Scary.
If someone is not directly linked to the government, or has commited a crime, their property is safe. If I made more money because of the minimum wage law than I otherwise would have am I a criminal? Can my property be homestead?
These people think so.
Of course, this redistribution is not based on libertarianism. Its just repackaged socialist redistrubtion. Libertarianism says a person is liable proportional to their crime, this redistribution wants to declare certain classes of property owners to be devoid of any rights. Property is not returned to the victims, but instead declared “common wealth” free for the taking.
My main complaint about agorism is its emphasis on violent revolution, probably due to its links to communism. The idea that the “market” response to government is full scale military conflict is rather stupid.
Government will cease to be because of the market of ideas, not the market for guns.
As far as I understand it, agorists seek to displace, not violently oppose, the government. At any rate the modus operandi seems to be to wrest from it the market at large, to the extent that when it finally reacts it has nothing but shaky foundations to act with. Agorists feel free to correct me.
-Jon
How is Agorism linked to Communism? To my knowledge, not all Agorists view the market as responding to the government with a full scale military conflict as the answer (possibly because they would be crushed?), and I don’t remember any posting here saying so either.
Agorism does not advocate violent revolution. It is a phased application of civil disobedience to the economy to the extent that it is in bed with the state; economic secession. The state will cease to be because of the inertia of the market in general, and this can only rise from the bottom up. That’s the point.
Agorism is not linked to communism. I have no idea where you got that impression.
If we can’t identify the victims and return it, I see no reason that the current owner is more entitled to it than anyone else.
Your minimum wage example is a bad straw man that doesn’t follow at all.
It is not state-socialist redistribution; it’s not even legislative. According to libertarian institutional analysis, not all currently existing property titles are just, especially those of the state itself. None of the state agents legitimately “own” any of it. You do realize that the transformation from the status quo to a free society will have the effect of redistributing property away from unjust owners, correct?
Furthermore, I fail to see how the alternative of literally trying to quotally redistribute (you don’t want to call it that, but that’s what it is) state-held property back to the individual tax-payers in proportion to what was originally taken from them is not a gigantic welfare redistribution scheme in and of itself? And highly impractical, for that simply cannot be calculated and is nullified intergenerationally.
Agorist Class Theory was explicitly derived from Marxist class theory, as far as I know. Though it also explicitly incorporated free markets, there seems to still be a lot of collectivist-left influence, at least in attitude and the tendency toward “revolutionary” rhetoric.
As to the (re)appropriation of property through homesteading, I’m all for it if the present “owner” is not legitimate, and the property can be said to be “unowned”. However, there’s a deep, dark rabbit-hole you can go down in pursuing the definition of “unowned” that will lead to a lot of trouble if done recklessly. And it almost certainly would be done recklessly, judging by the original source and other opinions I’ve read.
First, the definition of “legitimate” ownership. For instance, just because my land was originally and illegitimately delineated by the state’s drawing lines on a map, does not mean that I (or the original builder, whatever) did not properly homestead that land.
Second, if the land is said to be stolen, the orignal owner, or his heir, or assign, has to come and make a claim. Land is owned individually, none of this “common heritage of the [insert oppressed group here] people”. When a claim is made by an individual, somebody will have to help them figure out who has the better claim, or they can fight it out amongst themselves. I don’t really care which, unless it’s my land, then I’m keeping it, come hell or high water.
Third, if you want to homestead a stretch of Interstate 90 and claim it’s yours now because it was unowned due to having been acquired by theft, have at it. You’re probably right, except for the prior easement claims of every driver that’s ever driven over it. Just don’t go claiming to be doing it on my behalf, because you ain’t. And don’t go drawing lines on a map and calling it “homesteading”. Just as in the second case, there’s no “the people” to make a land claim collectively. An individual has to have boots on the ground at the point in question to be a homesteader, otherwise, he’s just another wannabe state - except probably a little easier to dispose of.
Yup. That’s just the kind of recklessness I spoke of. Anyone trying to implement that has declared themselves on the spot as a threat to free and peaceful men.
Agorist class theory is presented as an alternative to Marx’s class theory, although it could be viewed as an extension I suppose. But it is notably different in how it regaurds the role of the state in class conflict and in the fact that it isn’t purely a one-dimensional dichotomy. It is nuanced enough to be able to recognize shades of grey. In many ways it is a deconstruction of Marx’s theory only to replace it with something more updated in light of history and economics. Agorism is merely an extension of what Rothbard inherited from Oppenheimer in terms of an emphasis on a historical conflict between political and economic means and political power and social power. Also, Hoppe (who most certainly is more representative of the libertarian “right”) has an interesting paper in which he endorses the notion of a libertarian class analysis and essentially proclaims that marx’s initial premises are correct but he approaches them from an incorrect angle.
Classical liberals originated the notion of a class theory to my recollection; Marx merely twisted it (as did other socialists) to suit his strange ideology.
-Jon
Yes, Comte.
Classical Liberal Roots of the Marxist Doctrine of Classes
What is his incorrect angle? I thought Austrian Class Analysis was quite sound.
OK, then all is fine.
I merely stated what Hoppe stated, and I agree with what he states in the article I’m refering to (which I probably should have linked). His “austrian class analysis” accepts some of the fundamental premises of marxism but attributes entirely different reasons to them and draws entirely different conclusions from them. I can see how you could have read from that that I was accusing Hoppe of approaching it from a wrong angle, but I was merely echoing Hoppe’s correct claim in the paper that Marx approaches it from a wrong angle.
I think quite a few libertarians get scared of agorism from a knee-jerk reaction to the language employed by SEK3 and others. Niccolo’s use of “comrade” has gotten him quite a bit of flak when it’s really just a word.
I do think a lot of agorists these days use overly violent rhetoric. When I read the New Libertarian Manifesto I didn’t at all get the impression that agorism advocates a violent revolution. The NLM seemed reminiscent of Thoreau’s “resistance to civil government” and Benjamin Tucker’s commitment to “passive resistance.” Some of today’s agorists unfortunately, use language that reminds me more of the violent “propaganda of the deed” employed by anarcho commies-- shooting up capitalists and politicians and tossing bombs at JP Morgan. Even though some of em might deserve it’s a bonehead strategy.