In an attempt to shock my convictions, I have begun investigating the recent history of Somalia; I had expected to find behavioral quirks that would weaken my enthusiasm for statelesss capitalism (e.g., perhaps an innate tendency to form religious tribes rather free-trading property-rights communities).
Rather than meeting those expectations, however, the evidence is mounting that stateless capitalism can thrive! I am actually incredibly surprised by how much empirical evidence is available for this conclusion, and it’s much more compelling than the standard anarcho-capitalist appeals to old-school Iceland and the Law Merchant.
So, I’m here to ask you what great materials you know of that analyze the anarchic economy of Somalia. I’m already familiar with Peter Leeson’s work, so I’m hoping for other sources.
I also think people underestimate the achievements of the Somalis. Not that it’s a paradise, but in context, the statistics are quite impressive.
Michael van Notten’s Law of the Somalis (edited by Spencer Heath Maccallum) has been on my book list for a while. Amazon also suggests this book by Peter D. Little, which may have some valuable info.
I have the Van Notten book and it’s actually more of a legal analysis - he was a law student. He studied, by the way, under one of the most brilliant libertarian natural law theorists there is; professor Frank van Dun. Unfortunately; van Dun his best work isn’t translated into English (yet). We at the Murray Rothbard Institute are, however, thinking of trying to do so ourselves.
In any case; the Van Notten book is quite good, but it doesn’t tell you much about the economic performances.
Just a thought,could Afghanistan be put into the same bracket as Somalia,stateless?I think since the Russian’s invaded there hasn’t been any central government in Afghanistan.The Russians left,then there was civil war,the Taliban then gained control and I’m sure they didn’t rule the whole country.
Afghanistan is a vast country with hundreds of tribe’s warlords,chieftains and different dialects,and this is why the coalition will find it so hard to impose a state upon the Afghan people.
The Afghan people hate the troops on their land,they also hate the Talib’s,but above all they hate the state.
@Wibee: Somalia is not a liberal society as envisioned by 18th century European liberalism. However, I think that Somalian society is, by and large, a natural order society.
An-cap of Friedman or Rothbard? Maybe. But one must consider some things. Is it anarchy? Yes by definition, there is no monopoly on law, and there is no government. Is there a market? Yes. Is there law? Yes, although it is voluntary, it is not libertarian in the traditional sense. So there is law, a market and anarchy. I think it is safe to say it is free market anarchy. So this begs the question, is anarchy be default a libertarian principle? I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. I think it is inspired by libertarianism, and is freedom, but isn’t inherently libertarian. Is it the most ideal? No. We can’t expect paradise from liberty. Things never work so quickly. We must look at the context of a political system or lack of. In the same sense that Iran is a bad government, and the U.S has a better standard of living. Sometimes it’s not the political system which creates all prosperity. There is a lot to learn from Somalia.
I think the problem, and this is exacerbated by Rothbardianism and maybe to a lesser extent, Hoppeanism, is that anarchy is conflated with a higher moral purpose, instead of being seen as a form of organization. This is where I, as a mostly Friedmanite (and Misesian) anarchist diverge from the Rothbardians.
In my opinion, a moral people must adopt anarchy, but this does not imply that all anarchy is driven by morals or ideas of freedom, or anything more than an inability to effectively organize a state.
A society is only as good as the people in it, not the structure (or lack) of a government. Rules and regulations, constitutions and traditions are only as valuable as the people cherish and understand the ideas behind them.
When cowardice and ignorance, willful or otherwise, become cultural norms, an individual will struggle mightily to achieve liberty, even if we all agree that it is his due as a man.
In my opinion, a moral people must adopt anarchy, but this does not imply that all anarchy is driven by morals or ideas of freedom, or anything more than an inability to effectively organize a state.
Right, building a state requires a certain amount of material and intellectual capital to run effectively. However, given a particular people even a ‘too-poor-to-statize’ society would be better than that same society with a state; and is more likely to advance towards freedom.
Morality is important. Imagine the arguments for slavery when it was going on, I’m sure they held onto this conservative utilitarianism, it is the system now, thus we shouldn’t change the system.
But one cannot deny the utility of anarchy. I can imagine less then 10 percent of taxes going back to the people who paid them. And we get these results. Just imagine if the services we get from government were thrown into a free market. Everyone would have much more money, and a better quality of life. On top of that all that money saved is put back into the economy.
I’m not convinced that Somalia has a capitalist judicial system. The customary law there sounds like old fashioned tribal communism as in the Americas before colonization.
I’m not convinced that Somalia has a capitalist judicial system. The customary law there sounds like old fashioned tribal communism as in the Americas before colonization.
No no no. It is much more like what Roderick Long talks about in his paper on Virtual Cantons. They have a multilateral dispute arbitration system which has non-hereditary, selectable elders who depend on their reputation. One can change from one tribe or another, and conflicts between tribes are either decided by agreement or sent to an agreed third party for adjudication. There is nothing at all resembling communism, private individual property is widely recognized. The trouble is that it has not developed in a Universalist framework, which means that conflicts between Somali and non-Somali are possible, since there is no recognized way for an outsider to join a tribe. Thus an American like myself would be in a much more precarious position (legally) than a native farmer.
There is even some reason to suspect that their piracy started out as fishermen privately protecting homesteaded fishing waters and/or extracting tolls from those who passed through, and mainly decended into piracy for the same reason that youth defensive organizations (i.e., gangs) did: they were prevented from having any recognized method of enforceable dispute resolution.
I think the point is that we should avoid analyzing social outcomes in moral terms - enslavement is evil but “slavery” is not. No individual can decide for there to be slavery but one individual can enslave another. Hence, “slavery” cannot be good or evil - unless you mean it in the looser sense of beautiful or ugly. But enslavement is the result of a particular individual’s actions, hence, it is within the proper domain of moral discussion.
I completely agree with your point that purely descriptive political theory is pretty much useless. What other point is there to the social sciences than to answer the question, “What ought to be?” The hard part is to maintain enough humility to recognize that there probably isn’t a damn thing that can be done to change the way it is, no matter how compelling the case for change may be.
