Before humanity came to harness fire, they could only react to fire. If they encountered fire in nature, they might run from it, but they could not control it. Over time, humanity has learned what causes fire, how to create it, and how to utilize it for human purposes.

You can think of electricity as well. Humanity used to just see lightning and run, or get a static shock and not be sure what caused it, and ignore it. They could only react to it. But as we’ve developed a greater understanding of electricity, we can now control it, to utilize it for the benefit of human civilization.

Engels had pointed out that there is a similarity between natural phenomena and social phenomena in this regard. In the same way that when humanity had lacked an understanding of natural phenomena and could thus only react to them, humankind does not fully understand its own social structure.

Take, for example, the laws of supply and demand. Capitalist societies do not fully grasp all the causes to supply and demand, and they thus are incapable of actually predicting them. As a result, individual businesses can only react to market forces. They do not control the market but instead react to changes in the social system that are far beyond their personal comprehension or control.

Things like this cause human societies to be somewhat “anarchistic.” Even the central government in capitalist societies cannot fully understand or predict what is going on capitalist societies, it instead just reacts to changes in the economic system and tries to make general corrections, but it does not control the economic system. As Engels once put it, “What each individual wills is obstructed by everyone else, and what emerges is something that no one willed.”

The “anarchy of production,” in some sense, takes on a mind of its own. If you build a capitalist society, you cannot fully predict the outcome. It may sometimes grow, may sometimes crash, may lead to rapid industrialization, and may even lead to rapid de-industrialization. You just have to hope it turns out well.

A socialist system attempts to overcome this anarchy of production by making human economies deliberate.

from Is Juche a form of Marxism-Leninism?