[recursivedoubts]

There definitely is an informal and growing consensus on just riot theory.

I hypothesize that the treatment of riots by liberal (classical sense) scholars has been based on their rationalistic optimism and a belief that domestic political problems can be solved non-violently. If they can't, that throws the entire liberal (classical sense) project into question, and opens exhilarating, dangerous doors on both the left and right.

I personally hope that the view that violent riots are illegitimate wins out, but I am not planning my life around that hope.

Addendum: I should note that, if one were opposed to the liberal (classical sense) project, the encouragement of riots (regardless of them being left or right) would be an excellent strategy.

[hirundo]

> If they can't, that throws the entire liberal (classical sense) project into question, and opens exhilarating, dangerous doors on both the left and right.

Only if they _can_ be solved with violence. I'd argue that even if a particular issue can be solved with violence, the net result will generally be worse than the status quo as the violence will rarely be limited to such issues.

I'd think that for an undirected mob, violence that was a net beneficial effect would be even more rare than violence by a well regulated army. E.g. U.S. military violence during WWII was arguably a net benefit. What would be an example of mob violence that led to a net benefit?

[recursivedoubts]

I agree with you. James Scott has written about how, for the common person, war, revolution and riot is typically a net loss:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_C._Scott

I am not an anarchist, but I enjoy his writings immensely.

[teataster]

It's not uncommon where I am from for plain clothes police to start riots. That delegitemizes the protestors and legitemizes violent action by the state. Pretty anti-liberal (classical sense :)

That's not exactly an undirected mob, but police and edgy teens seem to have an aligned interest.

[thinkingemote]

Additionally in the UK, the police often infiltrates protest organisations. They are often near the very top. The official line is that they cannot use entrapment but they are encouraged to help out and assist activists.

Any activist movement should consider themselves hacked and should look at.amd around the leadership for the site of the vulnerability.

[vkou]

> What would be an example of mob violence that led to a net benefit?

The American revolution, the February revolution, the Red River Rebellion, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the revolutions in Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, the Chech republic, Poland, do I need to keep going?

All of them had violence inflicted on property, and most of them had violence inflicted on people.

Were one of those events happen in your town, your police department, your mayor, your governor, and your president would without hesitation call them 'a violent riot'. Your news anchors would be clutching their pearls, showing pictures of broken Amazon Go storefront windows, bookended by testimonies of police officers, and terrified citizens who'd just like the world to go back to the way it was last week.

[SenoraRaton]

You forgot the civil rights movement.

[nordsieck]

> I'd think that for an undirected mob, violence that was a net beneficial effect would be even more rare than violence by a well regulated army.

For the mob? I think looting is a pretty easy example.

[ultramundane8]

The net beneficial effect mentioned refers to some kind of societal net benefit. The sentence doesn't stand independently from the rest of the post.

[trgn]

French revolution started with a riot. While the terror state that came soon after is condemned, it was the violent spark that realized the Enlighment ideals in Europe.

1830 was a riotous year globally. Belgian independence started with a riot, and was successful in a sense, carving out a place for libertarian optimism and industrial expansion from a war-weary continent.

These are both fairly conventional pop-culture interpretations. But maybe similar developments would have happened without the flash in the pan of some undirected mob breaking things.

[recursivedoubts]

Life is complicated and lines are grey. For example, while I am in general opposed to rioting, I am deeply sympathetic to the miners in the coalfield war:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado_Coalfield_War

I would argue that the French Revolution was functionally fundamentally, albeit cryptically, illiberal (classical sense) with De Sade as the crux. And to Napoleon as the illiberal tyrant that came out of the chaos of that time.

[hirundo]

The French revolution led in fairly short order to the French empire, which is generally not considered to have been a net social benefit.

I suppose the Boston Massacre could be an example.

[082349872349872]

After the fall of the french empire, my country kept the new laws, the new roads, and the new social structure. We just got rid of the french who had been running things and put locals in their place.

[moate]

What about a lynch mob murdering a violent criminal (I'm specifically thinking of a pedophile because culturally that's one of the 'worst') who got off due to a technicality? How is that not a small scale version of state violence? Society has a problem that was unable to be solved through normal, peaceful ways, so violence needed to happen.

Also, just throwing this out there for people in the back who seem to forget: You cannot commit violence on things. You can't murder a building, or a car, or a city. Only the people who may be inside those things at the time. They're objects and in a riot become symbols ("we destroy the rich by destroying what makes them rich") but they're not people. A riot can be destructive without being violent.

[dodobirdlord]

This is a weird take. Is an armed robbery not violence if the victim gives up their money and doesn’t actually get shot? A riot is violent because it caries the threat of violence for anyone who tries to stop it, in the same way that a stick-up is violent because the alternative to losing your money is getting shot. If you limit someone’s choices via force, that is violence.

[zigzaggy]

So in your opinion, someone can only commit violence against people? So outside of personal injury behavior cannot be violent? I'm sorry to say I disagree with you. (To be clear, this is not an endorsement for or against either "side" in the current culture war in the US.)

I hate to be that guy that quotes the dictionary, but let's start with dictionary.com[0]: Violence (noun): - swift and intense force: the violence of a storm. - rough or injurious physical force, action, or treatment: to die by violence. - an unjust or unwarranted exertion of force or power, as against rights or laws: to take over a government by violence.

Now, Wikipedia [1]: Violence is "the use of physical force so as to injure, abuse, damage, or destroy". Less conventional definitions are also used, such as the World Health Organization's definition of violence as "the intentional use of physical force or power, threatened or actual, against oneself, another person, or against a group or community, which either results in or has a high likelihood of resulting in injury, death, psychological harm, maldevelopment, or deprivation."

What about domestic abuse violence that doesn't even involve physical abuse? From WebMD [2]: Domestic abuse is more than just hitting, shoving, and other physical attacks. It’s a pattern of controlling behaviors. The goal always is to get and keep power over an intimate partner.

To be clear, I'm not comparing these riots to domestic violence. What I'm trying to do is debunk this argument that somehow because these rioters aren't hurting anyone that they're not committing acts of violence. These acts of destruction are very much acts of violence. Words are important and the truth matters. Let's call this what it is, violence and destruction. Just because people might not be being targeted doesn't mean that they aren't getting hurt and traumatized. And yes, this is violence.

0. https://www.dictionary.com/browse/violence?s=t 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violence 2. https://www.webmd.com/mental-health/mental-whatis-domestic-a...

(Edit: forgot my references, and changed "Webster's" to "Dictionary.com"

[patcon]

I've heard complexity science folks entertain the premise that a riot (or any non-equilibrium social order) is perhaps like a phase transition in the social strata of complex matter (like how boiling or combustion is a phase transition in the physical, molecular strata of matter).

A forest isn't a forest if it's always on fire, but the system of the forest is often in equilibrium only when forests are swept with fire every so often. A similar logic might be part of a complete political theory.

[recursivedoubts]

I think that may be a false analogy.

Generally, in the modern state, I view riots as being allowed and/or managed by the ruling class for their benefit.

To quote banksy: "You are an acceptable level of threat and if you were not you would know about it."

[nordsieck]

> I should note that, if one were opposed to the liberal (classical sense) project, the encouragement of riots (regardless of them being left or right) would be an excellent strategy.

It seems absurd on its face to claim that only classical liberals oppose riots on theory grounds.

[recursivedoubts]

I agree, that would be absurd, which is why I did not make that claim. I, for example, am not a liberal (classical sense) and I oppose riots.

I said only that as a tactical consideration, bringing down a liberal (classical sense) regime with riots would be an excellent strategy.