You may not find too many examples of Christian A, but there is no shortage of Muslims who believe that sharia is God's law, infallible and eternal, (unlike man's law) and that the maximum amount of freedom is obtained when man submits to God's law. It is argued precisely that way -- we need Godly restrictions on our behaviour in order to be more free.
In the Muslim system, God enforces his law by where you go after you die. There is quite a lot of Sharia that, under Muslim judicial theory, does not get enforced in the courts.
I have run into a lot of folks who don’t exactly start from Christian A priors, but argue the conclusions based on “Everything is God’s, so those operating with his approval get to enforce His will as they see fit.” Kind of a disturbing amount, really, seeing as how they don’t seem to have given any consideration to how one can be sure those claiming to operate under God’s authority are actually doing so. Of course it is probably a result of wanting the conclusion and arguing backwards, but it is surprisingly common with youngin’s.
I have property. Other people, including foreigners, can go on it only with my permission. I don't see how that raises immigration issues.
I'm not arguing that one cannot use force against trespassers, just that the country doesn't belong to some imaginary person called "the people" who gets to decide for me who goes on my land.
“Meaning of ‘Libertarian’” might appear to suggest either a simple definition or some essence of the word or the idea. What we really need is an explicit philosophical theory of libertarianism that can solve the philosophical problems that arise with libertarianism.
Christian A is not a libertarian in practice (as normally understood). But he is a libertarian in a weird theoretical sense. Christian B is a libertarian in practice (as normally understood). But he is a non-libertarian in a weird theoretical sense. So Christian A is “more libertarian” in theoretical terms while Christian B is “more libertarian” in practical terms.
“What does ‘libertarian,’ predicated of a person or a conclusion, mean?” It usually means that they are libertarian in theory or in practice according to the person making the assessment. And this assessment will always remain open to debate (as everything always is, because of the conjectural nature of knowledge).
>“I certify that I do not believe in or advocate the initiation of force as a means of achieving political or social goals.”
But we clearly do need to engage in “the initiation of force” to deal with crimes against liberty that do not themselves literally initiate force (fraud, shoplifting, trespassing, squatting, etc.). A definition or theory of “force” that declares all unlibertarian acts thereby to be using “force” does not make literal normal sense of “force” and is thus circular rather than explanatory.
Yes, you are “a libertarian with different arguments but libertarian conclusions”. So am I.
The main problem is that a full philosophical theory of libertarianism can only be relatively complicated (at least, compared to the “non-aggression principle”, the “non-initiation of force”, “non-coercion”, etc.). An initial reading of it is unlikely to enlighten anyone in an instant (“Thou know’st we work by wit and not by witchcraft, and wit depends on dilatory time”). The only way to grasp it is to criticise it in detail. I have now made my own theory as concise and precise as I can for substack in a logical sequence of stages:
I mean, why would the fact that some proportion of property was stolen at some point (more likely all if we are discussing land) be the reason to dismiss libertarianism?
The natural rights version of libertarianism has a problem, although perhaps not an insoluble one, with property stolen in the distant past. The consequentialist version doesn't.
Not really. If we are using system x to resolve our disputes, and a dispute depends directly on events that either occurred before system x was in place or on evidence that no longer exists, that is clearly outside the scope of the system. If a plaintiff has the appropriate evidence (and is making the sort of claim that the system deals with), it shouldn’t matter whether the events were recent or distant. Each claim is based on a prior claim, and so long as the disputants agree on some claim, however distant in the past, the dispute can be arbitrated using the undisputed claim as a starting point.
Is there a philosophy of ownership that doesn’t have that issue? I can’t think of one that includes a rule of ownership that doesn’t fall afoul of “at some point people killed other people to take this land” and doesn’t sort of hand wave into “well, let’s all agree to not do that anymore.” Which seems fair, don’t get me wrong, I just don’t see how one gets away from that if killing people and taking their stuff is to be forbidden.
I think I am none of the above. I’ve been influenced by Stephan Kinsella. His idea is that a property dispute points back to a basis that both parties agree on (although in some cases, of course, they might not agree on anything). They don’t agree on who owns X now, or exactly what happened in the past 20 years, but they agree that one hundred years ago Johnson owned it, and neither of them has a dispute with Johnson. Obviously, this will not address gross injustices of the distant past, but what would? Libertarianism is not a magic spell for redeeming the past. And if someone did have clear evidence of an ancient claim, they could pursue it.
All labels, especially ones of a political nature, are necessarily simplifications and generalizations of the much more complex and many faceted belief systems that they (mistakenly?) attempt to capsulize and define. If more people ethically and philosophically examined their beliefs as you do such gross symbolic identifications would not be so divisive. Regrettably the majority does not do this and this is why they instead assign labels for their feelings and opinions because they have primarily assumed them from an external source rather than from a personal and individual process of rationalization. While I might identify myself as an atheist, an anarchist, a capitalist and a libertarian I fully understand that these ‘labels’ are my individual opinions of aspects of my belief and that others who use the same ‘labels’ might very well differ in how they define them. While language may be a tool for pursuing clarity of thought, it is an inexact process that only approximates truth rather than concretely defining it.
When a person says that their position flows from argument, give them a reasonable hypothetical situation where their principle leads to an outcome you generally know they wont like.
For example:
When a person argues that second amendment is a natural right, ask them if the illegal immigrant too should be allowed to own firearms in USA because it is a "natural right", if they argue that constitution is only for citizens you can ask them if it is okay to waive the 8th amendment for them too and give them cruel punishment like burning them alive or the rack.
When people argue that an unborn baby is a life and must have same right to life as anyone else, ask them if the State of Texas should help a pregnant illegal immigrant cross the hot dessert in order to help her deliver the baby safely.
I have very basic familiarity with Hoppe's work. Being an academician I do not deny that he himself might be sincere in his arguments but those who use it often come across those who do not want to sound nativist but want to sound libertarian while very deliberately pushing libertarian ideas.
I think people like Hoppe as bad influence on our freedoms as they create bad faith arguments that used by some to coerce others.
"When a person says that their position flows from argument, give them a reasonable hypothetical situation where their principle leads to an outcome you generally know they wont like. "
You have just described Chapter 41 of _The Machinery of Freedom_. Also much of a talk I gave in 1981.
> When a person argues that second amendment is a natural right, ask them if the illegal immigrant too should be allowed to own firearms in USA because it is a "natural right",
They aren't allowed to be here, with or without firearms.
I really like the idea of putting a metric on libertarians. I'm less entranced by having a Platonic Libertarian at ground. Wouldn't it be more consistent with libertarianism that each libertarian view himself as ground, and evaluate all others by their distance from himself? One statistic of interest might be the minimal dimension of the graph -- how many flavors of libertarians are there?
“God, having created everything, is the rightful owner of everything.”
This requires either a peculiar or a very casual idea of ownership. In order to use something, we need the owner's consent. I suppose the sort of person who would make this argument might reply that god has given consent in the Bible, or though the church, or in mysterious ways unknown to us. But when there is a dispute, the owner never shows up in court. He has competing incompatible interpreters struggling to speak for him. So it needs more, at the very least. Or should we all join in the squabble, if we think we might represent his genuine will?
Sorry for quibbling over an argument that I suppose was not meant to be taken seriously
I kind of thought the same thing. “If God wants me to stop breathing His air, He can surely demonstrate that by making me stop doing so. If he doesn’t, we can assume he is fine with things.”
There is a sense in which that is a common position. God enforces his rules by sending you to Hell if you break them. The small practical problem is that you don't know you are being punished for something until long afterward, which makes it hard to adjust your behavior to fit God's commands.
God doesn't stop the slave owner from whipping the slave, so your argument also implies that He is fine with slavery. Libertarians want an argument to convince the slave owner to stop or authorize the libertarian to stop him, but if the slave owner claims he is doing what God permits it comes down to "might demonstrates right."
Not only that might demonstrates right, but that those of God's duly appointed authorities on Earth might not actually be such. He doesn't issue badges after all, and so it is hard to pin down whether they actually speak with His voice, as it were, which makes it pretty unconvincing that they are correct.
Particularly when it comes to thinks like dietary restrictions which seem like rather victimless crimes. One can sympathize with a slave, but once piglets stop being cute pork belly is damned hard to argue with.
Indeed. Personally, I can only accept that if there is a god as described by eg Catholics he must be extremely hands off, and has little interest in earthly affairs while the participants are still alive. As Calvin put it, it is hard to be religious when certain people are never incinerated by bolts of lightening. It seems to me that God isn’t too picky about who claims to be operating with his authority.
"I, arguably, am an atheist version of Christian B." Me too. :-)
First principles are necessary to start to formulate an argument, but consequences matter to complete the argument. Current public discussion has embraced non-consequentialist ethics. In addition, while liberty should have a high value, there are always tradeoffs.
My favorite tradeoff is helping the poor properly, as a government sponsored insurance scheme. Once that is done, other tradeoffs with liberty seems much less pressing.
I think the crux of (paleo)libertarianism lies in the concept of voluntariness.
Could you draw a clear line between voluntariness and involuntariness? If not, there can be no clear derivation from a single libertarian principle of non-aggression or voluntariness or the like to any practical conclusion. Take the occupation of hitherto unoccupied space as a paleolibertarian starting point. In what way is this act entirely voluntary? It excludes latecomers against their will. You could completely fence in a person according to this libertarian "homesteading principle". This is a fuzzy, good rule of thumb, but it is nonsense to make an absolute moral claim (=without exceptions/provisos) out of it.
That depends on what you mean by an absolute claim. Most people seem to think it means that no violation of a principle is ever justified. This seems like putting a thumb on the scale to me, since we know that violations will occur, and might even make sense. The alternative is to say the principle is absolute, but exceptions can be made if the victims are compensated. Answers about just compensation might turn out to be complicated, but this has a similar abstract appeal, without the impracticalities.
There are two problems with that argument. The first is that if you generalize it you have just justified eminent domain, seizing property without consent but with non-consensual compensation, which most libertarians disapprove of. The second is that there may be cases where it is enormously important to violate someone's rights but you don't have the power to compensate him — the obvious example being if the rights violation kills him.
The temporary use of property without the owner's consent literally cannot be undone. It is in the past. The taking of property can be undone. The violation continues into the future
I am not advocating that violations be excused, or worse, institutionalized, just that appropriate restitution should result. Am I making exceptions, or just pointing out how things could work?
Anyone can trespass, but property still works if not too many do. If everyone can use eminent domain on each other, property stops making sense. For my argument to lead to eminent domain, someone would have to toss in a subsection showing that eminent domain is legitimate and only the state should use eminent domain. We need some other constraint preventing me from confiscating my property back one second after someone else confiscates it from me. Nothing in the original argument addresses those issues in a way that leads to legitimizing eminent domain.
A use of property without the owner's consent is always a violation, but violations will happen. It is not clear what the appropriate restitution for a temporary non-consensual use should be - many factors should be considered. But the appropriate restitution for an ongoing violation is to stop it, not to legitimize it.
If the owner can’t be compensated because he is dead, compensate his heirs.
I should not have mentioned exceptions. That is confusing and misleading. It may be the case that someone is justified in violating rights of others in an emergency, but this is always a violation, and entitles the victim to compensation. “Justified” is also not quite the right word. Many people would interpret that as if no actual violation occurred and no compensation was owed. It is a violation, and calls for compensation, but is not blameworthy. It is more like a tort than a crime.
My concern goes back even further, to the beginning: the creation of a right in itself. I think that rights are never created by being derived from a first principle. Rights are by-products of (repeated) conflict resolution. The original owner as occupier more often keeps his possession because he is often in a better position as defender than the attacker. Defending is usually easier and less costly than attacking. As a result, possession is more often defended than conquered by force.
As a result, at some point the legal conception and idea emerges that the first (or even current) occupier has a right to that first (or current) occupation, or that a long occupation will eventually become a recognized right. However, the concrete boundaries of any possession cannot be formed from a pure principle alone. In a sense, the libertarian principle of non-aggression stands at a possible and utopian end of an evolution in which conflicts have largely disappeared. But without conflicts, there is little need for a principle to deal with conflicts.
edit:
Or in a sense, what someone might call a "violation" of just an idea of a right is part of a process of creating a right, of forming the concrete shape of that right. Think of a "right of passage".
Thank you for your link. I will read it. I know your older "A Positive Account of Property Rights" on your website.
Since I read it many years ago, I have been thinking a lot about Schelling points, what they actually are, how they might evolve, and how they might shape society. Very interesting stuff. Here are some of my humble thoughts about it: https://pointcloud.substack.com/p/what-is-a-focal-point-and-how-to
>possession is more often defended than conquered by force.
More often or more easily? More often seems trivial - if a defense is ever successful, then there will be more defenses than conquests, since the number of conquests equals the number of unsuccessful defenses.
>the libertarian principle of non-aggression stands at a possible and utopian end of an evolution in which conflicts have largely disappeared.
I am confused by this. The basic idea of social norms that involve rights and obligations seems founded either on aggression or non-aggression. In practice, we do often see societies that seem founded on threats by one group against another, but we also see societies that at least pretend to be founded on consent of the governed.
The alternative claim involves basing obligations and rights on subjugation and force. On the one hand, we see this frequently in history. But the sort of obligation created that way doesn’t seem binding except in the sense that slaves will be punished if they try to escape. It isn’t as if an impartial third party would think they had made a mistake or done something bad. Is that what you mean by utopian, the idea that societies based on aggression might be improved upon?
Historically, rulers have used myths and propaganda to put a fig leaf on the aggressive basis of their rule. If their aggression is too naked, it inspires riots or more covert varieties of resistance. Hence aristocrats and even kings were considered to have obligations toward ordinary people, and democracies pretend to be (and sometimes genuinely are) guided by popular opinion. Is it utopian to investigate the possibility of turning this sham obligation into a real one?
Libertarians usually recommend using markets to solve social problems, and recommend some other voluntary method when markets are inappropriate. They do not assume that the existence of voluntary means will eliminate all social problems instantly once we decide to avoid aggression. This does not seem utopian to me, though it is necessarily vague on some of the details.
Anything that can be accomplished by aggressive means can be accomplished voluntarily, although the accomplishment may be less convenient. So why don’t we? I’m not sure. I will wave my hands a bit and say that we are playing a particular game, and the moves in that game that would lead to a beneficial change in the rules are not winning moves in the short run, especially for those who are winning the game in its current configuration. And once we decide to avoid aggression, that doesn’t determine what we ought to do instead, and so it is even possible we will get it wrong.
My point is that I see a broad continuum between "coercion" and "voluntariness".
As I said at the outset: "I think the crux of (paleo)libertarianism lies in the concept of voluntariness."
What is perfectly "voluntary"? Every human expressive interaction consists of communicating costs, of putting the other side to a choice and decision, and every option involves a cost to the one being presented with the choice. "Money or life!" asks the robber. You can risk your life for some of your money, or leave the money to the robber and maybe creating many more cascades of future costs (getting robbed again and again) this way.
Even in this extreme situation, you still have the freedom to choose. The opposing side tries to shape the frame in which you see your options. But - that is always the case. Even in the most peaceful relationship.
Take a married couple. Staying together is conditioned by a certain behavior of the partners. In order to keep your partner, you have to behave in a certain way, you are not completely free. At a certain point, you can talk about a form of coercion, a forced relationship. Where is the clear line?
Or if you are the first to occupy a space, if you draw a fence around it, you uno actu exert a certain amount of pressure on those who are excluded, on the latecomers. The less space there is for others, the more.
The libertarian wants to live in a world of complete voluntariness. But is such a state even conceivable? What is unquestionably voluntary interaction? How is it possible? To be completely free of coercion, there must be no costs imposed on either side. If there are no costs in any form, that is, if there is no scarcity, we speak of an utopian state of post-scarcity or post-economy. So to speak, the Marxian utopia of communism (with the state "withered away") and the libertarian ideal become indistinguishable and - in the same way - trivial :).
Some more thoughts on this can be found here, if you like:
Interesting. I think it is a mistake to oppose voluntariness with coercion, except when speaking very loosely. As noted above, there are legitimate forms of coercion involved in enforcing rights (get off my land or else I’ll…). If we are speaking strictly, that is still “voluntary” in that presumably all parties consent to the rules being enforced or could stay away. Coercion is disallowed while playing the game, but is allowed when enforcing the rules. The rules allow us to create situations that others will consider to be costs, as nature does. The distinction should be between those costs that we have agreed to in advance via the rules and those we have not.
This doesn’t fully solve the objection presented above, since we have not really agreed to all the rules of the game we face, nor can we nullify them by estoppel when we wish to withdraw consent, or even buy some land and secede, at least at present. But it leaves open the possibility that a genuine solution could be developed, which seems to be denied by the comment above.
And there is still an interesting issue regarding what counts as voluntary when desperate persons have no effective choice. How desperate, how choiceless, how much responsibility for their own difficulty marks the distinction?
J.C. Lester has some relevant books and articles, and a Substack. I’m not fully convinced he has everything covered, but he has made a significant, though under-appreciated contribution. I’m not sure how to provide a link. @jclester ?
The (my) question is, how does one exercise coercion (i.e., power) over someone?
If there is a set of rules, and two parties seem to "agree" on them, then there must be a process of coming to that agreement. And if there is coercion involved, it is already in that process. My particular concern is not with the enforcement of these rules or contracts or whatever they may be called, but with their creation, with the concept of "power" to give them any significance.
Whenever there is negotiation or bargaining, there must be some form of conflict beforehand, i.e., an overlap of interests, i.e., multiple, mutually exclusive ends competing for a single resource or means.
So each side tries to bend the other's will to their own favor. And again, how do we define coercion in this context? Ultimately, it is a form of cost communication. You make it clear to the other side what the possible costs of choosing or not choosing a certain option will be. You try to make it (too) costly to choose the "wrong" option. Ultimately, costs are costs of opportunity. Opportunities, in principle, lie in the future, are speculative. It is a psychic game of bold words. Who is the bolder one? And it does not sound so completely "voluntary", even if there is an "agreement" in the end.
I mean, libertarians must embrace the question of power if they want to succeed. It is not anarchy, it is panarchy. In order to balance a powerful one, there needs to be a competing power, a contest of power, alternative spaces of power. This is what I would call "anarcho-capitalist" in a positive or purely descriptive sense, as presented by David D. Friedman.
You may not find too many examples of Christian A, but there is no shortage of Muslims who believe that sharia is God's law, infallible and eternal, (unlike man's law) and that the maximum amount of freedom is obtained when man submits to God's law. It is argued precisely that way -- we need Godly restrictions on our behaviour in order to be more free.
In the Muslim system, God enforces his law by where you go after you die. There is quite a lot of Sharia that, under Muslim judicial theory, does not get enforced in the courts.
I have run into a lot of folks who don’t exactly start from Christian A priors, but argue the conclusions based on “Everything is God’s, so those operating with his approval get to enforce His will as they see fit.” Kind of a disturbing amount, really, seeing as how they don’t seem to have given any consideration to how one can be sure those claiming to operate under God’s authority are actually doing so. Of course it is probably a result of wanting the conclusion and arguing backwards, but it is surprisingly common with youngin’s.
Immigration issue is not a simple one. If there is property then there are borders. Coercion at some point is necessary to enforce the boundaries.
I have property. Other people, including foreigners, can go on it only with my permission. I don't see how that raises immigration issues.
I'm not arguing that one cannot use force against trespassers, just that the country doesn't belong to some imaginary person called "the people" who gets to decide for me who goes on my land.
“Meaning of ‘Libertarian’” might appear to suggest either a simple definition or some essence of the word or the idea. What we really need is an explicit philosophical theory of libertarianism that can solve the philosophical problems that arise with libertarianism.
Christian A is not a libertarian in practice (as normally understood). But he is a libertarian in a weird theoretical sense. Christian B is a libertarian in practice (as normally understood). But he is a non-libertarian in a weird theoretical sense. So Christian A is “more libertarian” in theoretical terms while Christian B is “more libertarian” in practical terms.
“What does ‘libertarian,’ predicated of a person or a conclusion, mean?” It usually means that they are libertarian in theory or in practice according to the person making the assessment. And this assessment will always remain open to debate (as everything always is, because of the conjectural nature of knowledge).
>“I certify that I do not believe in or advocate the initiation of force as a means of achieving political or social goals.”
But we clearly do need to engage in “the initiation of force” to deal with crimes against liberty that do not themselves literally initiate force (fraud, shoplifting, trespassing, squatting, etc.). A definition or theory of “force” that declares all unlibertarian acts thereby to be using “force” does not make literal normal sense of “force” and is thus circular rather than explanatory.
Yes, you are “a libertarian with different arguments but libertarian conclusions”. So am I.
I set aside any discussion of libertarianism and immigration controls, but my own explanation is here: https://jclester.substack.com/p/immigration-and-libertarianism
The main problem is that a full philosophical theory of libertarianism can only be relatively complicated (at least, compared to the “non-aggression principle”, the “non-initiation of force”, “non-coercion”, etc.). An initial reading of it is unlikely to enlighten anyone in an instant (“Thou know’st we work by wit and not by witchcraft, and wit depends on dilatory time”). The only way to grasp it is to criticise it in detail. I have now made my own theory as concise and precise as I can for substack in a logical sequence of stages:
1. liberty in itself: https://jclester.substack.com/p/liberty-in-itself-a-libertarian-viewpoint
2. liberty maximisation: https://jclester.substack.com/p/liberty-maximisation-a-libertarian
3. liberty in a state of nature: https://jclester.substack.com/p/liberty-in-a-state-of-nature-a-libertarian
4. liberty in propertarian practice: https://jclester.substack.com/p/liberty-in-propertarian-practice
5. liberty and morality: https://jclester.substack.com/p/liberty-and-morality-a-libertarian
6. critical rationalism and its application to libertarianism: https://jclester.substack.com/p/critical-rationalism
Congratulations, your first example is a thought experiment pointing to why I don't consider myself to be libertarian.
Some proportion of property was originally stolen (aka acquired by initiating force), and the egg can't be unscrambled.
Isn’t libertarianism more about how to achieve a truce than about the perfect justice of history?
DamnedifIknow. I suspect it may depend on which libertarian you ask.
I mean, why would the fact that some proportion of property was stolen at some point (more likely all if we are discussing land) be the reason to dismiss libertarianism?
The natural rights version of libertarianism has a problem, although perhaps not an insoluble one, with property stolen in the distant past. The consequentialist version doesn't.
There's still the practical problem related to what the exact cutoff date for the "distant past" is.
Not really. If we are using system x to resolve our disputes, and a dispute depends directly on events that either occurred before system x was in place or on evidence that no longer exists, that is clearly outside the scope of the system. If a plaintiff has the appropriate evidence (and is making the sort of claim that the system deals with), it shouldn’t matter whether the events were recent or distant. Each claim is based on a prior claim, and so long as the disputants agree on some claim, however distant in the past, the dispute can be arbitrated using the undisputed claim as a starting point.
Is there a philosophy of ownership that doesn’t have that issue? I can’t think of one that includes a rule of ownership that doesn’t fall afoul of “at some point people killed other people to take this land” and doesn’t sort of hand wave into “well, let’s all agree to not do that anymore.” Which seems fair, don’t get me wrong, I just don’t see how one gets away from that if killing people and taking their stuff is to be forbidden.
I think I am none of the above. I’ve been influenced by Stephan Kinsella. His idea is that a property dispute points back to a basis that both parties agree on (although in some cases, of course, they might not agree on anything). They don’t agree on who owns X now, or exactly what happened in the past 20 years, but they agree that one hundred years ago Johnson owned it, and neither of them has a dispute with Johnson. Obviously, this will not address gross injustices of the distant past, but what would? Libertarianism is not a magic spell for redeeming the past. And if someone did have clear evidence of an ancient claim, they could pursue it.
All labels, especially ones of a political nature, are necessarily simplifications and generalizations of the much more complex and many faceted belief systems that they (mistakenly?) attempt to capsulize and define. If more people ethically and philosophically examined their beliefs as you do such gross symbolic identifications would not be so divisive. Regrettably the majority does not do this and this is why they instead assign labels for their feelings and opinions because they have primarily assumed them from an external source rather than from a personal and individual process of rationalization. While I might identify myself as an atheist, an anarchist, a capitalist and a libertarian I fully understand that these ‘labels’ are my individual opinions of aspects of my belief and that others who use the same ‘labels’ might very well differ in how they define them. While language may be a tool for pursuing clarity of thought, it is an inexact process that only approximates truth rather than concretely defining it.
When a person says that their position flows from argument, give them a reasonable hypothetical situation where their principle leads to an outcome you generally know they wont like.
For example:
When a person argues that second amendment is a natural right, ask them if the illegal immigrant too should be allowed to own firearms in USA because it is a "natural right", if they argue that constitution is only for citizens you can ask them if it is okay to waive the 8th amendment for them too and give them cruel punishment like burning them alive or the rack.
When people argue that an unborn baby is a life and must have same right to life as anyone else, ask them if the State of Texas should help a pregnant illegal immigrant cross the hot dessert in order to help her deliver the baby safely.
I have very basic familiarity with Hoppe's work. Being an academician I do not deny that he himself might be sincere in his arguments but those who use it often come across those who do not want to sound nativist but want to sound libertarian while very deliberately pushing libertarian ideas.
I think people like Hoppe as bad influence on our freedoms as they create bad faith arguments that used by some to coerce others.
"When a person says that their position flows from argument, give them a reasonable hypothetical situation where their principle leads to an outcome you generally know they wont like. "
You have just described Chapter 41 of _The Machinery of Freedom_. Also much of a talk I gave in 1981.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GuYt6X2g0cY
I will check this video and read the chapter as well.
> When a person argues that second amendment is a natural right, ask them if the illegal immigrant too should be allowed to own firearms in USA because it is a "natural right",
They aren't allowed to be here, with or without firearms.
The question is of principle, not of nitpicking. If a person is nitpicking I can assume they aren't interested in addressing the principle.
Pointing out the incoherence of your position isn't nitpicking.
I really like the idea of putting a metric on libertarians. I'm less entranced by having a Platonic Libertarian at ground. Wouldn't it be more consistent with libertarianism that each libertarian view himself as ground, and evaluate all others by their distance from himself? One statistic of interest might be the minimal dimension of the graph -- how many flavors of libertarians are there?
“God, having created everything, is the rightful owner of everything.”
This requires either a peculiar or a very casual idea of ownership. In order to use something, we need the owner's consent. I suppose the sort of person who would make this argument might reply that god has given consent in the Bible, or though the church, or in mysterious ways unknown to us. But when there is a dispute, the owner never shows up in court. He has competing incompatible interpreters struggling to speak for him. So it needs more, at the very least. Or should we all join in the squabble, if we think we might represent his genuine will?
Sorry for quibbling over an argument that I suppose was not meant to be taken seriously
I kind of thought the same thing. “If God wants me to stop breathing His air, He can surely demonstrate that by making me stop doing so. If he doesn’t, we can assume he is fine with things.”
There is a sense in which that is a common position. God enforces his rules by sending you to Hell if you break them. The small practical problem is that you don't know you are being punished for something until long afterward, which makes it hard to adjust your behavior to fit God's commands.
God doesn't stop the slave owner from whipping the slave, so your argument also implies that He is fine with slavery. Libertarians want an argument to convince the slave owner to stop or authorize the libertarian to stop him, but if the slave owner claims he is doing what God permits it comes down to "might demonstrates right."
Not only that might demonstrates right, but that those of God's duly appointed authorities on Earth might not actually be such. He doesn't issue badges after all, and so it is hard to pin down whether they actually speak with His voice, as it were, which makes it pretty unconvincing that they are correct.
Particularly when it comes to thinks like dietary restrictions which seem like rather victimless crimes. One can sympathize with a slave, but once piglets stop being cute pork belly is damned hard to argue with.
Perhaps it would lead to a policy of “might makes right.” God favors whoever wins the fight?
Indeed. Personally, I can only accept that if there is a god as described by eg Catholics he must be extremely hands off, and has little interest in earthly affairs while the participants are still alive. As Calvin put it, it is hard to be religious when certain people are never incinerated by bolts of lightening. It seems to me that God isn’t too picky about who claims to be operating with his authority.
"I, arguably, am an atheist version of Christian B." Me too. :-)
First principles are necessary to start to formulate an argument, but consequences matter to complete the argument. Current public discussion has embraced non-consequentialist ethics. In addition, while liberty should have a high value, there are always tradeoffs.
My favorite tradeoff is helping the poor properly, as a government sponsored insurance scheme. Once that is done, other tradeoffs with liberty seems much less pressing.
I think the crux of (paleo)libertarianism lies in the concept of voluntariness.
Could you draw a clear line between voluntariness and involuntariness? If not, there can be no clear derivation from a single libertarian principle of non-aggression or voluntariness or the like to any practical conclusion. Take the occupation of hitherto unoccupied space as a paleolibertarian starting point. In what way is this act entirely voluntary? It excludes latecomers against their will. You could completely fence in a person according to this libertarian "homesteading principle". This is a fuzzy, good rule of thumb, but it is nonsense to make an absolute moral claim (=without exceptions/provisos) out of it.
That depends on what you mean by an absolute claim. Most people seem to think it means that no violation of a principle is ever justified. This seems like putting a thumb on the scale to me, since we know that violations will occur, and might even make sense. The alternative is to say the principle is absolute, but exceptions can be made if the victims are compensated. Answers about just compensation might turn out to be complicated, but this has a similar abstract appeal, without the impracticalities.
There are two problems with that argument. The first is that if you generalize it you have just justified eminent domain, seizing property without consent but with non-consensual compensation, which most libertarians disapprove of. The second is that there may be cases where it is enormously important to violate someone's rights but you don't have the power to compensate him — the obvious example being if the rights violation kills him.
The temporary use of property without the owner's consent literally cannot be undone. It is in the past. The taking of property can be undone. The violation continues into the future
I am not advocating that violations be excused, or worse, institutionalized, just that appropriate restitution should result. Am I making exceptions, or just pointing out how things could work?
Anyone can trespass, but property still works if not too many do. If everyone can use eminent domain on each other, property stops making sense. For my argument to lead to eminent domain, someone would have to toss in a subsection showing that eminent domain is legitimate and only the state should use eminent domain. We need some other constraint preventing me from confiscating my property back one second after someone else confiscates it from me. Nothing in the original argument addresses those issues in a way that leads to legitimizing eminent domain.
A use of property without the owner's consent is always a violation, but violations will happen. It is not clear what the appropriate restitution for a temporary non-consensual use should be - many factors should be considered. But the appropriate restitution for an ongoing violation is to stop it, not to legitimize it.
If the owner can’t be compensated because he is dead, compensate his heirs.
I should not have mentioned exceptions. That is confusing and misleading. It may be the case that someone is justified in violating rights of others in an emergency, but this is always a violation, and entitles the victim to compensation. “Justified” is also not quite the right word. Many people would interpret that as if no actual violation occurred and no compensation was owed. It is a violation, and calls for compensation, but is not blameworthy. It is more like a tort than a crime.
My concern goes back even further, to the beginning: the creation of a right in itself. I think that rights are never created by being derived from a first principle. Rights are by-products of (repeated) conflict resolution. The original owner as occupier more often keeps his possession because he is often in a better position as defender than the attacker. Defending is usually easier and less costly than attacking. As a result, possession is more often defended than conquered by force.
As a result, at some point the legal conception and idea emerges that the first (or even current) occupier has a right to that first (or current) occupation, or that a long occupation will eventually become a recognized right. However, the concrete boundaries of any possession cannot be formed from a pure principle alone. In a sense, the libertarian principle of non-aggression stands at a possible and utopian end of an evolution in which conflicts have largely disappeared. But without conflicts, there is little need for a principle to deal with conflicts.
edit:
Or in a sense, what someone might call a "violation" of just an idea of a right is part of a process of creating a right, of forming the concrete shape of that right. Think of a "right of passage".
You might be interested in my positive account of rights:
https://daviddfriedman.substack.com/p/a-positive-account-of-rights
Thank you for your link. I will read it. I know your older "A Positive Account of Property Rights" on your website.
Since I read it many years ago, I have been thinking a lot about Schelling points, what they actually are, how they might evolve, and how they might shape society. Very interesting stuff. Here are some of my humble thoughts about it: https://pointcloud.substack.com/p/what-is-a-focal-point-and-how-to
I mostly agree. however….
>possession is more often defended than conquered by force.
More often or more easily? More often seems trivial - if a defense is ever successful, then there will be more defenses than conquests, since the number of conquests equals the number of unsuccessful defenses.
>the libertarian principle of non-aggression stands at a possible and utopian end of an evolution in which conflicts have largely disappeared.
I am confused by this. The basic idea of social norms that involve rights and obligations seems founded either on aggression or non-aggression. In practice, we do often see societies that seem founded on threats by one group against another, but we also see societies that at least pretend to be founded on consent of the governed.
The alternative claim involves basing obligations and rights on subjugation and force. On the one hand, we see this frequently in history. But the sort of obligation created that way doesn’t seem binding except in the sense that slaves will be punished if they try to escape. It isn’t as if an impartial third party would think they had made a mistake or done something bad. Is that what you mean by utopian, the idea that societies based on aggression might be improved upon?
Historically, rulers have used myths and propaganda to put a fig leaf on the aggressive basis of their rule. If their aggression is too naked, it inspires riots or more covert varieties of resistance. Hence aristocrats and even kings were considered to have obligations toward ordinary people, and democracies pretend to be (and sometimes genuinely are) guided by popular opinion. Is it utopian to investigate the possibility of turning this sham obligation into a real one?
Libertarians usually recommend using markets to solve social problems, and recommend some other voluntary method when markets are inappropriate. They do not assume that the existence of voluntary means will eliminate all social problems instantly once we decide to avoid aggression. This does not seem utopian to me, though it is necessarily vague on some of the details.
Anything that can be accomplished by aggressive means can be accomplished voluntarily, although the accomplishment may be less convenient. So why don’t we? I’m not sure. I will wave my hands a bit and say that we are playing a particular game, and the moves in that game that would lead to a beneficial change in the rules are not winning moves in the short run, especially for those who are winning the game in its current configuration. And once we decide to avoid aggression, that doesn’t determine what we ought to do instead, and so it is even possible we will get it wrong.
My point is that I see a broad continuum between "coercion" and "voluntariness".
As I said at the outset: "I think the crux of (paleo)libertarianism lies in the concept of voluntariness."
What is perfectly "voluntary"? Every human expressive interaction consists of communicating costs, of putting the other side to a choice and decision, and every option involves a cost to the one being presented with the choice. "Money or life!" asks the robber. You can risk your life for some of your money, or leave the money to the robber and maybe creating many more cascades of future costs (getting robbed again and again) this way.
Even in this extreme situation, you still have the freedom to choose. The opposing side tries to shape the frame in which you see your options. But - that is always the case. Even in the most peaceful relationship.
Take a married couple. Staying together is conditioned by a certain behavior of the partners. In order to keep your partner, you have to behave in a certain way, you are not completely free. At a certain point, you can talk about a form of coercion, a forced relationship. Where is the clear line?
Or if you are the first to occupy a space, if you draw a fence around it, you uno actu exert a certain amount of pressure on those who are excluded, on the latecomers. The less space there is for others, the more.
The libertarian wants to live in a world of complete voluntariness. But is such a state even conceivable? What is unquestionably voluntary interaction? How is it possible? To be completely free of coercion, there must be no costs imposed on either side. If there are no costs in any form, that is, if there is no scarcity, we speak of an utopian state of post-scarcity or post-economy. So to speak, the Marxian utopia of communism (with the state "withered away") and the libertarian ideal become indistinguishable and - in the same way - trivial :).
Some more thoughts on this can be found here, if you like:
https://pointcloud.substack.com/p/the-praxeology-of-power
https://pointcloud.substack.com/p/on-the-problematic-definition-of
Interesting. I think it is a mistake to oppose voluntariness with coercion, except when speaking very loosely. As noted above, there are legitimate forms of coercion involved in enforcing rights (get off my land or else I’ll…). If we are speaking strictly, that is still “voluntary” in that presumably all parties consent to the rules being enforced or could stay away. Coercion is disallowed while playing the game, but is allowed when enforcing the rules. The rules allow us to create situations that others will consider to be costs, as nature does. The distinction should be between those costs that we have agreed to in advance via the rules and those we have not.
This doesn’t fully solve the objection presented above, since we have not really agreed to all the rules of the game we face, nor can we nullify them by estoppel when we wish to withdraw consent, or even buy some land and secede, at least at present. But it leaves open the possibility that a genuine solution could be developed, which seems to be denied by the comment above.
And there is still an interesting issue regarding what counts as voluntary when desperate persons have no effective choice. How desperate, how choiceless, how much responsibility for their own difficulty marks the distinction?
J.C. Lester has some relevant books and articles, and a Substack. I’m not fully convinced he has everything covered, but he has made a significant, though under-appreciated contribution. I’m not sure how to provide a link. @jclester ?
Sorry for the late reply, my time is flying :).
The (my) question is, how does one exercise coercion (i.e., power) over someone?
If there is a set of rules, and two parties seem to "agree" on them, then there must be a process of coming to that agreement. And if there is coercion involved, it is already in that process. My particular concern is not with the enforcement of these rules or contracts or whatever they may be called, but with their creation, with the concept of "power" to give them any significance.
Whenever there is negotiation or bargaining, there must be some form of conflict beforehand, i.e., an overlap of interests, i.e., multiple, mutually exclusive ends competing for a single resource or means.
So each side tries to bend the other's will to their own favor. And again, how do we define coercion in this context? Ultimately, it is a form of cost communication. You make it clear to the other side what the possible costs of choosing or not choosing a certain option will be. You try to make it (too) costly to choose the "wrong" option. Ultimately, costs are costs of opportunity. Opportunities, in principle, lie in the future, are speculative. It is a psychic game of bold words. Who is the bolder one? And it does not sound so completely "voluntary", even if there is an "agreement" in the end.
I mean, libertarians must embrace the question of power if they want to succeed. It is not anarchy, it is panarchy. In order to balance a powerful one, there needs to be a competing power, a contest of power, alternative spaces of power. This is what I would call "anarcho-capitalist" in a positive or purely descriptive sense, as presented by David D. Friedman.
https://jclester.substack.com/