Have you seen Harvey's discussion with Graeber?

http://davidharvey.org/2012/05/video-dav…

The most interesting part is about 2/3rds into the video, where they begin discussing this notion of larger-scale forms of organization. Graeber concedes that it is one of the most important things facing radical thinkers today, but also notes that there is no reason this large scale form needs to necessarily look like states do now. His examples (Zapatistas, etc) sort of suck. But I agree with the core of that argument: The majority of "the state" does indeed seem to be completely superfluous to actually serving the needs of people, in the same way that the majority of our city has been turned into a sluice for liquid capital, rather than a real social infrastructure.

So why do you think that large-scale forms of organization must be "like the state"? This seems equivalent to saying that density development plans must be "like a concentration camp" -- sort of true, in that concentration camps did concentrate population very efficiently, but everything else in their functioning was, you know, not so nice.

I certainly agree on the need for large-scale institutions that have a "nested" or hierarchical form (though also ones which are able to mesh with more horizontal structures below the 15,000 person limit that Harvey points out). But I think it's incorrect an overly dismissive to portray anarchists in general as dogmatic horizontalists -- most anarchists absolutely believe in the need for these same large scale institutional forms. Harvey himself points out that there were once strong syndicalist models for doing precisely what he's talking about.

It's a good book, though.