From The Ego and its Own; ‘political liberalism’.
This greater insight into the genesis of any ‘state’ - that it is only made possible by these terms - demands either a radical restructuring of the entire institution so that it does not require this essential conflict in order to exist… or the complete abandonment and dismissal of any attempt to establish it at all.
But this decision does not rest with the bourgeois, for they are not the makers of the state. Rather they emerge after it’s established, after it’s made possible out of the abundance of material productivity and wealth. And yet, ironically, it serves their interests more than the interests of those who made them possible in the first place.
The fundamental sham of the ‘state’ is just this embarrassing if not comical piece of logic, which stirner lays out quite masterfully throughout the essay(s). The strangeness of this insight has never struck anyone as much as the anarchist, the one who through virtue of reason and in such good taste simply refuses to participate in such an unprincipled sham.
And if and when the anarchist declares himself a nihilist in the company of philosophers and politicians, this is more of a general statement of withholding commitment to what these perceive as problems that can be addressed without first resolving the problem of the ‘state’. Hence, philosophical activity that does not involve itself here, first and foremost, is generically unworthy of receiving any real effort from the anarchist. since if the fundamental problem of the ‘state’ is not first resolved, no amount of philosophical floundering over the vast array of social, political and economic issues produced from within this essentially problematic superstructure will ever come to any resolution.
The kind of philosophical speculation one indulges in more often betrays the degree of attention and insight they are capable of having of problems that are actually worth any attention at all. This is expressed well when Marx says ‘the philosophers have only interpreted the world… the point is to change it.’ but of course this is a comment made exclusively to the proletariat, for it is in his power alone to do this. Again, the bourgeois neither brings the state into existence or holds it together… but emerges as a by-product of the accumulated mistakes and errors of the working classes. Therefore only those who produce the ‘state’ have the power to change it. Or I should say ‘correct the errors they have made throughout history.’