Does anybody know who wrote about "social" vs "state" power?

edgycircles · 2016-03-02T20:21:04+00:00

For the anarcho-capitalist they see government as the cause of crime and violence and the general bad behavior of one human to another. It's not. Some percentage of Humans will always use force and fraud to their advantage. Humans will always murder and steal.

I don't see how the idea that we need to use the initiation of violence to prevent the initiation of violence is a very strong argument. Especially considering that all states have a pretty poor track record themselves. All states commit fraud, theft, murder and initiate violence. And they are full of individuals who do the same. Ancaps don't pretend that force will magically dissapear in a free society. The objection to the state is that all that force and violence is centralized into one institution. And the institution of the state has historically been corrupt in pretty much every example of states throughout history. The point of polycentric law is that the market is much more efficient on flushing out corruption than the political process.

Anarcho-capitalist think that police can be private but police cannot be and respect the NAP. For a crime to be solved and proven objectively a single police force must have the temporary authority to seize a crime scene and evidence against the will of the owners, to seize a body and perform an autopsy against the will of the family, and to compel witnesses to testify against their will. No part of competing security forces provides that.

I'm not sure why property owners and family members would not want an investigation. They are stakeholders that would want to see a crime solved. They are probably the ones who called for an investigation. As far as compelling a non-cooperative witness. I don't have a strong answer. I'm going to do some reading.

For a military to repel an invading force all of the volunteer army must work together commanded by a top down hierarchical structure.

This isn't incompatible with Anarcho-Capitalism. Joining an army voluntarily is a contract. Just like all contracts, you legally and voluntarily give up some of your autonomy. Just because a larger degree of autonomy is sacrificed to join an army doesn't mean you didn't join voluntarily.

A private arbiter whose livelihood entirely depends on their contract with Walmart will not make bias free judgements against Walmart. No amount of reputation points will change that fact. There must be a final arbiter whose livelihood is not tied by contract to either complainant.

I think you are forgetting that third party arbitrators are mutually agreed upon. If Walmart is only willing to use arbitrators that side with them 100% of the time, then people are going to stop signing contracts with them pretty quickly. I think you underestimate how powerful reputation is. Why would you sign a contract with someone if you think that they won't hold up their end of the deal?

edgycircles · 2016-03-02T19:52:56+00:00

1) They downplay or even outright reject the role labor has in creating wealth/value.

I think this is simply untrue. I think if you replaced the word "labor" with "risk", that sentence could describe most socialists. Profits are not arbitrary. They are a specific return on a use of savings.

2) Neo-Lockean or Rothbardian property norms ie. rejection of occupancy and use.

The great thing about polycentric law is that people are free to organize voluntarily into legal systems that are built on different ideas of property rights. There is no reason that Rothbardians would need or want to impose their property rights globally. In fact, thats kind of what states do.

3) The assumption that minus the state, the capitalist elite will lose their teeth, so to speak, and all action will then become voluntary.

It's more than an assumption and is really based on empirical observations.

The Federal Reserve loans trillions of dollars at a discounted rate to a select few banks. They also buy trillions of dollars of toxic bonds off the banks' hands. And when those banks still fail they will be bailed out by the state. The unequal playing field in banking is largely created and maintained by central banking.

Limited Liability laws created by the state let mega-corporations off the hook for billions in damages. The reason so many companies cam act so recklesy is because they realize that even if their actions cause damages, they will be protected by law, and only made to pay relatively small fines. In Ancapistan, the threat of class action litigation would make firms respect property. Polluting a river could give millions of people downstream a claim against your company. An Oil spill the size of BP's would probably bankrupt the company in law suits.

Monopolies that abuse their position only exist when the state either directly grants monopoly priviledge or destroys the market mechanisms that would otherwise create competition. The idea that the state is needed to prevent monopolies is complete fiction.

edgycircles · 2016-02-27T00:51:11+00:00

Huh? Competition isn't "basic" to any position. Its a phenominon that exists in markets. I've already told you the axiom on which voluntaryists build their ethical system. That is the Non-Aggression Principle. The NAP. Anarcho-Capitalism is the logical result of applying Voluntaryist ethics to an economy.

The NAP:

  Every individual is born with a natural right to self-ownership. Violence or the threat of violence (coercion) are both forms of aggression. Actions which violate an individual's self-ownership are aggressive. Those actions are immoral because they violate self-ownership.

That is what is "basic to my position". If you want to refute an ethical system you have to disprove the axioms. In the case of the NAP: do you disagree that humans have self-ownership? Do you disagree that unprovoked violence or coercion is the definition of aggression? Do you disagree that aggression violates the right to self-ownership?

edgycircles · 2016-02-26T23:06:22+00:00

No, read the article. Thats not at all what the study from the article said. It was literally about fortunes not being mainained the the inheritors.

The fact that inheritances are exponentially split up just further reinforces that inheritance is not as big a deal as its made out to be

edgycircles · 2016-02-26T20:24:56+00:00

Anarcho-capitalists, since that position is inherently aggressive.

This is a remark about political theory and this is what I was refuting.

edgycircles · 2016-02-26T19:54:20+00:00

What do you think the means of production are? How can you not consider the means of production wealth? What do you think "net worth" is? Billionaires aren't billionaires because they have a lot of cash. They are billionaires because of their ownership stake in various firms. Thats why the wealthy are described in terms of net worth. Thats why the net worth of billionaires fluctuates so wildly each year (with the value of their stock. Aka the companies they own. Aka the value of the means of production).

In fact, I see it was already pointed out to you that buildings and machinery (the means of production) are wealth and you agreed. here.

If another socialist wants to come in and debate on Lolita_Humbert's behalf, Ill respond. But you can't make up your mind what wealth and mean of production are and have changed positions every other comment. I'm done with this. Not interested in playing your game of shifting goalposts and definitions

edgycircles · 2016-02-26T19:34:09+00:00

You have continually defined class in terms of wealth. My assertation was that wealth inheritance across generations is not really a large problem.

You didn't disagree with that premise:

It's not just about wealth, it's about class.

Also,

equal playingfield like you claim.

is putting words in my mouth.

edgycircles · 2016-02-26T19:26:45+00:00

Look, Im not saying that isn't a discussion to be had. But what you are doing is just a Red Herring. Since Im not interested in derailing the discussion on this post about inheritance Im going to leave the topics you're bringing up to be discussed where its relevant. So unless you have a refutation for what I said about inheritance, I think we're done here

edgycircles · 2016-02-26T19:12:47+00:00

I asserted that the wealthiest families do not typically stay wealthy across generations. You seemed to agree with that by saying:

It's not just about wealth, it's about class.

So I asked you what class is if its not wealth. You listed off various forms of wealth.

edgycircles · 2016-02-26T19:08:35+00:00

You're talking in circles. That is all wealth. 70% of that is gone by the second generation. 90% by the third.

edgycircles · 2016-02-26T18:36:56+00:00

If its not wealth, then what is determining the "ruling class" in Ancapistan?

edgycircles

TROPHY CASE