What do you believe are some “bare-minimum requirements” of one’s being a member of a community in the town or city where they reside? What do you believe would be some examples of unreasonable expectations members of a community may put on other members? Thanks in advance for any responses.
This actually depends on how you define by the words like ‘community’ and ‘(un)reasonable expectations’, really.
As a general rule, libertarians feel that there can be no initiation of force against innocent people. Retaliatory force is oke, enforcing agreements is oke and so on and so forth. So as a ‘bare-minimum requirement’, people ought to respect other people in this minimal sense: do not initiate force against other people. Some things are clear - don’t steal, don’t kill, don’t rape - so are borderline cases (noise, some kinds of pollution, some kinds of trespassing, etc.) As a general rule; people will have an idea - as they do know - what they ought and ought not to do to harm other people. And most conflicts can be decided by just talking to your neighboor (‘dude, that music is way too loud!’) So those are the bare minimum requirements. Anything above that, in this political sense, would be unreasonable, as in: you can’t demand that with the use of force.
But there are other requirements that can be reasonably expected - but when people fail to satisfy these expectations, it’s still not allowed to use force to enforce these expectations. E.g. we usually expect from our friends that they help us if it’s at a low cost to them and has a high gain for us. When friends/family don’t help, they are usually ‘obligated’ - in a certain sense - to explain why they can’t help, which, most of the time, amounts to basically explaining why the costs are actually higher than you initially thought.
Another example is that when you have an accident, you can have a reasonable expectation that someone will help you/call the ambulance. Unreasonable expectations are, for example, expecting that people will serve all your ends, donate a lot of money all the time, etc.
This really is just ‘common sense’, i.e. the art of living with other people in your every day life. I don’t think I did anything else than describe that and that’s how it really ‘ought’ to be, as far as I see. It’s just the organization called government that fucks this simple system of natural liberty and community up.
a contract maybe
It will end up depending on what is considered morally accepted in that community. As much as I like the NAP, I cannot say that all communities will follow it. The ‘spontaneous order’ might well end up being different. So, it depends.
In the western world most people (I would say 90-95%) follow the “NAP” they simply don’t apply this to the state, and I find it hard to beleive that they would go against their subjective sense of justice simply because there is not a state. On the other hand islamic countries would still be barbarian hell holes as far as civil liberties for minorities (jews, women, gays ect) but I think without a centralised law making authority they would become “westernised” sooner. The thing that would eventually drive private courts that practiced sharia out of buissiness is the fact that there clients would be unable to interact with “western” courts so it would become more profitable for them to adobt a “liberal” set of laws.
That was a reply to Merlin btw, incase people though I was going off topic.
Good post, Evilsceptic. The vast majority of people don’t want aggression - they just don’t realise that they are causing it to happen through the democratic process, and the ‘government is good’, ‘democracy is the best’ propaganda only exacerbates this blindness. As for Sharia etc., I think when the choice is between extreme, hard-line religion and improving one’s (material) quality of life, the latter usually wins out.
[sorry, double post]
A few months ago I would have agreed but I’m becoming increasingly weary of this “natural NAP mod” idea. I am now closer to Hayek’s position that, if left alone, communities develop into a spontaneous order, and than competition among communes promotes those orders that work best. So, I would not say that, absent a state, we’d have NAP-abiding citizens, even in the west. It would depend on how the community handles communal power.
What would happen, I believe, is that indeed ‘the mob’ would take over. Of course left without its monopoly on high-rate loans, gambling, drugs and weapons, it would be far less of a mob as we know it, but still mini-absolute monarchies would spring up by neighborhoods. That’s not as bad as it seem, for Hoppe’s argument still stands in this world of mobsters, and even more so than it did in XIX century Europe.
Still I agree that such a world of spontaneous orders would tend much, much faster towards the NAP than our world of countries. We just need not illude ourselves that absent the state all would become hard core libertarians. People ain’t like that.
What is a “NAP”?
Non-Agression Principle.
Oh. Guess I should have known that. Thanks MaikU.
This actually depends on how you define by the words like ‘community’ and ‘(un)reasonable expectations’, really.
AdrianHealy, Yes, I suppose the word “community” can have some elasticity applied to it, but here I am referring to those who reside within relatively close proximity. I suppose I am being somewhat arbitrary here, but I I would say perhaps a 3-5 mile radius. Honestly, though I wish no one any harm or ill-will anywhere, I personally don’t feel or sense any compunction to “prop-up” or support the agendas, lifestyles or desires of others just because it may be considered fashionable. Do you know what I mean? If I CHOOSE to do so, that is a different matter, but not to be part of the status quo.
As far as defining “unreasonable expectations” goes, let me give you a personal example as an illustration. I reside in a rural town here in Ohio (picture a Norman Rockwell painting in your mind and you’re pretty close). The population is approx. 23,000 give or take several hundred. Conservative to very conservative politically and religiously (i.e. mostly Evangelicals supportive of the Warfare-State and violations of peoples civil-liberties in general). Public support for “public” schools is very high, so walking in lockstep with the consensus is almost demanded lest one wishes to be labeled an “idiot” (or worse!), having no “school spirit” or “pride in ones community”. Speaking out against such things and dissenting from the majority opinion will get one strange looks as if one is from another planet and ostracized quickly (It rarely, if ever, occurs to inquire whether a dissenter may be correct in the matter). The pressure to conform is enormous and I am only citing this one example. I could list many others.
Now don’t get me “wrong” here; I’m not a trouble-maker, one who goes around looking for laws to break or people to disrespect or harm or rebels just for the sake of the act itself, but I am opinionated, outspoken and not afraid to confront that which may need confronting without being belligerent and the conforming thing just isn’t my bag. Some folks 'round these parts just don’t like “my” type (i.e. I don’t think within the same frame of reference or paradigm as the vast majority of them).
Spontaneous Order. I don’t think there needs to be any “requirement” because society will develop some form of order naturally.