right so in russia what had happened was that communists got into power

and power naturally corrupts (which is why anarchists oppose it)

they switched leaders at one point iirc

and eventually they ended up being corrupt and turning into a dictatorship

after that people saw that communism wasn't working

black markets popped up

and they grew in support

we see this same process happening in north korea right now

they're migrating from communism to capitalism

I see, so the anarchists need another ideology to grow in power, but then this same ideology who helped them destroys them?

exactly

so anarchists have traditionally had two routes to our ideology

the first is the one I just described. help communists, then when in power dissolve government/ownership

the second is what you see in the middle east and places like egypt

a violent revolution, usually alongside communists and disgruntled capitalists

the problem is that it ends up with a power vaccuum, and a dictator takes the stand for people to follow

so basically: tear down and become a dictatorship, or build up and become communist then a dictatorship

and dictatorships with ownership and communist distribution give rise to black markets and capitalism

hence the horrible cycle anarchists find ourselves in

i see, so you guys basically have no way to rule without becoming a dictatorship?

not quite

so the issue is that since ownership is still in place, that naturally leads to capitalism no matter the route

communists support ownership due to their economic model

which is why it always collapses

the problem historically is that anarchists have not yet dismantled the ownership expectation

under capitalism it's impossible to do

under communism the only way to do it is through government changes

So didnt any anarchist think about a violent uprising, for a "greater good"?

right, that's why we got the second route of tearing things down

the idea is to just overthrow government and reject it's power

but given societal expectations and ways of living, it still results in capitalism

Oh

so the modern anarchist solution is to instead adopt alternative ways of living

that don't rely on ownership

this is *very* difficult to do right now under capitalism

but ideally we should be going the way of offgrid people (who are usually libertarian) along with making individual communes and smaller communities

so far it's not going too well

because trying to replace all infrastructure is very expensive

and not too many people support it just yet

i see

so right now a lot of anarchists tend to support progressive candidates who help remove capitalist reliance, and focus on buildin alternative ways of living