Does God exist? Is anarchy desirable? The two sorts of question are obviously different and only on the second one does economics have something instructive to say. In the Winter issue of Regulation, I review Michael Huemer’s recent book Knowledge, Reality, and Value: A Mostly Common Sense Guide to Philosophy, but this also served as an excuse for reviewing his 2012 The Problem of Political Authority: An Examination of the Right to Coerce and the Duty to Obey. The latter argues that the government has no moral authority to do anything that ordinary individuals may not do and that nobody has a moral obligation to obey the government just because it is a government; the book also presents an economic defense of anarcho-capitalism. Both books are well worth reading.
Consequentialism, utilitarianism, and deontology are among the topics that, following (and sometimes opposing) Huemer, my review discusses.
My current, provisional, incomplete conclusion on anarchy:
The jury is still out on anarchy, and it will remain out until an actual experiment is realized. Perhaps classical liberalism or non‐anarchist libertarianism is as far as we can go toward anarchy? In his 1969 book Éloge de la société de consommation (In Praise of Consumer Society), French philosopher Raymond Ruyer suggested as much: “Real anarchism, feasible and realized … is simply the [classical] liberal economy.” Certainly, we should at least aim to maintain or recover the “feasible and realized anarchy” and push the limits of classical liberalism. The ideal is anarchy, not authority.
READER COMMENTS
Cobey Williamson
Jan 8 2022 at 11:12am
Anarchy is the default. Hobbes demonstrates as much. Coercion is the rationalization of those who wish to externalize their refusal to resist it. Sans oxygen and means of production, free will accounts for everything that makes up human material conditions.
Anarchy is not classical liberalism. If anything, it is the opposite of that. It is the realization that one has the ability to do anything one chooses to do, and the humility to practice mutual restraint instead.
Jose Pablo
Jan 8 2022 at 12:01pm
The Problem of Political Authority is one of the best books I have ever read, but I still find the “first part” (dismantling any possible logical/moral justification for government authority) more compelling than the “second part” (how an anarchist society would look like and how to get there from here).
Anarchism is an ideal very difficult to reach in practice. But, is there any alternative? I mean, pursuing “minarchism” (call it “liberalism”) is a fool’s errand. The only purpose of the State (no matter how initially little and/or constrained) is to grow. And it is, always and everywhere, going to be very successful at it.
If history is a guide …
Pierre Lemieux
Jan 8 2022 at 2:23pm
But history is not finished.
Jose Pablo
Jan 8 2022 at 2:42pm
That reminds me of Fukuyama’s espectacular prediction failure some 30 years ago …
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/world-population-by-political-regime?country=~OWID_WRL
Roger McKinney
Jan 8 2022 at 1:10pm
Does the author completely ignore the great atheist philosophers who demonstrate that the categories of good and evil dont exist without God? If so then the problem of evil that persuades him God doesn’t exist isn’t a problem.
Philosophers know that logically morality can’t exist without God, but they can’t live without morality so they ignore the issue. Everyone thinks about morality so we talk about it without having an explanation of why we have those thoughts.
The most common explanation for feelings about morality is that in some way they helped us evolve. But that is circular reasoning. It says we have survived and have moral feelings so morality must have helped us survive. That’s not explanation, just description. But even if it was true that morality is a genetic accident that aided survival in the distant past, it’s still relative and not objective or universal, what most philosophers once called morality. It’s just ethics for a particular group at a particular time, an admission that morality doesn’t exist.
With only moral feelings lacking logical foundation, we can’t say why it’s immoral other than most find it distasteful but if a group enjoyed it I guess it would be moral for them.
The Bible has a way around this chasing if our tails. It says God exists and so does objective universal morality, but man’s rebellion introduced evil into the world.
Handle
Jan 9 2022 at 9:46am
In “Conceived In Liberty”, Rothbard wrote that Pennsylvania in the second half of the 1680s was about as close an example of functional, peaceful, “anarchy” as one can find in American history. See, “Pennsylvania’s Anarchist Experiment: 1681–1690.”
It came to an end in large part because it was impossible to collect taxes from people used to living in such conditions.
Pierre Lemieux
Jan 9 2022 at 12:41pm
I’ll have a look. But nine years is a short period in the history of mankind.
Mactoul
Jan 9 2022 at 11:40pm
How is property to be secured in an anarchy? Ultimately , private property is secured by the laws of a people and backed by the armed might of the State.
Worse, how is private property to be defined in an anarchy?
When an individual secured his possessions with his force alone, irrespective of the laws of the community he is embedded in , he is not enjoying the security of private property.
Jon Murphy
Jan 10 2022 at 8:52am
There are lots of different answers to this question, from the John Locke definition of “mixing labor” to the Bart Wilson discussion of language. Bart’s book The Property Species has a great overview of property and how it is defined.
I’m wondering if you could expand on this claim. It seems to me to be prima facie contradictory: in the first clause, you say the individual has secured his possessions. In the last clause, you say his possessions are not secured. What role does the modifier “with his force alone” play?
Mactoul
Jan 10 2022 at 9:59am
Locke’s answer is general but to define property, we need particular answer. How much labor we need to mix with precisely what object?
Can land be owned by mixing one unit of labor or are ten units needed? Can air be owned at all?
Are minerals underground part of ownership conferred by mixing labor on the surface? Political community is essential to provide specific answers to these particulars.
Jon Murphy
Jan 10 2022 at 10:24am
Indeed, Locke’s account has problems. That’s why I said it is merely one of many. Bart Wilson’s account is much more complete to me.
I agree that political community is essential to resolving conflicts. Indeed, rights are meaningless absent other people. But I think it’s more appropriate to understand politics in the broad definition of the term here: “the total complex of relations between people living in society,” rather than the workings of a government or state. Thus, we can explain why we see rights emerge absent states (such as on the high seas) or even in defiance of states (black markets, piracy).
Mactoul
Jan 10 2022 at 10:01am
I distinguish between possession that are secured with force and private property that is secured by laws (ultimately backed by armed might of a State).
Jon Murphy
Jan 10 2022 at 10:17am
There are two problems here:
First, it’s a distinction without a difference. Force is used in both cases. It’s merely a question of who uses the force.
Second, you’ve made it impossible for you to be wrong. You’ve defined rights as only being secure under a state. Thus, it is impossible using your definition for anarchy to have property rights at all, never mind secure them.
Mactoul
Jan 11 2022 at 1:06am
It is the difference between state of nature and state of law. I would imagine it makes all the difference if my claim to my possessions are backed by the community I am in or not.
Jon Murphy
Jan 11 2022 at 7:57am
Alright I see the point you’re making. But I still object to the implication that laws must ultimately be backed by the State (and, consequently, could not exist absent the state). As I discuss above, there are many examples of non-state communities developing their own laws and enforcing them.
A state can (and, indeed, probably is) be helpful in enforcing law more effectively than simple private arrangements of a community. But it isn’t necessary or sufficient.
Mactoul
Jan 13 2022 at 12:42am
The term “State” essentially means a state of laws. There need not be a formal legislature and prime minister etc.
“Private arrangements of a community” are just customs of a people which are again laws of that people.
The notion of private property as a universal custom supports the idea that political community is needed to even define private property, especially in land.
While notion of property is universal, it needs specific customs or laws of a specific people to entirely flesh out the notion.
For example, land rights in Europe typically exclude mineral rights but include in America.
You can’t get this result from economic theory.
Pierre Lemieux
Jan 13 2022 at 11:27am
Mactoul: I would challenge your definition of “state” as confusing to say the least. It would mean that primitive stateless societies had a state.
If by “economic theory” you mean narrow “price theory” up to circa 1950, you are right that it merely assumed a certain definition of property rights. Otherwise, you are wrong: think about Demsetz, Coase, Hayek, Buchanan, and even de Jasay, among others.
Or perhaps I don’t understand your objection?
Comments are closed.