Warning Signs of Anarchy – Do You See it Coming?

The word “anarchy” dredges up images of third-world countries, overrun by rival warlords battling for control. Yet anarchy can mean a number of different things. By definition, civil war is a form of anarchy; because any society in anarchy is one in which the government has lost control. It can manifest in lawlessness of many types, even without a total collapse of the government.

For governments to function, they must be able to control the society. Whether this is through fear tactics and bullying or through a just system of laws and authority, the government must be able to predict what the members of society are going to do, as well as direct their energies into productive directions.

To the degree that they lose that ability, anarchy has set in.

The American Revolution was a time of anarchy. Our brave forefathers broke off from British rule and established what later became the United States of America. Britain reacted to this by sending military units to put down the rebellion. For a time, neither side had full control, leaving the people to govern themselves until the revolutionaries won their freedom.

While these sort of revolutions always seem to take us by surprise, there are signs that they are coming, just as there are signs that the government is losing control.

How Do You Know When it Starts?

When we see a number of these signs happening at the same time, we can be sure that a country is on the road to anarchy, even though they might not be on the brink of revolution or of a complete breakdown of society.

  • Supply shortages – When people have a hard time getting the things that they need for day-to-day survival, they are likely to react in anger and violence. This happened in the Argentinean financial collapse, with hundreds of thousands of people turning out into the streets in protest. Many of those protests turned violent.
  • Increased crime rates – One of the principal purposes of government is to protect the people. This is manifested through the various police departments and court system; apprehending, trying and incarcerating criminals that threaten society. When the government can’t deal effectively with these criminals, it encourages others to join their ranks.
  • High unemployment and poverty – People who are fat and happy are not anywhere near as likely to rise up in revolt as those who are hungry and angry. When a government can’t create an environment which provides financial and material security to people, their anger spills forth in acts of defiance and lawlessness.
  • Government ignores citizen’s wishes – When a government stops paying attention to the wants and needs of their citizens, the people begin to distance themselves from the government; “divorcing” themselves from it. It is easy to rebel against a government that you don’t feel is yours or that you feel doesn’t care about your needs.
  • Financial instability – The financial climate of a country greatly affects people’s ability to take care of their basic needs and those of their families. A government which doesn’t provide an atmosphere of financial security is ignoring the people’s most basic needs.
  • Class and racial warfare – When a society becomes divided, people are more likely to turn against one another. This can turn to low-level warfare between different races or classes of people. Left long enough, it can lead to genocide.
  • Police brutality – Police are always outnumbered by citizens. When police feel threatened by the citizens that they are sworn to protect, they often turn respond with aggressiveness and violence. Police can only control the people when the vast majority of people are not involved in any social unrest. When the police are outnumbered by dissidents, they have to turn to more violent means of control, which can easily spark retaliation from citizens.
  • Lack of confidence in elected leaders – While there are always dissidents who are opposed to the elected leaders, when the vast majority of society loses confidence in them, they stop listening and stop obeying.
  • Lack of government funding – If the government does such a bad job of managing the economy that government revenues start to shrink, it can cause government services to be curtailed. Typically politicians will react to this by increasing taxes, especially on the middle class. Eventually, they reach the point where people find ways to stop paying taxes, further reducing government revenue.
  • The law stops having meaning – When the government stops obeying the law, it sends a message to the people that they too can stop obeying the law. Without the law to protect us, we are only a step away from anarchy.
  • A major disaster – Any major disaster can bring on anarchy in a moment; it doesn’t matter if it is a man-made or natural disaster. Plagues have been known to bring it on.

Anarchy doesn’t necessarily start at a particular point in time. Often, a society slides into anarchy as government gradually loses control. The government might technically be in place and operating, but they are ignored by the vast majority of the population. As this increases and government influence decreases, others step in and try to take control.

While any one of these things can be a harbinger of anarchy, the greatest danger is when you see a combination of them working together. The more signs off of this page that are going on at the same time, the closer a society is to falling into anarchy.

If you have seen any of those signs advancing in our society, speak up you mind using the comment form below!

This article has been written by Bill White for Survivopedia.

Written by

Bill White is the author of Conquering the Coming Collapse, and a former Army officer, manufacturing engineer and business manager. More recently, he left the business world to work as a cross-cultural missionary on the Mexico border. Bill has been a survivalist since the 1970s, when the nation was in the latter days of the Cold War. He had determined to head into the Colorado Rockies, should Washington ever decide to push the button. While those days have passed, the knowledge Bill gained during that time hasn’t. He now works to educate others on the risks that exist in our society and how to prepare to meet them. You can send Bill a message at editor [at] survivopedia.com.

Latest comments
  • I have repeatedly said for the last 40 plus years, that this country will see another civil war! It won’t be North against South, black against white, it will be all of “us” against all of “them!” My friends all thought that I was crazy way back then, for making this (and other) predictions! But the most funny thing is, in the last 18 months, all of them have called me up, and conceeded that I had been 100% right all of these years! Now, their scared, and rightly so! They have darn good reason to be!

    • My thoughts exactly! Connect the dots, from the effort to hide birth and education info from us, to the creation of a civilian army, to FEMA camps, to a consistent policy of division of the electorate, to selective enforcement of laws, to the dismissal of many high ranking military officers.
      Let’s not forget about a senior Senator [Schumer] calling on the FBI and IRS to launch a “full blown investigation” of Tea Party affiliates for the “crime” of exercising their first amendment rights to disagree with his political views!
      Stand up and be heard! You won’t find most of this in the MSM, but it is all verifiable. If we don’t act, we’re lost!

  • As a comedian has said: “Here’s your sign”!!!! IF one can remember the Black Movement of the ’50s and early ’60s, OUR government almost demanded that the Black and White races be Intergrated. However, they were secretly determined to not let that ever completely happen and they succeeded. A unity, with similar demonstrations nationwide, could have possibly prevented America from self destructing … from the top down. However, our own government made sure that it would never happen. NOW we are seeing the results of the “puppets” that “We the Sheeple” have allowed ourselves to become. We still act like we believe everything out of Washington is “always” the best thing for “US”!! How sad!! Now, have you ever though just how you are going to explain this to your children and grandchildren?? Maybe one could ask some of the survivors of Hitler’s death camps and get a viable answer. Just remember the saying: “History repeats itself”. THIS is a true statement, especially when the people refused to learn from the past … even if it happened in another time and in another country. So you aren’t a confessing Christian. So what? Those ideals, when once adhered to, made America the #1 Nation in the world … Christian or Atheist! Take a few minutes and do some serious and unbiased thinking about it and then ask yourself again!!!

  • I agree we may be headed that way. BTW seems someone is blocking the site the link for the book is located at.
    Wonder who that might be, gee. Our terrorist friendly government?

  • You might want to consider re-ordering the signs for Anarchy for more impact and as they relate to the state of the nation today.
     Lack of confidence in elected leaders
     Lack of government funding
     Government ignores citizen’s wishes
     High unemployment and poverty
     The law stops having meaning
     Financial instability
     Increased crime rates
     Class and racial warfare .
     Police brutality
    A major disaster
     Supply shortages

  • Judging from the instant list, we have been living in anarchy for all of my 60 years.

    • Right on bill!
      Talk about fear mongering!
      The next decade we will be seeing many babyboomers retiring, creating jobs galore for the nation!
      Anachy may happen in areas of national disaster, ie leavy breaks, major flooding, we know were we live every state has a soft spot and those residents do have to prepare, I wouldn’t want to end up in a FEMA camp but some like the idea.
      Let’s prepare for the worse and have a happy retirement! As long as the Feds keep printing the green back everything is going to be alright. Happy Happy Happy!!!
      Happy preper

      • Yeah, just keep printing the green back. Are you serious? That’s how the national debt has increased (more than doubled) by more than $10 TRILLION DOLLARS under obama. So yeah, just keep cranking out those green backs and watch the economy collapse even faster…

      • Anarchy in America and Anarchy in the UK is poised for a major uphieval. People who are thoughtful are not listening to government anymore. Brexit process laughable if it was not such an orchestrated mess. Corona, The Trueman Show. Parliamentary actors who could not supply pencils to A classroom if required. The internet has exposed the system as the biggest rort of practice and intellect and most people would have more confidence in the local fish and chip business owner leading the country. My prediction hopefully is that the Tradesman community soon will have their opportunity to lead. The anarchists, you see them socially detached and glazed not with wanting to create a better society but to destroy society as they are damaged themselves through idolation, bad home life or victims of abuse. They now have become a dangerous mass family.

  • Out of the 11 points presented in this article as signs of anarchy,
    I see 9 signs already manifested in the U.S. already. Plus the other
    signs could happen at any time now. People of the country need
    to wake up and pay attention!

  • Members of Congress break the law by engaging in insider trading of the stock market. Then the people who they are supposed to represent are no longer represented! The executive branch tramples on the Constitution by executive orders implemented through the branches of the cabinet that infringe on citizens individual rights! All of this because major corporations and bankers want our Govt to look the other way! I have had enough!!! Its time to take our country Back!!!!

  • Firstly, we must understand what Anarchy is and the way it is characterized here causes fear in the minds of people. Anarchy is the absence of government, not the presence of chaos. How many of us reading this article need to be controlled or policed? Perhaps, chaos is what we fear not the lack of control. I abide and live according to the laws of God and nature, then man; and subscribe to the fact that I am sovereign and do not need to be controlled or coerced to abide by laws that do me and my neighbors no good. If you want to be controlled then this should scare you, but if you take responsibility for yourself, your friends, neighbors and family then this may not be cause for fear but a reminder that each man should take responsibility for himself and his community. When communities get beyond the mind-control of race and religion and see his fellow man as an equal then we may fair well, otherwise our controllers win by sending in the troops to put us down. The battle before it is over will be the citizens under siege by their own government, and that is as scary as being in Iraq or Afghanistan under US occupation. Because when they come, the color of your crayon won’t matter and that has always been the case.

    • I couldn’t agree more with this statement or have said it any better. Americans need to relearn self-government under the laws of Nature and Nature’s God. If communities learn to view their fellow man as equals made in the image and likeness of God, then we have a real foundation upon which to understand self-government and Unity in community.

  • inflation has been ongoing …in 1913 the evil fed was created..gvt stopped printing dollars and started printing bonds ..bonds ! a curse on the people..since people have to pay for bonds and their interest…gas was 25c in 1956..now 16 times higher..
    why should a gvt print bonds to buy bux ? when it could just as easily print dollars ? why ????? the fed , no more federal than fedex prints the bux …and buys u s t bonds ..that indebt the people ! ! ! very hard for people to understand that gvt is a criminal society ..and that the fed / treasury cartel is killing the economy…

    gvt and media claim the econ is recovering..a lie ; a damn lie ; a criminal lie…know anybody who can’t get a job ? i most cert do…why doesn’t gvt print the money and avoid the 17 trillion dollar debt ? ans : bribery….cong and exec are controlled either by money or fear or propaganda…the 17 trill debt is suffocating economic activity ..all federal taxes go to try to service the debt , the 17 trill debt ..it’s not working ..the econ is declining …when the grid goes down …watch out …supply lines will crump…mad max the movie of many years ago is what we will look like …on a good day… most dismiss this idea.. most will not admit that the gvt could be evil or that the gvt is controlled by evil men in the federal reserve …

    it is so bad …people will not believe it …even when the society collapses , people will bitch about taxing the rich ; spending cuts; immigration …and endless complexities..it is not “more complicated than that” as many like to pompously assert…it is dirt simple ..the fed is a rogue bank printing money..the treasury is a compromised part of a compromised gvt…printing nothing but IOU’s …debt coupons known as treasury bonds …a crime against us …a claim on future tax revenues that haven’t yet been earned by us or even those not yet in the work force, ….is this taxation without representation ??? yes ?

    • Print more money? I think not. In 1973 (if I remember correctly) President Nixon abolished the gold standard, so $US currency no longer had to be backed up by the equivalent of gold bullion reserves. So yes, the fed can print more money but it will quickly devalue. How? Because if more money is printed it is distributed to the banks (those nice institutions that contributed to your once-great country’s economic demise) and they will broker loans for minimal $ which anyone can afford. So then most people can go buy more or better quality products which will drive prices up and result in inflation which is a fast road to economic ruin, like Zimbabwe today or post-war Germany where a wheelbarrow full of marks would not buy a loaf of bread. Sorry to ramble on but it is essential that you understand printing more money is pointless. In my opinion you are being screwed by the electricity companies (which has begun here in Oz) and by the oil companies who have bought out patents for inventions that would slash fuel consumption. I also think your country needs to butt out of costly international conflicts (and so should Australia) Enough from me…!

    • We have so much oil Texas crude that is or Alaska gold LoL dude we will never see madmax real life in our life time so don’t be afraid, as long as we allow more refineries to be built you can buy all the gas you want and I promise I will sell it to you! Deal?
      Happy preper

  • these 11 signs are not coming soon-they’re already here! Obama already has destroyed and divided the nation like no other. Having seen this in 1950s Cuba, I can tell you this. Trust no one who even pretends to mildly disagree with you and/or tells you it’s not that bad, they are passive aggressive and will turn on you in a heartbeat. Do not befriend liberals or ANYONE who won’t trash Obama at the mere mention of his name. They’re in denial or complicit, and will also turn you in or tell Big Brother about anything you have they want. They will direct mobs to your home. Be vigilant and arm up!

    • Carlo ! Passive aggressive is better then a misguided aggressive idiot wouldn’t you think?

  • You have an icon (?) here that says “Download as PDF”, when I clicked on that I got a pop up from I think Word Press or something that said error, Don’t leech. I’m not sure what that is supposed to mean. I just gave up on downloading it. Can you explain to me what that means? I took it as they or you thought I was going to try to use it for something other than my personal files. I have been trying to download files like that and print them up to have access to them should the internet or power grid go down. I certainly wasn’t trying to steal your work or use it in any other manner.

    • It worked find for me, Gena. Maybe try a different browser?

    • I have had similar problems. I usually end up copying into a word document to print. I also like various info in hard copy for the same reasons as you.

    • That PDF widget shows to the readers a printable version of the article. But it seems like the features of some operating systems or particular browsers block the PDF widget from our website. We are working on it. In the meantime, please contact us using our Contact page if you need a certain article that you cannot print. Thank you in advance and we apologize for the inconvenience.

  • I can see several of these “signs” in our present system. To me, it seems that our government as well as our society as a whole is breaking down. The president doesn’t follow the law of the land and so the people feel they don’t need to follow the laws of the cities, towns, hamlets, they live in. When confronted about the lawlessness the people respond with either violence or indifferent sarcasm.

  • All one has to do is read what is going on at the Bundy ranch to see the signs of anarchy rising. That thing is going to explode big time

  • Listen….illegal “immigration” is already a form of anarchy…

    You (not me are letting it happen…

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