Justice and defence the anarchist way

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Justice and defence the anarchist way

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Even many who are relatively sympathetic to free market minarchist and mutualist ideals where as much as possible is done through voluntary rather than coercive statist mechanisms often have a problem envisaging a system in which no state apparatus exists. Two of the most common objections are that we at least need a state to administer "justice" and to ensure "national defense". Even intellectual heavyweights such as Robert Nozick felt that a de facto "state", at least at a local level, would emerge from private law enforcement agencies.

Cover: Chaos Theory by Robert P Murphy So I'm often on the lookout for literature that explains how a private law based society would work, indeed would vastly improve upon the current predominant state run model, and so I am delighted to point my reader to "Chaos Theory", a pair of short essays, one on "justice" and the other on "national defense" by Robert P Murphy. It is available as a freely downloadable PDF at the Mises.org site. You can also buy a dead tree version (though I find delivery costs too high at Mises.org to justify having these sent to the UK).

It also provides further illustration of the point I was making in my previous piece on how respect for private property and contracts frees us from the need for a state.

I have also prepared an MP3 audiobook version, which is attached to this post. It's mainly just for me to listen to again on the way to work, but if you'd prefer to listen than to read, and can face my dulcet tones, feel free to use it, Robert Murphy has given his permission. It's only an hour and a half long, so you can judge how long it will take you to read this very accessible introduction to some of the ideas involved.

Particularly on the "justice" side, I can see ways in which the Mutualist ideal of creating such institutions and mechanisms within the current system could be successful. Since the non-aggression principle would not rely on the same ability conferred on state agents (i.e. the police) to arrest someone, there is no reason why such mechanisms could not operate successfully on private property at present.

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Comments

Submitted by Oranjepan_ (not verified) on January 8, 2010 - 16:07.

"Now I don't necessarily disagree, but I do find it difficult to reconcile the idea of a philosophically private state of objectivity (by objectivity in the political sense I mean legitimated sanctioning of defence and justice comparable to the way you refer to them as abstractions) when the philosophically public state of objectivity is presumed to be infinitely impossible to measure and therefore ascertain (that is, without a constant borg-like neural net connecting all parts at all times, with no outages or down time).

Surely humanity has to accept imperfection as a redeeming feature which allows for, inspires and initiates continuous improvement, for a private state of objectivity would inevitably result in stasis, ossification and a bliss/boredom dichotomy.

I mean, compare the evolving state to music - would you ever be satisfied to learn that the best music had already be made (not Handel and definitely not the sixties - the best music is by definition always being made now!)

Submitted by Jock on January 8, 2010 - 16:09.

But surely the point is that the market mechanism of honing perfection is better than the statist one, not that the former is static?

Submitted by Oranjepan (not verified) on January 15, 2010 - 00:32.

Well, I'm not happy with 'better' alone. I seek the best, which means I will refuse to rule out any method of improvement.

As a subsidiary point to that I don't think you've established that it is a matter of either/or - why can't market and state models be used as a balance to each of their weaknesses? I admit that the two apparent opposites are difficult to reconcile, but it is certainly not impossible since we live in a mixed society. Certainly it is currently an imperfect mix, but that's only because successive illiberal governments have progressively distorted the model.

It strikes me that you may be reacting against the distorted vision emplaced by the illiberals and less-liberals and working from a first principle rather than asking 'what works?'. From my perspective such a hard line strategem is unlikely to ever win enough support, so you'll need to find another way to bring it about.

Now I don't think I'm far away from you in the desired outcome, but there is a significant difference in arguing for a state in a society where nothing is needed from it and arguing against a state because it may be largely destructive: my preferred scenario has a liberal government, yours has no government.

Of the two I think my method of autonomous agreement is better able to coalesce support than one where perpetual argument is desired, for one I have to ask, doesn't argument necessarily and ultimately lead to agreement?