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Anarcho-Capitalists: I'm Calling You Out

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Agent_Grey

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All right, it has been a bunch of threads now, and they all seem to come to a screeching halt from your side when I press you on the issue of the rule of law and law enforcement.

I understand the idea of having a privately provided security force in lieu of any form of government involvement, but what I do not see is what keeps that force from engendering all the very things that you feel are wrong about existing societies' police.

So lay it out here. Let's really talk about this one.
 
Hey, don't just limit it to anarcho-capitalists. Any form of anarchism has this problem one way or the other.
 
Harshaw said:
Hey, don't just limit it to anarcho-capitalists. Any form of anarchism has this problem one way or the other.
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Fair enough, but as I'm calling out more specific individuals, I wanted to aim it more at their flavor of choice.
 

I've pointed this out before: in the absence of other government, those with the largest quantity/quality of organized armed force tend to become the gov't. Witness the robber barons of the early middle ages, after the fall of Rome, who over time legitimized themselves as Kings, Dukes and so on.
 

Obviously I'm in agreement. I just wanted to give them a chance to explain themselves on this issue.

I'm sick of having threads burst in on with these arrogant, snarky posts insisting that things would so OBVIOUSLY be better in the absence of government without any actual arguments to back it up, particularly on this issue.
 

The problem is, I've yet to see anyone who suggested any form of anarchy who could really defend their views, they seem to live in a magic land where everyone is going to automatically be happy and peaceful and play fair and we all know that's just not realistic. The people who are the most powerful are going to seek more power, they're going to take over and create their own fiefdom. In the absence of any single governmental system, people who ideologically agree with each other are going to naturally band together and create their own governments. In a few short years, if that, you'll no longer have anarchy, you'll have a fledgling repeat of what we have today.

These people just don't comprehend human nature.
 

In bold. I have also said this, and this is the demise of their entire presentation.
 
Harshaw said:
Hey, don't just limit it to anarcho-capitalists. Any form of anarchism has this problem one way or the other.
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Not necessarily. Any too individualist anarchist system would. Social anarchism and similar would solve such things using such devices as federated local and regional communes balanced by federated voluntary and occupational associations. Obviously there is the question of just whether this constitutes a "gov't".
 
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CaptainCourtesy said:
In bold. I have also said this, and this is the demise of their entire presentation.
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I don't know, I think that Proudhon, Kropotkin and Landauer for a start have almost as good a grasp of human nature as anyone. They perhaps neglected authority a little too much, though they still had enough respect for benign, decentralised forms. It is there followers post-1960 and other individualist types of anarchists who really don't grasp human nature.
 
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From a standpoint of understanding how human nature affects human behavior both as individuals and in groups, these three were very naive. Their idealist positions do not reflect the realities of human nature, so I very much disagree with your assertion.
 
What I never understood is their belief that the capitalist market is self sustaining. For free market compeition to occur, the framework for free markets must exist. In an anarchistic society, there is absolutely nothing preventing players from modifying or even completely removing the free market framework and replace it with something extremely unfree. In a sense, their beliefs are self defeating. Their beliefs destroy what they seek to create.
 
But do you actually understand or know much about what they believed in? In my experience most who attack anarchism don't know much about it, the general assumption in this thread is already towards the marginal individualist kind for instance. Although I doubt you're so lacking in knowledge as the usual criticisers CC. I'm not saying there are no criticisms of it, I'm not an anarchist and have my own criticisms, just that a lot you often come across are rather lacking in knowledge of the ideology.

Decentralised groupings have been the normal forms of human association for most people for most of human history, so I don't think you can call them particularly naive or out of touch with human history and through it human nature. They have there flaws, I'm no anarchist myself, but I don't think some of the usual objections like they have no idea of human nature are valid assertions when you are familiar with their ideas.
 
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Most anarchists are communists or collectivists it is worth pointing out.

However I agree with you about the above as a critique of a lot of ancapism.
 
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I have some understanding of what they believed in; I've read some, but not in depth information. What I know is that the idealized version of pretty much any socio-political ideology is doomed to fail because of human psychology, and radical theorists, like these three tend to forget that. I know a bit more about Krompkin and Proudhon then Landauer, but what I know of the first two, applies. Now, if their practical visions alter from their idealized visions, that could alter my position, but everything I've seen tends to make me believe that they steadfastly hold to the idealized notions of their visions of society. And these visions do not reflect how human psychology would prevent them from materializing, or alter them, dramatically, if they did.


If they do have an understanding of human nature and human psychology, their theories do not reflect that.
 
Before I can really reply to this it would certainly help if I knew just what you understand their idealised positions to be?
 
Agent_Grey said:
All right, it has been a bunch of threads now, and they all seem to come to a screeching halt from your side when I press you on the issue of the rule of law and law enforcement.
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I don't have the time / mental energy to keep up with all of the threads all of the time, especially since being on this forum is supposed to be a relaxing experience for me after a hard day of coding. I will catch up with all threads... eventually... :roll:

I have at least started to address the issues of NAP, [ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polycentric_law"]polycentric law[/ame], [ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_defense_agency"]private defense agencies[/ame], contract law, restitution, ostracism, and so forth...



No free market entity can have the "divine right" to initiate aggression that everyone has been brainwashed to believe the governments have. This means private security has no special powers except to aid in self-defense, which includes the defense of their client's property and the enforcement of explicitly-announced rules on that property (ex. no [ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shouting_fire_in_a_crowded_theater"]shouting fire[/ame] in this particular theater).

They can't come onto your property without your permission, unless of course they have evidence that you've initiated aggression against one of their clients, which they better be damn sure about because if they turn out to be wrong then they've initiated aggression against you, and thus owe you restitution. When was the last time police paid anyone restitution for screwing something up?

Furthermore, private security is subject to competition. You deice what security services you hire. If you don't like the security services hired by a neighborhood association, don't move there. If you don't like the security guard at your bank, you can tell the banker that that's the reason you're canceling your account, and if enough customers do that the bank will probably switch to a different security company. Etc. This creates natural selection that leads not only to better security cost-effectiveness, but to better customer service as well.

But if the government police screws you - you're screwed. It's like that line toward the end of Braveheart, it matters not that you never pledged loyalty to him, he's still your king.


Harshaw said:
Hey, don't just limit it to anarcho-capitalists. Any form of anarchism has this problem one way or the other.
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Anarcho-Capitalists are not anarchists! Chickpeas are not chicken!
 
Wessexman said:
Before I can really reply to this it would certainly help if I knew just what you understand their idealised positions to be?
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Firstly, I agree with your assessment that most anarchists are actually communists or collectivists.

For Proudhon, a society where there is no land-ownership, or at least where property is equally distributed; a lack of profit in industry and the workforce.

For Krompkin, a society based entirely on mutual aid and mutual protection.

I am less familiar with Landauer but I believe his society would be one similar to Proudhons from a land ownership standpoint. He also points to a society with no power base and no individual egocentrism.

This is how I understand these theories would view their ideal societies...in very basic terms.
 
(My apologies for the links in the last post - I keep forgetting to uncheck those checkboxes in "Miscellaneous Options", and then the forum went down and when it was back it was too late to edit. Is there a simple way to have those boxes unchecked by default, or do I have to whip up another greasemonkey script?)


Cephus said:
These people just don't comprehend human nature.
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Greed, territoriality (i.e. property rights), and preference for explicit relationships (i.e. family & friends) over strangers are parts of human nature. Being brainwashed by governments isn't.



I have already addressed that numerous times, and there are many good books that deal with that issue in great detail.
 
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Well I could go into details but I'm lazy and its been a very hot and humid day here.
So I'll put it more briefly.

Firstly I agree that some of their ideas are flawed but I don't think the above, perhaps excluding the description of Kropotkin's ideas on mutuality which I will get to later, constitute a complete naivety on human nature or anything like that, particularly when studied indepth. There is certainly a lot more grasp of human nature than many more individualist classical and social liberal seem to show imho. Proudhon's ideas on land for instance could be considered to have flaws but I wouldn't say the flaws show anything like a complete lack of a grasp of human nature.

That description of Kropotkin's views do however verge on the naive but I don't think he actually quite believed such. He was a bit too enthusiastic about the good qualities in human nature and neglectful of the bad, I agree, but I don't for a minute think he thought removing the state would induce a state where everyone was not very self-interested and that altruism was far from all that in his opinion to maintain a good society.

I too have not read much by Landauer himself but I have read Paths to Utopia by his friend Martin Buber, which amongst other things goes into his, Kropotkin's and others view on human society(Buber is keen to recall the pluralist or communitarian ethic in anarchism and Utopian socialism and its insistence on the need for association for human individuality, freedom and order similar to what the conservatives like Burke and classical liberals like De Tocqueville said.), and personally from that I would say that he had the keenest of all grasps of human nature of the classical anarchists, though I'd have to read more his own work to be sure.
 
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Alex Libman said:
Anarcho-Capitalists are not anarchists!
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What does this mean?

I have already addressed that numerous times, and there are many good books that deal with that issue in great detail.
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Sorry mate but I have never seen you deal with this, nor actually do I know of any anarcho-capitalist actually dealing with it and I have some familiarity with the subject. Ancapism does usually incorporate the most extreme and absurd atomistically individualist tendencies of classical liberalism.
 
Wessexman said:
What does this mean?
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Exactly what it says - Anarcho-Capitalism has nothing to do with anarchy. It is a philosophy based on free market capitalism that takes minarchism to its logical conclusion: full decentralization of all governance. It has absolutely nothing to do with the anarchist movement that rejects globalization / technology / property rights.



You do know that those underlined words are links that can be can be clicked with your mouse, right?
 

Agreed. I once had a debate with a self-proclaimed anarcho-capitalist who seemed to think that in an anarchist system, we'd still have an agreed upon system of currency and that everyone would universally agree on it's value and usage. Why? Magic, I guess. :roll:
 
Alex Libman said:
Greed, territoriality (i.e. property rights), and preference for explicit relationships (i.e. family & friends) over strangers are parts of human nature. Being brainwashed by governments isn't.
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Humans are inherently social creatures, they gather together in like-minded groups and set up hierarchies that, whether we like it or not, become governments. Apparently, anarcho-capitalists think that humans who are naturally greedy, territorial and want to be surrounded by a particular group of people are going to treat the out-groups equally and fairly in trade relationships, military encounters, etc... because...

Well, they can't satisfactorily explain that one.
 

That isn't a part of serious AnCap theory. The natural and the ideal solution is to have free competition between currencies: those backed by precious metals and other commodities, as well as those backed by contractual obligations made by banks. Competition will make unscheduled inflation next to impossible, because as soon as one issuer of currency breaks its promise everyone will switch to other currencies.

On-going advances in information technology will make real-time currency conversion very convenient. For online shopping it's just a select box that controls how prices are displayed on the site (or a Web browser setting that's passed in the HTTP request header, which can already be used to tell the site your preferred language, etc). For physical shopping it's pretty easy as well, since it's a good idea to review neutral info for all products you're thinking of buying via your smartphone, and then there are electronic price-tags, shopping carts with screens that display your totals via built-in screens that read RFID tags of everything in your cart, etc.


Cephus said:
Humans are inherently social creatures, they gather together in like-minded groups and set up hierarchies that, whether we like it or not, become governments.
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It doesn't become a "government" unless there's aggression involved - that's the defining feature of what a "government" is and isn't! Without force it called a family or a clan, a club, a corporation, a non-profit organization, a church, a secular ethical authority, a foundation, a neighborhood association (which can be as big as Singapore), a university, a private nature preserve, a local business alliance, etc - all those things are the building blocks of an Anarcho-Capitalist society.



Because they don't like getting shot or paying / working off restitution, which is the natural consequence of initiating aggression, or being ostracized, which is the natural consequence of other annoying / antisocial behavior?


Look, the level of cognitive dissonance you are exhibiting right now is astonishing... You need to step back, get some fresh air or something, massage your head or whatever it takes, re-read my post history (where I've already addressed most of the issues people keep bringing up), think real hard, and come up with a challenge to Anarcho-Capitalism that's at least coherent...
 
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How do you avoid having your anarcho-capitalist utopia invaded and annexed by centrally organized armies of the statists? Without an organized army, you would be prey to your neighbors.
 
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