Is there a ‘ready-to-use’ libertarian constitution? Or would you give everyone guns and leave it an anarchy? Many things need to be considered. When you decide to not create any government, how would you make sure noone starts one and tries to take you over? Or dumbs people down until they get taken over? What are the alternatives? I have read many books and seen many discussions, but I am missing an action plan, a final conclusion. What is the ideal society and how would you create it?
The first necessity would be property ownership. I don’t think a “new country” is the objective, though. I think it’s weakening government until it can be defeated.
one would need the context of this revolution before making plans on how society would go further
It only depends how the land is acquired. If you are using unappropriated land, you can use whatever laws you want. Say everyone has to wear a funny hat. You just can’t force people to come. And there’s the issue of people being born on your property… you could technically evict them the second they are born, but it would be more profitable for you to play nice and offer them an ultimatum at 18 or something.
Let me answer from two different angles.
First, I’ll answer the intent of your question. The most realistic action plan is peaceful secession from existing political units. Political power has been aggregating for several centuries. Fiefs have consolidated into states, states into nations, nations into political unions and so on. The one-world government types are essentially betting that this process of elimination will continue unabated. However, I think that political unification must have a natural limit. It is easy to see why. Let’s say the world was fully unified into just two, relatively power-balanced political units. War can’t resolve anything because they’re matched powers. The leader of each political unit respectively benefits from his territorial monopoly on law and force to a far greater extent than any bribe or payout that can be offered by the other leader to accept unification under him. Obviously, the process of unification has worked to the point where there are but 200 nations in the world. But how much more can the world be unified? The limit must lie somewhere between 200 and two.
If the tide turns, we could see a process of disaggregation begin. Peaceful political secession would be the right tool for the job. While the essence of the state (territorial monopoly on law and force) would be preserved, it would be considerably weakened with each secession. The ultimate limit of secession is, of course, individual autonomy under a customary law, that is, under unitary law. Unlike political unification, there is no logical problem with unlimited secession.
As far as strategy/action plan goes, I think that the most important things to do are being done by LvMI and similar organizations, like the Property & Freedom Society. In addition, I think that we would benefit from a Renaissance in moral philosophy*. Moral philosophy has been largely dormant for the last 150 to 200 years. There is such a thing as an ill society and I think Western culture has fallen gravely ill. Without a revival in moral values, we are doomed to remain a society with a systemic tolerance of tyranny and political exploitation. A society with a healthy, sound moral foundation is a society which everywhere rejects the idea that right and wrong can ever depend on the identity, class, occupation, affiliation, family or other distinguishing characteristic of the acting individual. If I forcibly remove money from your wallet, it is wrong, whether I’m the King or your fellow serf. That idea - the most elementary moral concept of all - spells utter doom for tyranny. If I beat you over the head because you mouthed off to me, it’s a crime whether I’m a police officer or a fellow civilian. If I force you to endure me rubbing my hand over your genitals on pain of losing your ticket to fly, it’s sexual assault, whether I work for the TSA or I’m your fellow air traveler.
Without widespread toleration for dual-morality (immorality) where there is one standard of right/wrong for one special group of individuals and another standard for the rest of us, government is impossible because taxation - the material source of the Prince’s power - crucially relies on a tacit acceptance of dual-morality. It’s OK for some people (government revenue agents) to forcibly remove money from your wallet but it’s not OK for just anybody to remove money from your wallet.
Second, I think you’ve not quite yet grasped the essence of anarchism. Anarchy is descriptive of the world as it is, not prescriptive. Anarchy is not “the way it oughtta be” it’s the way it is. Government - like any superstition - is an illusion, a meme, a perception in the minds of the masses. There was a time when women who made an enemy out of some spiteful individual willing to report them to the Holy Office were burnt at the stake for being witches. Today, we torture adolescent goat-herders fingered by paid Afghan ‘informants’ for being terrorists. So much for progress.
Society is not created, it emerges. There is no ideal society. There are no right social outcomes. There are noble individuals, role models that can be held up as ideals. Individuals perform right actions and wrong actions. It takes some work but try to force yourself to stop thinking in that old habit of collectives. Whenever you talk about society, try to avoid using the word ‘we’. It took me a good six months to wean myself off the word ‘we’ and even now it still slips through from time to time.
Clayton -
*Please note that my espousal of morality should not be mistaken as a concealed religionist agenda - there are plenty of people out there playing that game and they are part of the moral sickness I’m talking about. I’m pretty much agnostic, which means that I don’t have a horse in the religion race.
I would buy an island like Iha das Pacas in Brazil http://www.privateislandsonline.com/ilha-das-pacas.htm. Then I would sell 70% of the land, with the purchasers being required to occupy and improve the land they own. The remaining 30% of the land would be leased, with the option to buy. The leased land would be under my rule. I would leave it up to the owners to determine how they want to run their island.
Thanks for the replies so far. While the secession route is very interesting (and something I might pursue in another discussions),
I am talking about a situation where you would be able to get land that is not a property of any government yet. While it is very tempting
to create a new type of government, I want to see what the alternative would be. One of them could be that
you allow people on your property (country), as long as they sign a contract that they will obey by your laws.
Later on you can decide to sell or lease part of your properties, with or without the right for new laws to be created. What I am looking for could
be some sort of constitution/contract which resembles the GPL (free software thingy). The original owner of the country
could sell off parts of it, under condition that everyone that buys it will respect the GPL. I’m just thinking out loud here, so you might
better grasp the context and my ideas.
I like Sieben’s idea. I’d actually appropriate as much land as I could, than rent it out to people to live in by my rules. I can imagine certain financial arrangement that would make this a worthwhile option, especially for more skilled people. If I succeeded, many more such ‘fiefdoms’ would spring up. But even 10 would give people a decent range of choice between ‘legal systems’ and ‘taxes’.
Actually, neo-feudalism (large tracts of land owned by individual/companies and rented out along with governing services) ould appear to be the quickest, least painful transition to full anarchy.
And i’m not even sure whether it would wither away, with land gradually devolving into smaller plots, in time.
The problem with these renting out-land examples is the premise of an existing law enforcement system. The fact is that law is enforcement, is violence, so a class of exploiters must form - and achieve a monopoly to ensure sustained future revenue from their human stock, before relative peace and stability over the land can be achieved.
you are equivocating between defence of ones property and being an exploiter.
this is not serious philosophy.
Violence is not a priori illegitimate. Only involuntary violence is. If you pay me to indulge with you in some masochist fantasy, than whatever harm I do to you as part of such a fantasy is not violence. Dueling is an other example.
Thus to my tenants I say: pay, me X amount, come live in this nice town I’ve built, and accept such and such punishment for such and such violation. This kind of violence is completely voluntary, thus legitimate.
Whether violent punishment would be practiced instead of monetary compensation, that is something else indeed.
you misunderstand. the relationship between enforcement of order and owner of land is the problem. if you hire some security company to keep peace on your island, whats stopping them from giving you the middle finger and taking control of the land as their own? Nothing is, unless you actually own the security company. In either case, the result is the formation of the state. Ive elabor
Ah, my misunderstanding. Well, I cannot say with 100% certainty that it could not happen. I would that as a very dim possibility, since there will be some 100 other companies just dying to get in. Also, if I really feared that (I don’t think I would), I would give discounts to every tenant who held weapons a home. That would discourage any rash actions by the enforcer. Or I could do business sonly with security companies insured against precisely this (or require them to pledge a large sum to my account for this purpose), thus at least I get some money back should this happen. In extremis, should all this fail and a state be established, all people have to do is move to some other such fief. Keeping them in by force is unviable as small fiefs in a modern society can never be self-sufficient, and if trade need to get in, than people can get out. Perhaps keeping people tied to the land worked in the middle ages when self-sufficiency was the rule, or in my own communist , where self-sufficiency was the goal, but in the modern world its impossible.
But also notice that the only one who stands to loose here is I, for I will be expropriated by the security company. To the tenant nothing will change: they owned nothing here, and they loose nothing. Indeed this violent takeover would be just like any sale of business to the security company the incentive to perform well are still there.
PS: On the other hand, it would be e distinct possibility if I paid some state army for protection. Than all such checks would fail. That’s a good reason not to get protection from armies.
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Actually, I think xarthaz has a point. Law enforcement is a service which must be produced by humans who will also need a place to live, something to eat, and so on. This automatically entails an entire society just for the enforcement of your artificial sub-letting legal system, yet what law will these individuals live by? If you say “the same law” then you are assuming, just as statists do, that you, the noble social-planner, are an angel and are not subject to the temptations of exploiting your fellow man, however subtly, that other men are subject to when given the opportunity. In other words, in the very act of trying to create an ideal society through contractarian sub-letting of a piece of property which you fully own, you will have created yet another system of class-based exploitation.
The problem is that a landlord cannot be a king, I mean, he cannot fairly be a judge even in his own disputes. How can a law system emerge which can hold you accountable to the terms of your own contracts when whoever is supposed to be judging that law can be evicted by you? It just doesn’t make any sense.
Clayton -
well, the OP implies vacuum, but we all know, that neither states, nor anarchies do not emerge in vacuum, so to answer is harder than one can imagine. I, for example, wouldn’t know were to start if there is nothing, just a piece of land (called “country”).
To clarify even further: the case would be that you buy land from an african country, with the right to secede immediately. I want to know what ‘system’ I can establish to create the best country. That system might obviously not imply a government at all, just a contract that everyone has to sign before they are allowed to enter (being born there is another discussion, let’s get the basics first). Upon entering I would give everyone a gun - making it harder for external parties to take over, with every new ‘citizen’ joining. I have to weigh my words carefully when saying ‘system’ and ‘citizen’ 
[Also pardon my spelling, I am from Belgium, my english is not perfect]
How did you aquire those guns? If you are rich by default, then yeah, everything is possible, invite people to “free land” and start making business and better society.
If you say “the same law” then you are assuming, just as statists do, that you, the noble social-planner, are an angel and are not subject to the temptations of exploiting your fellow man, however subtly, that other men are subject to when given the opportunity. In other words, in the very act of trying to create an ideal society through contractarian sub-letting of a piece of property which you fully own, you will have created yet another system of class-based exploitation.
Would you consider me doing whatever the hell I want on my land exploitation? Are rules that people accept voluntarily exploitative? If the LvMI banned me right now form their forum, would this be ‘unfair’ in any way? I truly cannot see how that could be the case.
The problem is that a landlord cannot be a king, I mean, he cannot fairly be a judge even in his own disputes
‘Fairness’ is not the point, voluntarism is. If someone would find such a system wanting in fairness (or any other virtue) , he’s free to find other, more palatable ones.
How can a law system emerge which can hold you accountable to the terms of your own contracts when whoever is supposed to be judging that law can be evicted by you? It just doesn’t make any sense.
Again, I see voluntarism as the only virtue worth analyzing. In my house I’m king. Whoever enters does so on my terms if those terms might include, not just a legal system, but also the term that I myself shall be the sole arbiter in case of disputes. Otherwise, an external arbiter could be selected in advance. Whether I, the landlord, can be made to obey his ruling is an issue not specific to this scenario.
In extremis, people would just move out, and since they hold no property here, this would be a low-cost option. Hence the amount off abuse (if any) they would be willing to take, is indeed scant.
Last but not least, I’m driven by profit, and if I’m not, someone who is will purchase my derelict company. Profit commands me to never abuse the term I set out. Reputation is the true capital of a business.