But not equitable to a very large kingdom Tyrant correct? Do you get where I am going?
If you don’t think it’s relevant why have you highlighted the point? What about the remainder of the argument? Do you offer any critiques?
I’ll ask the same questions to you that was asked of Retropper.
Assume a Warlordish PDA.
A)How does it generate revenue?
B)How do they pay wages to their employees, who are not operating Bandits/pirates?
C)How do they maintain their capital given that their company is antagonistic, hostile, and overall costly?
In General, can you explain to us the theoretical framework of a hegemonic PDA or warlordish type PDA? How does it operate in general?
Do you agree or disagree that an antagonistic defensive(Offensive) agency is likely to experience a greater cost of doing business, as their equipment takes repeated abuse from repeated confrontational encounters? IE Offensive protection agency is likely to cost more then a defensive?
Does this PDA get backed by insurance? What arbitration services will it partner with?
Do you think Warlordism is likely? What reasons are there that would cause such a situation. I’m looking for any substantive theory behind this belief. Perhaps we can take this discussion in a much further productive state, then the discussions with that other guy… wink
Raids on, and expansion into the territory of other warlords and whatever local revenue the population would generate normally.
B)How do they pay wages to their employees, who are not operating Bandits/pirates?
They protect the local populations ability to trade from other, competing warlords. They probably also get some kind of share in the plunders from the previous said raids.
C)How do they maintain their capital given that their company is antagonistic, hostile, and overall costly?
Military expansion, how else?
Do you agree or disagree that an antagonistic defensive(Offensive) agency is likely to experience a greater cost of doing business, as their equipment takes repeated abuse from repeated confrontational encounters? IE Offensive protection agency is likely to cost more then a defensive?
Agree. Do you agree or disagree that this says nothing on whether the plunder is higher than the costs (a profit can be made)?
Does this PDA get backed by insurance? What arbitration services will it partner with?
Yes, the financial backing of the wealthy interests it protects. Any services that recognize its authority. If that is only the small town it controls, or a larger territory is largely irrelevant to its existence.
Do you think Warlordism is likely?
Depends on the culture behind this stateless society and where soveirgnty is believed to lie; in those who can exercise it most powerfully, or in the self. If the former, yes. If the latter, no.
EDIT: To answer the original question; there is not much that can prevent warlordism other than social norms; or an educated and active population with a strong belief in, and willingness to defend the soveirgnty of the individual (imho)
Again, you commit a major fallacy here, namely, that your assertion begs the question: Why assume that a system of warlords evolve in the first place? You don’t provide an answer, but just assume they will fight until one conquers all.
If the question at hand explicitly assumes warlords, which implies some territorial and/or coercive monopolies already in place, then the question is asking about a possible statist conflict and not some conflict arising in the free market between private defense agencies.
You must first address the question you were asked: how would a private defense agency become a warlord in the first place? Private defense agencies posses customers. Voluntary customers. Not territory! Those customers can disappear rather quickly.
A) This assumes that the hegemonic PDA already exists, are we assuming that? I hadn’t known. I was curious as to how it would form.
B) Raiding into other territory’s is a bit of a mischaracterization. I would say raiding non-member individuals property. This explains how the PDA obtains property, but not how they generate revenue. When you rob someone’s house, the house doesn’t magically create food and shelter for your employee’s. This is not revenue, these are assets.
How does the PDA generate Revenue(Money).
Again how does the plunder magically turn into wages which can be used to purchase food from other regions in order to feed and shelter the employee’s of the bandit PDA.?
This doesn’t answer the question. Given that the practice of said PDA is offensive, and more likely prone to capital consumption, how do they keep their capital from beeing depleted overtime? IE how do they maintain their tanks and/or purchase new ones?
Irrelevant for now. All that matters is that we establish an agreement that it is more costly to maintain an offensive agency, rather then an agency which specializes in simply the defense of property.
Err protection from what/whom?
Are you making another leap of faith in arguing that Defense agency’s and insurance may be one in the same provider? Or work in tandem as if partnered? If so how will they generate enough insurance to cover their expensive legal fees revolved around capital destruction?
If the culture is in favor of warlordism a state won’t eliminate it. If consumers naturally wish to fund war, and find utility in it, then the nations government will just become a war-nation. Liberal Democracy has no checks and balances against that, a constitution is not a check or a balance, especially if the culture is fundamentally against the document. If warlordism is in the hearts and minds of the individuals of said region, then their government will reflect that. So you’ll just have a super-hegemonic PDA a state. Right back to where we started.
Because it was one of the main points in the article, and I thought it was irrelevant. Feel free to explain how it is relevant, unless you are too tired, that is.
No, simply a question. How did the first state form?
This is a bit of a tangent, but why is it necessary that this group would be a PDA? What if they don’t defend anybody? What are they considered then? I think this is why I am confusing you guys. You seem so thoroughly mired in the an-cap paradigm to the point where the mention of a possible phenomena that isn’t mentioned in an-cap literature is beyond the scope of consideration.
You know, the old timey Viking staples: Raiding, pillaging, looting, slave trade, etc.
maybe some mafia protection rackets, you know - nefarious stuff.
Don’t really understand this question (as we both know, it seems like we are speaking different languages to one another most of the time), but if you mean guys who don’t raid all of the time? Well, I’m pretty sure the usual method is,
“If you don’t raid, no spoils”
How anybody keeps their capital: force.
Again, I really have no idea what you are trying to communicate to me. They take stuff from people without permission or through coercion. It’s really not that complex.
It’s impossible for me to make a blanket “yes/no” statement in regards to your question. Do you really expect me to consider any and all circumstances?
Why would they need it? The life of an outlaw is not a cautious one, that’s for certain.
Why would it need one?
If history is any indication, yes.
Scarcity.
Hate to disappoint, but there isn’t much literature I can cite. Let me put it to you this way:
Trade works, but what if you have nothing to trade, or the possessor of the item you covet is unwilling to trade. What to do? (Try to) take it, or leave it. It’s basic schoolyard economics.
OK, my turn,
Why would anybody pay wages to the unemployed?
Why do you assume this entity would take the form of a company?
Do you think that theft would still exist in a stateless society? Why do you find it impossible that theft could be institutionalized in a stateless society?
As an aside, I’m not trying to be contrarian for the hell of it. I’d really like to have a “magic bullet” argument against statists on this issue. So far, the only convincing arguments I’ve heard are the modern availability of weapons, and moral norms. The moral norm argument is extremely easy to counter (not every one will share/abide by such norms), and the weapons argument inevitably leads to leagues of mutual protection, aka confederation, aka states (according to the guy I argue with at work). I’m probably the most skeptical/critical person I know, so I figure if it passes my “sniff test” it will be pretty tough for this guy to find fault. So please, prove me wrong.
This assumes that the hegemonic PDA already exists, are we assuming that? I hadn’t known. I was curious as to how it would form.
It forms when and if the consituents of one company find it more profitable to sieze the assets of another company, even if they have to make agreements with the consumers of said company, than to mutually compete. It doesn’t matter whether it is likely or not, the question is, what in an-cap would stop it.
When you rob someone’s house, the house doesn’t magically create food and shelter for your employee’s. This is not revenue, these are assets.
How does the PDA generate Revenue(Money)
They get paid by their constituents for opening up new access to trade (assets, routes, people). I imagine they also distribute plunder amongst the plunderers, as plunderers have been known to do (Roman conquest, anyone?). Land, and other assets can be just as good as any wages. This also resolves the “food” question as well.
Given that the practice of said PDA is offensive, and more likely prone to capital consumption, how do they keep their capital from beeing depleted overtime? IE how do they maintain their tanks and/or purchase new ones?
If a PDA finds it more profitable to expand militarily, and this choice proves succesful, do you assume it’s investors will suddenly pull out?
Err protection from what/whom?
People who want to protect their assets from the threat of other hegemons?
If so how will they generate enough insurance to cover their expensive legal fees revolved around capital destruction?
What legal fees? As Jackson has said, hegemons are not really in the interest of being temperate or moderate. If they can make it profitable for their investors to plunder any land that disagrees, they have a likelihood of doing so.
If the culture is in favor of warlordism a state won’t eliminate it. If consumers naturally wish to fund war, and find utility in it, then the nations government will just become a war-nation. Liberal Democracy has no checks and balances against that, a constitution is not a check or a balance, especially if the culture is fundamentally against the document. If warlordism is in the hearts and minds of the individuals of said region, then their government will reflect that. So you’ll just have a super-hegemonic PDA a state. Right back to where we started
It would seem we are in agreement here, no matter what the legal/political system.
Don’t you have a hegemony over yourself? Do you defend yourself when attacked? Viola! Hegemonic PDA!
Whoa, brainstorm…
OK bear with me here,
We occupy some amount territory (physical space) at all times. Given that, we have a monopoly (hegemony) on the space we occupy at any given time. Without moral norms, there is no way to determine if this occupation is justified. So without the norms, there would be no such thing as warlords, just large landholders who sometimes utilize violence. I guess the question becomes:
“What would mitigate the use of violent means to appropriate resouces in a stateless society?”
You can appeal to the assumed “economic certainty” of violence being less efficient at achieving desired ends, but I’m generally not into “truths”. What else you got?
Yes that was the point I was making to Epicurus. Thanks. Was I asking a quesiton?
Because others disagree with that viewpoint, and prefer theivery, and murdering. But this is entirely seperate from a systematic organization which robs, pillages, and steals for a living. Or are you attempting to conflate the two?
…and semantics. The phenomenon is one and the same: territorial power/force monopoly regardless of names attached to it: gang, PDA, warlord, state, etc.
The real life experiment is over and the results are conclusive: This planet populated with this human actors has already converged to a state of power/force monopolies over EVERY square inch of valuable territory. Let’s revisit after few hundred years with a slightly evolved human actor model. Until then…
Nobody has made or reached such a fallacious conclusion except for you.. And now Z just knee-jerked in response, which proves that he has been arguing with himself during all this time.
Look I guess I mis-understood. I thought you guys wanted an honest/friendly discussion. I guess I was wrong. I personally don’t feel my questions are that vague or hard to understand. It’s confusing because I thought you were purposfully acting dense just to irritate me. So either one of us is being intentionally difficult, or you and I geniunely have a communications issue. Since I think the latter might be the case I’ll just back out of this discussion now and leave it to whomever else wants to get involved. Have a good one.
This is incredibly silly. How is this any of our positions? Also this sentence makes me wonder the intent of the discussion? Is it just to poke petty jabs at Ancaps?
You guys also need to review the “Burden of Proof” wiki page. =p
Yea I feel like I got cheesed into a debate, not about the realistic appraisal of warloridsm, but a cheesy attempt to poke fun at various ancap positions. I don’t see any evidence of a genuine discussion formulating here, I smell more retropperishness than anything else. I realize that some folks may take this as a cop-out but I don’t care. I dont want to waste my time on these types of threads any more, they’re so tiresom.
This is a bunch of stuff I wrote before your last few posts. I don’t think I’ll follow up on any of these however.
At any rate, below is what I wrote.
A good question. This is a cpo-out but that would start a winded discussion, and would be better suited as another topic no?
You’ll have to forgive me, I hadn’t thought that this was the angle you were taking. Usually when people use the “Warlord” argument(at least on the mises forums) they’re referring to a rogue PDA. This was a mistake on my part, I mis-understood the position yuor trying to raise. I mean youl could have just said “Piracy” or banditry" but thats neither here nor there.
At any rate I think dealing with piracy/banditry is just as easily handled on the market as any other form of aggression would be.
So it’s safe to assume your referring to a band of thieves then?
That doesn’t explain how they earn wages(Money), with which to trade for other things. I didn’t ask how they obtained assets, I asked how they earn wages. Whats so complicated about this question? If you raid a furniture store, you can’t eat the furniture. How do your bandit employee’s go to subway and buy a sandwhich with a stolen sofa?
Can anyone else tell me if my questions are that difficult to understand?
What does force have to do with keeping steel from corroding? I’m referring to capital consumption here.
It’s far more complicated then you give credit for. Your describing a fantasy type of banditry you read in fiction and or bad history books. Where a group of robbers go live out in the woods and on occasion storm into town and take things. Organized crime however is far more complicated then your insisting apon. Shoot, if it were as simple as a band of theives out in the woods, that would be easily handled.
Look I ask these questions because you brought this topic up, not me. The burden of proof lies with you to explain to us why Wardlordism is something we should even regard to as a concern.
What would prevent warlordism? Banditry? Piracy? Well historically speaking we know that many organized crime institutions worked in concerted cooperation with the state. Take the mafia for example, they actively employed local police organizations to ensure that their firms operated safely and that the cops would stay out of their way to an extent. Without a state however such protection does not exist, and these institutions are at risk of running into the ground.
I’m not sure why you take issue with my questions? They seem honest enough given the discussion you brought to the table.
Well if we conceded that it was cheaper to run a defensive operation, then you would have a simple argument for why Warlordism is not of concern. I could see you’d like dissmiss this line of reasoning.
So you can’t say in general, whats a more costly model to follow. Offensive banditry institution? Or an institution which only specializes in defense of private property only. Do you see why I might think it’s cheaper to run a defensive operation?
Ok so I see your theoretical understanding of how things would operate differ from mine. We’re talking about a more primitive institution. Can you cite the historical examples you refer to?
Just to be clear I don’t thikn anyone one here is saying theivery would just magically dissapear in a voluntary society. What the argument, at least mine, is that there are market forces to midigate those problems, and by comparisson to the state aren’t that bad. Also historically speaking they tend to be overstated.
You think scarcity is more likely to instigate violence rather than social cooperation of markets?
I didn’t ask for literature, I’m asking for a theory in your mind. Since you presented the case, not me.
At any rate, What if? How does that logically conclude to warlording factions?
Why would bandits stay with the group if they couldn’t go buy food and pay for shelter?
I don’t find it impossible. If I stated that somewhere I retract it. Can you cite where I took that position?
I have been trying to explain the economic arguments for you, but you’ve been un-interested in engaging that. You don’t seem interested in morals which is fine. So you take the might makes right stance, which is historically typical for you.
Well no offense but it seems like your just trying to find someone that agrees with your specific line of reasoning.
This doesn’t make sense. Hegemonic firms and monopolies refer to a social context, IE more then a single person. They aren’t regions of the body, but are multi-body situations. They refer to a social context. Was your response here a serious one? These kinds of statements are an example of the reason why I can no longer take this thread seriously.
Have you ever stopped to question your “sniffing” abilities?
Well, I would say that in the misty past, human populations were far more susceptible to relinquishing their rights for reasons(scarcity of weaponry, need for physical prowess, religious superstition, maybe more as the thread I started about it gets some posts) which have become anachronistic. As a few posters have mentioned, a state without perceived legitimacy is difficult to maintain. The question now becomes,
What are the methods the state employs to legitmize itself?
What can be done to refute those avenues?
As far as I can tell, that’s all it will take to decentralize potential force to the point of irrelevancy (which is all one can hope to achieve).
there’s a delicate balance between the power of the individual and the power of the group. with the techonology we have today sans government (that is to say, sans laser guided missles and aircraft carriers) it’s arguably easier today than it has ever been to protect oneself from an aggressor. when you can pick off alexander the great from a mile away, sending his generals and army into disarray, you stand a lot better chance than if you have to wait for his hordes to break down your wall and go toe to toe.
the wrath of the masses is always the elephant in the room when discussing ethics or political philosophy. it doesn’t matter if you have a libertarian paradise or a totalitarian romania, if you piss enough people off, regardless of whether your actions are justifiable or deplorable, you are going to end up dead. the best you can hope for is giving everyone enough of a say to defend their best interests with force and pray like the dickens it doesn’t come to that. but I doubt things would get out hand, at least not for any large length of time or on a large scale geographically.
I’m sorry, I interpreted these statements implying aggression was always less profitable than exchange, which would doom aggressors, inevitably, to failure.
Trust me, this is a communications issue. I can assure you I don’t enjoy talking in circles for page after page. Which brings us to this:
No, no, for the nth time, no!!! what makes you think I’m a troll, the fact that I’m not convinced by what you found so compelling? This is exactly what I was talking about when I wrote,
We are two different planets. To get you to understand me, or vice versa, would be akin to explaining “red” to a blind man.
What am I trying to prove?
[INSULT DELETED] I don’t fully agree with your lame positions, so I must be out to undermine Anarcho-Capitalism.
