RoR: Forum

David said:

>First of all, opting out can only apply to actions which do not include those defined as >initiating force against another. I can opt out of any voluntary exchange of values - but I >obviously cannot opt out of the consequences of committing robbery.

But disagreements will agree as to what constitues 'initiating force'. This is not something which is black and white! What is a 'voluntary contract'? When the contract was being agreed to it is important to know: Was there some duress or threat of duress by one of the parties? Was important information concealed from one of the parties? Were both parties of sound mind? Were both parties intellectually capable of understanding the consequences of their actions? (Suppose a small child wonders on to a main raod - should we let him be run over on the grounds that his actions in crawling on to the road were ''voluntary'). The question of what is voluntary and what is not is not nearly as simple as many people think. So we need some way of defining it and enforcing it. And reasonable opinions will differ.

>The assumption here is that the enforcement agency in question is from "outside" - that it >has no means of enforcing. In reality, protection agencies would form relationships with >each other - based on their commonality of principles. So, assuming they both agreed >robbery was a crime (which is highly likely, given the history if societies and moral >systems) - then such a relationship/treaty would provide for such enforcement. It would >also be reasonable to assume that any rational enforcement service was concerned not >only in apprehending the suspect, but enforcing compensation should such a suspect be >proven guilty.

If protection agencies both agreed why bother to compete? Why not just combine into a single agency? (i.e The Libertarian Minarchist State).

>On the other hand, if the "crime" in question was smoking marijuana - then it's quite >possible that other enforcement agencies would have no means to enforce outside their >area. That is similar to how things are now. In some cases, what is defined as a crime in >one country, is not a crime in another. And because of that - the so-called criminal is >only defined as such, in the country where the act is considered criminal.

Precisley. What do you do when the competing agencies disagree.? This is what Joe was asking and you haven't given a sensible answer to the question.

>What is being suggested here is the need for another "higher" agency which can arbitrate >between enforcement agencies - sort of like a "high court" service. It would be perfectly >reasonable to assume such a situation "may" arise - and create the need for a mechanism >to settle such disputes.

Right, sure we need a 'higher agency': that's what political theorists call 'The Libertarian Minarchist State' ;)

>I think the essential point about competing agencies is that such agencies would >obviously enter "treaties" - to allow them to offer meaningful protection across much >greater areas.

What what would define and enforce such 'treaties'? As you admited, a higher agency is needed to arbitrate... but as I pointed out, this 'higher agency' would in fact be equivalent to the Minimal State (not anarchy).

>And like I said - such multi-jurisdictional cooperation already happens. For on a global >scale (taking nations as individual entities) we already have an anarchic structure. That is, >nations have sovereignty over their own territory - to define their laws and customs. One >country's laws are not automatically enforceable in another's - but that issue is overcome >by cooperation between countries.

'cooperation between countries'. Yeah, right. Like the 'cooperation' between Iraq and the United States yeah? Most 'treaties' and 'International Laws' are a laughing stock, not worth the paper they're printed on. That's why it all comes back to the need for a global Libertarian minimal state.

Post 21

Wednesday, April 7, 2004 - 11:05pm

So Marc, the logical consequence of your point of view is - world government. One set of laws, one army, one police force, one justice system.

At that point, the prison camp will be complete - unless I can escape off-planet! :-)

Post 22

Wednesday, April 7, 2004 - 11:50pm

Actually David, there is no escape off planet either, since the logical consequence of my view is Universal government ;) But it wouldn't be a 'prison camp' because it would be a universal Libertarian government. You are much more in a 'prison camp' under anarchy than you would be under a Libertarian world government. Think about it... right now there are plenty of countries that you can't easily visit because of immigration barriers or because they're run by thugs and bureaucrats who would infringe upon your rights. Under a Libertarian world government, you could go anywhere and do anything, so long as you didn't initiate force against others.

Here is another argument against anarchy: In order for two parties to engage in civil discourse, they must either communicate based on what they have in common, or they must appeal to some universal standard to guide their interactions. So there must be some background standard on which they both agree (otherwise making a 'contract' would be impossible). And this argument can be extended to interactions between all rational beings. In order to ensure that there is a civil basis for interaction (contracts), either everyone (implicitly or explicitly) has to find some common standard upon which they all agree, or they must create or appeal to some universal standard in order for which to be a workable basis for agreements (contracts). An analogy here is that of a 'Sys Op' on a computer. There are many programs (Windows) running on your computer, but in order to avoid system crash, there has to be some background Sys Op governing every single program. The 'programs' are analogous to individual people, the 'Sys Op' is analagous to the Minimal Libertarian State.

If background moral Universals exist, then there is not need for competing service providers. All the different law and order providers implicitly have to have these background universals in common, so they may as well combine into a single provider (the minimal state).

These background 'Universal Principles' are objective morality, and they are what clinches the case for the minimal state. That's why Rand said that Anarchy is arbitrary (because anarchy is based on the idea that these background universals don't exist and that morals are subjective).

Post 23

Thursday, April 8, 2004 - 5:46am

David:

I see that I misunderstood how you would encourage the development of an anarchist society. At length you explained how this evolution would occur. In part, you stated:

Right now, if you want to buy and sell - you are assumed to be using government money (fiat paper). As long as you play this "game", you must play by the rules. That means your bank will report any suspicious cash transactions, Your government will tax your income. If you don't pay, they will raid your bank account. The government will require that all your financial dealings are reported to it. You will be required to pay VAT, GST or sales tax on most of what you buy. The list goes on.

But what if you don't play the game - what if you start buying and selling privately using non-government money? What if the transaction systems for this are completely private and secure - away from prying eyes, so no one can discover what you are doing in the privacy of your own financial "home"?

At that point, the market has delivered up an alternative to the government "system" - and the incentive for anyone to use it is simply the keeping of one's own money. It's a strong incentive.

Basically, I take it, your idea is that we create and expand a black market economy until it subverts the state. I agree that you may be able to do this under primitive conditions where the market is primarily the trade of goods and commodities, as opposed to manufacturing and services, and where the state is weak. We observed something like this in post-Soviet Russia.

But, I have to say, David, I don't see how such a process ever takes root here. I say this from the perspective of a businessman. I am the general manager of my family's manufacturing and real estate development companies, and such an "opt-out" holds no appeal to me. It denies me access to the capital I want to expand my businesses; it prevents me from buying the sophisticated machine tools and real estate I desire; it shuts me out from most of the market for my products; it stops me from hiring the best people available to work for me; and it even precludes me from obtaining all the luxuries my hard-earned dollars could provide me.

For example, I just sold a beach front home on Lake Michigan. Now how could I have consummated that transaction on the black market? Why should I limit my potential market to only those who can pay cash or barter? That would only reduce the price I can get for the place. Where will I get a competent realtor who'll go along with a black market sale? Who will pay seven figures for a property WITHOUT a recorded warranty deed protected by title insurance? How do I explain the disappearance of this property on my balance sheet? And so on ...

And even if I could get this deal done in the underground economy, let's say by selling it to a mobster, what do I gain by doing so? OK, I pocket the taxes I would have had to pay, which may total about five percent of the sales price. I face the prospect of tax fraud and imprisonment for mere money in my pocket. After all, my black market deal did not eliminate the state and its ravenous demand for money. That is a reality that remains while it exists, and I would be irresponsible to ignore it.

My point is, David, that the evolution to an anarchist society as you suggest cannot happen because the American economy is too sophisticated to go underground in order to subvert the state. Too many people profit from the existing system -- and can ONLY profit from it -- despite the excessive taxes and regulation to ever make an anarchist society look attractive, let alone the losses that would have to be suffered along the way there.

Once again, if I have misunderstood you, by all means, elucidate.

Regards,
Bill a.k.a. Citizen Rat

Post 24

Thursday, April 8, 2004 - 6:01am

Marc:

In disputing the efficacy of anarchism, you offered the example of southern Italy. Another good example is Russia of the immediate post-Soviet period. The state was weak and gangsterism took root as competing mafias offered goods and services that had been previously provided by the state. Genuine anarchy prevailed until the Russian economy redeveloped enough to need secure title to property and inexpensive capital for continued growth.

At that point, anarchy's "customers" demanded effective government and the rule of law. Russians being Russians, of course, went for the strongman, and now we'll have to see if Putin will be contained by the Russian constitution. But whether or not Putin was the best alternative to anarchy, the point is that the Russians experienced anarchy and wanted an alternative because of their rising fortunes.

Regards,
Bill a.k.a. Citizen Rat

Post 25

Thursday, April 8, 2004 - 5:09am

I�ve heard that Childs changed his mind regarding anarchism towards the end of his life. It would be interesting to see what sort of justifications he might have used to support his revised opinion.

Yes, he did. Although he never officially stated this, but after his death an unfinished essay called "Anarchist Illusions" was found where Childs shows a negative opinion about his earlier work. However unfortunately he never gives any convincing arguments to why he earlier was wrong and most of his arguments against anarchism seems to be more on an emotional level, which is very unlike the younger Childs well though out reasoning and writings.

Anarchist Illusions
http://www.dailyobjectivist.com/Extro/AnarchistIllusions.asp

Ronald N. Neff, who was a close friend to Roy Childs, wrote in his introductory essay "Roy Childs on anarchism" (part five) what he though made Childs change his mind on the subject. It is only speculations, but that is pretty much all we got to try to understand Childs, but perhaps it can give somewhat of an understanding to why Childs decided to abandon his earlier position.

Roy Childs on anarchism - Part five - Archist illusions
http://www.thornwalker.com/ditch/eboa_preface_5.htm

Post 26

Thursday, April 8, 2004 - 5:27am

Anarchism works if you make a huge presumption: that everyone shares reasonably Objectivist or at least Libertarian values. If that were the case, contracting companies and individuals would contract dispute resolution clauses to settle disputes, as happens now. These agreements define what may be disputed, what jurisdiction and rules pertain to resolving the dispute, and how the dispute is to be resolved, including which party bears the cost of the dispute. I will leave aside the fact that many times, these are adhesion contracts, wherein a less savvy party with virtually no bargaining power will sign an unconscionable contract with no means to enforce it against the more powerful contracting entity, which is further proof of the need for an independent 3rd party to make decisions as to how the rights of individuals interact.

But people don't share the same values. Not everyone agrees that it is immoral to steal, cheat or kill. Many believe that might makes right. A "I am going to get mine--by any means necessary" attitude is quite prevalent in the world today. Many wealthy and powerful people believe these things. So, as has been addressed before, what happens when competing protection/enforcement agencies clash? What happens when profits are down, and these for-profit protection agencies need to increase revenue? A for profit protection agency based upon my Italian ancestry provides the answer: ever-increasing protection money that eventually serves as a down-payment or purchase money for the purchase of the business endeavor. You sure you Anarchists want to go down that road?

Here's some more food for thought that reveals Anarchism as a bad decision. What happens when we have an ambiguous contract? We both hire a protection agency to kill one another until the last man standing wins? What happens if a more powerful party forges a contract--is that more powerful party allowed to hire its own police to arrest me, its for-profit Judge to convict me, and its for profit protection agency to punish me? What if I don't subscribe to that agency, but another?

I think David (could be wrong) pointed out that any government and any funding of government is an initiation of force. He is absolutely correct. But because human beings are of volitional consciousness and can derive values and a morality of right and wrong, less rational, logical, or intelligent humans will disagree as to those values, so it is necessary in order to live in a just society to have as independent and impartial a tribunal as one can muster to judge and enforce the rights of man against his fellows. It is the cost of the benefit we all seek, which is kept in check by a strong, enforced Constitution which specifically limits the function of government.

Post 27

Thursday, April 8, 2004 - 6:20am

I haven't been to keen to get involved in this discussion because as I see it, it isn't dealing with the real issue: that is to derive politics from its foundation: ethics. Instead its more about quibbling about technical issues whatever a monopoly-government or a non-monopoly-government is the best. But this is completely irrelevant to the issue, either monopoly-government or non-monopoly-government is legitimate according to Objectivist ethics or its not. You don't have to argue what is the best of the two, by doing so you are acting more like Utilitarians than Objectivists, that is you are arguing about what is the most practical. But if its practical or not does not have the final say on whatever its ethically legitimate or not.
So instead you should try to prove that your monopoly-government or non-monopoly-government is morally legitimate and your case is done.

Roy A. Childs has showed in his work "Objectivism and the State: An Open Letter to Ayn Rand" how its not apparent how a government can gain the exclusive right to enforce a monopoly on another government. By this he has brought forth the case that the traditional Objectivist monopoly-government is not legitimate, and thus it needs to abandon its monopoly to become a legitimate government.
You should not answer this critique by trying to defend your monopoly-government, you should instead try to prove that its existence is legitimate. Its meaningless to try to defend something that hasn't a legitimate purpose for existence in the first place.

Your arguments will most likely just turn out to be circular as did Rands, in VOS 109, "a government holds a monopoly on the legal use of physical force. It has to hold a monopoly, since it is the agent of restraining and combatting the use of force." Nicholas Dykes elaborates more on this above quote and other logical problems of Objectivisms monopoly-government in his work "Mrs Logic and the Law: A Critique of Ayn Rand's view of Government".

Post 28

Thursday, April 8, 2004 - 7:48am

Anarchy has always seemed pretty ridiculous to me. As someone pointed out, that's the situation we have now at the global level, and the results aren't too good. Let's face it, competition between 'force projecting' agencies (ie. law enforcement, military etc) is not a good idea. Such 'competition' all too often ends in warfare. World War I was a massive 'competition between competing service providers' , which killed 10 million people. And what about Word War II? - there's another great example of an anarchist contest between 'competing service providers' - 50 million dead that time.

This appears to be a quite ridiculous argument against non-monopoly-government since it really is a problem with monopoly-governments.
I don't know how much time you have spent on thinking about politics outside of the monopoly-government box, but the main difference between it and non-monopoly-governments is that in the later you have a right to secede if you belive that it fulfills your need of safety better.

So lets say that a non-monopoly-government starts to increase its military spending beyond a level you find reasonable for defensive purposes. That is they require more and more money (either directly or at the expense of your safety and liberty) from you and other citizens. Now we have two things happening:

Your government is mobilising its military beyond what you consider necessary to maintain your safety, but in fact it could be potentially dangerous since it could use its large military force to initiate force against you or anyone else.
The cost of maintaining your government is increasing above what you consider necessary to maintain your safety. If other governments exist (which is quite likely if a monopoly on it doesn't exist, in other cases its always possible to setup a new one) you can easily tell if your government is to expensive/inefficient or not by comparing them with others.

Now two things would most likely occur:

Everyone that believes that your current government might become dangerous will secede from your government and join or start another.
Everyone that might not be interested in monitoring the development of their governments will find that their government becomes more expensive and thus they will become more interested in joining or starting cheaper alternatives.

When citizen (consumers) leaves the mobilising government this will result in that it get less money/labour to support itself, while other governments get more money/labour to support themselves. Thus the mobilising government will have a hard time expanding or maintaining its huge military force, while other governments will get more money to build up their military. The conclusion is that the potential aggressive governments military will become weaker relatively to the other governments whose defensive military will become stronger. Market-equilibrium is happening.

Consider now what would happen if the governments involved where monopoly governments instead:

Your government is mobilising and thus increases its cost (either directly or at the expense of your safety and liberty), however you do not have a right to secede. Instead if you don't want to participate in this you have to be willing to relocate geographically, that is become a citizen of another government, if your government is a world government ruling throughout the universe you have a problem.
Since the incentive to change government is decreasing (or isn't possible) most people are likely to stay and put up with their mobilising government. Thus its military will have easier to expand, which could give it a benefit if its planing on attacking another government or its own people.

Please also notice that a government mustn't increase its cost on its service to become more dangerous towards you or other people:

It can simply cut down on the expenses on defending citizens and increase its spending on defending itself from citizens.
Another alternative is simply that the government becomes inefficient due to methods it practises which might make it more dangerous to its citizens since it makes a bad job protecting them from crime.

Another very important variable to take into effect in this case is that your society might not be 100% rational, that is some people actually wants the government to mobilise its military and attack other people or its own people (perhaps minorities). In the non-monopoly-government these irrational people would be more likely to have to pay for all this by themselves, while the rational people would switch government and perhaps decide to increase their expenditure to be able to retaliate against the potential aggressive government.

So avoiding the fact that you in your WWII scenario confuses non-monopoly-government with monopoly-governments, the European government didn't allow for secession and thus acted like traditional monopoly ones. Which leads you to completely miss the point with having a market for governments, that is the economical events that takes places in all markets.

Thus the problem is that the governments had a monopoly and potentially you could say that the problem is that they wanted to get a monopoly on the European market and perhaps even the world market.

The problem is statism not voluntaryism, and the solution is to never surrender your individual judgement.

Post 29

Thursday, April 8, 2004 - 3:35pm

Scott DeSalvo wrote:

.. , what happens when competing protection/enforcement agencies clash?

Anarchism and the Public Goods Issue: Law, Courts, and the Police - by Osterfeld, David page 12 should give somewhat of an understanding about how this can be solved depending on the severity of the case and the stubbornness of the persons involved.

Post 30

Thursday, April 8, 2004 - 4:57pm

David has answered Joseph's questions better than I could. Two points in reply to Marc:

International anarchy is not anarchy. Each State in the international arena is a tax consuming entity, they hold their populations in bondage to their will. If a State makes an unpopular decision, they aren't faced with the possibility of boycott; they can carry on regardless because they are certain of their income. Imagine how radically different the situation the United States government would have been in if they hadn't had the power to tax and conscript during Vietnam - they would not have been able to pursue that war.

In highschool here in New Zealand we learnt about the Maori (the indigenous people of NZ) tribes pre-colonisation. In their society the tribal leadership was quite fluid, they regularly deposed incompetent chiefs and installed new ones. If a chief was pursuing an unpopular war, his tribe could simply abandon him. That situation is analogous to anarcho-capitalism in that the 'leadership' doesn't have the power to force people to accept its leadership. An aggressive or corrupt protection agency would be far more expensive than its peaceful and well-run peers, and its customers could simply boycott it! Of course it could try to become a State and force people into supporting it, like the Mafia in Marc's example, but that I think is a universal problem which isn't made better by having one gang more powerful than all the others combined.

Also, what are you doing defining Liberty in such an odd way! That sounds like a demand for positive rights, which do not constitute liberty.

Post 31

Thursday, April 8, 2004 - 5:37pm

Thank you David for attempting to answer my questions. Unfortunately, your answers were a little lacking.

The first question seemed to be answered. You say that a PA ('protection agency'), if it believe someone has used force, is allowed to use force against them. There is no "opting out" of that part of the system. Fair enough.

The next question was whether one protection agency is allowed to judge the use of force of another. I assume this follows from the first question, because otherwise you could simply "opt-out" by claiming to be a PA. But you didn't answer this question for yourself. I'm not talking about just a conflict of opinion between two agencies, which you claim can be fixed. If an agency uses physical force against someone, do other agencies have the right to second-guess them? If Agency X decides to punish someone for a crime, can Agency Y say "That's not a crime, and so your punishment is a violation of rights"?

And the third question you gave a bizarre answer for. You immediately jump into an assumption that agencies will for an entire area, and not just people. But that's going right back into minarchy. That would be not allowing individuals to pick their own PAs. Even saying "well, they can just move" is the same in a minarchy. If you don't like your government, move somewhere else. That's not bringing "'sovereignty' down to the level of each human individual (not nations or groups)".

The interesting thing is that you jumped into a definition of minarchy in order to explain how you would solve the problem I mentioned. I'm sure it was unintentional. Perhaps you can try answering the question again in the context of anarchy.

Post 32

Thursday, April 8, 2004 - 6:21pm

Here's some general comments to the anarchists:

Makemore thinks this discussion is about which is better, minimal state or anarchy. He thinks we should address which is ethically sound. I think before you can go to that, you have to be clear about what you're talking about. And clarity is the last thing I see in this thread. There's no reason to accept that anarchism is a valid or useful concept given the confusion it's generated so far.

For instance, one of the anarchists has accepted that at the international level, we already live under anarchy. And yet this was just argued against by another. Well, which is it? That depends on what the essential nature of anarchism is.

We've probably all argued with communists at one point. An argument they use is that they never had true communism. They define communism is a system of collective property, where everyone is equal, prosperous, and happy. Only problem with that is the first half contradicts the second half. It's a utopian definition, and irrational.

Are we seeing the same thing with this definition of anarcho-capitalism? What's the essential part? That there are competing agencies? Or maybe that you have a "right to opt out"? Does that mean every agency has to respect that right? Isn't this utopian? It's funny to see anarchists complain that a minimal state is impossible because it will always try to violate rights, and yet they claim that a hundred or thousand states won't violate rights. Of course, it could happen if everyone accepted unconditionally the "right to opt out". But then again, any government could work if everyone accepted unconditionally individual rights. If this is really the required foundation of a working anarcho-capitalist system, then it's not only utopian, but it's an unfair evaluation. If you start with the premise that everyone respects rights under anarcho-capitalism in order to make it work, you can't exactly go and say it's better than a minimal state which would work equally well under such a magical, wonderful system. If the world were made up of angels, no government would be necessary.

So clarity on the anarchists position would be a nice start. What is the essential nature of anarchism? If you define it by the magical quality of everyone accepting and defending the right to opt out, how is this different from defining and promoting a system where everyone is an angel? And if you define it as having more than one government, how is that different from the international world today? And if you define it as being able to start your own government/PA, isn't this just based on the utopian view? Certainly you can start your own government now, but if you use force, the government will come in and judge that use of force for itself. You'll be put on trial.

Another place where clarity is lacking is in the discussions of the minimal government. Look at the US! We have tons of governments. We have local governments, county government, state governments, and a federal government. Saying this is a "world government. One set of laws, one army, one police force, one justice system." is a gross simplification, and ignores the reality, and the intellectual backing for a minimal state. We have jurisdictions. We have separation of powers. We have checks and balances. We have federalism, a Constitution, a Bill of Rights, etc. Ignoring the details is motivated by an attempt to equivocate between an Objectivist government, and a totalitarian one.. If there was a world Objectivist government, the power would be split a thousand ways, keeping the bulk of it local and decentralized as possible. I doubt you appreciate it when we compare your PAs to local street gangs.

So how about some clarity? I'm not interested in utopian assumptions that every PA will be nice and would never/ever force someone to stay in their PA. The details you should be providing is how would PAs take care of situations where there are bad guys. I'm really curious here because Anarchists have been pretty consistent on their foreign policy. They think that no state should be allowed to attack another unless their own existence is threatened. I'm interested to see how you think this policy would apply when you've got the "right to opt out", and overlapping governments all over the place. If someone kills your neighbor, but his PA (which might be his gang) refuses to do anything about, the position seems to be that you can't do anything about it. Certainly they're not attacking you (and if you think they are, they'll simply say they aren't...which was good enough when Saddam said it, wasn't it?). You would be the hostile party, "invading" someone who was no threat to you. How do you solve this aside from resorting to the utopian argument? I'll be interested to hear.

Post 33

Thursday, April 8, 2004 - 7:50pm

makemore said:

"I haven't been to keen to get involved in this discussion because as I see it, it isn't dealing with the real issue: that is to derive politics from�its foundation: ethics. Instead its more about quibbling about technical issues whatever a monopoly-government or a non-monopoly-government is the best."

I have to agree.

Discussing every "detail" is akin to a minimalist state supporter being constantly asked, "What about the roads?" And then when that question has been answered - "what about....?"

The fact is, the process itself, and questions like "what about this or that" is not the issue - it's the fundamental idea that is important.

The market is capable of providing solutions to all situations - and trying to speculate on "assumed" situations is missing the point.

Anarchism is right, morally - because it is based on the right of the individual to opt out.

Post 34

Friday, April 9, 2004 - 12:22pm

Joseph Rowlands, if I understand him correctly, remains sceptical to anarchism as a working political theory, and thus gives the appearance of supporting an archist political theory (minarchy) as the way to go to realise Objectivist politics.
However by Rowlands curiosity on how anarchism would work I assume that he do believes that anarchism, if it would be presented as a coherent and realistic theory, could be compatible with Objectivist ethics.

So Rowlands asks for more elaboration on how an anarchistic society would work. However here I disagree with him, he is correct that it is of interest to understand more in detail how an anarchistic society would behave in different scenarios, but this is not the main issue.
Anarchy and Archy, freedom of governments versus one single government, the individuals liberty to associate and create governments by his individual judgment, this is the real issue. We differ in how we interpret the Objectivist ethics. I who hold the position presented by Roy A. Childs in his "Objectivism and the State: An Open Letter to Ayn Rand" believes that the traditional Objectivist government with an exclusive monopoly on existence violates the ethics it derives its legitimacy from, while those who support the monopoly government must belive that it doesn't. As long as we disagree on how the Objectivist ethics should apply to Objectivist politics we will forever disagree on what the political result of Objectivism will be.

Even if I answered on all of Rowlands questions on how an anarchistic society would work, this still could not make him change his mind on how to apply Objectivist ethics. Because as long as he believes that he has interpreted ethics correctly, and thus that his political theory is the correct one, he would have no reason to change to my position, unless I by presenting my political theory manages to convince him to change his ethics. But this is to go backward in reasoning, and thus to complicate the issue a lot, and the most likely outcome of this approach is that we would quibble about technical issues forever and just give up the subject eventually.

So my suggestion is instead that we try to solve our issue on the ethical level. That is I would like to see how you prove that the government should have a monopoly on police, law and military - that is how one individual is perfectly allowed to deny another one from exercising his natural unalienable right, the same one as the first individual is using. I have put forward my case as stated by Childs.

When we have agreed on how individuals is supposed to behave towards each other we can begin to discuss how it would work from a political perspective.

Post 35

Friday, April 9, 2004 - 12:46pm

Makemore,

The questions I've asked do serve a point, even if you haven't gotten them. You want to talk about ethics, but you can't evaluate either position without knowing what those positions involve.

All of this talk about a "monopoly" just serves to confuse the issue. For instance, even in America we have had private police forces, private security system, private arbitration systems, bodyguards, and on and on. Under minarchy, people have guns and can use them for self-defense. You can even imagine private military groups. You speak of a minarchy in a simplistic way that ignores the facts, and so far the whole stated case for anarchism is based on a fool's version of minarchism.

And I've yet to hear a coherent statement of anarchism. It's been said that you can "opt out" of a system. That might sound good on paper, but so far it doesn't mean anything. If the government (you can call it the protection agency with the biggest guns) decides that someone has initiated force, they can arrest you. There is no opting out of it. If you have your own protection agency, and it uses force, the big PA can judge your actions and decide whether or not it was an initiation of force. So again, you can't opt out. So the fantasy of opting out doesn't mean anything.

You could argue that you can opt out of paying for a particular protection agency. But that doesn't mean anything in a minarchy where there is no taxation. Everyone is free to opt out of paying. But you're not free to opt out of being punished for your crimes.

Now you're welcome to disagree with this assessment, but reading through these posts it's clear that even you anarchists can't agree what it means. "Opting out" is a floating abstraction. Talking about a "free-market" in government is a floating abstraction.

You brush it off as if I'm trying to get too many specifics on how it works like private roads or something. But in fact, I'm just looking for a coherent explanation of the basics. If you claim to be able to "opt-out", explain what it means and what are the limitations. So far, the attempts to explain it have been fully compatible with a minimal state. You're welcome to have your own security agencies and courts, but the government still keeps the final say on what is an initiation of force. If they judge you to have initiated force, they'll arrest you. It's simple. And if your PA tries to prevent them, they'll properly judge it as a criminal organization. It would be an accomplice to the crime. And they'll arrest all of the people in it as well.

Post 36

Friday, April 9, 2004 - 4:25pm

Makemore,

Thanks for the links on Roy Childs. The gist of Ronald Neff�s article seems to be that Childs� doubts about anarchism were based on two factors: how to affect change in an orderly way, and the practicalities of anarchism.

I won�t go into the practicalities, but I think Childs� concerns about change, how to get from here to there, are prescient. He seems to be saying that in order to affect orderly change, one needs to take part in the current political system, but the people who want to do so are the wrong sort of people for promoting anarchism, as they are those most likely to be subverted by the system.

No doubt this thought was prompted by some personal animosities, but there�s some truth in it from another angle. People who run for public office are assumed to have some loyalty to the existing system, and it�s also assumed that those who take office will sincerely defend and uphold that system. An anarchist, of course, cannot do this and remain true to his principles, so that avenue seems to be closed off as a way of affecting change. If violent revolution were rejected, the only other way of affecting orderly change would be through agitation and education, but unless you can also get your hands on the levers of power, agitation by itself can be pretty ineffective. To a lesser degree, the miniarchist faces the same challenge.

But there is also a more basic issue holding back libertarianism, both anarchist and miniarchist, and that is the claim that politics is, or should be, primarily a matter of interactions between individuals. I think this is a profound error. Politics as we know it, that is democracy, is the process of negotiation between groups in society. The very existence of libertarian parties is a tacit admission of this fact.

But in order to make headway in the political arena, groups have to engage in some form of collectivism. Individuals have to lay aside at least some of their differences and be subject to some form of discipline so that everyone is �singing from the same hymnbook�. Libertarians are understandably loathe to do this.

So that�s the dilemma: success in the existing political arena requires a degree of collectivism, but collectivism undermines the ethos of libertarianism. If that dilemma can be resolved, you can find a way of moving forward.

Brendan

Post 37

Friday, April 9, 2004 - 5:43pm

I don't believe "opting out" is a floating abstraction at all. I can think of one issue that is highly relevant - and very concrete.

If we take the minimalist government theory - that government is limited to matters of law and order, defence etc - and has a legal monopoly on the use of retaliatory force - then this still doesn't prevent such a government from "initiating" force against someone.

Going by the views of many Objectivists - the war with Iraq is justified. Now, I happen to vigorously disagree. And yet, even under a fully Objectivist-inspired government, those in power would consider it right and proper to force me to pay for that war (via taxes).

But to me, being forced to fund a war I morally object to is totally unacceptable.

I need to be able to opt out. If I refuse to pay my taxes - then the government will initiate force against me - take me away, and imprison me (as a last resort).

So it comes back to basics. Either freedom means being free from the initiation of force, or it does not.

Post 38

Friday, April 9, 2004 - 7:10pm

David,

Most Objectivists want a minimal government that doesn't tax. One doesn't need to be an anarchist to be in favor of that.

Post 39

Friday, April 9, 2004 - 9:44pm