Introduction
There are many who claim not to see the difference between negative and positive rights. However, this isn’t a valid position to take given the extent of application of the positive/negative distinction. Far from being applicable solely to the rights of man, they find use in describing virtually every situation in which action is required. For instance, in Operant Conditioning, the terms positive and negative are used to denote different forms of reinforcement. Negative reinforcement isn’t punishment and positive reinforcement isn’t reward. Negative reinforcement is withholding or not using a stimulus (whether a reward or a punishment). Positive reinforcement is giving that stimulus to the subject (again, whether it’s a good or bad stimulus).

When it comes to rights, negative rights are quite simply those things you would have with no interference; Unless you murder me, I live. Unless you stop me, I’m free. Unless you take it, I have property. Unless you attempt to take it away from me, I have that right. Positive rights on the other hand are things you can only have with interference (again, ‘good’ or ‘bad’). A ‘right to a standard of living’ can only be maintained if those who don’t have that standard of living are given it by an outside source. This outside source is inevitably government. And said government works through taxation and regulation. You have a ‘right to a standard of living’, if I subsidize it. You have a ‘right to maternity leave’ if your employer concedes it. The difference can only be made up through the contribution of others. It is thus a ‘positive right’. And, because this ‘right’ can only be maintained through the coercion and loss of property of others, it is mutually exclusive to the maintenance of negative rights. The same is true for all ‘positive rights’. They thus result in a net loss of liberty.

But a man could ask why any rights at all?

Which is an exceedingly more difficult question. But one I’ll try to handle in the following post. As I’ve said, I’m a behavioral ecologist. And while I love monkeys, I also have a passion (if you couldn’t tell) is for philosophy. Particularly evolutionary epistemology and ethics. Evolutionary epistemology is comparatively easy to derive from first principles, and even easier to expound upon. Evolutionary ethics, on the other hand, is a huge mess. It is nearly impossible to derive a ‘good’ and a ‘bad’ when all actions essentially derive from selfishness. We call the selfish but devoted father that is the Titi monkey ‘good’, while we call the infanticidal–but no more selfish–male Howler monkey ‘bad’. I still haven’t figured that problem out, and the manuscript still sits on the back burner more or less untouched, 2.5 years later.

The Problem
This basic problem of how to define ‘good’ without a clear universal is even more complex when it comes to political philosophy. The reason is because what at first looks like a simple problem is actually twofold:

1)Why are ‘negative rights’ good? Why are ‘positive rights’ bad?
2)Why any rights at all?

I’ve discussed Problem 1 at length both here and at my own blog. The major defect in ‘positive rights’ is that it posits the existence of ‘The People’ as a single entity, a collective. This differs from ‘the people’ as used by the Framers to denote a collection of individuals who share a common government. The idea of a collective, of group selection, has little or no basis in reality. It hasn’t been shown to exist. Rather, as outlined by Adam Smith and corroborated by two decades of economists, mathematicians, and behavioral ecologists progress and cooperation are simply epiphenomena relating to self interest. To quote Terry Pratchett:

‘I’m sure we can all pull together, sir.’

Lord Vetinari raised his eyebrows. ‘Oh I do hope not, I really do hope not. Pulling together is the aim of despotism and tyranny. Free men pull in all kinds of directions.’ He smiled. ‘It’s the only way to make progress…’

Forcing humans into a collective goes against our very nature, which is why such coercive governments seldom last without the added coercion of lethal retaliation for disobedience. And why they inevitably succumb to stagnation.

The Solution
And in here we see a makeshift solution to the ‘good’/’bad’ problem: What were we built to do? How were we built to behave? What are the rules by which we function? And if the trend continued, how would things end up? In other words, if the models that behavioral ecologists and economists used were taken to their logical conclusion, what would we see?

With Problem 2 we run into greater difficulty. ‘Surely what we see in nature is anarchy,’ would inevitably be an anarchist’s reply. And in that no animal other than humans has a codified rule of law, he’d be right. Yet there are trends we can see within the animal kingdom, particularly among the most intelligent social mammals, that would seem to tend toward things that are too expensive to fight for.

The basic idea is that the ‘worth’ of an individual can be calculated in terms of the time and energy spent to create said being. An insect or a mantis shrimp doesn’t cost a whole lot to make. Neither does an egg-laying vertebrate like a fish or a frog or a snake. Small mammals aren’t much further up the scale. But as one goes up the scale in intelligence, sociality, longevity, and size, they get much more expensive and much more demanding very fast. Just for some perspective, while some rodents can produce up to 6 offspring every 3 weeks, you can only produce 2-4 wolves every two years in your average pack (which consists of several adults of both sexes). It takes a monkey anywhere from 2 to 6 years to achieve completion, a chimp or a gorilla up to a decade, and a human close to 18 years, with correspondingly lower interbirth intervals.

A mantis shrimp dying might only represent 50-100 calories lost. A chimpanzee on the other hand, would amount to literally anywhere from hundreds of thousands to millions of calories of lost investment if he died. Interestingly enough, the cost of producing an adult of a given species and the intensity, frequency, and lethality of fight situations within and between groups shows a pretty robust trend toward fewer and less intense fights the more expensive the individual. Fights to the death are not uncommon among invertebrates and ‘cheaper’ vertebrates such as the famed lethal dances of male hummingbirds. But amongst higher primate males (excluding humans), within-group lethality is such an uncommon occurrence that a simple description of the incident is often worth an entire scientific publication (in other words, pretty remarkable). Lethality between groups is likewise low, with Chimpanzees being the only other primate known to do so in a systematic manner. And even that is rare.

As might be predicted, the general trend we see, from ‘life’ on down through ‘property’, is that the higher the energetic worth of an animal, forcible coercion through violence drops lower and lower. Instead, the mere likelihood of retaliation is enough to convince the would-be aggressor not to bother. This is the basic principle behind Heinlein’s assertion that ‘an armed society is a polite society’.

Conclusion
This would seem to be an argument in support of the anarchist’s assertion that society will find order on its own anyway. But an important part of this understanding is that violence does happen. Animals’ ‘property’ (whether food or territory) is stolen. And females and males alike find themselves coerced by more dominant individuals on a regular basis.

Although the incidences of all of these would decrease relative to other animals in a human anarchistic society due to an increased fear (and cost) of retaliation, they would still exist. So what the anarchist asserts is that a basal level of murder, coercion, and theft is somehow ok. The depredations against others in an anarchy represent the background noise that proponents clearly ignore as mere stochastic effect. Which seems just a bit dismissive, if you ask me. And not all that different from the collectivist mentality of the leftist when you get down to it. Just as–according to the Supreme Court–the police are responsible for the protection of ‘the people’ but not a single individual, the anarchist is fine with a relatively low level of transgressions against man’s right to life, liberty, and property among ‘the people’ despite its continued occurrence amongst individuals. ‘As long as ‘the people’ are more or less free, who cares about a couple of them?’ is what they seem to say.

But more importantly, the anarchist imputes too much to statement that ‘All men are created equal.’ Even at birth, some are taller, some are heavier. Some are healthier, some are more alert. Should one strip away all of the material (environmental) differences, the genetic differences would still leave vasts gulfs between the most capable and the least. The anarchist’s basic argument of self order is dependent upon not only a level playing field but teams consisting of cloned players. While his assumptions hold basically true in the animal kingdom where the difference between the Alpha male and the lowest of the subordinate males doesn’t tend to be all that great, in a population as varied as humanity, the assumption doesn’t even begin to resemble reality. In such a system, where some are capable of greater acts of coercion than others, and where the threat of retaliation varies widely from almost none to almost infinite, a few will inevitably come to control the many. An oligarchy. History tells us much about these oligarchies, and about how noble, how meritocratic, how well-meaning they are in the beginning, such things will inevitably become mere tools for the ambitious, the greedy, the predators, to all the more easily take power with. And so tyrannies are born.

The anarchist turns a blind eye to the difference between the perfect world of their assumptions and the real world. The classical liberal merely acknowledges them. He sees that for society to remain free from tyranny, individuals must treat each other as if they were equal. It is not only the logical conclusion of the trend toward less and less coercive acts in the animal world, but also the only way to prevent tyranny. The young man must not kill the old one merely because the latter cannot protest. The man must not rape the woman merely because he can pin her. The strong must not take bread from the mouth of the weak merely because he can. Because eventually the young man will become a general, the man a police chief, the strong an iron-fisted dictator.

The latter position is taken by Nikhil Rao, of the Liberty Papers blog, in “Why Any Rights At All?”. This entry was presented at the last Carnival of Liberty and was supposed to knock down market anarchy. The objectives of his entry are three-fold: first, to explain what negative rights are, second, to shed some light on self-order in other species, and third, to discuss the issue of human social organization and why anarchy is insufficient. I wouldn’t dare to touch him in ecology or biology, and since his discussion on the topic promotes self-order, I thankfully don’t have to object to it either. As a libertarian, I also do not object to his analysis of rights. I do, however, have some important points to raise about how he interprets anarchy.

For those of you who don’t know me, I am coming from a market anarchist position, but I consider the term a tautology only needed because sadly most anarchists are quite contradictory in their positions. Anarchy implies a return to the natural state of man, which is, as history I think has well demonstrated, that of producer and trader, not of oppressor. I’m fairly certain Nikhil agrees with me that oppression necessarily involves inequality, in light of his entry. So this will be the basis for our discussion.

First, let me give the positive case by explaining why anarchy is the mode of social organization most conductive to the sustainment of natural rights. First of all, I must preface by saying that I see natural rights as a purely theoretical concept- everyone tries to fulfill his values, not a concept of rights. Nevertheless, rights give us a guideline by which we can evaluate how progressive a society is.

The most important difference between statism and market anarchy is this: in statism, a singular value system is imposed on the entirety of a society, but in a market anarchy, people are free to choose the value system they live under. What does the latter imply in terms of rights?

Suppose you are a customer under a market anarchic system. You don’t want to be subject to any rules, so you decide to first purchase a service from an agency which offers a completely permissive code- murder is permitted, theft is permitted, fraud is permitted, no action is ever stopped by this agency, and all is left to the individual to cope with. People could still live, work and trade, but they would have considerable overhead in protecting themselves (as they have refused the possibility of an agency doing that for them). You don’t want to have to do all this hard work!

But why do you perform this work, instead of letting everything stand as it is? Because of your value system. You value your life, your property and your ability to have relationships, hobbies, and all that sort of thing. You do not value getting assassinated, robbed, kidnapped. This is perfectly natural, and most people, uninfluenced by statism (which states that the individual must submit to threats of attacks against his person for the “common good”), would agree.

So our value system is a natural counter-balance to the desire to not be subject to rules. There is a point of equilibrium which should be attained by this process. Where is it? Well, it is definitely lower than the exploitation of statism, and definitely higher than a total lack of organized order (which I think is what Nikhil thinks of when he says “anarchy”). Does it fit perfectly in the peg hole of natural rights? I doubt it, but I assume it must be pretty close. The fact that systems of laws which arise from non-coercive, private systems of justice- such as Roman law and English common law- tend towards natural rights much more than our current laws should be encouraging, although they reflect the statist concepts existing at the time (immigration, the privileges of kings, and so on).

On the other hand, what does statism offer us? Democratic states only grow- for that is what their incentive system dictates. A democratic state is ensured to deviate farther and farther from natural rights. Monarchies grow at a much slower pace, because of the private ownership of government inherent in the monarchic system, and the subsequent desire in the king to keep his rule from interfering in his citizens’ lives, in order to maximize his profit. Nevertheless, monarchies also offer us no tendancy towards natural rights.

Nikhil is a minarchist, and so would probably like me to believe that some form of minarchy can exhibit such a tendancy (not the US Constitution, I hope). I will let him express his position on that issue, but he would have to make his proposed concrete mode of organization clear so that we can examine its incentive system. I can guarantee you that it’s not going to work in the long run, simply because all states expand in the long run. This is the simple inevitable consequence of monopolizing force.

Nikhil believes that “the market has limitations”. What limitations would that be? So-called “market failures”? Even if I forget about my market anarchist position for a second, I still can’t see how the market has limitations that the state can overcome. The state is merely an agency of redistribution of resources by force. In and of itself, it does no productive work. If something is possible under statism, then it is automatically possible under a market, through consumer demand. It may be less probable, sure- for example, I doubt very much that free individuals would surrender 50% of their wages to a vast bureaucratic monster, but that’s a good thing- but it is still possible.

My general evaluation of his entry is that Nikhil apparently sees anarchy as nihilistic in nature. On the contrary, I would argue that the concept of an anarchic society is impregnated with value and meaning. This kind of discussion is rather similar to that of a religious believer arguing that the atheist can derive no value or meaning from life- while it seems to me that the truth is rather inverted here. Once the mind is freed from the bridle of sterile religious thought, it is then that value and meaning can really flourish. Statism is equally sterile in moral terms, as it is fundamentally an ideology geared towards a singular goal, the enforcement of the ruling class value system, and its means merely “might makes right” dressed up in a pretty costume.

To illustrate this point, he says:

Although the incidences of all of these would decrease relative to other animals in a human anarchistic society due to an increased fear (and cost) of retaliation, they would still exist. So what the anarchist asserts is that a basal level of murder, coercion, and theft is somehow ok. The depredations against others in an anarchy represent the background noise that proponents clearly ignore as mere stochastic effect.

This is, once again, to say that people do not have values, and that they need values to be enforced by the state. Yet this is contradictory in three different ways. First, if people do not have values, then how can the ruling class have values to enforce? Second, why would the ruling class care at all to enforce values which would suit its population? And third, even if it wanted to, how could it?

To address the point, it is simply not true that “the anarchist asserts (…) that a basal level of murder, coercion, and theft is somehow ok”. I have met no real anarchist (by which I understand someone who actually wishes to eliminate all states, not simply replace them with syndicalist mini-states or communist utopias) who asserts such a thing, explicitly or implicitly. Let me state this clearly: a basal level of murder, coercion and theft is not okay. It is more conductive to my values to live in a society without any murder, coercion and theft, than it is to live in a society with any level of murder, coercion and theft. So I desire to live in such a society. This has nothing to do with rights per se, but rather with morality, two topics which are distinct but related.

I like the analogy of roads in this case. He thinks we have only two alternatives: a road system without any lights or signs (crime is permitted), or a road system where lights and signs are placed by divine fiat (state “protection”). Market anarchy says lights and signs are a private matter, and should be determined and coordinated by road owners, acting under consumer demand (market protection).

This single mistake nullifies any point Nikhil may have desired to make about anarchy and its relation to rights. An anarchy tends towards rights better than statist systems, not because the system is engineered to do so a priori, by divine fiat, but because humans are engineered to seek their self-interest. And we are self-interested in living in a prosperous and coercion-free society, giving us the incentive necessary to seek out what we see as an optimal balance between freedom and security, so to speak.

Nikhil then veers towards equality as a crucial concept:

But more importantly, the anarchist imputes too much to statement that ‘All men are created equal.’ (…) Should one strip away all of the material (environmental) differences, the genetic differences would still leave vasts gulfs between the most capable and the least. The anarchist’s basic argument of self order is dependent upon not only a level playing field but teams consisting of cloned players. (…) In such a system, where some are capable of greater acts of coercion than others, and where the threat of retaliation varies widely from almost none to almost infinite, a few will inevitably come to control the many.

(…)

The anarchist turns a blind eye to the difference between the perfect world of their assumptions and the real world. The classical liberal merely acknowledges them. He sees that for society to remain free from tyranny, individuals must treat each other as if they were equal.

He’s got it all wrong- it is the statists who believe that all men are the same. How else could it possibly be reasonable to enforce a singular value system on an entire population? Statism is inherently utopian (i.e. a system that goes against human nature) because everyone necessarily has a different value system, just as everyone has different natural hair colour, height or intelligence (although of course the value system is open to a lot more volitional decisions than any of those properties). As an anarchist, I would be foolish to turn a blind eye to that fact- it is one of my main arguments!

We must treat each other as if we were equals, because that is the only way to neutralize the potentially oppressive effects of natural and social inequality. Very good! But statism, which creates a ruling class with considerably more power than the rest of society, cannot possibly be the implementation of this principle, even in a minarchic way. Only some form of anarchy can implement it.

Anyway, framing the issue pretty well, he says that

On the issue of natural rights, I am not in good company. Most anarchists take quite a pragmatic stance, and deny that rights exist, or claim that rights contradict the absolute freedom of anarchy, or require a state in order to be effected (which is patent nonsense said by people who should know better). And minarchists claim that we need a state in order to protect such rights.

Anarcho-capitalism, market anarchy, whatever you want to call it is something I would love to believe in. You know how a lot of democrats with some level of brains say “I wish Marxism could work, even though it can’t”? That’s my basic position on the an-cap philosophy. I wish…

My political ideology is actually built upon a belief in the basic tenets of anarcho-capitalism. What I mean by this is that whereas socialism isn’t even a good idea in theory (despite leftists’ wistful daydreaming to the contrary), anarcho-capitalism is. It is from a basic belief in the self-ordering properties of all animal societies–especially human societies–that my minarchist position stems from. I have great faith in the ability of as simple a rule as self-interest to create complexity, order, and yes, stability. If there was one thing I could be said to worship, it would be just that. I’ve seen it with my own eyes in everything from petri dishes to Indian jungles to human society.

But the problem with anarcho-capitalism is that somewhere on the road leading from theory to practice, we find ourselves amidst a truckload of half-penny nails. Now, you could just go driving blindly through, ignoring the nails. Or you could take that exit right there and take the service road for a bit, being pissed off that you have to go 45 instead of 70 for a while. I am an anarchist with a practical streak.

So I wholeheartedly agree with his statement that

Anarchy implies a return to the natural state of man, which is, as history I think has well demonstrated, that of producer and trader, not of oppressor.

Anarchy Is Value Neutral
One of the problems with using economic/ecological language is that sometimes terms meant to be completely neutral come across as quite loaded. This apparently has fueled Mr. Tremblay’s assertion that I see anarchy as nihilistic. Far from it, as I said, I practically worship at the altar of natural self-order. But there’s a phrase used in evolutionary biology to describe natural selection: “Directionless and purposeless.” The economic mechanism most similar to natural selection would be what Adam Smith called The Invisible Hand. Like natural selection, the invisible hand is directionless and purposeless, moving at the whim of the finicky consumer, often without apparent reason. But ultimately working to promote order, just as natural selection is behing the complexity of a capuchin society.

This is what separates Darwinian evolution from the chain-of-being conception that preceded it. Humans aren’t ‘more advanced’ than amoebas. More complex, sure. But since in evolution there is no direction, one can’t be better than the other. Or to throw in a value-laden example, is the self-interested infanticidal male Howler monkey bad? While the self-interested Titi monkey who’s as devoted a father as you’ll find among mammals is good? Whether killing babies or doting upon them, these males are driven by the same motivation: Self interest drives both the ‘good’ and the ‘bad’. Anarchy isn’t nihilistic, per se. But their espousal of the market not only supports the maintenance and development of ‘good values’, it does so for ‘bad values’ as well, so long as they profit. As Francois says, the “concept of an anarchic society is impregnated with value and meaning.” I won’t disagree there, but I would argue against the assertion that the market somehow promotes good value and meaning over the bad. Self interest isn’t ‘good’, it just is.

Anarchy Is Only An Approximation
This next portion will go slightly out of the order it appeared in Francois’ post so that my thought process will be a bit more intelligible. He brings up a great point about ‘natural’ rights:

I must preface by saying that I see natural rights as a purely theoretical concept- everyone tries to fulfill his values, not a concept of rights. Nevertheless, rights give us a guideline by which we can evaluate how progressive a society is.

Darn tootin. I don’t see natural rights as particularly natural. Which is why I prefer to refer to them as ‘negative’ or ‘classical’ rights. I do, however, see their maintenance as necessary to the protection of the ‘free state’. Which is the crux of the argument. I say that it is imperative that we give up a minimum level of freedom to maintain a minarchist government, or we risk losing the rest of our liberty.

On the other hand, anarcho-capitalists believe that liberty is best defended through market mechanisms.

An anarchy tends towards rights better than statist systems, not because the system is engineered to do so a priori, by divine fiat, but because humans are engineered to seek their self-interest.

And indeed this is what I intimated–but failed to do so clearly–in Why Any Rights At All:

Although the incidences of all of these [trespasses against natural rights] would decrease relative to other animals in a human anarchistic society due to an increased fear (and cost) of retaliation, they would still exist.

Again, because of the language used (fear, cost, retaliation), I believe Francois takes that I’m implying this process of self order is a negative thing, when it is, in fact, just another way of saying what he did when he said:

So our value system is a natural counter-balance to the desire to not be subject to rules. There is a point of equilibrium which should be attained by this process. Where is it? Well, it is definitely lower than the exploitation of statism, and definitely higher than a total lack of organized order (which I think is what Nikhil thinks of when he says “anarchy”). Does it fit perfectly in the peg hole of natural rights? I doubt it, but I assume it must be pretty close.

By his own admission then, an anarcho-capitalistic society would continue to have crimes against liberty, their incidence would just be lower than they are in traditional statist systems. Which is what I meant when I said:

“Although the incidences of all of these would decrease relative to other animals in a human anarchistic society due to an increased fear (and cost) of retaliation, they would still exist. So what the anarchist asserts is that a basal level of murder, coercion, and theft is somehow ok. The depredations against others in an anarchy represent the background noise that proponents clearly ignore as mere stochastic effect.”

It is the latter part of that statement that he takes issue with when he says:

Let me state this clearly: a basal level of murder, coercion and theft is not okay. It is more conductive to my values to live in a society without any murder, coercion and theft, than it is to live in a society with any level of murder, coercion and theft.

Yet, again by his own admission, such things would continue to exist in an anarcho-capitalist system. Anarcho-capitalism can be looked upon as what’s known as a mixed stable system. The mathematics behind these are complex, but the outcome is simple to understand; those who value natural rights live alongside those who don’t. The latter cannot be completely eliminated by selective forces (in this case, market forces), since at some frequency there’s a payoff for ‘being bad’. So by ascribing to the an-cap system, you tacitly accept that the latter will continue to exist. You in essence treat them as a force of nature or act of god. So although he values a society without all the crimes he enumerated, he is unwilling to take the step to completely eliminate it.

Why Anarchy Won’t Last
The preceding was simply a snapshot in time of an an-cap society. Looking longitudinally, one could (and I do) assert that the market anarchist system is what’s known as an invadable strategy. In other words you might start out in anarchy, but you will end up totalitarian.

Remember that Francois and I both assert that the natural state of man is one of anarcho capitalism. Now, can you name a single hunter gatherer tribe where there is no ruling class of one kind or another? Can you name a social mammal group where one family doesn’t exert influence over another? Where one individual isn’t on the top of the heap? Neither can I.

Clearly this basic state doesn’t last. But why not?

Francois says that

We must treat each other as if we were equals, because that is the only way to neutralize the potentially oppressive effects of natural and social inequality. Very good! But statism, which creates a ruling class with considerably more power than the rest of society, cannot possibly be the implementation of this principle, even in a minarchic way. Only some form of anarchy can implement it.

What this ignores is biological or innate inequality. I alluded to this in ‘Men Like Me’. On a similar note, my friend Razib has discussed how meritocracy (very similar to the market in many ways) will result in genetic determinism. Even after you eliminate every social and material inequality, there will be the strong, there will be the weak. And an an-cap system (the basal system of all social animals) has no provisions to prevent the strong from turning it into a meritocracy, a plutocracy, a monarchy, or an oligarchy. Basically any kind of ‘archy’.

Which I hope better explains my statement that:

In such a system, where some are capable of greater acts of coercion than others, and where the threat of retaliation varies widely from almost none to almost infinite, a few will inevitably come to control the many.

Building A Lasting System
By declaring classical/negative rights an absolute, and modelling a society around that, we can create a system that isn’t perfectly uninvadable, but comes much closer than the an-cap system. Which is my essential position as a minarchist: building an uninvadable system around a market-anarchy-based ideology. If market anarchy were the platonic form, minarchy would be closest we could get to it here in this imperfect world.

Now how to build a minarchic system, this is where I’m going to get vague, and use the pitiful defense that you don’t want a young tyro like me to be the architect of your ideal government.

There is a huge problem in that, as Mr. Tremblay said:

On the other hand, what does statism offer us? Democratic states only grow- for that is what their incentive system dictates. A democratic state is ensured to deviate farther and farther from natural rights. Monarchies grow at a much slower pace, because of the private ownership of government inherent in the monarchic system, and the subsequent desire in the king to keep his rule from interfering in his citizens’ lives, in order to maximize his profit. Nevertheless, monarchies also offer us no tendancy towards natural rights.

It would seem that the best we could do is the proverbial benevolent dictatorship. What we really need though is something like what Garret Hardin (a pioneer in the under-explored field of the confluence between sociobiology and politics) would have called ‘mutally agreed-upon mutual coercion.’ We formally and consciously agree to draw a line in the sand and not violate others’ negative rights, rather than merely letting market forces get us merely close to that point.

Of course, any such system needs watchdogs. And watchdogs need power to be effective. And from there we get the conundrum that Francois posed. We can find hope in the fact that self-interest is not limited to things with monetary value. As I’ve said before, the role of self-interest in the quest for power and influence is all too often ignored. Obviously both are dangerous to liberty, but the latter could also be manipulated to its benefit. The key would be to found a government that gives no incentive to those seeking power and very little to those seeking greater influence. But sometimes the quest for influence can be a ‘good’ thing. There are those who would seek influence as defenders of liberty (the founding fathers), rather than manipulators of large masses of people (George Soros, any European politician, and many American ones as well).

We must create a government in which only those who don’t seek wealth, who don’t seek power, and who only seek influence as apostles of freedom would wish to serve in. Michael Z. Williamson offers tantalizing clues to such a system in his work Freehold. Where the government is extensively decentralized and a man must give up his wealth and his comfort to serve.

I have no hope that such a system would not eventually turn to totalitarianism. Humans are simply too complex for any system to adequately guard against the concentration of power. I do however believe that a well-constructed minarchist system can be constructed. One that surpasses the Constitution and the Articles. We know a lot more about human behavior and a lot more about modelling behavior than they did (although their intuitive understanding of such concepts boggles the mind).

Figure 1. Anarcho-capitalism is in blue and minarchy is in red. For illustrative purposes only

I also think that such a system would last much longer than an an-cap system. The bigger the an-cap society, the larger the pool of resources a man can bring to bear against the people. Just think of attempts at unifying more ‘civilized’ areas/peoples through empire-building compared with, for instance, attempts made by more ’savage’ people in tribal unifications (African, North American, Asian tribes).

Conclusion
The key to such a system is that it must, as I do, respect and admire the basic tenets of anarcho-capitalism, and as such support market endeavors where possible. It must only realize that like all things natural, market anarchy isn’t perfect. In the interest of keeping this from getting any longer, I’m going to cut off discussion here. If people would like, I could discuss ‘market failures’ especially ‘commons situations’ in more detail. Meanwhile, for a more concrete look at the basic roles of government I support, Anarchangel provides a great short and long look at it.

But the problem with anarcho-capitalism is that somewhere on the road leading from theory to practice, we find ourselves amidst a truckload of half-penny nails.

I also think that such a system would last much longer than an an-cap system.

He makes these statements but provides very little argumentation or evidence to support them. Until he provides a support for his dismissal of market anarchy as impractical, when it is in fact eminently practical and requires merely people dealing with each other as social equals and not as pawns of the ruling class, I must dismiss his position as an emotional cop-out.

He did provide one cliché argument, which I will get to in a moment.

First, he did catch me on one little issue. I mentioned that in a market anarchy, codes would not be perfectly coincidental with natural rights, when I did in fact claim that I wanted a society without coercion at all. So he says:

So although he values a society without all the crimes he enumerated, he is unwilling to take the step to completely eliminate it.

And here he falls completely into the statist mindset. Yes, I do want to take the steps to eliminate it. But those steps do not include forcing others at gunpoint to agree with me! That would be the exact opposite of what I want, which is non-coercion. Nikhil Rao may think that his proposed system is enlightened and should be the ultimate goal of society, but he has no right whatsoever to impose it on others.

And that is the ultimate difference between him and me. He wants to impose a singular value system by force, and I don’t- even if that value system happens to be superior in some respects.

Now to the argument he uses:

And an an-cap system (the basal system of all social animals) has no provisions to prevent the strong from turning it into a meritocracy, a plutocracy, a monarchy, or an oligarchy. Basically any kind of ‘archy’.

Ah, it’s our old “market anarchy is inherently unstable” cliché. I never get tired of seeing that one.

Actually, there is only one process regulating a market anarchy, and it is that process that “prevents the strong from turning it into” anything: it’s called consumer demand. I want to be free and I will not support anyone who tries to enslave me. If that means that I have to stop getting my services from the company with the best offer, then so be it- my freedom is more important than short-term financial gain. And anyone who did try to use violence to take over society would be met by retaliatory force, financed by all the people who agree with me that freedom is an important value (which are the vast majority).

The most eloquent proof of this, is that natural monopolies are virtually impossible, except when the state imposes one on society, or provides one itself.

As for his ideal system?

We formally and consciously agree to draw a line in the sand and not violate others’ negative rights, rather than merely letting market forces get us merely close to that point.

As he has rejected the market option, he obviously understands that some people are going to disagree with him. And if this is the case, one is led to the inevitable consequence that Nikhil supports some use of force to arrive to that goal. In short, he promotes coercion in order to promote the non-violation of individual rights. This is, I hope I don’t have to point out, highly contradictory.

By the way, Nikhil? They tried your idea before. It was called the United States of America.

It didn’t work.

Personally I saw plenty of argument in my last piece, but that’s just me. Anyway kiddies, it’s time for my infamous patented MSPaint work.

First up, behavioral modelling is a very old branch of mathematics and science. Started sometime in the mid 1800’s. The goal of modelling–whether in terms of economics, reproductive fitness, food acquisition, or energy expenditure–is to develop an equation or system of equations that, using a set of discrete variables can accurately predict an individual’s (or group’s) behavior:

At least in behavioral ecology, a decent model can predict a behavioral outcome anywhere from about 70-90% of the time, using only a small subset of all of the factors that go into an outcome. In the picture given, the square represents all possible variation in the factors that go into determining outcome, while the circle outlines the range of variation under which the model is accurate. Of the 120 variables that affect outcome, only 7 were used by the model to develop a relatively high predictive ability (the area of the circle divided by the area of the square).

Behavioral modelling of all types is subsumed under the field of behavioral ecology. Economics is merely a small subset of this field:

What I mean by this is that self-interest, the guiding principle of all behavior, is manifested in various forms. Economics concerns itself with only a portion of self-interested behavior, namely the exchange of goods and effort (whether through currency or barter). As I discussed in The Nature of Self Interest, a view of human behavior that considers solely economic self-interest is far too myopic. In the space of one issue of American Naturalist, Behavioral Ecology & Sociobiology, or hell, even American Journal of Primatology (a far less technical journal), you’ll see self-interest analyzed in several forms: maximization of reproductive fitness, minimization of predation risk, minimization of energy expenditure, and maximization of feeding efficiency, just to name a few. Although inter-related, each of these requires a different perspective and a different model incorporating different extrinsic and intrinsic factors.

Why did I go through that? To show the difference between model and reality, and to illustrate that just because a model works in one context, it may not work in another. Traditional economics–and thus the market–at the end of the day can only explain and predict a narrow range of human behavior; that which we give explicit monetary value to.

Mr. Tremblay sums up his position on why anarchy protects freedom through the market with the following:

Actually, there is only one process regulating a market anarchy, and it is that process that “prevents the strong from turning it into” anything: it’s called consumer demand. I want to be free and I will not support anyone who tries to enslave me. If that means that I have to stop getting my services from the company with the best offer, then so be it- my freedom is more important than short-term financial gain. And anyone who did try to use violence to take over society would be met by retaliatory force, financed by all the people who agree with me that freedom is an important value (which are the vast majority).

You see, economics relies on the placement of a market value on a given item. In this case, we’re concerned with classical rights. Anarcho-capitalists assert that consumer demand (and thus market value) for classical rights is high and will always be high. Now, what I value freedom at, what Mr. Tremblay does, indeed what most of the people who read this entry value it at, is indeed quite high. Somewhere between Thomas Jefferson’s assertion that he “would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it” and Patrick Henry’s declaration that he would rather death over loss of liberty.

But do people in general really believe that freedom is that important a value? The past 100 years would seem to indicate otherwise as we’ve seen the rise of the welfare state in every country around the world. I can count on my fingers the number of people I met during my year in London who actually held freedom in high regard. I initially met both of them through an American blog. Among my fellow students, I’m one of two libertarians that I know of. The rest are more or less evenly split between statists of either conservative or leftist flavor. I know that the political compass would claim otherwise, but if we are to be honest, liberty simply isn’t that important to most.

And this goes back to the very limited purview of economics. A greater understanding of the nature of self interest, not to mention a study of human behavior, would inevitably lead to the conclusion that what is most valued is comfort. Not wealth, not liberty, but comfort. In truth, who would choose the hard life of the wolf upon the tundra over that of the pampered labrador? Who would choose the freedom to fail over the security of ensured mediocrity? We may wax eloquent about freedom all we want, but the truth is that even the way our brains are wired biases us toward seeking comfort rather than a cold philosophical ideal.

Most of us are well acquainted with this famous gem:

A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of
government. It can only exist until the voters discover
that they can vote themselves largess from the public

treasury. A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of
government. It can only exist until the voters discover
that they can vote themselves largess from the public
treasury. From that time on the majority always votes
for the candidates promising the most benefits from the
public treasury, with the results that a democracy
always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed
by a dictatorship.–Alexander Fraser Tytler

And while he wasn’t speaking of market anarchy, the basic sentiment applies to the market as well (in which you ‘vote’ with your dollar). During the middle ages, men willingly chose the near-slavery of the serf over the free–but hard–life of the subsistence farmer. Why? Security. The vassal swore an oath of fealty and gave up his freehold that he might receive the protection of his feudal lord.

In fact, the history of middle ages Europe is a perfect example of the failure of the an-cap system. As more and more men chose safety and comfort over freedom, rulers’ power grew more and more in scope. Once upon a time ‘Kings’ were petty little things, ruling over small parcels of land of little consequence. But as time went on, kingdoms grew to the size of entire countries, and in time a Holy Roman Emperor would be crowned.

If men really valued freedom, then why did they willingly choose to create a monarchy of unprecedented size? If men really value freedom, then why at the ballot box does most of europe vote for more social welfare and more subjugation to the state. Why does half our country ascribe to leftist principles? Why does the UN remain in such high esteem despite their overtly and egregious statism?

Now, Francois does bring up the point that:

The most eloquent proof of [an-cap stability], is that natural monopolies are virtually impossible, except when the state imposes one on society, or provides one itself.

Which is a good point, but ultimately too superficial. No, natural monopolies don’t last for very long. But the basic power structures do. It’s a well known fact that the longer you’ve been an alpha male, the less likely you’ll remain so. Yet the basic system of a given alpha male monopolizing (or nearly monopolizing) mating opportunities continues. The same could be said of the breeding pairs in cooperative breeding systems. Monopolistic systems are remarkably stable, although the players at the top may change.

To invoke a little Orwell, the pigs will stand on two legs. And when they do, one will scarcely be able to tell the difference between pig and man. Personally I find little comfort in the fact that although I’ll remain oppressed my entire life, the identities of my oppressors will change.

So once again I argue that anarcho-capitalism is an invadable system. If every member of an an-cap society valued classical rights, then yes, such a system would work. Now show me such a population. And show me how they’d respond to the invasion by not only power-mongers, but those who value not liberty but comfort. Not so well. We saw that happen in the past 70 years as we failed to reign in our own government.

And in this day and age, most don’t even recognize what rights really are. Most can’t conceive of the individual as sovereign and the state just a tool. Most see government as inherently good. Some people want comfort. Others want power. Few want liberty. This combination can ill be resisted by such a system as the market.

Yes, I’m willing to compromise my ideals to build a state. Because, though inherently evil, the state represents our best chance of maximizing liberty. Apparently this is silly. I call it realistic. As I said in an earlier post:

Just as a surgeon must sometimes remove part of the body to save a life, we may sometimes be forced to advocate legislation where we’d rather none exist whatsoever. Beyond that, we must occasionally push for a direct curtailment of liberty in order to protect that which remains.

I stand by that statement, and I hope the past couple of posts will help you understand why.

Once again I have no objection, and neither do I intend to object, to his scientific work. What I mainly object to, is his butchering of market anarchist theory. He especially fails to grasp that the simple problems he raises can easily be turned against his belief in the state with more effect. In my previous entry, I explained why consumer demand stands against the possibility of the disintegration of an anarchic system. He replies that not enough people value freedom to make this true:

But do people in general really believe that freedom is that important a value? The past 100 years would seem to indicate otherwise as we’ve seen the rise of the welfare state in every country around the world. I can count on my fingers the number of people I met during my year in London who actually held freedom in high regard.

Here once again he falls into another statist trap: this time, of associating the behaviour of human beings under a state, with that of human beings in general. Of course people cheer the rise of the welfare state. They assume that the state is a permanent fixture, and thus seek to utilize as much of its power as possible to perpetuate their values against those of other people. Social warfare, after all, is the state of any society in a democratic system. And people mistakenly assume that the welfare state is good for their own security. Given this, their behaviour is not surprising at all.

People do value comfort- the comfort to live as they desire, and not have to answer to anyone else. That is the main drive of social warfare in a democracy, and the main drive of peace in an anarchy. There is nothing comfortable in warfare of any kind, or at least, I would like to know one person who thinks war is a comfortable state. Surely not! So how can people in an anarchy value the kind of war that Nikhil is predicting?

The question becomes, rather, how Nikhil expects his ideal state to make self-interest concurrent with natural rights- a point which he has not addressed at all. Market anarchy has been proven to work, again and again. Statism has never worked, and cannot possibly work due to the incentive system inherent to a monopoly of power. How can people not desire to exploit a monopoly of power, is the impossible issue that Nikhil must address.

When I was a minarchist, I racked my brain for years trying to find an answer. I shouldn’t have bothered, when the answer was already right in front of me. Perhaps Nikhil will come to that same conclusion one day.

Even more absurdly, he asks:

In fact, the history of middle ages Europe is a perfect example of the failure of the an-cap system. As more and more men chose safety and comfort over freedom, rulers’ power grew more and more in scope. Once upon a time ‘Kings’ were petty little things, ruling over small parcels of land of little consequence. But as time went on, kingdoms grew to the size of entire countries, and in time a Holy Roman Emperor would be crowned.

Is Nikhil seriously contending that Middle Ages Europe was a market anarchy? If so, I would like to see his proof.

We do know that some isolated regions of Europe were anarchies- such as Iceland and Ireland- and they were more peaceful and respectful of rights than their monarchic equivalents. I’m afraid that Nikhil’s argument blows up in his face on this one.

Nikhil says that my statement that natural monopolies do not occur is too superficial, and that the basic power structure always remains. What basic power structure? The desire to dominate? Sure. The desire to dominate is always there. But unless it can be given expression, it must be sublimated. If Nikhil can show me how a monopoly can arise in a market anarchy, he can talk about the problems of monopolizing systems. Otherwise, he should return his objection against the monopoly that he himself proposes to establish by the force of arms- his ideal minarchy.

His final point:

So once again I argue that anarcho-capitalism is an invadable system. If every member of an an-cap society valued classical rights, then yes, such a system would work. Now show me such a population. And show me how they’d respond to the invasion by not only power-mongers, but those who value not liberty but comfort.

Is not much better. I never stated that anarchy requires for all its members to value natural rights to “work” (insofar as “working” in an anarchy means that everyone is free to live the way they want). An anarchy can exist where 99% of people do not desire to be free, and they are free to assemble themselves in hierarchies as much as they want- but as long as some people do desire to be free, those people will be able to assemble and live their freedom relatively fully.

Given this fact, there is no point in invoking hypothetical “invasions”. There is no such thing as an “invasion”, for there is nothing to “invade”. There is no “country” or “state” to take over. Another group of people who want to assemble together in a hierarchy is merely that- another group of people who want to live their lives differently. Can Nikhil tell us what is being invaded?

Would a society where 99% of people reject rights be free? Not really. But a minarchy in that same society would make people even less free. So once again his point should be returned to himself.

I especially like how he ends by repeating an outright call to violence:

Beyond that, we must occasionally push for a direct curtailment of liberty in order to protect that which remains.

Nikhil keeps making veiled threats of coercion against anyone who disagrees with his ideal system. Unlike Nikhil, I have no wish to force those people to live the way I want. I am not a violent or utopian person. I simply wish for all to be free to live the way they want.

What I respect most about Mr. Tremblay is his philosophical consistency and his ability to get other liberty-loving folks to sit up and think. What I do not like about his belief system–market anarchy–is that the entire philosophy seems a bit like a teenager who’s watched A Beautiful Mind or read Freakonomics and now can’t stop raving about the amazing predictive ability of economics, yet hasn’t put much thought into the basic assumptions made by either market anarchy or economics or the limitations of both.

Market anarchy obviously is built upon economic models. Some of the assumptions that an economic model makes are perfect rationality (yeah, right), perfect information (people know EVERYTHING about what’s going on…), and that market value and real value are commensurate (I’m not even going to bother). When these conditions (and others) are satisfied, the model shows excellent fidelity. When these conditions aren’t satisfied, we see various levels of crappiness.

Furthermore, market anarchy takes the one inviolate assumption of all behavioral modelling, that individuals are self-interested, and then proceeds to make strange claims about how that self interest manifests itself. Not to mention making judgments on what we actually value.

Market anarchists hold that what people will always value life, liberty, and property at a high level. While there is good evidence for the first, and the third could be argued, the notion that liberty is highly valued is laughable.

From hormonal systems all the way through highest-order brain functioning, we are literally wired to seek comfort and security. Comfort and liberty are often, but not always, mutually exclusive entities. Furthermore, contrary to how many of us feel, most people would gladly trade their liberty for comfort. Hence my example of the serf. Liberty is an abstract. An abstract that in and of itself guarantees little or nothing in material wealth. Why should I pay a guy 10,000 dollars to keep other people from killing and stealing my property if he’ll let me starve to death? Surely I’d choose the guy who charges 15,000, performs the above services, but throws in a minimum level of food and shelter into the bargain? So what if he tells me I can’t do certain things (like not wear a seatbelt or leave the house past certain times) in order to be true to my contract? At least I won’t starve.

Mr. Tremblay tries to divert attention by saying that somehow people wouldn’t behave that way when free. Which explains why as I said there is no human society without a monopolizing power structure of some kind or another. He tries again by missing my point about monopolist systems. The structures themselves are remarkably stable. It’s merely the players that change rapidly.

Which brings us to another important facet of self interest: The quest for power. The man charging 15,000 is not merely after wealth but after power as well. He will manipulate the self interest of others, particularly their comfort-seeking, in order to gain power. At first, of course, it might be limited to material wealth. But it will turn itself to control of those under him. Such as restrictions on their behavior, etc. And if this man comes to control a sizeable portion of the total wealth in the population (which he will, given our innate tendencies), little could be done to stop him becoming a tyrant. Mr. Tremblay makes the quaint assertion that:

An anarchy can exist where 99% of people do not desire to be free, and they are free to assemble themselves in hierarchies as much as they want- but as long as some people do desire to be free, those people will be able to assemble and live their freedom relatively fully.

Because ambition has never led a man to want to control others. Oh sure, I guess the 1% could amass their fortunes and attempt to rise up. That’ll of course end well. Like the Alamo or Thermopylae.

Given this fact, there is no point in invoking hypothetical “invasions”. There is no such thing as an “invasion”, for there is nothing to “invade”. There is no “country” or “state” to take over. Another group of people who want to assemble together in a hierarchy is merely that- another group of people who want to live their lives differently. Can Nikhil tell us what is being invaded?

Well, I thought I was being clear about what invadable meant. Invasion is a term used in game theoretics to denote what happens when new players enter (or old players start to play differently) who play by different rules than the old players. Invasion occurs when the old system doesn’t work under this onslaught. Such as when, far from valuing liberty, people would actively yield it. And pay to do so. In this case, the invaders are power-mongers and comfort-seekers, as opposed to the utopian extant population who place a high monetary value on liberty.

Would a society where 99% of people reject rights be free? Not really. But a minarchy in that same society would make people even less free. So once again his point should be returned to himself.

I’ve never said that a minarchist society would be perfectly free. I’ve merely asserted that it would keep people the most free. Now, if you mean to tell me that a society organized along the lines of the intent of say the articles or the constitution (albeit with fewer federal AND state’s rights but more individual rights) would be less free than a society that’s 99% communist russia and 1% anarchist utopia?

Interesting proposition to say the least.

Nikhil keeps making veiled threats of coercion against anyone who disagrees with his ideal system. Unlike Nikhil, I have no wish to force those people to live the way I want. I am not a violent or utopian person. I simply wish for all to be free to live the way they want.

Apparently, this principle is very hard to understand.

I think I’ve done a good job of demonstrating that people won’t be free to live as they want. The majority will willingly choose the comfortable cage. And the ambitious men who guide them into those cages, taking money as they do so, will hardly constrain their ambition to just those many. Armed with the majority of societal wealth, it would be hard to stop such juggernauts from coming down like an armored fist upon those who really did value freedom.

So what we end up with is the market anarchist saying that ‘well at least I let people put themselves in a totalitarian goverment.’ Which seems to be the jist of it as he admits that people won’t necessarily choose liberty. So it doesn’t protect natural rights, by his own admission. But it is a convenient moral and philosophical high ground. Which I’ll concede. He’s more internally consistent, while I’m a violently coercive and oxymoronic statist claiming to defend liberty by chaining people to government. But at least I make sense in the real world.

By supporting ‘market anarchy’ you support a quick return to totalitarianism. Market anarchy is too far removed from the real world, takes too few factors into account, and makes some rather strange and un-thought-out views about human nature. In a lot of ways, they remind me of Marx. Starting out on the right track before veering off into the clouds with daydreams about what they want people to be rather than what we really are. But that’s probably just an assertion too.

1. That a market anarchy would inevitably collapse into a state.
2. That a market anarchy requires a perfect population to work.

I have soundly refuted both arguments in my previous post, and yet he’s still presenting them as if they completely refute my position. He is just not listening.

To repeat again in condensed form:

1. A market anarchy cannot collapse into a state, because a state is a monopoly of force, and natural monopolies are impossible without state intervention. Nikhil has failed to explain how such a monopoly could arise, as well as why he thinks that people’s self-interest would override the natural tendancy towards peace in a market anarchy (due to the fact that people must pay for their own wars, instead of imposing the costs on a captive population).

A state, of course, is already “collapsed”, and therefore if Nikhil considers this collapsed state evil, he must call his own system evil as well.

2. Unlike statism, a market anarchy does not require a perfect population, or even good people. It merely requires the existence of market processes- which is pretty simple- and willingness to trade. Even if 99% of a population lived in a collectivist commune, this should not prevent the rests of us from asserting our legitimacy and assembling together in ways that are more conductive to natural rights.

Nikhil abhors this scenario because he wishes to impose his desired value system by the force of arms. Even if he is a minarchist, he is still a statist, and he is still a person who desires constant violence and social warfare. This lack of morality is what led me to leave the fantasy of minarchism and understand that market anarchy is the only moral system. It is based on the simple premise that everyone has different value systems, and that trying to impose a singular value system on everyone is immoral, lunatic, and not conductive to freedom in the long run.

Good luck Nikhil. I hope you rethink your moral orientation in the future, and look more closely at your own arguments, because all the arguments you use indict you.