contained democracies" and as an "anti-autarky" due[22] to their dependence on raiding.
While rarer among imperial states, some autarkies did occur during specific time periods. TheMing dynasty, during its earlier, more isolationist period, kept a closed economy that prohibited outside trade and focused on centralized distribution of goods produced in localized farms and workshops.[23] A hierarchy of bureaucrats oversaw[24] the distribution of these resources from central depots, including a massive one located in theForbidden City. That depot was, at the time, the largest logistical base in the world. TheIncan Empire also maintained a system of society-wide autarky based on community levies of specific goods and "supply on command".
In some areas of theantebellum South, the enslaved and free black populations forged self-sufficient economies in an effort to avoid reliance on the larger economy controlled by theplanter aristocracy. In eastern North Carolinamaroon communities, often based in swampy areas, used a combination of agriculture and fishing to forge a "hidden economy" and secure survival.[25] The relative self-reliance of these maritime African-American populations provided the basis for a strongly abolitionist political culture[26] that made increasingly radical demands after the start of theCivil War. Due to tense relations with some Union commanders and political factions during and after that war, these communities "focused their organizing efforts on developing their own institutions, their own sense of self-reliance, and their own political strength".[27]
Communist movements embraced or dismissed autarky as a goal at different times.Peter Kropotkin advocated local and regional autarky integrating agriculture and industry, instead of the international division of labor.[28] His work repeatedly held up communities "that needed neither aid or protection from without" as a more resilient model.[29]
Some socialist communities likeCharles Fourier'sphalansteries strove for self-sufficiency. The earlyUSSR in theRussian Civil War strove for a self-sufficient economy withwar communism,[30] but later pursued international trade vigorously under theNew Economic Policy. However, while the Soviet government during the latter period encouraged international trade, it also permitted and even encouraged local autarkies in many peasant villages.[31]
Sometimes leftist groups clashed over autarkic projects. During theSpanish Civil War, the anarcho-syndicalistCNT and the socialistUGT had created economic cooperatives in theLevante that they claimed were "managing the economic life of the region independent of the government".[32] But communist factions responded by cracking down on these cooperatives in an attempt to place economic control back in the hands of the central government.
Some right-wing totalitarian governments have claimed autarky as a goal, developing national industry and imposing high tariffs but have crushed other autarkic movements and often engaged in extensive outside economic activity. In 1921, Italianfascists attacked existing left-wing autarkic projects at the behest of large landowners, destroying roughly 119 labor chambers, 107 cooperatives and 83 peasant offices that year alone.[33]Nazi Germany under economics ministerHjalmar Schacht, and laterWalther Funk, still pursued major international trade, albeit under a different system, to escape the terms of theTreaty of Versailles, satisfy business elites and prepare for war. The regime would continue to conduct trade, including with countries like the United States, including connections with major companies likeIBM andCoca-Cola.[34]
Economic self-sufficiency was pursued as a goal by some members of theNon-Aligned Movement, such asIndia underJawaharlal Nehru[35] andTanzania,[36] under the ideology ofUjamaa[37] andSwadeshi. That was partly an effort to escape the economic domination of both the United States and the Soviet Union while modernizing the countries' infrastructure.Inthe case ofFrancoist Spain, it was both the effect of international sanctions after theSpanish Civil War (1939) andthe Second World War and the totalitariannationalist ideology ofFalangism.Post-war famine and misery lasted longer than in war-ravaged Europe.It was not until the capitalist reforms of 1950s with the approach to the United States that theSpanish economy recovered the levels of 1935 launching into theSpanish Miracle.
In the latter half of the 20th century economists, especially in wealthier countries, backed the emergingWashington consensus, overwhelmingly endorsing free trade whilediscouraging autarkic and socialist policies.[38] These economists asserted that protectionism has a negative effect on economic growth and economic welfare while free trade and the reduction oftrade barriers has a positive effect on economic growth[39][40][41][42] and economic stability.[43] But economists from many developing nations, or who came fromMarxian traditions, endorsed more autarkic ideas includingimport substitution industrialization[44] anddependency theory.[45] The work ofCelso Furtado,Raul Prebisch[46] andSamir Amin, especially Amin's semi-autarkic "autocentric" policies,[47] proved influential in efforts by many countries in Latin America, Asia and Africa to stave off economic domination by developing[48] more self-sufficient economies.
Small-scale autarkies were sometimes used by theCivil Rights Movement, such as in the case of theMontgomery Bus Boycott. Boycotters set up their own self-sufficient system of cheap or free transit to allow black residents to get to work and avoid using the then-segregated public systems in a successful effort to bring political pressure.
Autarkic efforts forfood sovereignty also formed part of the civil rights movement. In the late 60s activistFannie Lou Hamer was one of the founders of theFreedom Farms Cooperative, an effort[49] to redistribute economic power and build self-sufficiency in Black communities. "When you've got 400 quarts of greens and gumbo soup canned for the winter, nobody can push you around or tell you what to say or do," Hamer summarized as the rationale for the cooperative. The efforts were extensively targeted[50] bysegregationist authorities and the far-right with measures ranging from economic pressure to outright violence.
After World War II,Autonomist efforts in Europe embraced local autarkic projects in an effort to craft anti-authoritarian left-wing spaces, especially influencing thesocial center andsquatters' rights movements. Such efforts remain a common feature of Autonomist and anarchist movements on the continent today. The Micropolis social centre in Greece, for example, has gyms, restaurants, bars, meeting space and free distribution of food and resources.[51]
Around 1970, theBlack Panther Party moved away from orthodox communist internationalism towards "intercommunalism", a term coined byHuey P. Newton, "to retain a grasp on the local when the rest of radical thought seemed to be moving global".[52] Intercommunalism drew from left-wing autarkic projects like free medical clinics and breakfast programs, "explicitly articulated as attempts to fill a void left by the failure of the federal government to provide resources as basic as food to black communities".[53]
InMurray Bookchin'sCommunalist ideal, he wrote that in a more liberated future "every community would approximate local or regional autarky".[54]
The influential 1983 anarchist bookbolo'bolo, byHans Widmer, advocated the use of autarky among its utopian anti-capitalist communes (known asbolos), asserting "the power of the State is based on food supply. Only on the basis of a certain degree of autarky can the bolos enter into a network of exchange without being exploited".[55][56] Widmer theorized that through "tactical autarky"[57] such communes would be able to prevent the return of oppressive structures and a money economy.[58]
Autarkic efforts to counter the forcible privatization of public resources and maintain local self-sufficiency also formed a key part ofalter-globalization efforts. TheCochabamba Water War had Bolivians successfully oppose the privatization of their water system to keep the resource in public hands.[59]
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Today, national economic autarkies are relatively rare. A commonly-cited example isNorth Korea, based on the government ideology ofJuche (self-reliance), which is concerned with maintaining its domestic localized economy in the face of its isolation. However, even North Korea hasextensive trade withRussia,China,Algeria,Syria,Iran,Vietnam,India and many countries in Europe and Africa. North Korea had to import food during a widespreadfamine in the 1990s.
Some would consider a modern example at a societal level isRojava, the autonomous northern region ofSyria. Despite a key alliance with the United States, supporters consider them largely cut off from international trade, facing multiple enemies, and striving for a society based oncommunalism, Rojava's government and constitution emphasize economic self-sufficiency[60] directed by neighborhood and village councils. Rojavan society and economics are influenced by Bookchin's ideas, including the emphasis on local and regional self governance. Under changes made in 2012, property and business belong to those who live in or use it towards these goals, while infrastructure, land and major resources are commons run by local and regional councils. Bookchin, however, was concerned about the effects of isolationist autarky in respect to the closing off of a community, and therefore always stressed the need for a balance between localism and globalism.[61]
An example of a contemporary effort at localized autarky, incorporating the concept's history fromblack nationalism,Ujamaa,African-American socialism and thecivil rights movement, isCooperation Jackson,[62] a movement aimed at creating a self-sufficient black working class economy inJackson, Mississippi. The movement has aimed[63] to secure land and build self-sufficient cooperatives and workplaces "to democratically transform the political economy of the city" and push back against gentrification. Cooperation Jackson also saw a gain in electoral political power when its involvement proved pivotal to the 2013 mayoral election ofChokwe Lumumba and the 2017 election of his son,Chokwe Antar Lumumba.
After veering toward autarky under war communism, in the 1920s the Soviet authorities began restoring business relations with traditional partners.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link){{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)Without such wholistic cultural and political changes as I have advocated, notions of decentralism that emphasize localist isolation and a degree of self-sufficiency may lead to cultural parochialism and chauvinism. Parochialism can lead to problems that are as serious as a 'global& mentality that overlooks the uniqueness of cultures, the peculiarities of ecosystems and eco-regions, and the need for a humanly scaled community life that makes a participatory democracy possible.
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