I think that could be done much more efficiently with a free market system. Government military isn’t very cost effective.
I agree that government military is not as cost effective as a private one would be, but we are, really and truly, assuming that it would be in the commercial interests of a PDA to wage wars abroad (it is possible some may donate charitably, however we cannot base any ideology upon this assumption alone) - and this is possible if the PDAs are employed, by, lets say a few businesses abroad. But fascism and military dictatorships tend to occur in poor, third world countries with poor economies, thereby, it is not in the interests of PDAs to actively engage in the risk of taking on a full scale military dictatorship. Especially not if the foreign state can bribe them away. Those are my thoughts.
Britain violates human rights to a greater extent than most overseas tyrants do, except it does so abroad and to foreigners, rather than at home.
Why phrase your argument specifically in terms of western states permitting non-western perpetrated atrocities?
Our government/military violate rights abroad, there is no denying this but not on the same scale as some fascist dictatorships.
?
Japan is not a western state.
A meanigless statement. A waste of space. Obviously Britain’s human rights record is superior to that of some fascist dictatorships, much inferior to that of some other fascist dictatorships.
Not for commercial interests, no, it would be much more like a private charity. I’m picturing it as a club that all right-wingers join if they want to organize a military. Of course the main purpose of such an organization would be national defense (and playing with guns). People would donate their money and some would volunteer to fight. You know, the lefties would join foundations that own the forests and the whales and right-wingers would join the national militia to bring democracy to the world. We wouldn’t all force each others to pay for the statism we like. People seem to be willing to pay for the military and volunteer in the current system, so why not when it’s voluntary and have a say in who to invade? It wouldn’t really be gritty fighting on the ground with casualties, but supplying arms and air-support to local rebels. Often it would be enough to assassinate the dictator. If evil dictators got assassinated regularly, they would essentially have to live underground, which would take a lot of the fun out of being an evil dictator. And free market countries would have such vastly better military hardware that they could take on any poor military dictatorship.
The thing is, the majority of people just couldn’t give a toss; right wing, left wing, whatever. They simply wouldn’t donate to charity. Even if they would, we cannot base an idea on the assumption that they would. People that join the military do not do so out of the goodness of their hearts but to make a living plus they get to be all macho. I find the theme of businesses militarily defending their commercial interests abroad more convincing.
Sure you’re still not a socialist?
That’s true, although I doubt you’ll ever hear a soldier admit that.
Privately conducted “humanitarian interventionism” has many upsides compared to statist meddling. For one should the human rights violations cease, many of the volunteers will return home and their funding will dry up. This gives the rights violator an incentive to improve his behaviour.
On the other hand a state military intervention once enacted can never be called off. Since it becomes an issue of “credibility” or imperial prestige it must be waged until a military triumph can be claimed.
Your confusing socialism for anything that’s remotely interventionist.
Interventionism is socialism.
I’m not trying to insult you, but I am trying to challenge you to think about your premises. If you really accept markets, then accept that some people don’t give a damn about genocide in Darfur. That’s reality. There are no Utopian markets, and trying to convince yourself that there is some theoretical way that markets could handle a [sic] problem, is still no guarantee that it will actually happen if the time comes.
The only way to guarantee an intervention is to use force and suppress voluntary action.
I’d flip that statement around; socialism is interventionist. Subtle difference.
I know.
My problem is not so much the market not being able to handle a given problem but a given scenario in which the market is not able to handle a problem that could have been handled by the state.
My belief is that the initiation of force by the state is justified on the provisio that there would be greater initiation of force without that state intervention. This doesn’t mean that I think anarchy would necessarily be more violent or chaotic or whatever but that I need to understand why there would be less trends towards to the initiation of force. For instance, if the state can overthrow foreign despots and the violence used to do so is less than the violence that would have happened if they had not overthrown the foreign despot, the action, in my mind is rectified. However, it could well be the case that the market could handle the situation better. In which case, how can the market handle the problem of foreign despots which the state can handle by waging war?
False premise.
Whose problem are the foreign despots, and according to whose subjective values would the state handle it better? I have problems too. If I found that the market cannot handle my (subjectively valued) “problem” of others having more than I, should I advocate that the state handle the problem “better”?
If you want to get into the details we can define ‘better’ objectively in terms of ‘the most amount of people killed’. Objectivity in calculation is fine provided it is based on a testable hypothesis or statistical evidence, for instance GDP to measure a country’s economic out put. I believe more people will die as a result of intervention in Libya. Thereby, I am opposed to interventon in Libya. But if there was a legitimate circumstance whereby state intervention meant less people died, I would not oppose it.
The problem you mention here about the state military not handling your own subjectively valued problems more efficiently than a private defence agency is quite obvious; the military is not a candy floss business. (Not trying to be antagonistic here, by the way). Most people wouldn’t buy a service unless it directly benefitted them somehow (I am assuming that the vast proportion of action is driven, first and foremost, by psychological egoism rather than compassionate self-interest - i.e. charitable love for others). So its fine if we are talking about a service that provides the individual with food, clothing, etc. but not when we are talking about a service that is highly politically motivated, purely because most people would not fund a private defence agency to intervene in foreign countries in the absence of a state owned military so it is not a question of which meets the consumer demands more effectively when there is no consumer.
If I knew how to update my signature with a statement that my knowledge is severely limited I would. I am merely trying to learn; I am not claiming I know as much about economics and so forth as some of the main people on here. Why is it a false premise?
So whose demand is being met, then?
Well demand is effectively desire backed by purchasing power. So there is no demand in such an instance. I would say military intervention should be used whenever it is the desire of the majority to overthrow a tyrannical dictatorship or, whenever it is the desire of a majority to protect themselves from foreign state invasion (for instance when Kuwait was being invaded by Iraq and we stepped into help them - yes I know the interest was primarily in oil but the intervention was none the less justifiable on humanitarian grounds). Libya, for example is no such place where the majority wish to overthrow Qaddafi. As such, intervention is pointless since there will be a new tyrannical regime and untold losses of life. Yes, I know the majority believing something does not make it true but if they desire to overthrow a statist regime then it is no longer the case that they are trying to impose their beliefs on someone else; they are merely trying to free themselves. Why not help them? Would charity be enough to provide the services required to help them? Taxation to fund wars requires aggression against people in the home country but, (assuming all goes ‘well’), the aggression used against the people abroad is reduced.
I know that Neolibertarians argue for this reason that their ideology is consistent with the non-aggression axiom. After all, if you are against violence, you must be against violence used by dictators both at home and abroad.
I don’t really take any stance. I am just trying to understand the Libertarian stance, see if it is reasonable and see if I can adopt it as well. Believe me, I want to adopt it; it is cognitive dissonance for me to accept foreign intervention. But I cannot see any alternative to it at the moment. So I would like to here what the market based alternatives are. Some people like to throw the; “well if your so concerned about foreign dictatorship, why don’t you pay for it?” To which my response would be “it is not enough for just me and a relatively small minority of charitable individuals to fund and raise awareness of such a cause. Hence, force is regrettably necessary (unless you can come up with a better alternative I’m waiting to hear, eagerly) to fund such a cause.”
That POV is not compatible with markets. You want to have your cake and eat it too.
The state only can do one thing over the market. Initiate force. The market can render defensive force. So why must the state be an aggressor in order to stop aggression? This is the disconnect. Everything the state does is as an aggressor. To help people in Darfur, it has to harm people somewhere else.
Ok, I get all of that. But what alternative solution can be offered by a market strategy?