Anarcho-capitalist FAQ

[Hogeye]

I just made a new page.

Anarcho-capitalist FAQ

Check it out and tell me what your think.

[Hogeye]

I don't see how the concept of private property could exist without government.

Doug, all you have to do is look at stateless societies to see that property preceeds government. Even primitive hunter-gatherers have property - scarce items like tools and weapons. Property is near hard-wired into people - even babies know mine and thine. I think of it as a contractarian thing. People, if they want to live with others, agree I won't take your stuff if you don't take my stuff. My favorite quote along this line (though I would replace "gift of God" with "attributes of man":

Life, faculties, production-in other words, individuality, liberty, property - this is man. And in spite of the cunning of artful political leaders, these three gifts from God precede all human legislation, and are superior to it. Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place. - Frederic Bastiat

Hobbes was right. We need a state to guarantee our well-being and oversee society to allow us to prosper.

Hobbes was right that, in a state of nature that disallows mutual aid, life would be nasty, brutish, and short. He was wrong in his second claim, that the only way out was a totalitarian State. It wasn't until Gustave de Molinari in 1849 that someone seized upon a better solution - competing security firms.

There are some stateless or near-stateless societies which blow away that theory (we need a state to guarantee our well-being), Doug. Celtic Ireland didn't do that bad, despite suffering repeated invasion. Classic Thing Iceland prospered and had probably the most sophisticated culture of its time. Then there's Holy Experiment (Quaker) Pennsylvania in the 1680's. Those are just a few counter-examples.

The correlation between State power and prosperity is negative, Doug. The richest countries tend to be the ones who enjoyed limited government, property rights, and avoided war. The US became wealthy because it had a century or so of relative free markets and limited government before it became a centralized State. Compare that with Latin America!

[Doug]

I don't see how the concept of private property could exist without government.

Doug, all you have to do is look at stateless societies to see that property preceeds government.

DOUG
People held onto items and carried them and kept them, but this is not sufficient to show that it was "property" as we understand the concept.

Even primitive hunter-gatherers have property - scarce items like tools and weapons.

DOUG
They had tools and weapons, but they didn't have property. Unless you just want to equivocate on the term. Unless you are just using the concept of "property" as equivalent to "physical object," saying you have property in the absence of a system of legally recognizing possessions seems contradictory.

Property is near hard-wired into people - even babies know mine and thine. I think of it as a contractarian thing.

DOUG
Unless babies have entered into a contract, which they haven't, thinking something is "mine" does not make it my property.

People, if they want to live with others, agree I won't take your stuff if you don't take my stuff.

DOUG
OK, so agreements between people create contracts and formulate the concept of property. Then you just lost. Government is the institution that is the guarantor of property recognition.

There are some stateless or near-stateless societies which blow away that theory (we need a state to guarantee our well-being), Doug. Celtic Ireland didn't do that bad, despite suffering repeated invasion. Classic Thing Iceland prospered and had probably the most sophisticated culture of its time. Then there's Holy Experiment (Quaker) Pennsylvania in the 1680's. Those are just a few counter-examples.

DOUG
I don't see any counterexamples. Show me that they had property without the concept of property rights.

The correlation between State power and prosperity is negative, Doug. The richest countries tend to be the ones who enjoyed limited government, property rights, and avoided war.

DOUG
Nonsense. When property rights are not enforced, wealth is minimal or nonexistent.

The US became wealthy because it had a century or so of relative free markets and limited government before it became a centralized State. Compare that with Latin America!

DOUG
The US became wealthy because it had tons of natural resources that cost little or nothing because they stole it from the Native Americans and used slaves to exploit it. Free resources at next to no overhead costs will get you a lot of wealth.

[Hogeye]

Doug, as far as I can see, we totally agree. You are using "government" different than I usually do, but your usage has respectable precedent: Jefferson, Paine, Oppenheimer among others. "Government is the institution that is the guarantor of property recognition." Using this terminology, anarchism is not against government (it is against State*). What anarcho-capitalists like me want is competing governments, where each person may subscribe to the government of his/her choice, and switch governments at will (except e.g. to renege on previous contracts.)

* State - an organization with an effective monopoly on the legal/legitimate use of force in a particular geographic area.

This definition comes from Max Weber. This, or something close, is the definition generally used by anarchists. In standard vernacular, when people say "government" they really mean "State." My capitalization is non-standard, but I want USAmericans to realize I mean State qua Etat, not state qua province of the United States State.



We agree that property is meaningless without property rights. Suppose, like in Anglo-Saxon history, people involved in a dispute went to mutually agreed-upon wise elders, known for their fairness and judgement. Suppose a system of law develops from rulings of these private judges. Suppose sophisticated decisions regarding property rights are made in this system. This is government without State (so long as people can switch judges.) Basically, such "polycentric law" developed many places throughout history. Monopoly law based on territory is actually a relatively new thing; before the rise of the nation state (pre-1500) most European legal systems were based on ethnicity, religion, and functional jurisdiction rather than territory.

When property rights are not enforced, wealth is minimal or nonexistent.

Yes, I agree with that 100%. Governments (in our current terminology) are needed to protect rights. What we don't need is monopoly. Having a monopoly in the provision of justice is bad for all the same reasons as a monopoly in the provision of bread. It's higher priced and lower quality than it would have been on a free market. And since it has a monopoly on legitimate use of force, it's a lot meaner than a bread company. It bombs foreign civilians and incarcerates masses of its own citizens. And States - monopoly governments - are more persistent than bread monopolies; by force of arms funded by plunder of its citizens, it can often perpetuate its parasitic existence for a long while.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

At this point, Hogeye, you have defined state, and apparently were defining Government, as an organizational entity in pocession of an army. The only thing I can say about that is when you have "competing organizations" having armies, you have war. When you have a single entity with an army and nobody else has one (monopoly) you also have despotic government - rule of army leader - over every group that didn't have one.

The societies that have or had what I call government and Hogeye calls "mutually agreed-upon wise elders" or "private judges" have been taken over by societies with armies. Our founders, fearing military coup, but knowing the defensive need for armies, created a very small professional army and state militias (officers appointed by the state, arms and training paid for by the fed) that could be called out by the president at need. The cancerous growth of the U.S. military is post-WWII, coinciding with the change of name from Dept of War to Dept of Defense. The excuse of the "Cold War", like the current excuse of "Terrorism" conned the people into not taking back the reins. Unfortunately, it still seems to be working.

FYI Hogeye - Anglo-Saxons had government, frequently of - or at least with co-ruling - warrior kings, as did the ancient Celts - they just had smaller territories than we currently think of, more like principalities or city-states.

[Hogeye]

At this point, Hogeye, you have defined state, and apparently were defining Government, as an organizational entity in pocession of an army.

No, we were defining government as an organization which provides legal/arbitration services. This is not a standard definition, but is serviceable.

The only thing I can say about that is when you have "competing organizations" having armies, you have war.

Counter-example - the US and Canada have competing organizations an no war. There are many pairs of States, in "anarchic" relation to each other, with do not automatically go to war.

War between armed groups is a possibility. Let's compare a) the likelihood and incentives of statism vs anarchism, and then b) the worst-case scenerios for statism vs anarchism.

Incentives - A state can conscript its subjects, and plunder them by taxation and forced labor to pay for wars; a PDA (private defense agency) can't do either. It's customers would switch services if it tried to ramp up prices or enslave their customers. Thus, for States you have the perverse incentive that the rulers get the goodies, wealth, fame, power, while the subjects pay the costs. For a PDA, war is expensive and costly for the owners, and simply bad business. Thus, PDAs are more likely than States to opt for negotiated solutions.

But if war happens - States, being territorially-based, are willing and able to use weapons of mass destruction, like nuclear bombs and biological warfare. Hell, everyone "there" is the enemy, as the dogma of statism identifies rulers with subjects with land area. PDAs, not being territorially based, make use of such untargeted weapons untenable - a firm doesn't want to kill its own customers. Pepsi doesn't nuke Coke because they have plants and customers in the same towns. So if worse comes to worse, disputes between PDAs will use targeted weapons rather than weapons of mass destruction; PDAs will likely target only enemy combatants, while as we know State are notorious for mass murder of innocents ("collateral damage".) So disputes between States are immensely more destructive, murderous, and large-scale than disputes between PDAs.

When you have a single entity with an army and nobody else has one (monopoly) you also have despotic government.

Cool! I think you're getting it now! Statism =- monopoly government; anarchism = competing governments. When you have monopoly governments, they get authoritarian and even despotic, as we can see just by looking at the world. They violate people's rights, and provide lousy protection. That why I prefer anarchism. It sounds like you're coming around, too.

The societies that have or had what I call government and Hogeye calls "mutually agreed-upon wise elders" or "private judges" have been taken over by societies with armies.

Some have, some were able to defend themselves. States, even those with armies have been taken over by competing States with armies, too. I think the question you're getting at is, which type of society defends itself more effectivly against foreign invasion? That's hard to say. Stateless Celtic Ireland more or less successfully defended itself against near constant-invasion for, what, ten centuries? That's longer than most States survive. Thing Iceland was not taken over by military conquest; it was perverted by Xtians. It lasted four centuries, twice as long as the USEmpire.

Anglo-Saxons had government, frequently of - or at least with co-ruling - warrior kings, as did the ancient Celts - they just had smaller territories than we currently think of, more like principalities or city-states.

You are mistaken. These "warrior kings" were more like militia commanders - they had little or no power except in wartime. They had no legislative or executive power - they could not make or decree law. Also, people could switch tuaths. Here's some info about Celtic Ireland:

For a thousand years, then, ancient Celtic Ireland had no State or anything like it. As the leading authority on ancient Irish law has written: "There was no legislature, no bailiffs, no police, no public enforcement of justice…. There was no trace of State-administered justice."9
How then was justice secured? The basic political unit of ancient Ireland was the tuath. All "freemen" who owned land, all professionals, and all craftsmen, were entitled to become members of a tuath. Each tuath's members formed an annual assembly which decided all common policies, declared war or peace on other tuatha, and elected or deposed their "kings." An important point is that, in contrast to primitive tribes, no one was stuck or bound to a given tuath, either because of kinship or of geographical location. Individual members were free to, and often did, secede from a tuath and join a competing tuath. Often, two or more tuatha decided to merge into a single, more efficient unit. As Professor Peden states, "the tuath is thus a body of persons voluntarily united for socially beneficial purposes and the sum total of the landed properties of its members constituted its territorial dimension."10 In short, they did not have the modern State with its claim to sovereignty over a given (usually expanding) territorial area, divorced from the landed prop erty rights of its subjects; on the contrary, tuatha were voluntary associa tions which only comprised the landed properties of its voluntary mem bers. Historically, about 80 to 100 tuatha coexisted at any time throughout Ireland.
But what of the elected "king"? Did he constitute a form of State ruler? Chiefly, the king functioned as a religious high priest, presiding over the worship rites of the tuath, which functioned as a voluntary religious, as well as a social and political, organization. As in pagan, pre-Christian, priesthoods, the kingly function was hereditary, this prac tice carrying over to Christian times. The king was elected by the tuath from within a royal kin-group (the derbfine), which carried the hereditary priestly function. Politically, however, the king had strictly limited functions: he was the military leader of the tuath, and he presided over the tuath assemblies. But he could only conduct war or peace negotiations as agent of the assemblies; and he was in no sense sovereign and had no rights of administering justice over tuath members. He could not legislate, and when he himself was party to a lawsuit, he had to submit his case to an independent judicial arbiter.
Again, how, then, was law developed and justice maintained? In the first place, the law itself was based on a body of ancient and immemorial custom, passed down as oral and then written tradition through a class of professional jurists called the brehons. The brehons were in no sense public, or governmental, officials; they were simply selected by parties to disputes on the basis of their reputations for wisdom, knowledge of the customary law, and the integrity of their decisions. - Rothbard, For A New Liberty ch. 12

[Doug]

Here's some info about Celtic Ireland:

For a thousand years, then, ancient Celtic Ireland had no State or anything like it. As the leading authority on ancient Irish law has written: "There was no legislature, no bailiffs, no police, no public enforcement of justice…. There was no trace of State-administered justice."

DOUG
What time period are you talking about? This seems patently false, but I can't double-check until we know what era you are referring to.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

Doug - he's talking about pre-Christian Ireland. Remnants of the system were still in effect as late as the 6th or even 7th century in the most isolated pockets. However, the governmental structure was quite complex and I would define that complex structure as a state. What they didn't have was written language - their religion forbade it, saying that when you write down law you make all men criminals - essentially preventing "letter of the law" type abuses by not have a letter of the law.

Interestingly enough, the administrator (king) was elected, although from a specific "royal" family group (derbfine - all the folks who have a great-great grandfather in common), was only a military leader in time of war, and had no legislative powers. Sounds sort of like the U.S. constitution's limitations on the president. On thing W wouldn't like - the "religious function" of kings included being sacrificed in really bad times. They weren't priests (those were druids). Bard, Druid, and warrior were at the same social level as king. The brehon was a subset of Bard, and basically analgous to a combination of modern lawyer and notary (reason it came under bard, was the memory training - they had to memorize all of what we'd call tort and case law).

The reason a person or group could move from one tuath to another is tuatha were made up of derbfines, and you can always switch to a derbfine with a different great-great grandfather in common.

[Betsy]

Hi Hogeye, I checked out your site and read these arguments and I'm just thinking, you're reallygoing way out there and you're spending a whole lot of time and effort trying to convert everyone into buying into your whole argument. It's kind of a shame to see so much energy wasted. And I mean that in a nice way, not a mean way. Your time would be so much better served if you could pick the one or two MOST IMPORTANT issues that you believe would be improved with your system, and then chop away at the "establishment" by improving one thing at a time (assuming it would be improved).

In fact, there are some things about your position that seem correct, and some things that seem incorrect. So when you pick that one or two things to start with, pick the correct ones

[Hogeye]

I would define that complex structure as a state. ... you can always switch to a derbfine with a different great-great grandfatherin common.

Regardless of whether you consider it a State, anarchist do not precisely because of your observation about switching. Since jurisdiction changes according to membership, there is no territorial monopoly. It doesn't satisfy the Max Weber definition of State = an organization with an effective monopoly on the legitimate use of force in a particular geographic area. The things that interest anarchists, besides the non-territoriality, is the "discovered" rather than legislated law, and the "private" competing judges. BTW, I recently saw an article about a modern example of anarchism - Somalia.


Betsy, I am not convinced that taking an absolutist position on liberty is "so much energy wasted." From a term coined in the 1950s, it's grown into a major ideology (along with the broader libertarian movement, which includes minarchists.) I'd call the efforts of Murray Rothbard and David Friedman etc. to be amazingly successful.

As for my own efforts, I feel I have made an impact through my writings, CAT TV shows, and association with Omni. I have observed significant change in Omni people, such as consideration of libertarian arguments and ideas that they never would have considered before. I even have Dick Bennet concerned with not using the statist "we" in language. Now, in case you don't know, these Omni folks are mostly socialist democrats - quite statist. Compared to them, you freethinkers are an easy sell! After all, freethinking by definition and tradition is opposed to submitting your mind to authority - of God or State. Freethinking and anarchism go hand in hand. All I have to do is to get you to use your ample powers of rationality and skepticism, not just on theism and blind faith in God, but also to statism and blind faith in State. Voltairine de Cleyre, the great freethinker/feminist/anarchist of 19th century America saw the connection.

I use the word "absolutist" purposely. Just as the anti-slavery absolutist, believing in self-ownership, could not support reforms such laws mandating freeing slaves after 30 years service, neither can anarchists, also believing in self-ownership, submit to half-measures condoning servitude.

There is a tactical element, too. Supporting issues piecemeal without emphasizing the big picture - liberty qua primary political value - doesn't work; without the principled ideal, people see their own liberty quite clearly but other people's barely at all. You have RTBA people seeing the right to own firearms but opposing the right to own cannabis; meanwhile pot-legalization people want to ban the gun. I even wrote a song about this gross hypocracy. So, while I do have my favorite issues (anti-war and anti-prohibition), my main mission is to delegitimize the State.

Fortunately, I don't have to convince everyone, or anyone for that matter. All I need to do is put the ideas out there. If I am correct in my prediction of a major monetary crisis (dollar hyperinflation), then virtually everyone overnight will become totally disgusted with statism. But regardless of when/whether that happens, we can build alternate institutions. Some things you can do: Support your local underground economy, use real money like silver rounds or e-gold, become adept at avoiding statist plunder, and learn how to use the firearm of the info age - PGP. Don't pay taxes and don't vote. Don't feed the beast.