Communalism has ethical features that logically follow from major libertarian socialist and communist arguments and principles. For example: the libertarian socialist argument for the right kind of interdependent self management bounded by the right kind of interdependent self management of other collectives and persons leads to communities having self management and means of production needed to reproduce daily life– at least to some significant degree. Otherwise, power is relatively privatized over and above co-federated communities in the hands of relatively private councils. Such relatively private councils are distinct from embedded councils within communal assemblies– and they are distinct from auxiliary councils to such assemblies that do not privatize what should be common. Self management on every scale bounded by the self management of others on every scale entails at least some kind of significant self management on the communal sphere. Furthermore, communist distribution according to needs (if it is to include means of production as needs) entails distributing means of production to communities and not just distributing surplus to communities– and given the needs that communal collectives have, that entails communal economic form and not just communist content (and communal form as a necessary but insufficient dimension of communist content). However, just because the reasoning of libertarian socialist argumentation and communism point towards communalism does not mean that communalism has been essential to all theories and movements that have gone under such names– hence its distinction as a strain of libertarian socialist and communist praxis.

Communalism has strategic features that are not just ethical in a mere abstract sense. Communalism is not just an end goal to be arrived at and developed, but a means to arrive at such a developmental ends that contains– as much as possible– the ethical dimensions of the ends it strives towards. Communalism can mobilize non ruling class people at the point of community (and co-federation) in a horizontalist political sphere to deliberate and take action in regards to reconstructive and oppositional politics at the points of resource extraction, production, distribution, reproduction, consumption, community life more broadly, etc. This malleable capacity of communalist organizing allows for variegated actions in many spheres of life as well as a shifting of strategy to conditions as they emerge while keeping at least some general principles consistent within the means and ends of such a development. Such minimal dimensions of communalism include but are not limited to horizontality, non-hierarchy, direct democracy, co-federation, ecology, liberatory technology, and communist distribution,

Communalism can be beneficial to other dimensions of an anti authoritarian socialist movement–for it can fill niches that need to be filled in an ecosystem of movements and supplement the filling of such niches by supporting groups and persons who are participating in–or would like to participate in– specific actions. If a radical union wants community support, or if a person has a community gardening project that they want help with, or if a collective is doing a direct action against banks, then communalist assemblies can do everything from bringing people to actions and broader promotion, to helping people with organizational infrastructure, to strategic advice in regards to contents of actions, to forming more formal co-decision making process between collectives, etc. Communalist praxis can potentially illustrate how particular problems and particular solutions are connected to general problems and general solutions, and inversely illustrate how general problems and general solutions are connected to particular problems and particular solutions. This can help people move between concrete actions and general organizing and understanding the potential relationship between both. However, such a potential for illustrative opposition (as the above is called by Chaia Heller) requires an educational dimension that includes more than just action– it is essential that good theory is generalized through popular education.

Just because communalism can be malleable towards variegated action in differentiated spheres does not mean that all actions in all areas of life that can be taken within the bounds of communalist minimal principles are all equivalent as far as ethics or efficacy in regards to communalist development (as well as additional ethical criteria over and beyond mere minimal principles of communalism). There will be general trends of various kinds of communalist content that are better than other kinds of content under various conditions for developing approximations of good ethical criteria, but there are nonetheless important exceptions that can be relatively extreme (given such trends can be probabilistic to relatively slight and extreme degrees). Furthermore, actions that are probabilistically better than others under specific conditions according to good ethical criteria will change as sufficiently relevant variables emerge. This goes into how the universal minimal dimensions of communalist praxis are necessary but insufficient for good communalist praxis– for good praxis also requires a strategic content that adapts to relevant variables as they develop in general and specific contexts.

Communalist assemblies can catalyze anti-fossil fuel direct action, create food justice projects, build community and worker controlled cooperatives and collectives, do targeted boycotts (hopefully in tandem with oppositional politics in other spheres), help with workplace organizing, block capitalist distribution systems, support migrant defense, facilitate tenant organizing, socialize reproductive labor, spread popular education, build people powered infrastructure throughout community life, develop new public ties that enrich community life, and create solidarity within and between communities and collectives on more immediate actions and on long term visions and plans. Such projects are by no means an exhaustive account of all of the possible content community assemblies can create. The above list is meant to be illustrative of the potential of community assemblies to be keystone organizations in and for an ecosystem of movements and actions.

Because communalism does not merely prescribe organizing at the point of production, it is able to organize a broader swath of the population than those who are currently wage laborers at the point of production and/or those who are only trying to organize at the point of production. A dogmatic conception of revolutionary subjectivity and action as only being limited to being at the point of production can exclude various non-ruling class persons such as much of the youth, much of the elderly, people with disabilities, unwaged reproductive laborers, unemployed, unemployable, some self-employed people, people who work at cooperatives, and even some professionals from revolutionary activity– activity which might be outside of the point of production or even in solidarity with oppositional politics at the point of production. Furthermore, such a dogmatic conception of revolutionary subjectivity and action as only being limited to being at the point of production inhibits an approach that deals with various spheres of life and the entire process of hierarchical and liberatory development–both of which include and go beyond the point of production. Revolutionary subjectivity potentially belongs to the whole of the non-ruling class–which under capitalism is of course largely made up of the working class– even though in different contexts different segments of society will be more and less likely to be revolutionary.

Even though workplace organizing is not essential to the core praxis of communalism–which is a fruitful critique for its insufficiency strategy wise– there is no reason that a communalist assembly in the mode of opposition against capitalism cannot have an organizing committee for workplace organizing or solidarity with workplace organizing. In fact, strategically developing such potentials for workplace organizing within communal assemblies that are in the mode of opposition to capitalism (which are distinct from assemblies in the mode of freedom) could further anti authoritarian left processes, help radical unionism, as well as give communal assemblies a class struggle character. The capacity for communalist organizing to add broad community solidarity with workers struggling in workplaces and at the point of production makes it ideal for assisting point of production based organizing, and if done right can be more fruitful than a purely point of production approach. A purely point of production approach to organizing is not only at the expense of a broader scope of where and how opposition and reconstruction can and should happen, it is at the expense of point of production based organizing itself.

Under a communalist society, different spheres of life would be qualified by a gestalt of the minimal principles of communalism. The economy would be integrated into horizontalist politics creating a horizontalist political economy with embedded councils, and embedded mutually equitable usership for collectives and persons, with decision making for communities, collectives, and persons according to needs and volition– deciding everything from resource use, to production, to reproduction, to distribution, to action, to participatory communal and co-federal development. Ethical development that includes and goes beyond the mere minimal dimensions of communalism should drive the content of people powered decisions towards greater freedom, mutuality, virtue cultivation, differentiation, happiness, pleasure, excellence, as well as an array of other good criteria.