Some stuff from when I was away:

An explanation of government


Cock: I thought it was helpful to write this because airhead libertarians out there don't really understand how or why government works. In other words, why do the vast majority of societies delegate the functions of law making and the making of decisions under these laws to specialised bodies or persons?

The chief reasons why we do this, are because 1: society is enormously complex and it is not realistic to make every decision that is required to be made in societies that affects that particular community because of information overload, 2: the other reason why society can't come to a decision quickly on many issues, is because there is bound to be differences of opinion on those issues. Sometimes it really is appropriate for this to go through extensive and full debate ( such as whether we should generally spend more money on welfare). But in numerous other situations time constraints require a decision maker to make timely decisions, after taking into account all the factors. It is one thing to argue whether we should have a fire service; it is another to make a decision about how many people should be employed in that service, what sort of working hours and conditions they should have, what model of fire engine we need to buy, etc etc etc. 3: while many problems are corrected by market forces, market failures exist as a result of information assymmetry which exists between the provider of that good or service and the consumer. The problem with solving this problem through the law of tort is primarily because private actions for damages can only come about AFTER the damage has already taken place. And the argument that the interests of the producer are synonymous with that of the consumer is utterly errorneous, as I have more or less amply demonstrated with the Ford example.

So obviously, specialised law making bodies create some rules on various issues which government is involved in. But contrary to the naive beliefs of airhead libertarians, even primary legislation ( statutes) can't cover every single situation where a government official needs to make a decision. Some discretion is therefore allocated. But how do we control the huge powers of what government officials might be able to do under these rules then? The answer in places with civilian or common law systems is "judicial review". That is, judges make sure that government officials exercise only those powers granted to them by the law.

Finally, as a historical footnote, it is true that for centuries all over the world government was extremely minimal. But these were, after all pre-industrial societies, which didn't tend to create the enormous problems associated with industrialisation and mechanised agriculture, including issues of public health, consumer safety, etc ,etc. I suppose an airhead libertarian would really like to live in shantytowns in lagos, mumbai or rio de janerio, which have been practically untouched by government.


A: Also, most people accept the epistemic value of deliberation, that is, that the aggregated decisions of many individuals who are NOT discussing the issue but merely giving their personal choices for aggregation are likely to be inferior to decisions brought about after deliberation. This is why we have representative institutions: they allow the division of labour and let this deliberation be carried out at a level where it is feasible.


B: Would not many things have been a matter of public debate already? And it seems interesting to think that deliberation ever goes on in a modern legislature nowadays -- bills get shuffled into committees of very few people (and are examined at an extremely slow rate), and speeches made in a legislature are mostly ceremonial. Usually, most of it already has been decided on party lines. We see this in both Singapore's legislature (in which policy is decided on LKY's dinner table, then Parliament holds a mostly ceremonial, pre-sciprted "debate") and the United States -- I would think it often similar for other modern "democracies". Most policy is generally debated outside the legislature, in back rooms, in party conferences, and public debate itself. It would seem that only the last is virtuous. The function of speech in legislatures is approaching that of being useful to just filibuster. When one speaks in Congress, one doesn't actually think he or she is going to convince other legislators -- it's mostly speaking to the press and so forth to record their stance.

Such is the nature of representative democracy.

"The answer in places with civilian or common law systems is "judicial review". That is, judges make sure that government officials exercise only those powers granted to them by the law. "

This is working out marvelously with Parliament superiority, insn't it? Even in the US system, I am very secure and confident in knowing that there are a lot of people -- nine people, in fact -- (some of whom have a questionable reputation) between my rights and an abusive state.

"But these were, after all pre-industrial societies, which didn't tend to create the enormous problems associated with industrialisation and mechanised agriculture, including issues of public health, consumer safety, etc ,etc."

Quite an oversimplification; I believe large-scale government intervention was historically precedented by the New Deal.

I'm looking at the Swiss system in particular, which is the most virtuous of the world's democracies; they have an extremely devolved system, a fair amount of direct democracy, including the ability for a citizen to directly initiate repeal. In New England, a massive amount of local policy is determined by town meeting, including among other things, taxes, budgeting, education policy, whether to spend millions of dollars on renovating public buildings, zoning regulations, which roads to repair and so forth.

But maybe I'm spoiled. I forgot that "Asian values" cannot handle it. I also forgot that Switzerland's main population consisted of pygmies and hunter-gatherers. My bad.

And did I ever say anything about market forces alone? This follows from the premise of left libertarianism, i.e. libertarian socialism, communist anarchism, etc.

"It is one thing to argue whether we should have a fire service; it is another to make a decision about how many people should be employed in that service, what sort of working hours and conditions they should have, what model of fire engine we need to buy, etc etc etc. "

These are the sort of things that are decided by an organisation, upon which the community throws behind its support. I also don't expect the rest of the community to be telling business owners whether to fire this employee or not, given that it is their organisations. *But* the community can demand certain standards from public organisations, just like customers demand certain standards of service from the businesses they patronise. (Surprisingly, though they may complain about certain employees, they generally do not get themselves involved in the dirty work either.)

"And the argument that the interests of the producer are synonymous with that of the consumer is utterly errorneous, as I have more or less amply demonstrated with the Ford example. "

I have fought fiercely with a right libertarian before, so I know what you mean. But you assume I am relying on market forces; I am not -- amongst the arsenal of a stateless society are the boycott, the strike and ostracism, among other things.

There are many problems with representative democracy -- and because it doesn't rely often on the muscles of the culture of citizen participation, is it a surprise when those muscles are atrophied? Citizens may be very passionate about certain issues, but unaware of most candidates (because, do you really tend to be interested in a bunch of aristocrats' lives, anyway?) -- come election time, all representatives have to do is pander to the electorate on television. Not surprisingly, voter apathy is highest on the federal scale in the United States; there are those passionately involved in local government but never vote federally. Representative democracy is unacceptable because most citizens don't have actual control over their representatives; it's not so much democracy as "choose your tyrant" (best, have a walkover, then you don't have to choose at all!).

Singapore is a striking example of this.


Cock:

> Even in the US system, I am very secure and confident in knowing that there
> are a lot of people -- nine people, in fact -- (some of whom have a
> questionable reputation) between my rights and an abusive state.

Er. The power of judicial review in the United States occurs at all levels of the federal courts system as far as I recall and is not limited to the supreme court, so, no.

> Quite an oversimplification; I believe large-scale government intervention
> was historically precedented by the New Deal.

Wrong again. Lots of important government functions taken on a federal level had already started even before 1933. Federal income taxes became fully legal thanks to a constitutional amendment in 1913, the federal reserve system was in place by 1919 etc. And that's JUST counting federal government. LOADS of government functions had already been started by governments on the state level before the new deal ( schools, hospitals, street lighting, roads ). So.

And I quote William Wade's first paragraph of his classic English administrative law textbook.

" ' Until August 1914' it has been said, 'a sensible law -abiding Englishman could pass through life and hardly notice the existence of the state, beyond the post office and the policeman.' This worthy person could not, however, claim to be a very observant citizen. For by 1914 there were aldeardy abundant signs of the profound change in the conception of government which was to mark the twntieth century. The state schoolteacher, the national insurance officer, the labour exchange, the sanitary and factory inspectors,
with their ncessary companion the tax collector, were among the outward and visible signs of this change.' "

> I'm looking at the Swiss system in particular, which is the most virtuous of
> the world's democracies

Idiot, referendums constitute only a tiny proportion of the law passed in Switzerland, there is a minimum of a few thousand signatures for referendums to even get onto the voting level, and less than 10% of these proposals actually get passed.

Like most normal democracies, legislatures on the canton and federal level in Switzerland exist, Switzerland has ministers in charge of executive functions ( although the presidency of switzerland rotates among these ministers), and there are lots of government agencies in Switzerland. You have confused the right of direct democracy in Switzerland with the idea that government is mostly run by direct democracy in Switzerland. Which I can assure you is NOT the case.

The same goes for New England town hall meetings. All that town hall meetings can do is to set down certain rules and guidelines as to what an administrator should or should not do. This still leaves a million things that an administrator can do within his or her discretion. For example, a town hall meeting can say "we, the little hamlet of Freedonia, decide that B will be given 1 million dollars to build a primary school". Within those powers B a lot of things to decide- hiring the architects, getting the land to build the school, hiring builders, etc etc. You might, in your naive imagination believe that town hall meetings decide the really minute details of everything that goes into building that school, but NO general piece of legislation goes into such detail.

I hope this has persuaded people on this group not to listen to the misleading things that B has said

> These are the sort of things that are decided by an organisation, upon
> which the community throws behind its support... *But* the community can demand
> certain standards from public organisations, just like customers demand
> certain standards of service from the businesses they patronise.

This is exactly where administrative law generally comes in, to control the powers of government.

For the benefit of the rest of the people here, to say that the relationship between a government and the community at large is akin to contract is incoherent. One is that a contract is generally understood to be an exclusive agreement between two private parties. But the problem with applying this to government services is that a government does not contract exclusively with you the individual to provide a service, it promises a service to the public under some piece of legislation. Most of the time this is framed in a way which gives the government some choice in deciding who to give services to. Traditional contract doctrines also emphasise privity of contract, which makes the analysis of legislation-as-contract even more flawed- how could it be said that a piece of legislation passed in 1960 could have agreed upon by people who weren't even born then or didn't move into the area where that territory applied?

> you assume I am relying on market forces; I am not -- amongst the
> arsenal of a stateless society are the boycott, the strike and ostracism,
> among other things.

In other words, the eradication of law from society. Wow. Not even Nozick has taken such an extreme view as you have- he would argue that a minimum state would still need laws against fraud, theft, use of force, and the enforcement of contracts. I have no time to critically analyse Anarchy, State and Utopia here, but almost any thinking person would agree that law, as opposed to rule-by-mob, is the minimum foundation of a civilised society. For empirical examples of this, see Mogadishu, Somalia, and Baghdad, Iraq.

Finally administrative law works on all levels of the US federal court system, and not just on the Supreme court. B, you do a considerable amount of disrespect to the judges who have to decide to what extent government should exercise discretion, and to what extent the courts should intervene. These are considerably difficult issues. As Antonin Scalia has written "administrative law is not for sissies".


B: The abolishment of the state is not akin to the abolishment of law. Even without the state, nearly all people would agree not to kill or steal from each other so that their rights to life and property are insured. The exceptions (e.g. the criminals) can be contained by the efforts of the rest of the unified community. Anarchism is a renouncement of the state, not necessarily a renouncement of organisation. The dissolution of the state simply means that a privileged minority does not hold the monopoly on violence.

"For empirical examples of this, see Mogadishu, Somalia, and Baghdad, Iraq. "

Those are civil wars, though people may popularly call it "anarchy". In addition, I note interestingly from Wikipedia, "The effective absence of government yields free trade without taxes or regulatory expenditures, making business relatively inexpensive. Businesses have hired armed militias to provide security against gunmen, leading to a gradual reduction in street violence..."

Baghdad in itself does not have absence of government -- rather the city is divided into multiple competing de facto governments ruled by different militia such as Al-Sadr's, imposing also their different interpretations of Syariah law.

And I am not unaware of the federal district courts; but in any situation these nine individuals almost always have had the last word (their silence merely means they uphold the lower decisions); the justice branch has been accused of being an oligarchy, and for good reason. Also, it seems a tad conflicting in interest to have the courts decide to what extent the courts should intervene, no?

"You might, in your naive imagination believe that town hall meetings decide the really minute details of everything that goes into building that school, but NO general piece of legislation goes into such detail. "

I asserted no such thing. Also, as to the classical rebuttal to social contract, that "why should I be subject to it when I never agreed to such a thing" can be countered with the idea that by remaining in said society (as long as one is granted freedom of liberty), one generally accepts its laws. I also believe this is what the function of "repeal" is for: to do away with contracts our ancestors may have consented to, but not we.

I also don't see how legislatures and the state are any more efficient at deciding whose services to consult (looking at their current performances) that the electorate itself, as I have said before concerning the current state of modern legislatures.

"to say that the relationship between a government and the community at large is akin to contract is incoherent. "

Oh I don't know, it seems to have a pretty long tradition.


C: I understand the technical defn of Anarchy as the absence of state. But any form of "organization" as you call it, for the maintenance of law and order and the prevention of civil way will be a state by some other name. And what is more, even if it begins with the minimalism that libertarians such as yourself conceive of, it will over time evolve into the form of the state that we are familiar with.

However you slice it, you cannot effectively argue against reason for state. The rights to life and property you speak of are meaningless in the absence of a state to guarantee those rights. This is why displaced and stateless pple find themselves in such a quandary. On the one hand, the very fact that they are human beings should ensure for them a basic set of rights; yet the fact that they belong to no state means that theres no one to back such a claim.

Now, just in case you shift responsibility to the international community, you will do well to remember that the international system is underpinned by the principle of sovereignty which is to say that its very logic is driven by a statist paradigm. So again, we will find ourselves appealing to states to back those claims of rights.

I don't believe that the libertarian model of society is a tenable proposition. Even if you role back the domination of the state by forcing it to adopt a nightwatchman disposition, you will simply leave yourself at the mercy of corporations and that I think is far worse a proposition. At least you know a state is not gonna up and leave on you in a recession.


Cock: Indeed, without a state corporations wouldn't be recognised in the first place at all. It is always helpful to recall that corporations are legal creations of the law, which in the case of most private and public law is very closely associated with the existence of government authority.


D (on Baghdad and Mogadishu): It is generally accepted that in the overall economy, having an properly operating government reduces overall costs incurred for all businesses. rather than each business having to hire security companies to provide armed guards etc, they all just pay (less) to the local head snake(or civil government, depending on one's point of view); utilities, supplies, are also generally cheaper in a peacetime environment (aka working government) compared to a war-torn zone, which reduces operating costs, and brings about cheaper cost of living for the inhabitants.


B: I already qualified F's citation of Baghdad and Mogadishu to be examples of areas with conflicting governments, not absence of government... These cities are not anarchist communes gone awry. In contrast, compare anarchist Catalonia that flourished during the 1930s and fought a bitter war against Franco; I believe George Orwell's Homage to Catalonia is testament to this. Surprisingly, though absent of most state presence and hierarchy, these were not lawless societies rampant with disorder, save for the insurrections triggered by the Republic's treacherous Stalinist allies.


E (on an interminable abolishment/abolition flame war): Deleting all those mails was starting to get on my nerves. Guess this is one reason why we full time representatives to run a government. Some of us have better things to do then get mixed up with this sort of stuff full time. If the people were consulted on every move, public policy would be dictated by people who have nothing better to do, and can afford to have nothing better to do.


B: Clearly full-time legislators that often pay little actual attention to their constituents and pay more attention to their corporate funders are the sure way to go for efficacy. Legislators often don't even debate. As I have pointed out before, both congressional and parliamentary debates are approaching that of the status of "ceremonial". When members of Congress swing the vote on the bill, it isn't because they got convinced by some impassioned plea made on the Congressional podium; rather they too, are likely to be more influenced by their personal convictions, phone calls in the back office, discussion within a party faction, and perhaps some greasing of palms (legal or otherwise).

Voters in constituencies have so little control (even collective control) over their legislators today, that modern legislatures resemble oligarchies. Modern legislatures are not the romanticised fantasy of intellectual elites debating amongst themselves what policies will be best for their country.

In a stateless society on the other hand, one does not necessarily need to impose majoritarianism on everybody and call a national referendum for every petty thing -- and petty things do swamp legislatures. Why impose punitive measures on polluting industry, when individuals can simply boycott distasteful industries out of business, and encourage their neighbours to do so? Given that government mandate and power is derived from a majority, let the majority exercise that power themselves. Because things are not regulated centrally, there is no need to call the entire community, town, nation and so forth in the case of pressing issues: a boycott or a strike movement for example, would simply spread from one part to another.


Cock: So. B.

1-How would you intend to use the tool of the boycott and the strike to ensure that all residential and commercial buildings have fire safety measures ( the ubiquitous smoke and fire alarms, fire extinguishers, sprinkler systems, emergency exits?)

2- What should a stateless society do in the event, say, that a bird flu outbreak bursts upon an enormous turkey farm some distance from the farm? ( This is not fiction this happened in Britain recently)

3- Whose information would a stateless society rely on so that consumers do not rely on unreliable rumours to boycott a particular manufacturer's product? ( recall the disastrous boycott in the early 90s that befell american apple farmers thanks to news reports that they were using a dangerous pesticide, which was not true)

4- How helpful is a boycott or a strike if a bridge or a tunnel or building collapses upon itself, and the builders who built it have gone bust a long time ago? Must a stateless society endure these tragedies as an inevitable price to pay to live in such a society?

5- How would a stateless society allocate who is allowed to use which bit of the scarce radio spectrum ( everything from TV signals to radio to wireless broadband to 2g and 3g mobile telephony)

I could go on with loads and loads of examples, but it is clear from B's theorising that he knows very, very little about real life. Some form of co-ordination is needed in some areas of life, even if all human beings were equally altruistic.


B: The boycott was but an example; there are many other things citizens can do without the need for a state. I do recall, for example, that it had been suggested that instead of waiting for the PAP to upgrade opposition ward lifts, that the constituents should pool money and upgrade the lifts themselves; such a move would have spitefully shown the opposition wards to be resistant to PAP threats.

I brought up the boycott as an example of the replacement of the function of punition and state power without infringement on liberty. Through one's own individual liberties: what one buys, what one speaks, what one lends support to, to whom one gives (and these are all capabilities that the State would demand from you in order to enforce some perceived collective good anyway), one can encourage or influence certain practices when the effect is taken as a whole.

In response to your first example, the community shouldn't impose upon you against your will the requirement to have fire safety measures; but on the other hand, it has the ability to strongly recommend it, even to voluntarily subsidise those who would be inclined to dismiss it out of inconvenience.

As to commercial regulations, citizens can always sound the alarm on businesses that fail to ensure safety practices for the public that patronises them. Since seat belts and so forth become cultural requirements, these are the sorts of things that are quickly noticed. On the other hand, the state often overlooks clear safety endangerments simply because they are not part of its bureaucratic lists of regulations, and a public that is handicapped by the state will not be able to afford any pressure (or at least, will not be used to, or have the exercised muscle of citizen culture to enforce it as such) against such a business.

Currently, consumers use the State as a crutch, and as such often aren't aware that their choices in spending can have adverse effects (e.g. buying from an unethical company), because they have no cultural pressure to do so. They rely on bureaucrats to check the adverse effects of their spending, even though they hold the source of power for the government and they hold the purse strings.

Expert citizens involved in certain fields will also likely raise the public's attention to any red flags. There will be a public demand for testing. There will be a greater cry against pseudoscientific products. Instead of state-imposed inspections, propriety will demand that private inspection certification be given. You will ask, do consumers want to take up such a responsibility? Yet, many consumers are dangerously and complacently ignorant of the sources of their food, and unaware of the things that the State still overlooks, e.g. such as what McDonald's doesn't tell you (but the FDA passes anyway) what happens in its meat factories

"3- Whose information would a stateless society rely on so that consumers do not rely on unreliable rumours to boycott a particular manufacturer's product? ( recall the disastrous boycott in the early 90s that befell american apple farmers thanks to news reports that they were using a dangerous pesticide, which was not true)"

If censorship is not imposed, fallacious arguments will be easily trumped by the rest of the public. Given enough eyes, all bugs will bcome shallow. News reports are a most curious thing, given that mas media broadcasting stations are often heavily regulated institutions, and monolithic in nature. The State, for example, requires extensive licensing and regulation for someone to even broadcast on a mass medium. Compare the internet, where the false rumours of CBS' Sixty Minutes (concerning George Bush' military record) was quickly dispelled by common citizens while the rest of the news media had not even picked up on the hoax.

"2- What should a stateless society do in the event, say, that a bird flu outbreak bursts upon an enormous turkey farm some distance from the farm? ( This is not fiction this happened in Britain recently)"

An enormous turkey farm some distance from the farm? What again?

I'm not exactly sure what your case is, and I would tolerate the typo if it didn't befuddle the example totally. In general anyway, the harm posed to the liberties of life (namely health) supersede the liberty to purchase what one wants. Most would come to the agreement that a cessation of purchasing from that area would be in order, and to shun those who would purchase. Is the farm part of the community?

Sometimes, killing or an enforced cessation of trade is also overreactionary for disease outbreaks in general among lifestock, especially if the affected animals can survive (and also produce precious antibodies) once isolated from the rest of the stock.

"How helpful is a boycott or a strike if a bridge or a tunnel or building collapses upon itself, and the builders who built it have gone bust a long time ago? Must a stateless society endure these tragedies as an inevitable price to pay to live in such a society?"

Would the public contract a company whose standards it could not examine, and one that had not been vetted by any private and reputable certification?

"How would a stateless society allocate who is allowed to use which bit of the scarce radio spectrum ( everything from TV signals to radio to wireless broadband to 2g and 3g mobile telephony)"

State regulation in this area is rather repressive, actually, and is in part responsible for the very fact that rumours were able to spread unchecked on TV news in the first place: the citizen had no capability for feedback. With increasing technology, you're also able to tunnel different signals on the same spectrum anyway; the internet (that would include things like internet radio and internet TV) is a far more democratic medium anyway.

"Some form of co-ordination is needed in some areas of life"

Co-ordination does indeed occur in a stateless society, only without the tyranny of state power.


Cock: That's because the private and reputable certificatio body would be performing a quasi-government service. It is well accepted in administrative law today that public bodies do include many private organisations which perform these vetting services. The Takeover Panel in the City of London is one very good example.

Your argument therefore falls flat on its face because whatever else you might call it, in substance it IS a public function, that is to say it performs a co-ordinating function no other organisation can step in to fill.

I have nothing to add to your ignorance of epidemic control, the historical development of fire safety standards in urban areas ( compare the generally lower number of deaths in well governed areas with coercive fire standards and those in ungoverned shantytowns worldwide), and radio spectrum allocation generally.


F: B has also failed to provide clear examples of how anarchist/extreme libertarian states have succeeded. I am still waiting for something other than the short-lived anarchist Catalonia. Whereas, where a form of govt actually exists, we have countless successful examples - UK, France, Germany, Japan, Canada. Etc etc etc.

Etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc.