Your assumption that people must behave better in the presence of authority - and therefore worse in the absence of it - is exactly the assumption that is under question.
Formal authority is quite often better than arbitrary, informal authority. And make no mistake, humans are social, their natural congregations are hierarchical.
We're on HN, just think about the pace of human development before agriculture and after. We were pretty much doing the same thing for half a million years and then in 10000 years: rockets in space! ;-)
And there are ways to have agriculture and industry and compounding scientific advancements without having rigid hierarchies, are there not?
Regarding your follow-up question, maybe there are ways to achieve the same thing with a radically different social structure. The problem with social changes on this scale is that they are extremely disruptive. I'd rather reform and improve iteratively than rewrite the whole code base ;-)
Primate dominance hierarchies are weak, accountable, and constantly challenged, and not even necessary in humans which exhibit other behaviors depending on nature. As a consequences, hierarchy is not necessary in humans and not inherent.
That being said, there are ways to move into anarchism that aren't that disruptive as long as the dominant power structure doesn't decide to violently repress it. Syndicalism into market socialism into anarchism is a common one.
Regarding the code analogy, I'd rather have a million pushes to prod than one huge force push that rewrites history;-)
In theory, there's no reason you couldn't go towards and anarchic society via a million small reforms, but in practice you get executed for using your already existing rights if you state that your goal is to do such reforms.
Sure, the absence of rigid heirarchies with strictly top-down authority in favor of fairly fluid ones with something like circular authority where the top of heirarchy is selected and changeable by the people subject to it is a hallmark of liberal society, realized to varying degrees throughout much of the world.
But that's not what anarchism is about.
Even if they were both this and peaceful then, this would only imply that we merely need to dismantle agriculture and the civilization dependent on it to return to that state, which I submit is an unacceptable trade-off to most people.
And even if it was acceptable to most people, it would take only a small minority opting out to retain the power to subjugate everyone opting-in and ruin the whole effort.
What it means is that hierarchies are not necessary for human organization.
Where?
It certainly might be legitimately viewed as a step up for the most systemically disenfranchised, exploited, impoverished communities, but it's not a demonstration of a way that a technological society can be maintained.
> And even if it was acceptable to most people, it would take only a small minority opting out to retain the power to subjugate everyone opting-in and ruin the whole effort.
Could you expand on this?
I would argue thay society today involve s less tyrany, less authority, and is more peacefull.
In general though, most people behave mostly good. The ones that behave badly probably would under any social construct. The people I know that got into trouble with the law were the same ones with antisocial tendencies in grade school.
I don't believe that the threat of government enforcement really encourages a significant proportion of edge cases to behave better.
Due to some unique circumstances, I actually have had the opportunity to see what a relatively anarchist society looks like in low-density areas. It honestly works about the same as it does under more supervision. When the occasional real problems develop, people band together and act as their own police force. What there isn't is a bunch of technicality type laws banning you from doing things that don't affect others.
A society smaller than this can be effectively self-policing because everyone keeps track of how everyone else behaves. No money, police, laws or prisons are required because everyone knows what everyone else thinks of their behaviour and wants to stay on the good side of the community that they depend on. So its not a problem.
Once a society grows past Dunbar's number this system breaks down. You see people you don't know misbehaving, but they don't suffer any downside because nobody knows who they are. When you have to deal with people you don't know if you can trust them, but you do know that if they rip you off you won't have any comeback. So the communal trust breaks down and you start needing police, courts, laws and prisons.
In short, anarchism and "primitive socialism" are nice, but they don't scale.
Because in our system, if you were to accumulate enough authority it wouldn't be in your interest anymore to follow laws.
In practice, your village can come to an agreement with other small villages and do military exercises together while still maintaining autonomy, and you can then maintain complex weapon systems and large armies.
I don't believe that, any link? City states are not anarchic nor are tribes.
You'd still have a bunch of people thinking you are a jerk - the reason your life might quickly become horrible is because you've been a jerk to pretty much everyone by claiming that you need to rule them by force.
(Edited to a more general statement.)