I’ve listened to almost all his lectures, and i think he’s great on economics, and exposing democracy. But some of his views on; natural elites, monarchy, city states, and a generally Nietzschein undertone to his social theory gives me major concern.
What are your thoughts on him? Ally, oportunist, crazy german, genius?
I like him. I tend to basically agree with everything I’ve read of his.
Do you agree with him when he thinks “natural elites” similar to kings would be perfectly acceptable and compatable with anarcho-capitalism?
Oh, and he hates Hayek to the point where he would spit on his grave
Well I do believe in “natural elites” in the sense that Mencken spoke of, so yeah I suppose I do.
I don’t think Hoppe ever claimed monarchy was actually legitimate. He simply showed that it could be seen as a lesser of two evils.
I think his theory on how the state historicaly emerged sounds like wishful thinking on his part.
He says the state emerged when one of many judges allied with the general populace winning them on his side with a promise of “cutting down to size - their own betters”, but actually there is no evidence to support this. This is no more likely than that the state emerged via an alliance of judges against the general populace, who would then go on to form formalised and static patrician class positioned above the general populace - the plebians.
Natural elites are compatible with libertarianism. It is just the name anti-egalitarians use for men of influence after all. However I think Hoppe wouldnt neccesarily like the natural elites any more than he does the artificial ones. For example there is no reason why Axl Rose in his heyday couldnt be considered part of the natural elite.
the state emerged when bandits decided that instead of raiding the villages every once in awhile they would just stay, protect the villagers from other bandits and live off the surplus.
the birth of the state came when people started producing enough to feed more than just themselves. 99% of conflict is about where this surplus of wealth will be allocated.
I need to polish this, but it’s the basic idea
http://macroethics.blogspot.com/2008/12/parable-of-economy-part-1.html
as for Hoppe, natural elites would be CEO’s in AnCap. I have no problem with the idea that steve jobs is several million times more productive than me and should be rewarded accordingly.
I think theoretising about the emergence of state thousands of years ago is of a very limited value. There is simply an enormous lack of information. However on the other hand new states are emerging from a stateless enviroment all the time. Until recently there have also been cases of them emerging seemingly spontanously. Ie an existing state was destroyed or forced to retreat by a popular revolt but then a new state emerged in its place albeit it was never the motivation of the insurgents to form a new state, but only to expell the old one. I think we would be better served studying such much more recent examples.
And I`ll wager a bet such states were an outgrowth of warlordism. After the war was over the most distinguished battle commander found himself in the position that he would go from an enormously respected person that people flocked to, to follow and be guided in battle, to a fairly ordinary person. At the same time however he saw that for the time being he stil commanded the loyalties of numerous armed men. So naturaly he moved to install himself as king-for-life, sweeping aside other distinguished commanders/warlords with similar designes in the process.
And where no one warldord was strong enough to sweep all the others aside you have the Somalia or Afganistan situation. The reason that is so in Afganistan and particularly in Somalia is probably to be found in tribalism. Warlords have very limited appeal outside of their clan so it is much harder for a warlord to emerge that would be powerful above all others.
What do you mean his views on monarchy? That a monopoly on defense is always inefficient and illegitimate. Hoppe, throughout his book D:TGTF repeats his belief that the government rests on public opinion and that a change in the view of the public in regards to the legitimacy of democracy is all that is necessary. Is it really that hard to see why he might compare it with monarchy, given that monarchy is already considered to be a joke and unworkable by many people?
As for city states, I don’t see what the problem is. It doesn’t sound particularly controversial to me to state that places will arise to facilitate trade between groups of individuals who otherwise dislike each other.
Natural elites, this isn’t anything unique to Hoppe. Even Jefferson referred to the natural aristocracy. A natural elite is merely an individual who is farsighted and has gained the respect of individuals within the community. Given that these individuals will choose their partners selectively it is likely that these traits will be passed down familial lines. Once again, what is so distasteful about this I don’t understand.
And genius, is the answer to your question.
I think theoretising about the rise of the state has very little value. We should discuss more about the current state as it is, and analize if it is legitimate and so on. Thinking about the rise of the state can be seen as taking the same marxist approach: delegitimizing private property because of its origin (appropiation, coerciveness, etc).
In fact, we have states because people want to. People are pretty much convinced that the state will solve their personal problems, or at least, that it is a necessary evil. That is the reason why states emerge from stateless environment all the time. If people are convinced that a government is not what they need, they will not allow this to happen.
I think that is a naive view. When the state emerges it doesn`t ask the people if they want it to. And in fact unless you have some sort of ideological libertarian background it is not necessarily easy to identify state formation taking place at all and it is stil harder to understand the full implications of its existance. After all the state does not appear in its most expansive form in an instant, on the contrary even the initial transformation from statelessnes into something that can be called a state can take years.
Initialy there is a lack of resistance because the danger is not recognised, lack of resistance due to statist indoctrination comes only later.
Yes now that you mention it, I recall Hoppe is big on this whole familial line thing. I tend to think he takes it too far. In fact I think people value self-made men the most, hence the great appeal of rags to riches stories. Few are equally fascinated by this or that “good family”.
That he’s a great thinker. I’ve read most of his books so far, and they’re well-written, lucid and tightly argued.
Do you have any idea about when his upcoming book will be released?
Sadly, no.
Hoppe’s overall brilliant reasoning made me become an AnCap I’d say. Before I’d studied Hoppe, I was still on the minarchist-democratic side of the fence, being convinced by the prospects of liberty but not quite ready to drop my blinders.
Then came Hoppe and suddenly, all the charade about “responsible and transparent governance” or “balancing of freedom and security” via the state apparatus appeared as hollow as it all in fact is.
If I had to pick three thinkers to promote, I’d go for Hoppe, Dawkins and Rand. Can’t think of a better triumvirate to promote individual sovereignty.
Richard Dawkins?
He toys with pseudo-science a bit much but he’s always been an interesting biologist, and moreover, a promoter of individual sovereignty, although I’d say with slightly leftist/“liberal” tendencies. Still, I wouldn’t put him in my top three.
Saying that, it’s not as if I have a top three in mind…
Hoppe is the intellectual heir to Mises that Rothbard never was.
His theories about the rise of the state are informed by his knowledge of the rise of the state in European history, from the feudal regime of competing fiefdoms to the absolutist state through the protestant reformation.
Nicely put. I always like to point the similarity between state and the Mafia.
But I also think the state used to emerge from within a community as well as from the outside. When markets aren’t sufficiently developed and when manpower is most important, it’s easy for popular support to create a government in order institutionalize theft and coercion.
A good line of argumentation should also show how ordinary people are prone to succumb to a state in order to fulfill their inappropriate wishes. Otherwise, we’re just being politically correct (or delving into conspirations, like in Zeitgeist).
Tom Palmer hates him, that’s good enough for me.