Fare - "Government is the Rule of Black Magic"

[gusl]

Faré is looking for feedback on his essay, titled "Government is the Rule of Black Magic"

You can find it here http://fare.tunes.org/liberty/government_black_magic.html

...
Of course, the answer that we libertarians have reached is that no, there are no rational justifications for government, its official explanations are bogus, and not only does it not solve the problems it claims to solve, but it creates these problems to begin with. This answer even defines us as libertarians. But this answer is not enough. It is a mistake to close the debate there and think that we've solved the problem — just our knowing that government is wrong in itself won't make government go away. We must ask: if these explanations are fake, then what is the real reason for people to believe in government? What is the rational explanation for these irrational explanations? In other words: if government is the answer, then what was the question?
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Write to him at fare at tunes.org or leave a comment here.

Comments

[spinemasher.livejournal.com]

I have been reading many of your entries with interest. I can't help but ask questions of this Libertarian view point. What do Libertarians have to say about a Naturalist/Scientific argument like the one I have created here Morality, Evolutionary Dynamics and Anthrosociopolitics?

For the purposes here I should be specific to the case in hand, namely government. What I view as a government (definition; so careful as we may have different definitions which lend themselves to completely different conclusions- say for example if your definition of government is the very inefficient evil thing that you oppose, well then I have no questions of you as nobody should support the existence of an entity such as that) is a body (singular or many) that is responsible for delegation of duty amongst a community. Examples of governments range from a bureaucratic monolith like a democratic-republic governing hundreds of millions to the de facto dictatorship of an alpha-male in an animal community of tens at most. In each case there is a clear chain of command and responsibility/rights allocation taking place.

In essence governments and communities go hand in hand. Now suppose I try to refute this statement. I need to make one of two claims.

1. Claim that there exists a community that is practical and stable in the sense of maintaining itself cohesively without the need for government.
2. Claim there is no need for community in the first place.

In the case of 1) this immediately raises the question of how conflicts will be resolved, since of course conflict is inevitable even in the most enlightened, intelligent, small and peaceful communities. In this case I like to quote American Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall "The right to swing one's fist ends at another's nose." This essentially asserts that there is no singularly clear way of deciding what is right in each instance. Metaphorically speaking, my fist will brush up against your nose whether we overtly try to prevent this or not i.e. due to randomness- accidents happen.

In the case of 2) we run up against my claim that organized collectives of humans (or any other species) called communities are more successful at surviving than individual non-collectives i.e. total anarchy. Biological evolution essentially asserts that anarchists won't survive nearly as well to pass on their genes and ideology (memes), hence their numbers will diminish until there are no more anarchists to debate with.

I know of no other way around this reasoning which simultaneously respects the constraints of physical (indeed biological) law.

[gustavolacerda.livejournal.com]

In the case of 1) this immediately raises the question of how conflicts will be resolved, since of course conflict is inevitable even in the most enlightened, intelligent, small and peaceful communities. In this case I like to quote American Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall "The right to swing one's fist ends at another's nose." This essentially asserts that there is no singularly clear way of deciding what is right in each instance. Metaphorically speaking, my fist will brush up against your nose whether we overtly try to prevent this or not i.e. due to randomness- accidents happen.

Sure, the easy solution is to create a government to settle disputes. But that has a lot of problems, and there's a lot of literature out there about private dispute resolution and private law, and some argue it would be better and less corrupt. David D Friedman comes to mind. Faré points out the common assumption that a government solution is inherently superior to a private solution, when in fact all it has going for it is the monopoly of force. How often does the use of force solve problems without creating other problems? (I'm not asking rhetorically: you fill it in... ). Faré also holds that anarchy and chaos are two very different things.


Biological evolution essentially asserts that anarchists won't survive nearly as well to pass on their genes and ideology (memes), hence their numbers will diminish until there are no more anarchists to debate with.

Is this an anthropic selection argument, i.e. "since there are no existing anarchies, anarchies must not be stable"?

[spinemasher.livejournal.com]

I am all for private resolution however the problem arises when a resolution is unreachable essentially due to the John Marshall quote. How is one to decide who's wishes take precedence? If one were to invoke an impartial third party arbitrator then one has in essence conceded to the use of government. I would also add that I don't believe private resolution to be impossible only that it is incomplete in that it is unable to address all possible issues due to the Marshall paradox. On the other hand while the governmental solution is by no means perfect, it yields solutions in all cases. Whether you like them or not is another matter.

As far as the use of force is concerned it is only one of many possible means of resolution. Ideally speaking a government is erected by the community with the full consent of all the community's constituents. Force is only required when an individual dissents so strongly that they refuse the will of the community, essentially reneging on their social contract due to selfishness. Therefore ideally speaking the use of force at all is (should be) rare and the only problems it creates presumably is for the rare dissenter.

I too agree that anarchy and chaos are not the same thing. However once again it boils down to a definitional issue. My definition of anarchy is this. Given a population say of people, we allow for the individuals which comprise the population total freedom. By total freedom I mean that they are free to do as they will unchecked by any laws or force (except of course by natural laws, that is, they cannot choose to live forever and for example will die of starvation if circumstances allow for it). In this situation the population always exhibits chaotic behavior, where chaotic has a prescribed technical denotation as defined in my above essay. So while they are not the same thing we have the following. Anarchical populations lead to chaotic systems.

Lastly, the answer to your last question is no, it is not an anthropic argument. Rather, it is a statement about dynamical systems. Actually to be fair I should mention that there are indeed stable solutions for anarchical populations. These solutions exist for what are called weakly coupled systems. It is the real life version of having plenty of resources and plenty of land or physical space with a small, initially well spread population with total freedom (i.e. my definition of anarchy). Actually this was the case early on in evolution which is expected as we did not start out with government. AND this situation does yield solutions to the John Marshall paradox. The two interacting bodies can just choose to ignore the other and go about their business, since if they desire, they need not ever run into each other again.

However, these assumed conditions are clearly not the case in current society. With the finiteness of resources and physical space together with the existing large populations, there are indeed no stable anarchical solutions.

I of course invite alternative definitions especially the standard Libertarian ones. Are my arguments dismissed because of a different choice of definitions or are there still yet objections to my logical argument.

I am still interested in what a Libertarian would say to such arguments.

[gustavolacerda.livejournal.com]

I agree that there are cases where force is required. And I won't question that government, to some degree, prevents bullying by the strongest. But I don't see why there can't be good anarchical configurations.


By total freedom I mean that they are free to do as they will unchecked by any laws or force (except of course by natural laws, that is, they cannot choose to live forever and for example will die of starvation if circumstances allow for it.

By your definition, you obviously can't have "total freedom" for more than one individual in a real society. If people try to use their "total freedom" in a way that hurts others directly, they will meet with forceful opposition, regardless of whether there is a government.


Anarchical populations lead to chaotic systems.

Don't you mean "lawlessness leads to chaotic systems"? Government gives an illusion that there exists an objective, impartial law. At least under anarchy, you know it's not that way.

To me, anarchy is relative. There will always exist power relationships that ultimately depend on force. In a way, my family has a government (though a benevolent one that hardly ever uses its force), and our citizens are allowed to immigrate once they turn 18.

[spinemasher.livejournal.com]

By your definition, you obviously can't have "total freedom" for more than one individual in a real society. If people try to use their "total freedom" in a way that hurts others directly, they will meet with forceful opposition, regardless of whether there is a government.

Brilliant, you have gotten to the heart of the matter. My assumptions furthermore are that an anarchy strictly forbids pairing or any larger congregation of individuals into a community. This is a "restriction" on what is meant by an anarchy and so when I said that the individuals were "totally free" to do anything I neglected to say "except to form a community". That is to say they will not cooperate with each other.

This means that when force is used unfairly no one is guaranteed to come to the aid of another. If anyone consistently helps out anyone else then they are an altruistic individual. Which is fine and permissible since I am thinking of a situation where all possible personality types exist. In fact I picked it to be Gaussian with the mean being non-altruistic and non-antagonistic more or less indifferent.

But when two altruists near each other they are likely to return the favor of aid. So what that means is that altruists form communities and hence governments in the sense that they are a democracy with a militia comprised of all (two of) the "citizens" in the community. These are sub-populations within the anarchical populace that are themselves not anarchical. They are the ones that survive successfully. And now you see that my definitions have been chosen so that the survivors by choice of definition are non-anarchists because they have a community and hence a government.

That's why anarchical populations always lead to chaotic systems. It is because the subsets which form ordered sub-systems are by definition communities with governments regardless of how informal they maybe. Also note that these populations may temporarily disband at any point in time and reconvene later with either the same members new members or entirely different members.

On the other hand I now appreciate what you are saying. You as well as other Libertarians seem to be envisioning a special population of reasonably intelligent altruists with a sense of equity. In this special case it is clear that such a population does not need a formal rigid government yet they still possess a government in the sense that there must be some mechanism through which rights/responsibilities are delegated to the members of the community.

I think your family example is an excellent example.

But now I think I have learned something. Namely, truly prudent Libertarians do not advocate true anarchy that is to say do not advocate no government at all but rather advocate a weak and minimal de-centralized government. So I can no longer disagree with you.

Yeah, right

[fare.livejournal.com]

OK, so thanks to Gustavo, I have an account here, and you can see me blogging on http://www.livejournal.com/users/fare/

As for your misreading of my article (did you even try? - The most meaty stuff is in section 5, IMNSHO), mind the footnote on the meanings on the word "government", at the place where the quoted paragraph is.