State-like structures were naturally forming within Anarres (People holding long-term power, the development of a capital, internal cliques and parties who had no loyalty to the revolutionary principles of Anarres, yet wielded considerable power with no effective structures in place to restrain their ambition).

Peace with Urras was maintained by operating the mines and selling the goods to Urras, who would otherwise have used force to obtain what they needed.Īnarres was reliant on the administration and neutrality of computer systems, which could fail and no one would know how to fix, or be taken advantage of and manipulated.

I was introduced to this book as a great example of how anarchism could totally be a thing, and I've seen it held up across the internet in this same light, though I am sympathetic to the idea and did fall in love with the conception of life on Anarres and it's philosophy, I couldn't help but feel the society was fundamentally unstable and was actually a perfect example of the inherent problems that an anarchist society will always run into due to human nature.Īnarres was reliant on the technological patronage of Urras to continue to function.

The dispossessed an ambiguous utopia