edit by krazy kaju: here is the link
This: "We know that in a cooperative action individual property rights are not absolute or objective, but necessarily cooperative and intersubjective. " is false when considered from the fact that if my right to my body (property) was not absolute, someone else could own part of me. Rothbard and Hoppe annihilated that form of communism.
We then must ask why property external to our body would be any different. Bob Schafer’s essay is woefully lacking in that answer.
Very very interesting essay on Long’s website. I found a lot to agree with, but also several points to disagree with. Overall, though, I remain strongly anti-IP in general (anti-IP as a public policy, and in the non-statist context this means I believe it won’t be supported on a free market in law). Here is a very brief breakdown that doesn’t really do the strong methodology of the article justice:
Here Schaefer argues that Kinsella equivocates on the meaning of conflict. Although that would totally destroy Kinsella’s argument, I don’t think it’s clear Kinsella is equivocating here. He may have just been a little stylistically careless in choosing to use the word conflict in two difference senses in two consecutive sentences. A minor style faux pas, but not necessary an equivocation. I think Schaefer should have included more context on this one, because an equivocation here is a very serious charge. It needs to be shown clearly if it occurred. I do wonder, though, why Kinsella didn’t just say “excludes” instead of “conflicts with (excludes).”
Schaefer uses a compelling argument about intersubjective norms being implied by cooperative action. For example, say two people agree in advance to go fishing together for their mutual profit because they can catch more fish together than separately. It makes sense that in agreeing that their goal is to share their fish catch, they are also tacitly agreeing not to kill each other (at least before they’ve caught any fish!). Also, if A and B agree to arrange a mercy killing of B (B needs A’s help to do it), then in that case A killing B is not wrong. This seems analogous to the concept that contracts are valid, and anyone can sign away their rights (as in Block’s “murder park”).
The main difference seems to be that Schaefer is arguing that simply performing an action in cooperation with someone constitutes a contract-like agreement.
So far it sounds pretty good, and is a very interesting concept - especially since it’s based in methodological individualism, but when Schaefer applies this to IP it seems unconvincing because it seems to imply collectivism.
I don’t think that if he elaborated on the concept behind his IP claim he could avoid falling prey to the social contract fallacy. Why can’t I copy something from someone I’m not “collaborating” with? Why by being born into this society or territory do I automatically become a “collaborator” with every other person in society? If I do, doesn’t this mean that I must also collaborate with the mafia? If not, where are the boundaries drawn? Is it the majority that matters?
So I like his approach based on human action, as long as he doesn’t slip into collectivism. He also undermines his closing paragraph when he writes:
Fallacy of composition. Kinsella’s view of “scarcity” may be garbled, but when buying a novel the medium and the convenience of having the content all in one place is all that need be included in what’s being sold. The scarce resource and the unscarce resource are being falsely composed into a single entity for ethical analysis just because they cannot but be sold or transferred together.
Here is that closing paragraph, which I heartily agree with, that I believe the quote above undermines:
I agree that it’s not impossible for a novel (data) to be property in terms of agreed-upon norms. In fact, even Kinsella must agree with this in the sense he agrees (I assume) that contracts can be binding.
In summary, excellent approach rooted in methodological individualism, but the results fall short in terms of supporting IP. Schaefer’s case seems tantamount to saying that IP rights are fine as long as they are contractual* obligations, which I don’t think many libertarians - even Kinsella - would disagree with.
*Schaefer’s approach to the notion of a “contract” (he never uses that word) is novel and highly recommended reading
…
Assuming he’s using “ownership” in the Rothbardian sense that includes owning people (I suspect he’s not), he would actually be saying someone else could own part of you if you agreed to it in advance by the cooperative action you were engaged in with that person (sounds similar to Block’s slave contract idea). But I think he may be only referring to the conventional meaning of property ownership. [Or maybe he means that someone could “own” (to a degree) part of your hand if you are consensually engaged in an arm wrestling contest with that person.]
I almost didn’t notice the argument for IP since I thought other aspects of Schaefer’s paper were more important and overshadowed his argument for IP.
Among those:
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He is saying the source of ethics is to be found in human action, and specifically in the Austrian-Misesian conception of human action. This is a marked departure from the paradigm he is critiquing, which as he points out, is based on objective qualities of nature.
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He rightly points out that scarcity isn’t a quality of nature, but a quality of human action, and that scarcity rightly conceived is the relationship between the object of action and the relative demand for that object. Scarcity is a feature of human action, not a feature of nature, as Schaefer writes:
“Kinsella, on the other hand, is intent on objectifying scarcity, i.e., linking the concept…to the objective given qualities of nature.”
I will note that Schaefer mistakenly quotes Rothbard as in support of his notion of scarcity, when in fact, Rothbard utilized the same notion of scarcity he attributes to Kinsella, though admittedly, it is difficult to see this, since Rothbard is both conflicted and confused on the issue.
Rothbard concludes in the same paragraph quoted by Schaefer:
“Air, then, though indespensable, is not a means, but a general condition of human action and human welfare.”
So Rothbard apparently concludes that, based on the physical abundance of air that air is not scarce, and thus not a means. Then, apparently, we do not use air to fill balloons with, blow out birthday candles with, stoke fires with, etc… Air—the physical substance that surrounds us in abundance—according to Rothbard, is not a scarce means. Then, there is no reason to purchase tanks filled with it for scuba diving or mountain climbing, and we can be certain that people swimming underwater or climbing above thirteen thousand feet will not act to attain air, since air is, objectively, not scarce…
So Rothbard makes the same mistake Schaefer criticizes Kinsella for, but Schaefer credits Rothbard with holding the correct conception of scarcity.
In Shaefer’s Rothbard quote, Rothbard does not refer to the concept of the individual’s wants or desires, while both Mises and Reisman do in their respective quotes. So Rothbard is conceiving something different from scarcity relative to desire, want, or demand, as he is not conceiving his idea in terms of the wants, desires, or demands of the individual actor.
To show how confused is Rothbard’s conception of scarcity as compared to the two definitions quoted from Reisman and Mises, consider the very quote Schaefer provides:
“In the first place, all means are scarce, i.e., limited with respect to the ends that they could possibly serve.”
If we consider a means, it would be more accurate to hold the exact opposite of Rothbard’s assertion:
“all means are unlimited with respect to the ends that they could possibly serve.”
Consider a piano. It can be used as a paperweight, as firewood, as decoration, to impress the neighbors, to learn to play piano, as a prop, etc…
What limit can be specified with respect the ends that a piano can serve?
Thus, aside from the fact that Rothbard misconstrues scarcity by not conceiving it as a phenomena that is relative to human want or desire, the idea of scarcity he does put forth seems to be incorrect on its face. In other words, Rothbard gets scarcity wrong both in terms of human action and on his own terms. Amazing.
- Schaefer argues that a theory of ethics, or of ethical phenomena, or of ethical action, can be constructed without reference to scarcity, as this concept has been interpreted by some theorists along “objective” lines. I interpret this to mean that a theory of human ethical action can be constructed largely without respect to Lockean-derived private property ethics theory in all its “objective” manifestations: Rothbardian objective natural law, the objective conception of scarcity, the objective conception of human action (i.e., the Hoppean conception of human action in terms of “movement and location of human bodies”), etc…
Scarcity may be inherent in human action in the sense that when an actor attempts to attain something (this is desire, want, demand, etc.), we may infer that he “doesn’t have enough” of that thing. But this notion of scarcity is not the same as the notion of scarcity as a quality of objects themselves.
When Schaefer writes that a theory of ethical action may be constructed without reference to scarcity, I interpret this as meaning without respect to “objective scarcity.”
“Our argument proves that the wellspring of rights in general and property rights in particular is not some squirrelly concept of an absolute and objective “natural scarcity,” but human action, more specifically, cooperative human action. Indeed, not once in our discussion of cooperative action and the genesis of the concept of “rights” and “property” does the word scarcity appear…or does it need to appear.”
Thus, libertarianism is not identical to the private property theory based on objective conceptions, which is what Kinsella implies in constantly equating libertarianism with Rothbardian/Hoppean private property theory. The private property ethic that tries to “justify” various ethical values and conduct based on objective conceptions of scarcity and human action, is not the only way to approach a libertarian theory of ethics or ethical action… This is another important aspect of Schaefer’s essay that in my opinion overshadows the IP discussion.
- Lastly, Schaefer, in my reading, is glimpsing a relationship between the Misesian theoretical approach, and how praxeology, by remaining value-free science, contributes to the peaceful coexistence of people who hold differing values. I don’t think it is a coincidence that Schaefer is pursuing a theory of human ethics based on human action, and at the same time, introducing terminology that suggests the peaceful coexistence of differing ethical and moral societies. Passages such as “…in a particular libertarian society…” and “…by that society’s common code of cooperative ethics…” are passages moving away from a monopolistic and monolithic conception of libertarianism.
This is moving toward a conception of libertarianism similar to that of Max Borders:
In conclusion, I don’t consider Schaefer’s essay essentially to be about IP. I believe the significance of his essay is much more profound, and that IP only happens to be the topic of discussion. This essay signals that libertarian ethics theory is in a transition from the older objective-realist theoretical paradigms of Rand and Rothbard, and it signals a growing awareness that the scientific and philosophical system advocated by Mises has applications beyond “catallactic” human action.
For decades, most readers simply ignored those passages where Mises states that praxeology is a general science of human action, and that economics is its best developed part. Schaefer’s essay is proof that libertarian social thinkers are increasingly taking this view of things seriously, and considering whether and how Mises’s system can be applied to social, ethical, and political problems.
Something I don’t think you’ve considered:
Not in the ordinary, everyday relatively all-things-being-equal way Rothbard was speaking about. Clearly, air would be a premium underwater. But we don’t live underwater, do we? Nor do most of us live in the rarified mountain air.
God that articles is horribly written and is just another attempt at trying to sell socialism and utilitarianism as if they were some sort of ‘scientific’ truth.
Schaefers likes IP and is probably willing to use violence against IP heretics in the name of ‘social cooperation’ - what a stupid joke.
Long’s comments are up.