What Is Anarchy?

[Anonymouse]

Are you meaning to say, that the US Army intentionally attacked and killed innocent civilians for absolutelly no purpose?! Im not the one to believe everything the media or government has to say, but this behaviour would be illogical, simply because it would foster (more) hatred among the Iraqis. I do believe there are some stupid people running the US government, but they arnt THAT stupid.

 

I am saying exactly that. In fact, current hatred of the United States in the Islamic world is precisely BECAUSE of continued U.S. involvement in that region, continually bombing them, enforcing U.N. sanctions, etc., in the name of oil and Israel. When Americans say "They hate us because of our freedoms, they are jealous", such questions are funny, for they save ourselves examining our own thinking and policies. It's always easier to scapegoat than ask questions. They hate the United States, because the United States has done something very horrible to their homes. How many kids died because of the U.N. sanctions, because of continued American and British bombings all throughout the 90s up until the latest Iraq war? How many countless others by U.S. cluster bombs? Hell, did you even forget U.S. soldiers with the "Gulf War Syndrome"? The problem with politicians is they aren't looking at the world historically, or from a cultural point of view, they are looking at it politically, what would get them their maximum gains in order to ensure a nice election. In politics, especially one such as an Empire as the U.S., the ends justify the means.

 

You dont have to look far to see what anarchy can do to a country, just look at Armenia (I was there summer '03). A nominal government does exist there, but thats all it is nominal: a facade for the rest of the world (and an ugly one at that). Anyhow, to the point, do you know what happence in the absence of a government/law? Money BECOMES the law - literally. Armenia has reverted back to the Medieval Age my friend: we have a dozen chieftains (with money) running the country.

 

But then to that I would ask, how did that become so? Why is it the way it is? It is precisely because of too much government, nearly a century of Bolshevism/Communism, and you wonder why all those problems exist? It is because of too much government, too much regulation, that we get the results that we get now. Free market economics has been virtually unheard of in Armenia, and the continued politics of Genocide and lack of trade with Turkey are another blow to this. Do you see how politics eventually contradicts economics? Those same "cheiftains" were around for the most part during the days of the hammer and sickle. Lo and behold, when that crumbled, they simply took it under their hands using once again, the government, it was working in tandem with government that one was able to achieve this, for even in the U.S. and globally, big business and big government went hand in hand, and monopolies such as Microsoft or Enron were nothing more than government created monopolies.

[Anonymouse]

I should also note, Anon, I dont completelly discount where your coming from, but do require some convincing, I just need to be pointed in the right direction: a book perhaps, I am sure it will prove a worthwhile read and will get to it as soon as I finish "The Art of War"

No worries mate, if you want to understand what I am arguing for, there are great books out there you can dig into ( by the way, The Art of War, is a classic. It should be a must read for all ).

 

Books that I personally found imperative for my understanding of the view espoused by the Austrian School of Economics, and libertarians is by none other than the brainchild of the Austrian Economics, Ludwig von Mises. His book Human Action, I would say, is a classic of the ages, sadly it doesn't get enough exposure. You can buy it, or read it online, it is available online.

 

http://www.mises.org/humanaction.asp

 

Another book that I found to be informative on Democracy, is Democracy: The God That Failed.

 

I would assume those should be enough for starters, but later on I guess you can check out the books available on the Mises Institute website, which they pretty much show what they are about and its self-explanatory, for beginners in the Austrian Economics. I myself am just getting familiar with this school of thought, and I don't have al the time in the world either, so it's still a never ending path for me.

 

www.mises.org

[Sasun]

( by the way, The Art of War, is a classic. It should be a must read for all ).

Is this the one by Sun Tzu you guys are talking about?

[Anonymouse]

Is this the one by Sun Tzu you guys are talking about?

Indeed, if that is the only Art of War out there. Is there any new one aside from that horrible movie, that I am unaware of?

[axel]

a few quick thoughts.

 

if we consider early societies as anarchic and if anarchy is a viable system, why is it that the "state" appeared? anarchists merely advocate another system (that which is defined as no system) as though systems held the key to mankind's problems. How naive a belief. Anarchy is based on the rousseauist premise that man is good in nature which is obviously not true of all men, or that every men following their own interests is the way to harmony and ultimate good which is an erroneous belief. one should at least learn that from history. if ethics are not the criteria for judging a society what is? efficiency? progress? these abstract notions that alienate man?

 

the free market? there is nothing to be loved in all this, nothing transcendent. just the mechanics of offer and demand. mechanics, that is the word. machinery. man is lost into machinery. But man's endeavor on this earth should be a nobler one than that of submitting to the forces of the "market". Otherwise life is just meaningless. It has no purpose. man is a mere puppet enslaved by the "laws" of the material world. But Man is FREE. Some people having discovered these "higher" laws or principles saw in them the hand of God. I am afraid this god, in christian terminology we refer to as satan.

[Anonymouse]

a few quick thoughts.

 

if we consider early societies as anarchic and if anarchy is a viable system, why is it that the "state" appeared? anarchists merely advocate another system (that which is defined as no system) as though systems held the key to mankind's problems. How naive a belief. Anarchy is based on the rousseauist premise that man is good in nature which is obviously not true of all men, or that every men following their own interests is the way to harmony and ultimate good which is an erroneous belief. one should at least learn that from history. if ethics are not the criteria for judging a society what is? efficiency? progress? these abstract notions that alienate man?

 

the free market? there is nothing to be loved in all this, nothing transcendent. just the mechanics of offer and demand. mechanics, that is the word. machinery. man is lost into machinery. But man's endeavor on this earth should be a nobler one than that of submitting to the forces of the "market". Otherwise life is just meaningless. It has no purpose. man is a mere puppet enslaved by the "laws" of the material world. But Man is FREE. Some people having discovered these "higher" laws or principles saw in them the hand of God. I am afraid this god, in christian terminology we refer to as satan.

First of all, you have a misconception on what is meant by "anarcho capitalism". This is not based on the belief or premise that man is good, that is false. Rather it is based on the premise that man is self-interested. A completely free market, unregulated and unhampered by the State does not require people be good. In fact abolishing government doesn't mean you won't have crime or murder.

 

If you want to talk about learning from history, I hope you learn that in the age of the 20th century and of total war, the State was unrelenting and now we stand on the brink of destroying humanity thanks to the State. Individuals don't commit genocides, States do, by convincing people that they must relinquish their minds to the craze of mass mindedness. Government has caused 200 millions deaths in the 20th century alone, how many have individuals caused by themselves working outside of political systems? Yet based on this you support government and say I haven't learned from history? There is no way to "harmony or ultimate good" and that is not what I said, merely something you assumed and put in my mouth. On the contrary what anarchy would mean is to lessen the amount of destruction the gradual rise of the State has done to humanity.

 

Politics is based on collective thinking and in any political system you believe in, you lose your ability to think for yourself, because political systems in their nature rely and operate on the collective mass mindedness in order to be successful. We all too often acknowledge that politicians lie, they cheat, they do the dirtiest things that we in our everyday lives will not do, yet we unconsciously vote for these morally depraved people to make choices for us. Another contradiction lies in the fact that the government can lie, cheat, steal, and go across to distant lands, bomb and maim and kill people, yet we do nothing about it, and in fact support and vote for these people, yet we condemn and criminalize individuals for essentially doing the same thing.

 

Take the democracy that we have in this country, or so we believe to have. It is premised on voting. From the beginning of political systems during the Enlightenment and what we know today as the State, in order to maintain social control, the State engages in violence and coercion to maintain social order. We covered a book in class called "Parliament of Whores: A Lone Humorist Attempts to Explain the Entire U.S. Government" by P. J. O'Rourke. O'Rourke writes:

 

"Authority has always attracted the lowest elements in the human race. All through history mankind has been bullied by scum. Those who lord it over their fellows and toss commands in every direction and would boss the grass in the meadow about which way to bend in the wind are the most depraved kind of prostitutes. They will submit to any indignity, perform any vile act, do anything to achieve power. The worst off-sloughings of the planet are the ingredients of sovereignty. Every government is a parliament of whores. The trouble is, in a democracy the whores are us. "

 

Politics is a game of telling people what to do. That is why we vote, to have an authority figure tell us what to do, to tell our neighbor what to do and make choices for us. While we acknowledge that communist, socialist, or fascist dictatorships are brutal and use illegitimate means of brute force and coercion to gain power, democracy is worse, and a far scarier concept. It gives leaders an excuse to do what they do. If a leader is elected and is a tyrant, all he has to do is show that it was the will of the people. And while there are indeed those of us who would like to vote our lives away into the hands of tyrants in a democracy, it throws everyone else who don't want to vote into the hands of the tyrant as well. So when you vote you are not only voting for yourself, but you are voting for everyone.

 

And once annually, almost like a holiday, we all go to the boothes to vote, to give ourselves the illusion that for one day we get to make important political decisions, that we run the state. This is why the Western governments have been so obssessed with spreading "democracy" around to the other world, not to decentralize political authority, but to make people believe they are state which they have been forced into believing. Only here to we believe that we have a "choice" between a Republican and a Democrat. The absurdity of this is proved by the fact that after 911 virtually all politicians supported Bush's policies and voting for the odious Patriot Act. No matter what, the government always gets elected. To quote Biafra of the Dead Kennedies "If Voting could change anything, it would be illegal".

 

As far as the free market, it was precisely the capitalist revolution which has brought all this prosperity and increased living standards that you enjoy. It was the capitalist revolution which ushered the division of labor giving individuals a chance to develop themselves and specialize. I don't see this as "evil". What is "evil" is supporting the State, making yourself just as guilty for those children in Iraq who die from U.S. cluster bombs or depleted uranium.

[angel4hope]

you know what i hate most about democracy...what do these people that are in politics have that is so essential that tey are able to govern others..people like you and i...i believe it all comes from the inference that money=better education=power=political career....

 

i often ponder about these topics, because no one man or group of men should be responsible for governing a whole population espacially in the issue of war...why do these government officials have the power to make decisions to make or break lives??? i understand that it would be difficult without any form of government...and that nothing is perfect...but i think that even american politics and so called "democracy" is tainted and fallacious....people should have the freedom to live and war does not imply freedom to live---i think for that issue...war...just like any other law passing process~they should have elections to whether the people want to go to war or not...im sorry if im driving the thread off topic...just my freelance writing gets a bit loose you know...

[Anonymouse]

you know what i hate most about democracy...what do these people that are in politics have that is so essential that tey are able to govern others..people like you and i...i believe it all comes from the inference that money=better education=power=political career....

 

i often ponder about these topics, because no one man or group of men should be responsible for governing a whole population espacially in the issue of war...why do these government officials have the power to make decisions to make or break lives??? i understand that it would be difficult without any form of government...and that nothing is perfect...but i think that even american politics and so called "democracy" is tainted and fallacious....people should have the freedom to live and war does not imply freedom to live---i think for that issue...war...just like any other law passing process~they should have elections to whether the people want to go to war or not...im sorry if im driving the thread off topic...just my freelance writing gets a bit loose you know...

why do these government officials have the power to make decisions to make or reak lives???

 

Because people continually vote for them, for the system. All systems are based on control. How do you control people? By controlling their thought and education. Schools, and television and media are essential to mold the minds of the masses.

 

 

i understand that it would be difficult without any form of government...

 

No it wouldn't. That is a misconception. Why would it be difficult? Government = coercion. Do people like to be coerced?

 

but i think that even american politics and so called "democracy" is tainted and fallacious....

 

America is resembling the late stages of the Roman Empire. Both started off as "Republics" and both are unrelenting Empires. Eventually America will suffer the same fate of history as others before it, for all systems move towards disorder per chaos theory.

 

people should have the freedom to live and war does not imply freedom to live-

 

To quote Murray N. Rothbard, "If men were like ants, there would be no interest in human freedom".

[angel4hope]

No it wouldn't. That is a misconception. Why would it be difficult? Government = coercion. Do people like to be coerced?

yes that makes it clear...but how and what would the world look like.......?i guess that democracy and politics have done a great job in brainwashing us--me at least..to the point where i cant imagine what it would be like without a form ogf government...

[axel]

First of all, you have a misconception on what is meant by "anarcho capitalism". This is not based on the belief or premise that man is good, that is false. Rather it is based on the premise that man is self-interested.

 

You must have read my post too quickly as I wrote:

 

Anarchy is based on the rousseauist premise that man is good in nature which is obviously not true of all men, or that every men following their own interests is the way to harmony and ultimate good which is an erroneous belief

 

I will try to look at your post in detail later on to see if there is something new in your reasoning but at first sight, there doesn't seem to be.

[Anonymouse]

You must have read my post too quickly as I wrote:

 

 

 

I will try to look at your post in detail later on to see if there is something new in your reasoning but at first sight, there doesn't seem to be.

You assumed that my goal here is to lay a creed along the lines of "or that every men following their own interests is the way to harmony and ultimate good".

 

There is no ultimate good or harmony, we can only lesson the conflicts collective thinking and mass mindedness has reaped upon humanity.

[Anonymouse]

This theory essentially rests on 3 empirically meaningful assumptions. First is that a government, the State, is a territorial monopolist of coercion and exploitation, and governemnt subjects as the victims of the initials action. Second is between a privately owned, inheritable monopoly, and a public uninheritable monopoly run by caretakers instead of owners. Third, the assumption of self interest on the part of the exploiting governments agents and its subjects, since government agents prefer more wealth, more income and more power, and their subjects prefer more wealth, income, and more freedom.

 

From this then it deductively flows that a private owner of government would be more interested in the preservation of capital values, as opposed to a public caretaker of government ( which is essentially what the presented "democracy" is ). This is not a new idea and is equivalent to saying that a private slave owner will take better care of his slave, than a public one.

 

To present a critique of this, you must prove either an error in the premises or the conclusion.

Edited January 26, 2004 by Anonymouse

[axel]

First I have to say I personally discard the state vs individual worldview which I find overly restrictive in that it is merely based on a materialistic/individualistic faith derived from ideas of the "enlightenement" (I find it ironic btw that you espouse such a view while accusing "nationalism" of this very wrong). Worldviews are based on value judgements, there are not mere rational constructions. Spengler values Culture, Solzhenitsyn, Ethics, others, Tradition vs Modernity... I just want to point out that I don't see the world through the prism of the State vs the individual so that I be not accused of standing in defence of what you call "The State" (which is a gross oversimplification btw that allows all possible amalgams to be made) or Coercion in the largest possible sense, by the following "critique" (the word critique is a bit presumptuous I guess ) for I reject the hidden assumptions that subtend the angle of analysis.

 

First is that a government, the State, is a territorial monopolist of coercion and exploitation, and governemnt subjects as the victims of the initials action.

 

Government subjects are not victims in the absolute (there might be victims in specific instances, under specific regimes). As much as I hate do so, I have to refer to the idea of social contract in which the individual forgoes some of his freedom in return for a certain amount of protection (be it physical, social...). This is also valid in early societies, in what Giambattista Vico characterizes as the heroic age.

 

Second is between a privately owned, inheritable monopoly, and a public uninheritable monopoly run by caretakers instead of owners.

 

Are you making a case for monarchy?

 

who says appointed caretakers make the actual decisions? that there does not exist ruling circles holding an "inheritable monopoly" on public affairs and exerting power through various means of pressure?

 

in fact things are much more complex but I don't have time to develop a theory on this subject in fact, this is not my area of interest.

 

Third, the assumption of self interest on the part of the exploiting governments agents and its subjects, since government agents prefer more wealth, more income and more power, and their subjects prefer more wealth, income, and more freedom.

 

This is a statement of belief, one which considers that this world is entirely driven by material greed and reduces man to a mere socio-economical animal. Nothing in the absolute justifies this assumption although I have to agree it has often been justified in practise (but not always).

 

From this then it deductively flows that a private owner of government would be more interested in the preservation of capital values, as opposed to a public caretaker of government ( which is essentially what the presented "democracy" is ).

 

A private owner of government? So you believe some form of government or authority/hierarchy should be maintained??

I don't see where anarchy stands here if authority is to be maintained.

 

Actually, authority/hierarchy exists in all forms of society. (And in the same way some see in the "invisible hand" an absolute law of God, others such as Maistre see in hierarchy and authority a divine manifestation according to the belief that "all power comes from God"). It is either hidden or apparent. The miracle of so-called democracy is to have made hierarchy almost invisible to the profane.

 

This is not a new idea and is equivalent to saying that a private slave owner will take better care of his slave, than a public one.

 

slave? slave owner? interesting comparison...

 

-Who are you?

-The new Number Two

-Who is Number One?

-You are Number Six

-I am not a number . . .

I'm a free man!

 

http://www.the-prisoner-6.freeserve.co.uk/...ner_updates.htm

 

the above doesn't stand as an argument but the words you use denote some hidden assumptions that contradict the idea of freedom you seem to be defending

 

To present a critique of this, you must prove either an error in the premises or the conclusion.

 

Thanks for the advice.

 

As for material progress (you refered to the improvement of living standards in order to make a case for capitalism thereby making a value judgement which I do not agree with. you may find some ethical arguments against the idea of progress here), it surely doesn't eclipse spiritual decay which I find to be the most worrying aspect of the modern world. But as Heidegger (among others) points out, spiritual decay has reached such a stage of advancement that most people no longer have the possibility of realizing it.

Edited January 26, 2004 by axel

[Anonymouse]

First I have to say I personally discard the state vs individual worldview which I find overly restrictive in that it is merely based on a materialistic/individualistic faith derived from ideas of the "enlightenement" (I find it ironic btw that you espouse such a view while accusing "nationalism" of this very wrong). Worldviews are based on value judgements, there are not mere rational constructions. Spengler values Culture, Solzhenitsyn, Ethics, others, Tradition vs Modernity... I just want to point out that I don't see the world through the prism of the State vs the individual so that I be not accused of standing in defence of what you call "The State" (which is a gross oversimplification btw that allows all possible amalgams to be made) or Coercion in the largest possible sense, by the following "critique" (the word critique is a bit presumptuous I guess ) for I reject the hidden assumptions that subtend the angle of analysis.

 

I don't know what your intention was with this little off topic deviation into the realm of making things fungible with relation to the discussion of the State and Anarchy. Nationalism is another creed that is based on mass mindedness, where you vanquish your indiviality to the State, it is part of the State. It is an ideology that reinforces the States existence. I don't understand you equating Nationalism with my defense of the individual, nor how they relate to each other. In fact it was you that tried to make nationalism elastic, in that there is some sort of 'nationalism' as applied to the Armenian peoples, and to others, and that somehow the Armenian nationalism existed before the creed of nationalism itself. The obvious error in that reasoning is something many can't come to grips with in how we create history where there was none. Whether it was fascism, or communism, or democracy, they all rely on collective thinking and mass mindedness, in which the individual is sacrificed to the alter of "the people" (a holistic entity ). There are no "hidden" assumptions aside from what they are, and that you do not own the State but the State owns you.

 

Government subjects are not victims in the absolute (there might be victims in specific instances, under specific regimes). As much as I hate do so, I have to refer to the idea of social contract in which the individual forgoes some of his freedom in return for a certain amount of protection (be it physical, social...). This is also valid in early societies, in what Giambattista Vico characterizes as the heroic age.

 

You did not show any errors in my previous premises or conclusion, thus what is your statement based on? Of course if you are a subservient little citizen mindlessly paying your fielty and your dues to the State, you are untouched. So you accept being submissive? There are no "alternatives" in the way you are conceiving them. What you most likely would conceive to a government alternative, is yet another government. What choices we have is simply to live without government, that simple. Private institutions will do the rest. The idea behind anarcho capitalism is that whatever government does, private businesses can do better, and a gradual privatization from police to firemen to other government services will be the rule, not the exception. For example. We pay taxes to government for its services, whether police or national defense ( this is where the ideology of nationalism saves government ). Government is already defined as a territorial monopoly of force. From an economic point of view, a monopoly is bad. If I as an individual cite as an example the failure of government on the scene of national defense ( Sept. 11 for example ), and its policing services' corruption and overall lack of protection, and I want to take my business elsewhere, perhaps a private institution, or simply myself, I cannot do that, for I must pay the tax and I have no choice. That is coercion. No choice, means no liberty, no freedom. Thus when politicians or us speak of this country representing "liberty" that is not so. This country was not always so. The framers recognized the rights of a state militia for their recognized that a centrally organized state would be dangerous. Thus the right to secede was something agreed upon up until the Civil War.

 

Contrary to Locke's "Social Contract" myth, the government doesn't serve the people and there has been no working model of John Locke's Social Contract myth. In fact all governments have come into existence through violence, even the United States. There is not one example of any State coming into existence by peaceful means, so that is a misconception that is often cited. As far as protection, government protection has clearly failed and it is no different than a mafia making you an 'offer you can't refuse'. You have no choice. Underlying anarcho capitalism is the idea that protection agencies would be privatized instead of a monopoly of government.

 

There is this thing called chaos theory, and if you study it you will see that the more complex systems get, they will eventually decay, in accordance with the second law of thermodynamics. It explains the failures of all government plannings. Since no one can predict the future, complex systems are vulnerable to too many variables to allow anyone to make predictions. All these government "measures" and "legislations" and "funding" and "think tanks" and "experts" all make predictions and it never goes according to their plan. The most obvious, lucid and visible example of the powerlessness of us making predictions is the market place. It revolves around nothing but chaos. The unanticipated consequences hit us from both the private and government sectors regarding chaos. The most lucid example is in Iraq where the government now has no escape strategy and is merley responding to consequences, not in control of them.

 

When you vote, you are declaring that you supoprt the idea of some people ruling over others via coercive means. You are being ruled coercively. Don't believe me? Try to not pay your taxes and insist that the IRS has no right to audit your income. Insist that the IRS is an illegal and fraudulent institution, just like the Federal Reserve, and the initial being the collection agency of the latter. Insist that they are unconstitutional, if you want to defend the constitution for the sake of argument. See what happens to you. Try refusing to serve in the states war machine if you are drafted ( hypothetically ) and see what happens to you. Try doing the same things the state does, namely, stealing, lying, killing, etc., and see what happens to you. So if I am of the persuasion that politics and political systems as we know it, are destroying our modern world, I would be putting my energies in support of this by voting. Remember in the 20th century close to 200 million people have died because of political systems. How many have individuals killed? If the argument is for safety, security, and control, then surely it is better to have no central ruling political authority.

 

Government contribution to mankind has been nothing but wars, genocide, confiscation, persecution, taxation, inflation ( this exists because of government meddling in economics, when the government is the distributor of the worthless paper money that you have now ). Every other contribution, has been because of the individual. After you cut through all the double think, rhetoric and altruism of what government is, all it is, is force. It is a monopoly of force. There is no voluntarism about obeying laws.

 

 

Are you making a case for monarchy?

 

who says appointed caretakers make the actual decisions? that there does not exist ruling circles holding an "inheritable monopoly" on public affairs and exerting power through various means of pressure?

 

Interesting that you should raise this. First, no I am not making a case for monarchy, but under monarchy we didn't have what was called "total war". Monarchy by far was more peaceful than "democracy". Like I said, for you to make a case in defense of democracy you would have to somehow show that the 200 million deaths in the 20th century can be attributed to something else. It was Socrates who praised monarchy over democracy, he was condemned to death. When can get a vivid description of Platos thesis on how democracy naturally evolves into tyranny. Reading his Republic books viii-ix one can see a vivid description of the transition from the Weimar Republic to National Socialism.

 

I consider monarchy a better form of government than democracy. The French revolution brought the historical revival of "Democracy", a sadistic sex orgy in which the "Divine Marquis" played personally. It wanted to bring equality and liberty under a common denominator, something Goethe considered only charlatans would promise. Equality indeed could merely be established in some form of slavery by force just as a hedge can be only kept even by constantly trimming it by force. So the revival of democracy with its ideal of equality is closely connected to nationalism. The basic drive for all this is "sameness". Under democracy even truth became a matter of majorities and the bigger the majority the truer the right answer. However, what I mean by privatization would mean the privatization of currently held government services.

 

If you read the initial part of my thread on anarchy, you would see how public caretakers, i.e. government workers, have no incentive to work or provide better service, security, or care, since their incomes are naturally guaranteed via the coercive process known as taxation. Everyone else including us must labor for our income, theirs is guaranteed. That is the premise of why private office holders will do a better job than a public office holder.

 

A private owner of government? So you believe some form of government or authority/hierarchy should be maintained??

I don't see where anarchy stands here if authority is to be maintained.

 

Actually, authority/hierarchy exists in all forms of society. (And in the same way some see in the "invisible hand" an absolute law of God, others such as Maistre see in hierarchy and authority a divine manifestation according to the belief that "all power comes from God"). It is either hidden or apparent. The miracle of so-called democracy is to have made hierarchy almost invisible to the profane.

 

This isn't about hierarchy. Of course there are hierarchies in nature, it is precisely because of the inequalities of minds, characters, and capacities that capitalism created the division of labor, which gave each individual the chance to cultivate themselves this is why the west has surpassed the world in living standards which you attribute to materialism, but as well as the development of the individual spiritually, which is why every yurns to live in the west, for that chance to cultivate themselves. The question here is with the State, a monopoly of force that has gradually become more powerful and more centralized and is evidenced by how our societies in the west are heading in a more socialistic direction. If government services were privatized all transactions would be voluntary exchange, not based on coercion. There would always be authority, but for the purposes of my discussion anarchy is the absence of coercive authority, i.e. the State.

 

It was Murray Rothbard who said that "If men were like ants, there would be no interest in human freedom". Freedom is something each individual wants, for it gives them the chance to cultivate their individual self. Freedom is something outside of government. Government only curtails it and takes it away. Government believes that freedom is something it gives to individuals. Thus the contention is with a centrally organized ruling authority by coercion. From that it deductively flows that this is in obvious contradiction with the principles of economics. Either politics of Statism are seriously flawed, or the principles on which economics exist are false. And we all know that economic laws claim to be apodictically true empirical propositions, in other words praxeological laws, of human action and conduct. Hence it would be a categorical mistake to think of them as ever being confirmed or falsified by historical experience.

 

This is a statement of belief, one which considers that this world is entirely driven by material greed and reduces man to a mere socio-economical animal. Nothing in the absolute justifies this assumption although I have to agree it has often been justified in practise (but not always).

 

You are, once more, making an assumption, based on something you believe I am saying or I ought to say for you to have an argument, not what I am saying. I think there needs to be a distinction between the egoist and the individual. This is the question which Rand has helped me raise, is individual self-interest synonymous with egoism? In other words, can one act with the intention of benefiting others and remain a self-interest motivated person? I leave the words of Butler Shaffer to do the explaining for he has done eloquently, what I cannot have done.

 

Egoism helps to create and reinforce this kind of divisive thinking. By definition, the ego separates itself from others, it being solely the product of its own thinking. The ego knows no boundaries except the range of its own consciousness. Because he has separated himself from others, the egoist believes that others exist to serve his purposes, and may be exploited in furtherance of such ends. The egoist transforms "utilitarianism" into the doctrine of "the greatest good for the greatest guy."

 

An individualist, on the other hand, acknowledges the self-serving nature of all life. But instead of taking this fact as evidence of some inherent conflict with others, sees it as the basis upon which he and his neighbors can cooperate to accomplish ends each would be incapable of doing on their own.

 

Because he sees his commonality with others, he is inclined to support social systems that harmonize, rather than negate, our self-serving pursuits. This is why he is less inclined to think of the "marketplace" as a geographical location than as a process by which people can peacefully negotiate for their self-seeking ends. Because the marketplace operates on principles of voluntariness, the individualist is aware that, in order to promote his self-interest, he must appeal to the self-interests of others. This not only results in unintended benefits to others, but intended ones as well. This is another way of saying that all volitional acts are motivated by the expectation of our being better off after acting than we would have been had we not acted.

 

The egoist – like the statist - operates from the divisive premise "if you’re not with me, you’re against me" and is prepared to use any means necessary, including force, to overcome the self-interest motivations of those who are unprepared to cooperate with his schemes. To such a person, society with others is a potential threat to be guarded against because, like himself, others are seen as having no purpose that would benefit him. This is why so many egoists have been attracted to the vision of a hermitage, a retreat from the rest of mankind, be it in the form of a "Galt’s Gulch," an isolated island or mountaintop, or a space station.

 

 

The individualist, on the other hand, recognizes the social nature of his existence. All that he is, and all that he is capable of becoming, has been shaped by his untold millions of ancestors, as well as by his constantly fluctuating relationships with contemporaries. His language and knowledge, as well as the quality of his material existence, have all been greatly influenced by others.

 

We discover who we are through relationships with one another. It is no coincidence that men who become serial killers are often described, by others, as "loners." When we have no one else with whom to converse but our own inner voices, we are apt to get the kind of skewed definitions of "reality" than can cause us to see anyone and everyone as "threats" to be overcome.

[axel]

First I have to say I personally discard the state vs individual worldview which I find overly restrictive in that it is merely based on a materialistic/individualistic faith derived from ideas of the "enlightenement" (I find it ironic btw that you espouse such a view while accusing "nationalism" of this very wrong). Worldviews are based on value judgements, there are not mere rational constructions. Spengler values Culture, Solzhenitsyn, Ethics, others, Tradition vs Modernity... I just want to point out that I don't see the world through the prism of the State vs the individual so that I be not accused of standing in defence of what you call "The State" (which is a gross oversimplification btw that allows all possible amalgams to be made) or Coercion in the largest possible sense, by the following "critique" (the word critique is a bit presumptuous I guess  ) for I reject the hidden assumptions that subtend the angle of analysis.

 

I don't know what your intention was with this little off topic deviation into the realm of making things fungible with relation to the discussion of the State and Anarchy.

 

Well I made it explicit. Maybe you should have read my post in the firstplace.

 

I will not engage further into this debate. There is nothing new in your dissertation, you are just rehashing the same propaganda like an automaton. Having no valid counter-arguments you write a 3-page message (which is not a response to mine although it appears to be) in order to drown the reader into an ocean of sophisms.

 

If anarchy is intrinsic to human activity as has been claimed in an early post, then why spend so much time discussing it? If it is a fact, a tautology, it is not worth debating. Do we engage in endless discussions over the fact we have two legs instead of three?

 

The fact is you first state the obvious and then narrow the theory down and using the very "fungibility" of words, manage to substitute another reality for the one you first presented. This is precisely the way Mises proceeds. He first attempts to present his theory in the most

general framework so that one may not reject and then pharisaically modifies the semantics behind the words so as to push a specific agenda and

put forward specific beliefs.

 

Why is it that this one-size-fits-all category you call "the state" exists? why did it appear? what could prevent it from appearing ore reappearing if ever it is destroyed?

One might argue nothing is artificial. All proceeds from man's nature. Chaos as well as Order. The rise of "monopolies of authority and coercion" and their fall. One may say all of this is inexorable or cyclic.

 

I wonder whether your real intent is to promote "anarcho-capitalism" in the US (this system doesn't seem to have greatly benefited Russia over the last ten years or so, has it?) or rather to confuse people with "fungible" and nonsensical ideas.

[Anonymouse]

I don't know what your intention was with this little off topic deviation into the realm of making things fungible with relation to the discussion of the State and Anarchy.

 

Well I made it explicit. Maybe you should have read my post in the firstplace.

 

I will not engage further into this debate. There is nothing new in your dissertation, you are just rehashing the same propaganda like an automaton. Having no valid counter-arguments you write a 3-page message (which is not a response to mine although it appears to be) in order to drown the reader into an ocean of sophisms.

 

If anarchy is intrinsic to human activity as has been claimed in an early post, then why spend so much time discussing it? If it is a fact, a tautology, it is not worth debating. Do we engage in endless discussions over the fact we have two legs instead of three?

 

The fact is you first state the obvious and then narrow the theory down and using the very "fungibility" of words, manage to substitute another reality for the one you first presented. This is precisely the way Mises proceeds. He first attempts to present his theory in the most

general framework so that one may not reject and then pharisaically modifies the semantics behind the words so as to push a specific agenda and

put forward specific beliefs.

 

Why is it that this one-size-fits-all category you call "the state" exists? why did it appear? what could prevent it from appearing ore reappearing if ever it is destroyed?

One might argue nothing is artificial. All proceeds from man's nature. Chaos as well as Order. The rise of "monopolies of authority and coercion" and their fall. One may say all of this is inexorable or cyclic.

 

I wonder whether your real intent is to promote "anarcho-capitalism" in the US (this system doesn't seem to have greatly benefited Russia over the last ten years or so, has it?) or rather to confuse people with "fungible" and nonsensical ideas.

The discussion from the onset was something that eluded you. From my original argument the premises and the conclusion laid, there would have been a discussion but in fact you made it a tautology, just as in the thread regarding Armenian nation. Here you simply chose to "discard" my argument, simply because you didn't like it, and then from that rallying point there was no point for you to be in this discussion, yet you lingered. So by discarding my argument, you ensured yourself some sort of moral high ground and no need to discuss aside from tautological statements.

 

Then when that wasn't enough, you simply assumed things and made things elastic, accusing me of the same thing, just like with regard to Armenian nationalism, and that Armenian nationalism must have been a fact before nationalism was itself a fact - a gross distortion of history may I add. So in both instances when things do not fit your preconceived views, it is ipso facto obvious that you do not wish to engage in a sincere discussion, since obviously ideology and bias has more to do with your thought process, than an actual point by point discussion. Then I'm accused of writing too much, simply because you cannot follow or address the points which you yourself chose to turn into a tautology, or simply because you don't know me nor that I write alot, or maybe I'm assuming you are interested in this discussion when you aren't ( if taken to its logical consequences your view would mean there is no need to discuss anything since everything at some point is a tautology ).

 

When that is all said and done, you "will no longer respond to this thread" like in the previous thread. Anarchy is simply a fact of life, and if you bothered to discuss, you would see that all our actions are anarchic, that our everyday actions revolve around something of our own volition, not because of State sanctioned laws or legislations.

 

Your "critique" of Mises is very abstract and in fact I am not even sure what you are critiquing him on, and such is either the attempts to present yourself either somehow familiar with Mises, or simply a misconception. If you haven't read human action, there is no point in you to raise this issue. Even the social contract myth which you repeated is clear to you to have been a misconception.

 

When presented with the argument that the State was not always so, and in fact it was precisely because of lack of regulation that the capitalist revolution took off, you ignore it, but then you seem to come back and linger on the idea that "the State as always existed". The "State" is a modern creation, coined first by Machiavelli. Entropy and thermodynamics which deal with chaos and order, are not from "man", i.e. his actions. Perhaps indirectly, but man is simply working within those laws. You further fail to accept since you very well know that the States life flows from ideologies such as nationalism, which you defended to the bitter end in the other thread, antihistorically may I add.

 

Mises laid out that there is either private ownership in society, or public ownership, of these only one accompanies choice, and the other uses coercion. Socialism and Communism use coercion to achieve their ends. Thus you are in essence arguing for control, and that the individual to himself is not an individual from the whole, a Marxist twist in essence. As far as Russia, when you have had Communism from 1917 until very recently, that is tantamount to almost a century of moving backwards. The problems in Russia are precisely a result of too much regulation and creating a big beaurocratic base thanks to the State.

 

I defined the "State" for you in my argument which you chose to "discard", yet you offered to other alternative definition. I delved into the theory of private production for security, you chose to not discuss that either, then you respond with tautology. Clearly you are incapable of any rational discussion here. So to start all over I will define the State in the hopes that you actually respond this time, and not "discard" it simply because it gives you a crack in your edifice of thought.

 

A State is defined as a territorial monopoly of force and ultimate decision making in the event of conflict (including conflicts involving itself) and implied in this power is its ability to tax ( you have no choice thus you have coercion )to determine unilaterally the price that those seeking justice must pay for its services. Now like I said, if you wish to provide a counter argument, you must show that somehow nothing will happen to you if you don't pay your tax. But even if you insist that you are happy with your paying taxes, what about those that don't want to or are not happy? The victims of the State have been 200 million people in the 20th century alone. You pretty much ignored this part. I'm afraid that discussing this with you would be a miracle. Adieu.

[Anileve]

Anon, can you brief me on the formation of the first state government and origins of Nationalism? It's pretty difficult to trace back the origins, yet I vaguely remember you mentioning the first state in Germany to be an official founder of the modern system of governance. And then again, my memory fails me. My skepticism regarding the “myth of Nationalism” is still in effect, so please elaborate.

 

But please for the sake of the Starry Night, can you please refrain from your prized words such as: collectivism, the masses, conditioning and any other views that are formulated to incorporate your resentment of government. Just facts in a nutshell please.

[Anonymouse]

Based on the above definition of the State being a territorial monopoly of violence ( in my previous post ), it is therefore easy to understand why founding a State would be necessary. Anyone who is a monopolist of power in that given territory can make laws in their own favor. Thus it is clear why the State exists. And if you can legislation, you can also tax, thus taxation is income guaranteed, whereas everyone else has to LABOR for their income, government workers, politicians get their income via coercion, even if they choose to do a lousy job or not, thereby lowering quality and increasing chances of corruption. So taxation is living off the expense or labor of others. It is theft, but our political conditioning will not allow us to call it theft.

 

Then there's the question of why and how do people allow such an entity to get away with it? This is where the Hegelian Dialect of thesis, antithesis, synthesis comes into effect. Create a problem, then offer a solution. All States come into existence via violence and not through a "peaceful" "Social Contract" has Hobbes and those of his persuasion might contend. A natural order exists outside of the State, in which people cooperate with one another. It is important to note that there will always be murder, theft and robbery, that is not sufficient for an argument in favor of the State. However, if humans were all evil then it is clear civilization wouldn't have come about this far, and if we were always at each others "throats" then we would have died out long ago, but we haven't, which shows that at some levle the human being is a rational animal able to cooperate for his self seeking ends.

 

To make a State appear necessary, those soon to be Statists would have to create a problem, then offer a solution. This is when some members of the social elite, or any other group incite the lower class, those that do not property against the property owners. In this chaos, the State then comes to rescue those private property owners. In other words the State would create chaos to justify its existence, and would then, lo and behold come out and make "peace" between the warring groups. In that sense, Democracy, Fascism, Communism, are all socialistic since they are all premised on the same idea of ruling via coercive means. It is also here that nationalism came into play, e.g. French Revolution, and its relation to Democracy. Thus Nationalism became attached to the State, as one if its tools ( ideologies ) for lumping the masses together, and educational institutions did the rest teaching "national history", getting people to identify themselves with this "nation", and that somehow the "nations" interests are served by the State. I cannot recommend enough Patrick Geary's "The Myth of Nations" as that is perhaps one of the foremost sources on how this development of nations came about.

 

So once the State has come about it will supress the riot and looting that it helped incite in the first place. At the same time it doesn't want to be too successful fighting against looting or crime, since that is what justifies its existence for the alleged need of the State. Another characteristic of the State is to ensure gun control laws, or if things come to worse case scenario, they would banish gun ownership, this way, the State ensuring that it would have a subservient unarmed population which will not dissent or rebel.

 

Of course, angel4hope brought up an interesting point in her thread in the other section of this forum regarding Mill and Utilitarianism, for at some point this intercets with what is going on here.

[axel]

Anarchy is simply a fact of life, and if you bothered to discuss, you would see that all our actions are anarchic, that our everyday actions revolve around something of our own volition

 

Yet another example of your not reading my response!

 

If anarchy is intrinsic to human activity as has been claimed in an early post, then why spend so much time discussing it? If it is a fact, a tautology, it is not worth debating. Do we engage in endless discussions over the fact we have two legs instead of three?

 

I am not saying here anarchy is not intrinsic to human activity. I do not know. But the "anarchy is natural" argument for justifying "anarchy" (and here is where you use the "fungibility" of the word to push forward a particular system ie anarcho-capitalism) is simply invalid. One may argue that everything that exists is "natural" so that the "State" itself is. My argument is metahistorical. It seems to me you mix metahistory with history which is why you do not get my point.

 

You are too much influenced by western thought and ideas, by the very enlightenment mindset you pretend to reject. You do not understand my ideas for you judge them according to a framework they do not fit in. You made an allusion to the "nationalism" thread. Well I thought TB's counter-arguments would have convinced you of the inanity of your "treaty".

 

I am not an ideologist btw. In fact, I've already said on this board that "the end doesn't justify the means". I am rational but I am not rationalistic. I do not have faith in "Reason". The atrocities of the twentieth centuries are not to be related with the "state" (that is too superficial an analysis) but with the triumph of ideologies based upon the belief that "Reason" should organize society. Well Man does not fit into all these systems or rational frameworks, Man is too large (I would advise you to read Dostoevsky). The pretention of reason to organize society which is the essence of enlightenment thought, this very pretention I somewhat find in your thought. I am not a partisan of the impersonal state or of democracy.I thought you would have understood from my prior posts. Or maybe you have and pretend not to, which is more likely, for you do not seem to be dumb.

[axel]

A natural order exists outside of the State, in which people cooperate with one another

 

Could you give us a historical example?

 

The feudal system was itself based on a form of "social contract". Peasants accepted the sovereignty of a lord in return for protection. Implicit contracts existed in early societies too.

Edited January 28, 2004 by axel

[bellthecat]

Axel and Anonymous - would you enlighten the rest of us by telling us what you mean by the rather mushroomy sounding term "fungible" that you are both using rather often? In my dictionary it just means "moveable perishable goods"!

[axel]

fungible (from fungus?) I understand it as twistable. Really imagé. I like the word.

[Anonymouse]

Could you give us a historical example?

 

The feudal system was itself based on a form of "social contract". Peasants accepted the sovereignty of a lord in return for protection. Implicit contracts existed in early societies too.

After the collapse of the Carolingian empire, the peasants found themselves victims of continuous invasions of barbarians, of other entities. It was therefore obvious many peasants would seek a lords protection from other lords or invaders. However, this then gave many other lords an impetus to act on the peasants. Whereas some naturally sought protection, the lords became like the mafia, making them an 'offer they can't refuse'. There still remained no monopoly, as the State is under feudalism, that is why it was fragmented and localized, and we had no total war.

 

Contracts exist in the marketplace where in order to gain on cooperates. All contracts in the marketplace, in our everyday lives are voluntary, from our choosing to go to work, or watering the plants, or dealing with our neighbor. Only the State in related to the individual is not voluntary, and once again, we have reached a tautology, that no State has come into existence by peaceful means, and comparing the State to feudal lords is like comparing apples to oranges. There is no working model of any State coming into existence by peaceful means. On the contrary, every history corner we look at we can see States coming into existence via violence.

[Anonymouse]

Yet another example of your not reading my response!

 

 

 

I am not saying here anarchy is not intrinsic to human activity. I do not know. But the "anarchy is natural" argument for justifying "anarchy" (and here is where you use the "fungibility" of the word to push forward a particular system ie anarcho-capitalism) is simply invalid. One may argue that everything that exists is "natural" so that the "State" itself is. My argument is metahistorical. It seems to me you mix metahistory with history which is why you do not get my point.

 

You are too much influenced by western thought and ideas, by the very enlightenment mindset you pretend to reject. You do not understand my ideas for you judge them according to a framework they do not fit in. You made an allusion to the "nationalism" thread. Well I thought TB's counter-arguments would have convinced you of the inanity of your "treaty".

 

I am not an ideologist btw. In fact, I've already said on this board that "the end doesn't justify the means". I am rational but I am not rationalistic. I do not have faith in "Reason". The atrocities of the twentieth centuries are not to be related with the "state" (that is too superficial an analysis) but with the triumph of ideologies based upon the belief that "Reason" should organize society. Well Man does not fit into all these systems or rational frameworks, Man is too large (I would advise you to read Dostoevsky). The pretention of reason to organize society which is the essence of enlightenment thought, this very pretention I somewhat find in your thought. I am not a partisan of the impersonal state or of democracy.I thought you would have understood from my prior posts. Or maybe you have and pretend not to, which is more likely, for you do not seem to be dumb.

Now you assume that I am influenced by Western thought and Enlightenment and that I pretend to reject it, which I reject. The only thing that I adhere to, which can perhaps be attributed to the Enlightenment, is liberty, but even that is something that exceeded the Enlightenment, and on can argue was only revitalized during the Enlightenment. Going into the mechanics of reason and faith, are not the goal here for faith begins where reason ends and to presuppose reason at every corner would be faulty. However with that said, it is not solely reason or the following of reason that has caused the destruction of the 20th century, one can make a case that it was blind faith in these ideas espouded by man. It makes no difference, for whatever we attribute to, it is literally the consequences of ideas from the Enlightenment, from Democracy and Nationalism of the French Revolution, or Marxism and Communism; it is clear that ideas have consequences. All political systems are based on collective thinking and mass mindedness in which we sacrifice our individual selves, to the collective herd, which is characteristic of our "Democracy". So by identifying allegiance with one of these groups created within the political system, on the left or right of the political spectrum, it virtually pits us against another group. Political systems are all based on collective thinking, no matter if it is a democratic government, a communist, fascist or what have you. History teaches us that it is only the individual that has the ability to think, to mourn, to laugh, to invent and create and express his soul through art and music. Governments, institutions and political systems have no soul nor spirit, they are lifeless entities that exist because of our willingness to sacrifice our individualism to collectivism. Ergo, it is by individuals attaching themselves to the State and mass mindedness and to these political systems, that the State was able to reap the havoc of 200 million lives in the 20th century. This is not a result of reason. Indeed, reason would mean that we have the ability to rationalize and question.

 

Political beliefs reflect how someone thinks men should relate to one another and they offer a practical insight into how one views humanity at large and himself in particular, that is what fascism, democracy, communism all have in common. Any given person, if alligned with any political belief, believes in a certain ideology and how it should be applied to everyone, in essence telling your neighbors how to live, after all that is what politics is about, telling people what to do. In fact, if you believe that "this or that should be done" to "get people to think this way or that way", you are thinking in political and majoritarian terms. In any given situation humans react in two different ways, either voluntarily or coercively. It is widely believed that a group has certain rights that individuals do not, a mistaken belief might I add. So this thinking implies that any group from the KKK, to lynch mobs, to the mafia, to the local gang, the IRA, or even a government, all have rights that individuals don't. They all believe that they can use force if necessary and when they see fit and like governments get away with it. When individuals do so, they are criminalized. Nevermind that the group, any collective group (includes anything from lynch mobs to the State ) all have caused more damage and killed more people than individuals could have any other day working by themselves and not aligned with any group.

 

Do you see how we think differently when we think about collective groups and about individuals? You might think of this as an unworthy example because the IRA or KKK are not like the government in that they aren't "legal" but aside from man made law, all it boils down to is the use of force the group can exert. So, with that said, one can see that force is the essence of government, and even worse, having a monopoly on force, they need a territory, and maintaining control of it is considered a successful government. One wonders if any terrorist organization would be legitimate if it had its own territory.

[Anonymouse]

Here is another article that I thought was brilliant by Butler Shaffer and I'll share it with you all.

---------------

 

Unchaining Liberty

by Butler Shaffer

 

My two most recent articles – "What Is Anarchy?" and "Save the Universe!" – struck nerves with a few readers of admittedly libertarian persuasions. While some critics offered valid, intelligent questions, a number reflected a common attitude best described as a fear of unsupervised life processes. It is this fear that leads far too many self-proclaimed champions of liberty to remain what I call "umbilical cord libertarians." They enjoy playing around with ideas of liberty, but are terrified by the existential implications of living without some external supervision. While desirous of expanding the range of their own decision-making, they insist on retaining the state "just in case."

 

Friedrich Hayek addressed what he called the "fear of trusting uncontrolled social forces." Many of those who criticized my views on anarchy and environmentalism, reflect this fear. Some suggest that, in the absence of state regulation, there would be a total breakdown of social order, with looting, killing, and violence running rampant. One reader went so far as to point to the "widespread looting" that took place in Iraq as evidence that "anarchy and property rights cannot peacefully coexist;" a statement made all the more remarkable by the fact that such behavior followed days of heavy bombing and shelling of Baghdad by forces of the American government! For the state to systematically create widespread destruction and disorder, and to have that offered as evidence of the failure of anarchy, represents the kind of twisted reasoning we have come to expect from the White House!

 

Others suggested that it is the fear of punishment that causes us to obey state rules; that coercion would continue to exist even if there were no political systems (a point I had made in the first article); that an anarchistic society could not "work" because most people would not be prepared for it; and that something called "human nature" would preclude such a system. Such thinking presumes that it would be catastrophic for individuals to exercise complete control over their own lives, but quite reasonable for the state to enjoy a monopoly of such powers over the lives of us all in order to define the purposes and limits of human action. Such a view is underlain by a contradiction rarely addressed in political philosophy. It assumes that the same men and women who are not to be trusted in the management of their own affairs, will suddenly be transformed into selfless servants of an alleged "public interest" when cloaked with the mantle of state authority! Such faith can be maintained only by minds unburdened both by a study of history as well as an awareness that the self-interest that invariably drives us all is a force only to be trusted in the hands of private individuals, and never in coercive collectives.

 

Critics of my more humorous swipe at politically-driven environmentalists were quick to suggest that I had a calloused view of nature (as though I had no interest in maintaining conditions conducive to life on earth). One very thoughtful reader told me that "nature is to be cherished" because it "is our most direct connection to the divine spirit." Others pointed to the need to control those (particularly corporate enterprises) who dump industrial wastes into rivers or pollutants into the air, activities that constitute trespasses to property boundaries.

 

Those who insist upon the existence of the state in order to protect people from murderers, thieves, and rapists – a function that even the most powerful state apparatus in history has failed to adequately perform – or to protect nature from private decision-making, reflect Hayek’s concern. We are conditioned through the schools, the media, the state, and other institutions to fear our own autonomy, and to transfer control over our behavior to external agencies. Schools instruct us in what we need to learn; churches define and guide our spiritual quests; the media informs us what we need to know and what actions we should take; the state prescribes, in the smallest detail, the propriety of our conduct, and punishes us for any deviations. We have been well trained in the proposition that others will take the responsibility for our behavior, and that our only role is to conform ourselves to these mandates.

 

This conditioning is reinforced by periodic episodes of fear generated by institutional authorities, who inform us of dangers we face from seemingly endless sources. We have learned to not only fear others (e.g., murderers, child-abductors, terrorists, racists, polluters) but our own capacities for self-direction. The ease with which the state, after 9/11, was able to mobilize the fears of millions of Americans into a mass-minded frenzy supportive of unprovoked war and unrestrained police powers, is testimony to the symbiotic relationship between state power and individual weakness.

 

Fear puts us in conflict with both others and ourselves. This is how political systems prosper: by promising to regulate and reconcile the conflicts generated by divisive, political thinking! We have been conditioned to define our sense of responsibility by our willingness to participate in this conflict-ridden enterprise; to employ our energies on behalf of political solutions to political conflict. By our so doing, we become the very problem we believe we are working to overcome.

 

We deplore the crime in society, and call upon the state to tax and police our neighbors in order to end such violence, unaware that the forcible policies of the state produce violence. We despise bigotry, and call upon the state to punish those who judge others by their race. To bring about such ends, we create "affirmative action" programs and, in the process, become racists ourselves. In the name of respecting the sanctity of human life, we insist upon capital punishment for murderers, a practice that further degrades human life. We have a new respect for nature, and call upon the state to take action against those whose behavior violates our sense of environmental propriety. We thus put ourselves in conflict with our neighbors and, in so doing, diminish the mutual respect upon which a peaceful and orderly social environment depends.

 

Is it possible for us to break this cycle of social conflict in any other way than for each one of us to withdraw our energies from the process? Can we discover the creative power of change that comes only from within each of us? So consistently has our thinking been embedded in notions of collective power, that most of us are unable to imagine anything so bold as a self-directed form of living. We forget a basic truth that should be evident to any libertarian versed in economics: life functions at the margin. We are born and we die individually. All learning and creativity take place at the margin between the known and the unknown, the established and the novel. We derive our understanding of the world through marginal changes and deviations from the norm (geneticists have a saying: "cherish your mutations"). The study of economics employs marginal utility analysis, and addresses the effects of marginal changes in prices. Even the protection of our lives and property from criminal acts – a function we delude ourselves that the state can perform for us – ultimately depends on our individual defenses against the criminal. Most importantly, perhaps, is the need for each of us to remember that only the individual is the carrier of life on earth.

 

One of the common themes that runs through readers’ responses to my articles is the sense that, while our individual thinking must change if we are to live in peace and liberty, there is little point in focusing upon such methods as long as others remain attached to statist thinking. "I will not change if others do not," would be a succinct way of encapsulating such responses. Their inquiries usually go on to ask: "in the meantime, what can we do?"

 

What such readers fail to grasp is this essential point: the only way to bring about such changes is to return to the source of the violence and repression that afflicts us: our individual thinking. The query "what can we do?" usually comes down to the question "what can someone else, particularly someone in authority, do to change all of this?" The answer is very clear: there is nothing anyone else can do to end our self-destructive attachments to statism. Because such change originates, marginally, only within our minds, you and I are the only ones who can bring that about. But to do so requires us to confront and break out of the mindset to which we have been conditioned.

 

I am fond of quoting Carl Jung on this point, because his writing focuses upon the psychological transformations that must occur if we are to transcend the fears and the violence that are tearing apart our world. He states:

 

if the individual is not truly regenerated in spirit, society cannot be either, for society is the sum total of individuals in need of redemption. I can therefore see it only as a delusion when the Churches try – as apparently they do – to rope the individual into some social organization and reduce him to a condition of diminished responsibility, instead of raising him out of the torpid, mindless mass and making clear to him that he is the one important factor and that the salvation of the world consists in the salvation of the individual soul.

 

Jung’s message underlies my previous two articles to which this one is addressed. Our freedom is inseparably tied to the responsibility we have for both our thinking and actions, a connection that goes to the question of control over our lives. It is only in a system of privately owned property that such qualities coalesce. Individual liberty is a social condition in which each of us enjoys unrestrained decision-making over what is ours, while peace arises from the practice of individuals limiting the scope of their decision-making to the boundaries of their property interests. The anarchistic system of which I write is premised upon the self-ordering nature of private property: I do as I please with what is mine to own and control; I control my actions so as to refrain from extending my decision-making over what is yours. This is where we must begin our inquiry into such offenses as victimizing crimes and environmental pollution: they are intrusions upon the property interests of others; they are trespasses, the failure to respect the inviolability of boundaries.

 

 

It should be evident that a system of private property fosters responsibility. If I, alone, control my actions, I, alone, am responsible for what I do. This is not a moral proposition, but a causal one, in much the same way that we can say a tornado was responsible for destroying Uncle Charlie’s barn. But to be responsible is to be accountable, particularly to the harshest critic we face in life: ourselves.

 

Most of us fear this sense of responsibility, which is why individual liberty is such a troublesome proposition to so many people. Walter Kaufmann has written of "decidophobia," the fear of making decisions. If we delude ourselves that we have no control over our lives, then we cannot be held responsible. And if we are not responsible for what we do – even to ourselves – then we must be the victims of other people’s decision-making. Is it any wonder that men and women who, having smoked cigarettes for fifty years and developed lung cancer, now want to sue the tobacco companies for the consequences of their own actions, or that alcoholics seek damages from distillers for their cirrhosis of the liver? A recent news story told of a man who brought suit against his local cable television company for turning himself and his family into television addicts! Do you not see the connection between the continuing diminution, by the state, of respect for privately-owned property, and the rise of the "victimization" industry?

 

If we are to live in peace and liberty, our efforts must be focused upon the only factor within our control to change without generating conflict with others, namely, ourselves? Those who profess such values, but then declare – at least implicitly – "I will not change if others do not," express a convenient way of avoiding responsibility for their lives. After all, what will cause others to change if those who verbalize their support for liberty are not prepared to do so in their own lives?

 

Such changes must include a willingness on our part to examine our fears, particularly the fears of living in a world of autonomous social forces; fears of ourselves and others. We might begin with a healthy skepticism of those who seek to extend their power over our lives by a daily introduction, via the media, of new hordes of bogeymen waiting at the city gates to invade our lives, and whose intrusions can be countered only by extended regulatory authority over our lives. We might then lose our innocence about all political systems and see them for what they have always been: mechanisms by which self-anointed elites control the lives of the rest of us.

 

To those readers who, despite my clear expressions, continue to ask: "what can we do?" to reduce statism in our lives, let me offer one minor contribution each one of us can make to this end: whenever you see a news story or hear a politician addressing some "social issue," insist that such issue be redefined for what it is, namely, an invasion of a private property interest. Clarify in your own thinking and that of your friends that "taxation" does not involve an "allocation of society’s resources," but is an act of theft, by the state, of private property; that the "war on drugs" is a war against self-ownership; that all forms of government regulation of economic activity involve attacks upon the private property of some persons for the benefit of others.

 

As you begin to clarify your own thinking, you may find yourself increasingly attracted to methods of handling disputes with others in ways that (a) do not involve the use of state coercion to accomplish desired ends and, thus, foster the social peace that comes from respecting the inviolability of others’ property interests; and, ( extend the range of your capacities to manage your own life and its inherent problems.

 

To the aforementioned environmentalist who spoke of the need to cherish nature, bear in mind that mankind is also an expression of nature’s wonder, and needs nothing so much right now as the removal of those restraints that compel people to become what they do not choose to be. Try respecting the "divine spirit" as it manifests itself in your neighbor by respecting the inviolability of his property boundaries. If it is your desire to save the kangaroo rat, or a wetland belonging to a farmer, show such respect by negotiating with him, voluntarily, rather than calling upon the state to coerce his obedience to your vision. In so doing, you may end up not only preserving a species or a wetland, but humanity itself.

 

January 29, 2004

 

Butler Shaffer teaches at the Southwestern University School of Law.