I agree. However, if I were to say that to an average person, they’d ask me what sovereignty is…but they wouldn’t really pay attention to the answer. If they don’t know what it is already, it must be unimportant.
Isn’t that actually an advantage of the term? It has none of the social stigma of either anarchism or capitalism, and actually speaks to the crux of the issue: voluntary social structure based on an axiom of individual liberty.
Does the “average person” give a damn about any of these labels? No, but they do have an adverse reaction to a number of the words associated with them.
I seriously do not recall LS saying he will enforce his views over an-soc’s, only that they’re would be an eventually dispute between the two, in a stateless society that may not have the mechanisms (aside from arbitration) to deal with incompatible views of property rights (this in itself is a messy problem & has been or is being addressed in a parallel thread concerning the possibility of meta-ethic, meta-politics, & meta-property rights laws. You are new however, so maybe you did not know about that…).
A minarchist wouldn’t call a spade a spade; a minarchist would still advocate coercion in an unclawed form. A minarchist would not bother seeing the problem of non- an-socs (for the sake of the lack of a current good term) & an-socs living parallel one another in a stateless society. A minarchist may not even make the option of “opting out” from The State a possibility.
My previous comment reflected my view that LS is not minarchist; he may not agree with you, but that doesn’t implicitly make him what you think he is. This is further reflected by the modifier in your sentence “…What LS seems to be saying…”
In regards to that sentence alone, many people on the forums, recently, have questioned utilizing the term anarchist in light of recent events, & the association the word anarchist has with other people who may have Statist tendencies, & are not totally against coercion.
I thought that would obvious since this is the same thread in which said conversation has ocurred, regarding the possibility of a different term and/or label that those previously associated with anarcho-capitalism / market-anarchistsm, could align themselves with to more acurratley reflect their stances. Many self-proclaimed anarchists do not believe in strong property rights; I do, so I do not consider myself an anarchist, but a Voluntaryist.
In fact, many anarchists I’ve spoken too have always had a pet peeve with anarcho-capitalists, not merley on the basis of the term itself, but because of what those anarchists percieved as a contradiction to anarchism regarding the stance on property rights. Typically, many anarchists who disagreed outright with said property rights tended to be more Socialist/Communist/Syndalcist.
In light of the above, can you can see why I object to your charge of minarchism, then?
I find that if I do not quote my opposite directly and specifically in an argument, sometimes I run the risk of putting words in their mouth.
It’s a bad habit and I do it as well, although I try not to.
I’ve asked someone to point out where I justified coercion, where I said the ansocs should not be allowed to follow their vision. I have quoted directly from the ParEcon founder, and seed document in response to the question of why I believe it is not in the best interest of ancaps to work with ansocs.
Wanting to get rid of the state is not enough. I want to get rid of the state to get to a post state world. And I’m in no rush to help people establish pre-state structures in that post state world so we can go through this all over again. I view democracy as a state, or pre-state institution. Should they be able to do it? Sure. Am I going to help them do it? EFF no!
Libertarians, ancaps, austrians believe that our democracy is the market. Ansocs have a more permanent institution in mind. You don’t withdraw if you don’t like a scheme the majority agrees upon. Again, socialism is coercive, otherwise it wouldn’t work (as well as it is understood to work in the first place).
I apollogize for being stuck on the concept of sovereignty, and I realize I have jumped into this discussion in the middle of some heated tangential debates, but I think there’s a point being missed.
The problem of any post-state philosophy is obviously the notion of how sovereignty is dictated. Currently all political and social philosophy besides anarcho-capitalism fail in this matter, because each relies on some variant of collectivism, which is inherently statism. Only a philosophy of individual sovereignty allows for a variance of social structures not inherent to some form of coersion and thus statism. Anyone truly devoted to erradication of the state, regardless of their moral or economic perspective, should also be devoted not just to individual liberty, but it’s absolute expression: individual sovereignty.
Starting from such a position, all sorts of social contracts are possible from a purely voluntary perspective.
I agree with most of this. I wouldn’t want to help anyone form socialist syndicates, nor encourage anyone to join them. However, I would like to help our cause by freeing ourselves from our current state. I think this allows a limited degree of cooperation with ansocs, at least those with the opinions of Robin, who we seem to have a common understanding of property rights with.
I also agree with taking precaution of pre-state institutions. However, I think we are missing something, which is that pre-state institutions were tribal, occasionally relied on violence to survive, and geographically-centered. This is not the way of the world anymore. Between the industrial revolution and the infomation revolution, social orders do not need to be geographically based or even occasionally revert to violence for survival. This strongly limits transaction costs of switching economic or political systems.
I think any institution that uses force to do its work is dangerous as a pre-state institution, even a capitalist defense agency. This is particularly true if they are large or hold a natural monopoly (which would be extremely improbable).
I think you are fearing the case where 50+% of the population decides to enter a socialist organization that is particularly difficult, economically or socially, to leave. This would indeed be a dangerous situation; however, I simply do not think anarchism could produce this. On the other hand, I think socialist institutions would generally shrink rather than gain members, and the total number of syndicates would multiply quickly. I also think the total number of syndicate members would be a super-minority of the population.
I apologize if I have put words in your mouth. I just think we generally agree on more than this thread has led us to believe.
Yes, thank you.
I am new and would be interested in reading it.
My response to dispute is that there will always be dispute. If the opposing sides wish to escalate it into violent war, then it seems the more powerful side will win. Given the industrial and technological nature of modern warfare, I would assume the more capitalist side of any dispute would usually win.
Might I step into this discussion late and add the idea of renaming anarcho-capitalism: “eklarchy” or “eklektarchy?”
It combines the Greek words “eklektos” and “archon.” Eklektos means, in Greek, “the freedom to choose.” Archon, in Greek, of course, refers to leader or ruler. As you can probably infer, eklektos is also the root word of “eclectic” (which means “composed of elements drawn from various sources.”) I think “eklarchy” is a really etymologically sound word, as it separates our philosophy from “anarchy” (no regulations or authority), and embodies the notion that we support having orderly rules we agree to follow, and some type of authority to answer to, but that we should be able to freely choose which rulers/authorities we pay for, and even that the authority we submit to be composed of elements drawn from various sources (contracting with one firm for our defense/security, another for our legal recourse, etc.).
Thoughts?
I like eklektarchy. I could support this. It also has nice “open minded” feel to it. So this would make me an eklektarchist? I like it.
This sounds similar to panarchy, but the explanation makes good sense. I would definitley consider it myself.
Which phrase is better: “eklarchy” or “eklektarchy”?
The first is certainly more easily pronounceable than the second, but the second evokes the word “eclectic,” which might give people a better prima facie grasp of our philosophy.
“Panarchy” literally means “All rule,” which makes me think of everyone ruling everyone, or everyone having authority over everyone. Maybe other people won’t think the same, but I’m not sure I’m comfortable with “panarchy.”
Panarchy does not mean what you think it means. What you describe as “Panarchy” sounds much more like Global Fascism or Global Dictatorship.
[from: http://www.panarchy.org/rozeff/panarchy.2008.html]
Essentially, anarchism on a global scale, at least when taking the above & the sites’ other sources into context.
How so? The sort of egaliarian collectivism is fundamental to all statist ideology, even of the monarchical kind. It makes no sense to ally with people who view the state in an entirely different manner. Most anarcho socialists have no issue with whether or not the state violates property rights, exactly the opposite, they see it as enabling property rights. As such they’d rather some sort of voluntary commune. Which, in reality is very similar to that of the state. Granted, this is a huge generalization and there are obviously cases that this does not apply. But why associate with these individuals anyway? They don’t have much to offer and their conception of society is still very egalitarian.
If “anarcho capitalists” keep using silly terms such as that and refuse to distant ourselves from the term “anarchist”, we won’t be taken seriously. We’ll continue to be associated with: bomb throwing thugs, punks and utopians.
The thing is, culturally conservative, private property orientated communities would far outcompete those that differed. Essentially if some people did wish to form egalitarian communes, they’d be outcompeted by the well armed, richer “capitalists”. People object to this by saying that it’s a matter of preference, which is entirely wrong. There’s nothing analogous to this in free market economics, I may well have a preference to produce cars with nothing but a screwdriver but at the end of the day I’ll be outcompeted because I produce a superior product. Well, the same applies to the service that is the community, if I produce a superior community by means of exclusion people will move to it and adopt the norms that are required.
Why not go with multiarchy as suggest in the original post. It isn’t too different from what people know and it captures what we believe in perfectly: competing governments.
Well armed…? Maybe the right-wing-nuts, sorry! cultural conservatives will preemptively shoot the ‘hippies’ ? Well, we all know killing potential criminals is self-defense and is in line with culturally conservative values.
You mean like revealed religion, bigotry, hypocrisy, that kind of thing ?
Out of curiosity…How do envision the future ? Do you think, for instance, that the asian world will either embrace catholicism and western conservatism or else die ?
But why should we have to change just because some people are idiots? After all, I don’t care if someone associates atheism with communism; I’m still going to call myself an atheist. Same thing with anarchist.
What?
Yes.
Depends what you mean.
I think that a free society will tend towards cultural conservatism, yes. Do I think the asian world will? Not in the near future, no.
you said
So, what’s the relevance of ‘well armed’ here ? Unless you think that hippies are wild dangerous animals or something…?
Well, why would irrational beliefs in fairy tales, and hypocritical ‘morals’, outcompete people with a more rational worldview ? When I say hypocritical what I have in mind is, for instance, religious conservatives who cheat on their wives – there’s good of deal of them, you know.
A rather vague claim…
But it the long run, it will ? Or else it will be outcompeted ?
Wild animals? Perhaps. As for dangerous, no, but that doesn’t mean they won’t try violating my property rights. In any case, I wasn’t talking about hippies.
You mean, like libertarians who have started fist fights? So what?
A vague question.
Not unless they abolish the state, something I don’t see happening anytime soon. Less soon than in the western world that is.
I see you’re unable to give a coherent explanation of the benefits provided by fairy tales, aka, revealed religion ?
As to ‘libertarians’ who start fist fights, well yes, they are the same sort of hypocrite. Like people who preach “do as I say don’t do as I do”, that is to say the vast majority of ‘leaders’ of ‘religious communities’.
I think you’re evading my question ? According to you ‘social conservatism’ will outcompete other world views, no ? You’re talking about western social conservatism and western churches I suppose ? If that’s the case, do you think these institutions will outcompete all other cultures ? Yes ? No ? Maybe ?