Left to Right - A perspective
With the latest electoral machinations going on in Quebec, the confusion that is the "left-right" paradigm has reared its head again. Despite the efforts of the Stageleft Bunker to bring some sanity to the discussion using the "quadrant" picture of political belief, clearly some people don't get it.
While the quadrant is much better than the old left-right idea, I prefer a simpler and more historically accurate line of reasoning as presented by Karl Hess in his book Dear America:
My own notion of politics is that it follows a straight line rather than a circle. The straight line stretches from the far right where (historically) we find monarchy, absolute dictatorships, and other forms of absolutely authoritarian rule. On the far right, law and order means the law of the ruler and the order that serves the interest of that ruler, usually the orderliness of drone workers, submissive students, elders either totally cowed into loyalty or totally indoctrinated and trained into that loyalty. Both Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler operated right-wing regimes, politically, despite the trappings of socialism with which both adorned their regimes....Hess was a former Barry Goldwater speech writer and Republican hawk that went through a kind of conversion to anarchism in the 60's and 70's. It was through his travels across the spectrum that he came up with the above observations and I believe it is most accurate.
The far left, as far as you can get away from the right, would logically represent the opposite tendency and, in fact, has done just that throughout history. The left has been the side of politics and economics that opposes the concentration of power and wealth and, instead, advocates and works toward the distribution of power into the maximum number of hands.
—Karl Hess, Dear America [emphasis mine]
It is about authoritarianism and hierarchy, not who supports what program. Based on this then, out Canadian spectrum would look like this:
Libertarians------------>NDP->Liberals-->CPC-->Nazis/Communists-->Absolute Monarchs
Economically it resembles this:
Decentralized voluntary------------>Planned--Corporatist-->Planned Communist---> Feudal
Free Market----------------------------------------------------------------------->Total Control
So, as Sheldon Richman has observed, the true left are the libertarians and the anarchists, who most value freedom - both social and economic - while the right are those who wish to impose their authority - both social and economic - upon others. The imposition of authority can come directly from the state, or via crony capitalism and state intervention in the economy on behalf of the corporate elites.
In Canada then, we really only have varying degrees of authoritarianism in our mainstream parties. So, when a Conservatives says they are a libertarian, they are lying - as long as they are okay with state or corporate control and favors, they are not in favour of freedom. When a Liberal or NDP says they are concerned with your liberty, they are lying - as long as they wish to regulate and legislate your economic activity and behaviour, the are not in favour of freedom.
The only real difference between our parties are who their corporate and union friends are and who they will rule for.
Update:
As per Ron's comment below, I'd like to make it clear that I don't see much of a difference between the major parties. Sadly my ascii art capabilities are not up to the task. There are very little differences between them. The NDP would have you give up economic liberty for lots of (perceived) personal liberty and the Conservatives would have you give up personal liberty for lots of (perceived) economic liberty. The Liberals will take a bit of both, and tell you they are moderate. In the end, you are still ruled by people who will use force and coercion against you and tell you they are doing it in your best interests, when its really in their interests and that of their cronies, be they unions or corporations or both.
Labels: anarchy, left, libertarian, rights
posted by Mike @ 8:57 AM
50 comments
50 Comments:
Mike: Your general point is accurate and well-taken but I see no reason to posit the NDP as even marginally less coercive than, say, the Liberals or Progressive Conservatives. Life in BC under a few NDP regimes disabused me of any notions that the NDP are a less coercive (or less destructive) option. The coercion was applied to different things, but no less present.
True enough Ron. I would love to show all three stacked, with slight variations, but I'm just not that good at ascii art.
But you are absolutely correct.
When I ran as a (capital L) Libertarian in a federal election, *all* the telephone threats regarding the safety of my family and possessions came from the NDP-style left. As well,*all* the calls to my boss asking him to fire me if I continued to run, and threats of boycott if he continued to employ me, also came from the NDP/labour left. Further, *all* the knee-jerk smears in letters-to-the editor about my supposed racism and sexism (as in, I must be racist/sexist if I'm a free-market capitalist) came from the NDP/left. There were more than a few instances of each.
It also bears mentioning that the only group that tried to keep me out of a supposed "all-candidates" forum they were holding was the Solidarity folks. They reconsidered only after I informed them that, although I supported their right to only invite folks they wanted, I would immediately and loudly tell the news agencies that their "all-candidates forum" was a laughable "some" candidates forum.
I have no illusions about the ability of NDP/union types to get nasty and coercive. I've seen it up close and *very* personal.
Ron, I've seen the Conservatives do just that here in Ontario.
Proving again that they are all the same underneath.
Exactly. The question is not
*if* they will both oppress you; it's "how and to what ends".
I find this analysis a little simplistic, as it overlooks a (very old) debate between different conceptions of liberty or freedom. See here. What you're worried about, Mike, is negative freedom -- a lack of restrictions or constraints. It's plausible that what the NDP, Libs, Cons et al are doing is actually trading that off (in some form) against (some form of) positive liberty -- the possibility of acting in ways contributory to one's life-purposes.
It's worth noting that the idea that negative liberty is the be-all and end-all only really works when a certain background level of positive liberty is presumed.
It's worth noting that the idea that negative liberty is the be-all and end-all only really works when a certain background level of positive liberty is presumed.
Explain that assertion, please.
I thought it was obvious, really. Perhaps not.
Unless you have a certain level of power to act, lacking restrictions is meaningless. For example, I'm not currently restricted from flying off the roof of my building -- I have perfect negative liberty to do so. But, I have no positive liberty to do it -- I lack the power. So, the negative liberty is literally nothing.
The same applies to any negative liberty. Take the negative right to self-expression, which should correlate with the positive right to self-determination. If I can't determine my own life-path -- I lack the power -- then being unrestricted in my choices is nothing. My choices aren't my own, so whether or not they're coerced is irrelevant.
Similarly, consider the negative right to free speech. If I don't have the positive right to actually have my own opinions, then what value is this negative right? None at all. I can't have my own opinions; so whether or not someone's coercing me is irrelevant.
This matters because there are many in society who, because of a variety of institutional factors, lack certain positive liberties. My favourite historical example of this is black slaves in the US. When they were released in the 19th century, many black slaves didn't want to leave their former owners. It was the life they were used to and, in a sense, the life they chose. The problem, of course, is that this choice had been made for them long ago, and simply removing restrictions was not enough. Without the background positive freedom to determine what life path they wanted to follow, the negative freedom to not be coerced or restricted didn't change them or anything for them at all.
adhr: That's kinda where I thought you were going with that, but I wanted to be sure.
The problem is that paternalistic folks will argue that there's no need for the negative right to be considered or implemented "until citizens are raised up" to some point (usually posited as a degree of awareness but sometimes just related to Maslow, for examples) where the powers-that-be accept that "the citizens" are ready to handle the freedoms we're talking about. Pro-partheid folks in South Africa were big on that kind of thinking, for example.
Or, turning your statement around: Without the background negative freedom to not be coerced or restricted, the positive freedom to determine what life path they wanted to follow, wouldn't count for squat. They could dream all they wanted to absolutely no effect.
Also adhr, at times you seem to be using "positive right" to mean something almost synonymous with a "positive ability". It's a looseness of terminology that confuses me, especially, for example, with this sentence of yours:
...consider the negative right to free speech. If I don't have the positive right to actually have my own opinions, then what value is this negative right?
Even if you have no legal permission to hold an opinion, you can hardly be prevented from quietly holding one--and I would contend that your ethical "right" of free speech remains intact even when your "legal permission" to speak freely is denied.
Another example: your sentence:
"I'm not currently restricted from flying off the roof of my building -- I have perfect negative liberty to do so"
confuses for the same reason.
There is probably a bylaw somewhere restricting your "legal permission" to fly/jump off your building, but you can certainly still do so (how effectively is another question) so the ability remains. So, by liberty did you mean "legal permission", "physical freedom" or "ethical right"?
In short, a "right", a "legal permission" and an "ability" are three different things.
ADHR,
To further Ron's points, the very thing that you would like to use to enforce "positive rights" is the very thing that has been used, traditionally, to deny those "positive rights" and to create the power imbalance you decry - the power and hierarchical, non-voluntary state.
I would posit that without a state to enforce the privilege that creates it, the power imbalance that you observe would not exist. People would act cooperatively or competitively, but certainly voluntarily to obtain their dreams - image no anti-union legislation, no rules that favour Shell Oil over the Lubicon etc.
Imagine if those freed slaves actually got their "40 acres and a mule" instead of nothing.
Libertarianism isn't just about getting rid of the state and leaving everything as it is now. Great swaths of libertarians and anarchists believe that some kind of land\property reform would take place to address illegitimately gained property and title. Even people like Murray N. Rothbard and Karl Hess (whom I quote) would agree to this (and have done so in print).
Its not just about removing the state, but about living in a voluntary manner, with no privilege that is not earned and no hierarchy that is not based on voluntary respect and knowledge rather than mere power.
Ron,
I'm happy with the idea that negative rights matter. My point is that the positive right is prior. You can have an ability, even if it isn't exercised, or even exercisable. Abilities are things that you have. You can't be unrestricted in doing something you have no ability to do. Lack of restriction requires the ability to act. Without that ability, there's no sense in which you could be restricted; hence, there's no sense in which you could be unrestricted.
Rights, abilities and freedoms aren't the same thing, but in context the terms are interchangeable. Positive rights or freedoms are defined as abilities. A freedom is a particular class of right. When we're talking about positive vs. negative freedom, then, the terms "positive freedom", "positive right" and "ability" can be safely used interchangeably. See here, incidentally, for some (slightly biased) discussion of the distinction. Rousseau is the classic source for a concept of positive liberty (although he didn't draw the distinction, he used the idea).
As for the examples, the first was meant to literally involve the ability to have my own opinions, not to say them. If I don't have that, the negative right to not be coerced in my opinions means nothing.
With regard to the second, your defense seems a little dogmatic. I can certainly jump off the roof, or fall, but I'm not flying. Flying is voluntary or intentional movement through the air, à la Superman. Calling falling flying is a bit like calling drowning swimming. (And I'd actually be surprised if there was a bylaw telling me I can't jump off the roof of my building. I know there are some wacky bylaws on the books, but that seems a bit too wacky to have attracted city council's attention.)
Mike,
Appeals to history cut both ways. I can find examples of powerful, hierarchical, non-voluntary states which did ensure positive rights. Unless there's some necessary connection between these sorts of states and the denial of rights, your case seems to me to be flimsy. It's certainly not obvious that powerful states have these consequences.
I don't see why you think there are no privileges without states. By definition, any group of people -- even a family -- has a level of power that a single person does not. Are you suggesting there should be no families? No voluntary associations? Of course you're not, as that would restrict a negative right. So, there's something missing from the argument: why is the privilege that comes with states bad, but the privilege that comes with other sorts of associations okay? You mentioned "earned" privilege, but what makes the privilege of being in a large and close family "earned"? It's a matter of the natural lottery, not desert. (To say nothing of the question of why earning is the fundamental moral relation instead of, say, need or interest. If we get into that, we'll be at this for months.)
As far as property, there's a couple of issues that need to be taken into account. First, property/resources aren't that important to prosperity. Economists have been riding that horse for decades now; the data don't support a strong correlation between control of resources and economic prosperity. Second, even if there were, there simply isn't enough to go around. According to Wikipedia, the world's land mass is 149,000,000 square kilometres, and the population is 6,450,000,000. So, not only is it impossible to give everyone 40 acres and a mule, you're only able, at best, to give everyone about 0.02 or 1/50th of a square kilometre of land apiece (about 5 acres). It sounds all right, until you take into account (a) that's the entire landmass of the Earth, including unusable land like Antarctica; and (b) the population is increasing, while, given global warming, the amount of usable land will be decreasing.
Finally, cogsci and various other subdisciplines of psych are demonstrating to us, fairly powerfully, that we aren't as voluntary as we think we are, and probably aren't even capable of living the way the libertarian ideal you describe would require. Many of the relations we enter into, including hierarchical power relations, happen below the level of our conscious choice. Since ought implies can, negation of can implies negation of ought (by contraposition). The fact that you can't do it implies that it's false to say you should.
adhr: the first article you posted frames the debate well and clarifies your use of the terms. We have some areas of disagreement possibly, but I appreciate your tone and your rigour.
Would you do me the favour of describing some positive rights, providing a few specific examples? With my thanks.
ADHR,
I intend to read the link you provided, so bear with me. At this point let me touch on a few things:
"why is the privilege that comes with states bad, but the privilege that comes with other sorts of associations okay? "
Privilege from the state is not voluntary, nor based on true cooperation - it is based on violence or the threat of violence.
"impossible to give everyone 40 acres and a mule"
Of course it is. I was making reference to the unfulfilled promise made to the freed slaves after the civil war. That this kind of redistribution did not take place is a more likely explanation why slaves stayed with their "masters" after being freed rather than your explanation of lack of positive rights. Remember, it was the power of a state, acting at the behest of certain landowning and corporate interests, that enslaved them in the first place. I certainly would not trust that institution to now guard their positive rights.
"I can find examples of powerful, hierarchical, non-voluntary states which did ensure positive rights."
I am sure you can but at what cost - usually the curtailing of negative rights, based on involuntary theft via taxes.
I have no problem with self-organizing into something resembling a "state" so long as it is voluntary.We do not have that now.
I would posit that your desire for enforcement of positive rights stems from the fact that those who seek privilege do so by using the power of the state to curtail negative rights. You seek redress for the lack of negative rights in the enforcement of positive rights, instead of trying to get the positive rights back.
At any rate, I will read your link and add more later.
"instead of trying to get the positive rights back"
Should be instead of trying to get the negative rights back.
Ron,
Sure. The freedom to form one's own opinions, to formulate one's own life path, to recognize and pursue the good.
Mike,
As you note, the state could as easily be based on voluntary cooperation as the threat of violence. Of course, it could also be based on other things. It could be a mechanism by which we promote happiness, for example, or by which we satisfy people's needs. Given that, it doesn't follow that privilege coming from the state is bad. It's privilege from oppressive or violence-based states that's bad.
Now, why voluntary cooperation is so sacrosanct is obscure to me. As said, we could also base the justification for the state on needs, or promotion of welfare/happiness, or a host of other grounds.
Furthermore, why you want this voluntary cooperation to be of one kind rather than another is also obscure to me. It's rare in the history of philosophy to find theorists who believe that the only way one consents to be governed is by overt agreement. Most accept some sort of implicit agreement -- such as by accepting the benefits of a state, or by participating in the mechanisms of governing the state (e.g., by voting).
With regard to the slaves, I'm not seeing why we can't both be right. That is, there was a problem with rectifying a past injustice, but also a failure to inculcate the necessary positive freedoms. Again, I don't have a problem with negative rights, but I'm saying the positive must be prior. Which is why it's not necessarily a problem to curtail negative rights, as long as positive ones are produced. (Although there will have to be a threshold beyond which the loss of negative rights outweighs the gain in positive rights. Positive rights are more important, but that doesn't imply they're the only the thing that's important, nor that they are of overwhelming importance.)
So, the idea of "redressing" a lack of negative rights by getting them back, instead of enforcing and creating positive ones, gets the picture backwards. Since negative rights aren't anything without positive ones, it follows that enforcing positive rights has to come first. Then we can worry about what negative rights should be in place as well. I accept the idea of negative rights as a way to stop the state from getting out of hand. But your idea is much stronger, it seems: that negatively free and voluntary associations are better than an organized society which creates positive freedoms throughout childhood and early adulthood, through enforced education and other mechanisms of social control. As I've said, though, people in these voluntary associations will have lost something of greater importance than what they've gained.
I should note as well that the idea that taxation is theft requires a handful of assumptions. (1) You have to assume that no one can take something of yours unless you have explicitly agreed to it. But, if implicit agreement is legitimate, then there can be an implicit agreement (e.g., by accepting benefits paid for by taxes (clean water, air, food inspections, roads, etc.)) which creates in you a a genuine obligation to pay. (2) Furthermore, if you accept these benefits and refuse to pay for them, there's a possible obligation to pay generated by fairness, ignoring agreement altogether. (3) Along that latter line, one could also argue that, because there are public goods that taxes pay for which you do use, not all the money you have is actually yours. Some of it is, in fact, ours; and we are entitled to use the mechanism of the state to get it from you.
adhr: Not meaning to Godwin the thread but according to your logic (by accepting benefits paid for by taxes (clean water, air, food inspections, roads, etc) which creates in you a a genuine obligation to pay) you'd have to support the idea that German citizens *properly owed* a debt of allegiance to the Nazi regime that provided their education and managed their economy, and that a refusal to support such a regime after growing up in it would be wrong.
Or that slaves owe their master servitude because the slavemaster feeds and houses them. Evidently agreement to such an arrangment is implied by merely being born to it, or so your logic strongly implies. I mean, according to what you seems to be saying, by the time someone is old enough and knowledgeable enough to maybe form a counter-opinion to a present state of governmental affairs, they've already implicitly agreed to the structure by living off and within its structure.
It's privilege from oppressive or violence-based states that's bad
If citizens are coerced into supporting a state, forced to pay for its operation, isn't such a state, by its very nature, oppressive or violence-based?
You speak of "promoting happiness" and "satisfy[ing] people's needs" but at the state level those goals require a certainty regarding desirable ends that I don't think you can justify, given that prioritizing the ends you might desire could/would be counter to differently prioritized and competing desires held by others looking to enjoy the positive rights you describe as "the freedom to form one's own opinions, to formulate one's own life path, to recognize and pursue the good".
"Some of it is, in fact, ours; and we are entitled to use the mechanism of the state to get it from you.
...and who is this "we" that you speak of along with "ours" but that somehow doesn't include me.
And where did that "in fact" come from, apart from you asserting some state claim on me based only on its existence prior to my birth?
Ron,
Implicit consent does have those sort of nasty consequences you note. That's one of the problems people have with it in that form. However, it's also worth noting that the obligation created doesn't have to be all-things-considered -- it can just be prima facie. That is, the fact that I've accepted benefits from a society will, normally, mean I'm obligated towards that society. However, if that society is hideously unjust for some other reason (massive Nazi oppression, widespread slavery), then the obligation is defeated.
My point really was that it's exceedingly eccentric to think that explicit agreements are the only legitimate source of obligations. If that's really the view at stake here, then more needs to be said to defend it. Why don't things like the promotion of happiness, considerations of fairness, or the presence of need also create obligations?
With regard to your second comment, I wasn't trying to deny that privilege from oppressive or violent states was bad, only pointing out that Mike overstated his case originally. He doesn't really believe that privilege from all states is bad.
I think the "recognize and pursue the good" positive freedom slipped by your attention. That on its own does imply a certainty about the good, namely that it can be recognized and found by everyone. Certainly we should allow people to make mistakes, but we should also educate them such that they are better able to avoid those errors. That's the idea, at any rate. So, it's contingent on certain ends being more desirable, regardless of whether people desire them.
Finally, with regard to your third comment, the "we" and "ours" does include, but is not exhausted by, "you" or "me". And the "in fact" was supposed to be a suggestion, not something I was necessarily endorsing. However, I do endorse it, so let me give you the argument.
Either institutions like states have some independent existence or they are nothing over and above their members. If they are nothing over and above their members, then changing the members would change the institution. However, members change constantly in states. New members are born or enter, old ones die or leave. Thus, if institutions are nothing over and above their members then institutions do not exist for more than a few moments at a time. By reductio, then, institutions have some independent existence.
Things that have independent existence can impose unique duties upon us. This everyone has to accept, given that we can be obligated to other persons, who, one would suppose, have independent existences. If institutions have independent existences, then it has to follow that they can impose unique duties upon us. (This does assume that independent existence is sufficient for imposing unique duties. Since some independently existing things -- tables, for example -- don't really impose duties on us, there's probably an elision here. However, given that the parallels between institutions and individuals are more extensive than those between individuals and tables, this is not, I think, a particular problem for the argument.)
The remaining question is how these things -- independently existing things -- do so and whether, in any particular case, they have. When it comes to individuals, we all seem comfortable with the idea that explicit agreement can impose duties on individuals. So, explicit agreement answers the first part of that question; and, in any particular case, we answer the second part by looking for such an explicit agreement.
When it comes to institutions, the answers may be less clear, but I've certainly shown you some possibilities, such as implied consent, happiness promotion, fairness, and the presence of need. If even one of those, or a host of other, possible mechanisms works as a way to create duties, then it follows that institutions like the state can impose unique duties upon us apart from the duties imposed upon us by explicit agreements with other individuals.
Given that, the final move -- to some of "my" property actually being ours -- is a relatively simple shift of the burden of proof. It would be very strange if only individuals had rights to property, and institutions did not, given that they are highly similar in other ways. So, prima facie (barring a demonstration of some important disanalogy between the two), institutions can have rights to property, too. And one way they can exercise these rights is through taxation.
adhr:
...it's exceedingly eccentric to think that explicit agreements are the only legitimate source of obligations. If that's really the view at stake here, then more needs to be said to defend it.
We agree. More needs to be said to defend it, but in a nutshell that's close to our position. It would be more accurate to say that the only legitimate source of obligations is voluntary contracts, and one's mere existence within an existing political state is not enough to imply an obligation to that state. One does not choose birth. Humans do not inherit an obligation to support an existing government or social structure simply because it pre-exists one's birth. We aren't born with a mortgage.
Although, as you say "[t]hings that have independent existence can impose unique duties upon us", tables and institutions are unalike. Although I think it's an inventive stretch to call what gravity or a table, say, imposes on me as a "duty", it cannot be said that it demands anything. The same can't be said for one's relationship with an institution like a state. Although the state pre-exists one's birth, it is also and only, like slavery, a volitional human construct, and just as slavery could not legitimately be imposed simply because it was a pre-existing condition, neither can the broader attributes of a state be legitimately imposed simply based on the state's pre-existence.
Ron,
As I pointed out, there's more analogies between individuals and institutions than there are between individuals and tables. So, given that individuals can impose obligations on us, and given that institutions do have independent existence (which it is often claimed they do not, in order to drive the disanalogy), it follows prima facie that we have obligations to institutions even though they are pre-existing conditions.
So, your argument has to be that being a pre-existing condition is a relevant difference that shows individuals and institutions are disanalogous; and, thus, individuals and institutions do not share the ability to impose duties. But this is vulnerable to counter-example. For being in a particular family is a condition that pre-exists one's status as an adult (a person who can enter voluntary agreements). Thus it follows that adults have no obligations towards any members of their families -- parents, for example -- unless they voluntarily assume them.
If you accept that you do have obligations towards members of your family, then it follows that being a pre-existing condition is not relevant for demonstrating that individuals and institutions have different duty-imposing powers. Something else must be different between them. If you don't accept that you have these obligations, then you need to explain why people are wrong to believe they do. That is, you have to show how people have overlooked the incredible difference that being a pre-existing condition makes to their duties, such that many people erroneously believe they owe something to their pre-existing family members.
Great article, great food for thought.
I think parents have an obligation to their children given that, barring rape, children are a consequence of a voluntary and volitional act. In other words, parents choose that obligation.
I do not think the obligation goes the other way unless it is acccepted voluntarily. Many children do accept a duty to care for, say, parents or even other family members in times of need, but doing so is a choice, not an obligation.
I choose to support my family members in times of need but that is due to my appraisal of them as being worthy, as in: they earned it. Not all parents or family members do earn such reciprocal support, and when they don't I have no quarrel with individuals who leave their family members to their own devices.
re: So, given that individuals can impose obligations on us...
Individuals can try to impose obligations, but they don't rightly impose involuntarily obligations. Or: I don't think that's a given simply as stated.
Further, I don't think it's proper in this case to reverse the burden of proof. You're asserting the positive which is: children are rightly obligated to their parents (or pre-existing institutions) prima facie. I'm saying they are not, and I'm doing so because I think it's improper to view people as chattel or slaves.
I think it's improper to view people as chattel or slaves.
More specifically:
I think it's improper to view people as chattel or slaves, even when it is parents or countries or institutions making the claim of ownership.
A bit more on this...
Even the obligation of parents to support their children times out when the kids reach majority. Very few people would accept the notion that the obligation to support one's children goes on in perpetuity (and rightly so); adults are generally thought to be responsible for their own support.
It should be noted that some jurisdictions have codified a reverse obligation of children to support parents (China and Fiji for examples) but I find it interesting that those jurisdictions have done so at least in part because they argue that the state at large or society in general should not or does not properly have that primary obligation.
In any case, we're discussing ethics, not law.
I'm trying to be clear here. Re this:
So, your argument has to be that being a pre-existing condition is a relevant difference that shows individuals and institutions are disanalogous; and, thus, individuals and institutions do not share the ability to impose duties.
My argument is nothing of the sort.
Both individuals and institutions can pre-exist us; neither can rightfully impose obligations on us. That said, free individuals may rightfully accept obligations towards either individuals or institutions.
Ron,
I accept that parents assume obligations to their children insofar as they willingly and knowingly conceive them. I'm a little surprised, though, that you think children have no obligations to their parents beyond those they willingly assume. Not even to return phonecalls? To treat them respectfully and decently?
Your argument is as I described it. Individuals can, with our agreement, impose obligations upon us; similarly, institutions can, with our agreement, impose duties upon us. Don't read "impose" too strongly; it doesn't have to be against our will. What's at issue is whether there are any other duties that emerge without agreement. I was working with the assumption that you'd allow some such cases for individuals, but clearly you want to push the idea even that far.
Consider these two cases; assume in both cases the child has not agreed to any obligations. (1) If you have a child and you fall desperately ill, your child has no obligation at all to help you in any way. (2) If you literally stumble and fall in front of your child, injuring yourself, your child has no obligation to help you, or even offer comfort.
I think you're going to say that these are both accurate readings of the cases. Your child may be a jackass (given the behaviour in (1) and (2), we're not dealing with a nice person here), but it still fulfilling the boundaries of morally correct (or maybe morally adequate; again, he/she's not being exceptionally kind) conduct. If that is your view, though, then I think you need to see how incredibly counter-intuitive people are going to find this. Agreements matter to people, true, but so do things like blood ties, and behaving with minimal decency towards others. It's not at all clear why agreement should trump the latter, and other, values to the extent that agreement is all that matters.
(Again, it's worth noting that, if the findings of cogsci et al are correct, then we probably aren't capable of as much agreement as seems required by the theory.)
What's at issue is whether there are any [strike]other[/strike] duties that emerge without agreement.
That's it in a nutshell, yup.
I think you're going to say that these are both accurate readings of the cases. Your child may be a jackass (given the behaviour in (1) and (2), we're not dealing with a nice person here), but it still fulfilling the boundaries of morally correct (or maybe morally adequate; again, he/she's not being exceptionally kind) conduct. If that is your view, though, then I think you need to see how incredibly counter-intuitive people are going to find this.
Agreement isn't all that matters, but it is the primary value necessary to affairs between truly free people. It is counter-intutive in this sense: all sorts of people (most people?) are very uneasy about the idea of all other people being free, but--as one writer put it--freedom means allowing others to do what you don't want. An analogy would be free speech: a right of free speech that doesn't protect unpopular, even obviously wrong-headed, speech isn't worth a pinch of doggy doo-doo.
An aside: you could say I want folks to be free to be jerks so that jerks then operate out in the open where they're obvious and can be dealt with readily and appropriately. Understand that social sanctions like ostracism and/or boycott are fine with me; I make a clear distinction between what I think is proper for the State to enforce as codified law and what I think it is proper for free individuals to hold as their response to other's actions. I think what might be defensible as a State area of purview would only be responses to positive acts of aggression, coercion, fraud, theft and the like, but there's well-developed private protection agency theory that indicates even that as not a function that requires a State or States.
[examples and then:]it['s] still fulfilling the boundaries of morally correct (or maybe morally adequate; again, he/she's not being exceptionally kind) conduct
I don't think the sort of behaviour you describe is generally morally even near adequate, but it may be entirely appropriate in either case; I don't know the hypothetical individuals at all, and I know even less about their perceived or deserved values to each other.
What I do know is that I don't know enough to support a one-size-fits-all (or even fits-most) legal requirement for a specific behaviour.
As for "impose", it's true that a person might not object to, or might even support, the imposition of a behaviour on themself, but the generally accepted undercurrent to the word "impose" is that an individual's will/agreement is ultimately irrelevant.
by the way, adhr: I still very much appreciate your civility and tone and I'm enjoying this discussion. My thanks.
Ron, adhr,
I am enjoying this even more by lurking on my own blog. Just a fantastic debate...please keep it up.
Well, I'm willing :-)
Maybe I'll start again right here:
adhr said: It's plausible that what the NDP, Libs, Cons et al are doing is actually trading that off (in some form) against (some form of) positive liberty -- the possibility of acting in ways contributory to one's life-purposes.
Well, what of it. My "negative liberty" isn't there for other people to trade. It's mine.
I don't have a problem if an NDP, Liberal or Con guy wants to "[act] in a way contributory to one's life's purposes." Why would I?
My problem is onlywhere someone's desire to "do good" requires my involuntary assistance or the involuntary assistance of others. It's pure unbridled and presumtuous arrogance for anyone (individual or group) to claim a certainty of value and of purpose sufficient to justify the enslavement of another human being, even if it's "just for a little bit y'know...".
As it happens, I have some good of my own to do, some "acting in ways contributory to one's life-purposes" to do. But I'm polite enough, civilized enough, to only involve people who want to be connected with it.
Hello again. Sorry for the delay. I had some bureaucracy to deal with at York, and then had to prep a paper for a conference submission. (Which, in the end, I didn't do because they wanted me to register -- and pay -- for the conference before they'd consider my paper. This may not sound like a big deal, but (a) if I have a paper in, I can get the department to give me a small (~$100) amount of money to cover the cost and (b) it's in South Africa, and I'm not going to commit to that kind of a trip unless there's some benefit to me.)
So, yeah, fun week for me. Back to anti-libertarianism....
Ron,
If agreement isn't all that matters, what else does?
I'm not generally sympathetic to conspiracy-style theories about what people are really uneasy or disturbed by, without evidence to support the claim. I don't mean this as any sort of personal attack; I just find it a very bad argumentative strategy. After all, as Freud demonstrated, it's easy to tie everything someone does back to some deeply-buried thought or emotion -- such as the infamous Oedipal Complex. The trick would be to show that people really are uneasy about this level of negative freedom.
And then, of course, you'd still have to show that they shouldn't be. ;) After all, uneasiness can be justified.
Mike,
If you claim that your negative liberty isn't there for someone else to trade off, then you're begging the question against people who think that such trade-offs are justified. The point is that the mainstream political parties in Canada are working on a different set of values, one which allows for negative and positive liberty to have value, and accepts the natural consequence of a value pluralism, namely that values have to be traded off against each other. This may all be error, but you haven't yet shown it's an error.
Your claim that it's arrogant for someone to assume sufficient certainty of value and purpose to "enslave" another to that value or purpose presumes, again without argument, that certainty is what's needed. Personally, I'm willing to go along with balance of probabilities -- if it's more likely than not that they're right, then I'm okay with it. I'm not sure why you think certainty is what's needed; that seems to set the bar higher than it needs to be.
adhr: nice to see you back.
To your first question: If agreement isn't all that matters, what else does?
I was responding to your statement: “Agreements matter to people, true, but so do things like blood ties, and behaving with minimal decency towards others. It's not at all clear why agreement should trump the latter, and other, values to the extent that agreement is all that matters.”
Well, blood ties and minimal decency are dissimilar things, and I don’t think you’d suggest blood ties as a general moral primary so let’s get to “minimal decency”.
First, control and responsibility are corrolaries; I cannot be said to be responsible if I do not have control, and I think behaving minimally decently requires taking responsibility for my life and my actions. How could it not? So, if I am to be a responsible human being, to take and to be held to have responsibility for my actions towards others, it follows that I must reject accepting coercion.
Consequently, then—and understanding that self-defence is not instigating coercion—I hold that, a lack of coercion is required for behaviour to be seen by me as minimally decent. Free people may certainly hold or aspire to a huge range of values in greatly differing hierarchies, so there are many things that “matter”. But agreement (or: a lack of coercion) is the primary attribute of decency (or: right behaviour) applicable to the attainment or support of any of those other values. It’s not the only value, but it’s essential. I mean, what would “minimal decency towards others” relative to any of those other values look like if it didn’t include a lack of aggression/coercion, a lack of…enslavement?
I'm not generally sympathetic to conspiracy-style theories about what people are really uneasy or disturbed by, without evidence to support the claim. I don't mean this as any sort of personal attack; I just find it a very bad argumentative strategy. After all, as Freud demonstrated, it's easy to tie everything someone does back to some deeply-buried thought or emotion.
Fair enough. It's my appraisal that "all sorts of people (most people?) are very uneasy about the idea of all other people being free" but it's really only based on my awareness of continued and consistent efforts by many to reduce or trade off negative freedoms, and it’s done by folks who are unwilling to risk (afraid of) what will happen if they don’t.
As for "you don't mean it as a personal attack", I fully understand and easily accept that. Same back, friend.
I understand why people are uneasy; there are numerous people who do bad things or don’t do “good” enough. Barbara Amiel once noted, though, that if we are to be truly free enough to act fully well, we must get comfortable with the idea that other people will also then be free to act badly.
The second bit you addressed to Mike, but you're responding to my comments, so:
My life is my property. Now, that's an assertion, certainly, but it's how I live my life. (And it is fair warning to anyone who works to treat me otherwise.) Consequently, I make no efforts to reduce the negative freedoms of others; to do so would be a clear act of coercion, something I would see as brutally morally inconsistent and truly criminal. I have no problems, however, with any voluntary moral pluralism; agreement (even if only to leave each other unmolested) is obviously possible and often beneficial between people who hold differing ideas and wish to live in different ways.
But negative freedoms and (I'm not easy with the term, but...)"positive freedoms" differ in one essential aspect. All positive freedoms require the provision of unearned tangibles. When not voluntary, this provision then requires some degree of enforced labour (enslavement) of citizens. Now, I have nothing against the provision of unearned stuff; go ahead, voluntarily provide them to whomever. Heck, I'm known for being generous myself, and there are good reasons for being generous. But I'm not generous enough to give away things that don't belong to me and I don’t make slaves of my neighbours. I think stealing and slavery are easy to define, and I think they’re both wrong. There are normal risks of human existence, and I don’t think any of those normal risks justify either theft or enslavement by me or by proxy.
Regarding arrogance: certainty of purpose regarding some "good" doesn't justify the enslavement of others, but it's not certainty of purpose alone that earns my determination of arrogance; it's certainty to a point that someone could justify becoming a slave master to achieve it. Is enslavement too harsh a term? What am I supposed to call it when I am bound in involuntary servitude to another; is there a nice way to put that? ;-)
Plus, this would be implicit: there is no way to work to trade someone else’s negative freedoms and consistently ethically maintain ownership of your own while or after doing so.
Anyways, you mention that, to you, a "balance of probabilities" is what's needed for you to "go along" with the trade-off, but whose appraisal of the balance of probabilities are you suggesting be used? Unless you reserve the right to make that determination yourself, you must be suggesting that there is some other agent or agency that has sufficient qualification. Who would that be, and why would they be known to be properly worthy of enforced servitude?
Oh...
Isn't coercing folks based on "a balance of probabilities" instead of certainty just overtly gambling with other people's lives? Gambling with someone else's life is one thing if it's voluntary, but it's certainly another if it's not. Is just "meaning well" sufficient justification?
re: the natural consequence of a value pluralism, namely that values have to be traded off against each other,
Why does value pluralism require that values be traded off against each other? I'd contend that value pluralism requires that they not be traded off.
I have no problem working to increase people's positive freedoms without coercing the people around me so there's no conflict there (I'm only limited by my abilities), and I can peacefully coexist with anyone as long as they don't attack or steal from me. Wouldn't something called "value pluralism" have to assume freedom for the widest possible plurality of values including, say, the value of self determination? After all, you didn't call it "value antipluralism".
If non-coercion is accepted as the primary requirement of human affairs, all other values can peacefully coexist. If it is not accepted as a primary, a huge range of values will quite evidently not peacefully coexist.
Ron,
First, control and responsibility are corrolaries;
That's a minority position in philosophy these days, actually. I know that seems really counter-intuitive, but let me spell out the thinking.
It's partly driven by work by Harry Frankfurt, particularly a suggestive sort of counter-example. I don't find the examples plausible, but here's the idea. Frankfurt asks us to imagine some incredibly powerful creature -- call it a demon -- that has the ability to control our actions perfectly and whenever it wants to. This demon has a plan for what it wants us to do, but, because it's a clever demon, it won't intervene unless it has to. Now, says Frankfurt, suppose that by blind chance you always end up doing what the demon wants you to do. In that situation, you are, he says, responsible: what you do is a result of what you want to do. You are not, however, really in control: the demon is. The demon can intervene whenever it wants, remember; it only refrains when it doesn't need to. So, really, the demon is controlling the situation.
I don't find the example at all plausible. But I do think Frankfurt's correct to question the connection between control and responsibility. For me to be responsible for something requires that the something is mine. I'm responsible for what comes from me. However, in order to control that something, I have to be able to affect it consciously, which is a much stronger claim. So, as long as an action or a choice or a situation is of or from me, I'm responsible for it. And this is the sense in which certain forms of coercion are problematic. They strip me of responsibility not because I lack control, but because the authorship of the action is no longer mine.
This is a good thing because, at some level, I'm just a bunch of particles operating under quantum laws. At that level, there's no possibility of my being in control. So, if control is necessary for responsibility, since total control is not possible, it seems that responsibility is put into doubt. Hence, we should probably do away with the idea of control, and settle instead for the idea of authorship.
My life is my property.
Locke said that centuries ago, and I've always found it puzzling. There's certain abilities you have that go along with property ownership. You can trade your property to someone else, for example -- assuming the trade is voluntary and so on and so forth. If that's so, then you should be able to trade your life, shouldn't you? But isn't that a justification for slavery?
Furthermore, is the relationship I have to my life really of owner and property? Am I to my life as I am to my jacket or my couch? Perhaps my life is a more important piece of property; but is that the only difference? Or is my life definitive of me in a way that mere property never can be?
As far as enslaving others, there's a difference between service and slavery that I think should be respected here. If I'm serving others, even involuntarily, it doesn't follow just from that that I'm enslaved. A serf wasn't a slave; nor was a journeyman sold into his position; nor a maid-servant born into hers. There's a number of distinguishing features here, not the least of which is that you can't sell a servant, while you can sell a slave. Slaves are just property; servants are people performing important functions. Another distinguishing feature of slavery is an inability to escape one's master; if one is serving others, though, one can always just stop. (With attendant consequences, of course, such as losing wages.)
As far as balance of probabilities goes, I don't really see why the determination has to be individual rather than collective. Why can't it be that we all sit down and decide, as a group and not as individuals, that a certain course of action is, on balance of probabilities, better for us all? Even though it requires that some of us (even all of us) will serve for the benefit of all. A secret ballot is the sort of procedure that could be used to ensure a decision was genuinely from the group and not from a collection of individuals.
Along the same line, I don't think it's quite fair to call it gambling if you proceed with less than certainty. Unless you're inclined to call civil litigation a form of gambling, which seems to me to be an overly broad use of the term! Balance of probabilities -- or its (disingenuous) equivalent, "reasonable certainty" -- is how we proceed in most matters. On balance of probabilities, you cross the street when the light turns green, trusting that the cars approaching the intersection will come to a complete stop. Are you certain? Well, not totally; but you're certain enough, because you know that it's exceedingly rare for cars not to stop when the light is red, and exceedingly common for them not to proceed into the intersection. So, on balance of probabilities, you act, assuming that what is more likely to happen actually will. You can always be wrong -- this is probabilistic, not certain -- but it seems to work pretty well, most of the time.
As far as value pluralism goes, by definition, the idea of a value pluralism is that certain qualities or states (or whatever) are equally valuable. So, there's no hierarchy. If there's a hierachy, it's not a pluralism any more; there is, instead, some sort of fundamental value, and everything else is secondary (or tertiary and so on). If you want to privilege non-coercion, then you're really into the realm of a hierarchy of values, not a value pluralism. Since pluralisms imply that certain things are equally valuable, it follows that they can conflict; a hierarchy of value eliminates that possibility.
Thus, value pluralisms have to have a procedure for trade-offs. One of the benefits of not being a value pluralist, by contrast, is that you always have the fundamental value -- liberty, utility, pleasure, what have you -- to appeal to in order to settle conflicts between values of lesser importance. Of course, the downside of not being a value pluralist is that you have to be able to reduce all other apparent values to, possibly at some distance, the fundamental value (e.g., as Mill argued, negative liberty is valuable because it serves utility, i.e., the permanent interests of man as a progressive being). This is notoriously difficult to do. Whether the value is liberty, equality, fraternity, or something else entirely, there always seems to come a point where a non-plural view of value has to claim that some things that seem valuable really aren't -- because they can't be attached to the fundamental value. For example, Mill rejected equality as a fundamental value because, in part, he couldn't make it work with utility; utility can sometimes be best served by allowing for even very broad inequality. But this is highly discomfitting, because some level of equality matters to us. So, Mill would owe us a story about the mistake we'd made in thinking equality was important (AFAIK, he has no such story). This is in contrast to Rousseau, who gives up negative liberty in favour of positive liberty, which in turn supports equality as a secondary value. Rousseau, though, has an argument: he thinks that negative liberty has gotten society into a very bad state, and is basically a tool of the wealthy to continue to oppress the poor. He may be wrong, but he at least has a story.
So, that's the challenge for someone who adopts a hierarchy of values. First, place all other important values into your hierarchy. And, second, explain away the ones that won't fit -- that is, give the story about why we're wrong to think they matter.
It's late and I'll have more to say, but for now:
A secret ballot is the sort of procedure that could be used to ensure a decision was genuinely from the group and not from a collection of individuals.
You know of a group of living people that isn't a collection of individuals????? What a magic thing you take this "ballot" to be.
All a ballot does is place fiat control of somethings or someones in the hands of a majority of the individuals that make up the group.
...bit by bit, from work...
adhr (re: "my life is my property"): Locke said that centuries ago, and I've always found it puzzling. There's certain abilities you have that go along with property ownership. You can trade your property to someone else, for example -- assuming the trade is voluntary and so on and so forth. If that's so, then you should be able to trade your life, shouldn't you? But isn't that a justification for slavery?
Why shouldn't I be able to voluntarily trade my life for something? That's no justification for slavery considering that it's a voluntary arrangement. But, interestingly, all sorts of the peoople who claim that I don't own my own life are front and centre when it comes to claiming ownership of all or part of my life for themselves. Whether it's a government draft, or a collectivist who just wants a large fraction of my work-year to support what they can't/won't pay for themselves, they all lay claim to my life.
adhr: As far as enslaving others, there's a difference between service and slavery that I think should be respected here. If I'm serving others, even involuntarily, it doesn't follow just from that that I'm enslaved.
I ask again, if not "slavery" what is the nice/polite term for "involuntary servitude"? The difference between service and slavery *is* that one is voluntary and the other is not. I'd be thrilled if folks would respect that difference.
All the other differences you mention are quibbles having to do with a slave's working conditions, the terms of which are still all set by the State or the master and imposed on the slave/involuntary servant.
And interesting that slave and serf have the same etymological root.
Ron,
I thought we'd established that the group isn't the same as the individuals that make it up -- because the former can continue on while the latter change. And there's a difference between "secret ballot" and "majority vote". I was thinking of unanimity as being required for the vote to pass.
I think you've missed the problem with owning one's own life. If I own something, I can give it away completely, for nothing, to someone else's control. Correct? That's part of what makes it mine. So, if my life is just another thing I own, I should also be able to give it away, for nothing, to someone else's control. That is, I should be able to make myself a slave.
I also don't see why service has to be voluntary in order to not be slavery. As I've noted, there are other features of being a slave that matter, such as being property of one's master (which is what underwrite the inability of the slave to leave his/her slavery). Calling them "quibbles" seems a flip way of avoiding the point. It'd be like me saying that your worries about freedom are just "quibbles" because, even if you're coerced in important political decisions, you can still choose your morning breakfast cereal.
I don't really find etymology interesting generally. Sorry. ;) Etymology has more to do with the rules governing language and its changes than it does what the words signify.
So, that's the challenge for someone who adopts a hierarchy of values. First, place all other important values into your hierarchy. And, second, explain away the ones that won't fit -- that is, give the story about why we're wrong to think they matter.
I have no trouble placing values in a hierarchy that suits me, and I have no reason to assume I could or should do so for others; after all, it's not me looking to impose anything on anyone.
And why would I think equality, say, shouldn't properly be a value to you, even a high value, even a secondary value if you agree with Rousseau? That's your business.
I only refuse you permission to impose that value system of yours on me.
I was thinking of unanimity as being required for the vote to pass
If it was unanimous, it would also be assuredly voluntary. If I refused to vote, period, it would not be unanimous or voluntary. If I was forced to vote: same; not voluntary and not unanimous.
I think you've missed the problem with owning one's own life. If I own something, I can give it away completely, for nothing, to someone else's control. Correct? That's part of what makes it mine. So, if my life is just another thing I own, I should also be able to give it away, for nothing, to someone else's control. That is, I should be able to make myself a slave.
Leaving the term "slave" aside for the moment, why is that a problem? If you own your own life, you should be able to do give it away, for nothing, to someone else's control. Why not, or at least: why would that trouble me?
I ask again: what term, though, should I use for involuntary servitude if not "slavery"? If it's voluntary servitude, no matter to what degree, then I have no quarrel with someone choosing it, but I don't see that it's slavery. It's just a choice.
If you desire that in this discussion "slavery" can be either voluntary or involuntary and still be slavery, then I'm asking you to please suggest another term I can use where we will both understand and accept that I mean "an involuntary/coerced servant".
The etymology was just an interesting aside.
And I'm appreciating this discussion.
Calling them "quibbles" seems a flip way of avoiding the point
Well, it was flippant (and you aren't earning that from me, so "sorry") but I'm sure not trying to avoid the point.
or maybe it's better if I ask using a different approach...
How would "involuntary servitude" be freedom, except from responsibility and self-determination.
A few more minutes, and back to this:
me: First, control and responsibility are corrolaries;
adhr: That's a minority position in philosophy these days, actually [followed by the Frankfurt example].
Frankfurt's example might illustrate some limits on control/responsibility but I don't see how it affects the corrolaries. When and where you have control, you are responsible; conversely you are only responsible for that which you control. At least from your example, I don't see that Frankfurt's hypothesis changes that any more than, say, gravity changes that. When you say that "since total control is not possible, it seems that responsibility is put into doubt", I can understand doubt about over what and where you might have control, but that wouldn't change the idea that when and where you did have control you would also have responsibility to an equal degree.
Incidentally: I do think civil litigation standards should be as high as those in criminal trials; I think guilt should require establishment beyond a reasonable doubt.
It would be more accurate to say that I hold non-coercion as an essential value, but not so accurate to say that I see it as fundamental in any sense that it provides positive support or provides justification at base for any other value. Other values may be good, bad, high or low on their own merits but coercion aside (in other words, if I am not involved involuntarily) I have no justification for instigating coercion myself.
Among other things, that's why I would have no problem with you selling yourself as completely as you might choose, nor would I see your doing so as providing any argument in favour of involuntary servitude for anyone else. It wouldn't be something I'd do myself, but you might have your reasons.
My argument is with people who want to trade my life, or parts of it, regardless of my agreement, just to suit their plans.
Does this make my use of the term "slave" clearer: if you voluntarily traded your life totally and for nothing, you wouldn't even be a slave; you'd just be a possession--and rightly so.
Y'know, I've been thinking about this "value pluralism" and I'm going to accept what adhr stated as a definition, or at least as the nature of the beast: "the idea of a value pluralism is that certain qualities or states (or whatever) are equally valuable. So, there's no hierarchy"
Okay, no hierarchy. Values are equal and (asserted:) "Since pluralisms imply that certain things are equally valuable, it follows that they can conflict"
Okay, and when they conflict, how does one ascertain what of which value will be traded for what of the other value, since "there is no hierarchy".
Is that trade then to be done with no reference to some hierarchy of...values? What other kind of hierarchy could possibly rightly be applied to the task.
In other words, application of the concept of "value pluralism" requires its own contradiction if it is to be anything other than arbitrary and amoral.
Some thoughts:
A right is simply a restriction we place on ourselves about how we'll act toward others in the hopes that they'll reciprocate. Under a system of complete freedom, they are under no obligation to do so.
Anarchy existed first. We've spent several hundred thousand years getting away from it. The reason is that perfect freedom includes the freedom to oppress/coerce/lie/change your mind, and it is only through oppressing those who would enact that freedom that we get away from an animal-like state of savagery.
As a specific example:
Is a person obligated to support their child? If so, who enforces that, and who decides what constitutes "support"? Isn't the enforcement of this placing an implicit burden upon the individuals of said society unless they've explicitly agreed to it? And if that's true, are children prohibited from attaining citizenship unless they explicitly agree to a code of conduct? If they do not agree to this code of conduct, what happens? Are they prohibited from trading with the rest of the community? How is such a prohibition enforced upon someone who has not explicitly agreed to the rules of the community? Now it seems the rest of the community must require some sort of citizenship papers before every transaction -- how are these papers ensured to be legal and proper?
What it boils down to is when you get beyond a group where each individual of the community can identify each other, anarchic systems do not work, and all that happens is you impose the condition on your society that everybody pledge an oath of allegiance under pain of deportation before being taxed and paying for all the things we pay for anyway.. but hey, at least now it's voluntary and you have your "Papers please!" to prove it.
"A right is simply a restriction we place on ourselves about how we'll act toward others in the hopes that they'll reciprocate."
A positive view of rights that I do not subscribe to. I may do anything I please so long as it does not harm others. If it harms others, they are able to use as much force as needed to stop me or recover their property.
End of story.
"Under a system of complete freedom, they are under no obligation to do so."
Yep. And there is no problem with that. One should never be obliged to do anything they have not freely and previously agreed to do. Anarchy is about free voluntary arrangements, not coercion.
"Anarchy existed first. We've spent several hundred thousand years getting away from it. The reason is that perfect freedom includes the freedom to oppress/coerce/lie/change your mind, and it is only through oppressing those who would enact that freedom that we get away from an animal-like state of savagery."
Well, Locke was wrong, we do not need Leviathan. Indeed evolution shows that those that cooperation and altruism are the better survival strategy, so "man in a state of nature" is a biological and historical myth. Not much to base a system of government on.
I also find it interesting that your solution to the possibility of one person exercising their "freedom to oppress/coerce/lie/change your mind" is to create a system of individuals (a state) that does this by oppressing/coercing/lying/changing their mind and outright theft.
That's called cognitive dissonance and it is illogical.
Indeed it can be argued that the state itself occurred because certain individuals did not obey those rights and obligations, as you describe them. You are supporting the very kinds of people you claim to be against when you justify the state.
"Is a person obligated to support their child? If so, who enforces that, and who decides what constitutes "support"? Isn't the enforcement of this placing an implicit burden upon the individuals of said society unless they've explicitly agreed to it?...."
You may talk of hyperbole and fantastic hypotheticals, by the reality is a person is not obliged to support their child and a quick perusal of the newspapers show this to be true even today. But those that do not, do not reproduce and those that do care for children do. Thus our society is filled with people who do not need coercive laws or the state to tell them to take care of their kids. Thanks to evolution by natural selection, we do it anyway, because it is a good survival strategy for our genes. It is also the root of altruism.
No state required.
Now it seems the rest of the community must require some sort of citizenship papers before every transaction -- how are these papers ensured to be legal and proper?
You seem to be confusing laws as the exist now with voluntary agreement. By voluntary, I mean negotiated and freely entered into agreements between individuals. A large group of individuals may explicitly agree to the same rules and consequences, but some will not. In that case, yes, people will simply not trade with them or associate with them. Reputation will go a long way and with it, because of the need, other methods of ensuring reputation. What those are I will not speculate, though a web of trust model (like pgp uses) would suffice. And, of course, individuals may, at different times, forgo the risk and trade and interact anyway. Because they are free to make that decision for themselves, rather than have it imposed.
"What it boils down to is when you get beyond a group where each individual of the community can identify each other, anarchic systems do not work, and all that happens is you impose the condition on your society that everybody pledge an oath of allegiance under pain of deportation before being taxed and paying for all the things we pay for anyway.. but hey, at least now it's voluntary and you have your "Papers please!" to prove it.
As this is clearly based on your previous false premises and is thus itself false and specious, I feel no need to address this particular straw man.
But for what it is worth, there is nothing preventing you from voluntarily entering into a societal arrangement almost identical to what we have today. So long as it is voluntary. But you had better be prepared to allow the Syndicalist and the Market Anarchists and even the Communists to do the same (so long as they aren't trying to impose themselves on you).
Try reading things like Chaos Theory" and some Rothbard and come back when you are prepared not to argue with straw men and outrageous hypotheticals.
Post a Comment
<< Home