I mean, the USSR "worked". Disputes were resolved. It was just a might makes right system of resolving disputes, and the state was the one with the might. It's the same in the US now. It's a might makes right, and the US government and its provinces and districts are the ones with the might. Do you consider that this system works? Does the Cuban system work?
You could say that this system of the law was inefficient of did not maximize conflict resolution or violence avoidance, because it created more violence while getting rid of some of it.
I use example of the fact that there was a serial killer in Berlin in 1940s. And SS were busy looking for him. So, while some members of SS were busy gasing Jews, Communists and Gypsies, others were doing real police work. That's not a good justification for SS's existence.
Here is precisely the question my friend asked: "What do you guys [i.e., the libertarians] mean when you say that government meddling with the markets is immoral? I understand how it's bad from utilitarian point of view, but how can you say it's immoral?"
OK, so let me ask it this way then: what is wrong from non-economic point of view with all these systems? Why shouldn't it be might makes right? How would you explain this to a statist who believes in a "benign tyranny" of the state? Again, from moral/ethical/legal/social/etc. point of view, not economic one.
Well, what about the NAP? I mean, if someone fundamentally believes it's okay to aggress against others and institute a double standard in society, then there really isn't much you can do. I think the best way to go about it is to talk about the Golden Rule. It's about as close to the NAP as something can get, and most people seem to agree with it, they just don't realize the implications.
From a legal standpoint, might makes right is just a double standard. Different sets of rules for different people. I'd say most people recognize that it's immoral when it's another country, such as Nazi Germany or Cuba, but when the same stuff happens in their own, such as dropping a nuclear bomb on 2 different cities or putting Japanese Americans in internment camps for being Japanese, well it's for the greater good. But it's the kind of legal double standard that leads to a Nazi Germany. America is getting worse, though most people don't see it.
Like I said, it depends on what people fundamentally believe. Try the Golden Rule on someone. Maybe it will work.
Well, then I guess that's the way to put it. Joint ownership is really just another way of saying "centralized law". We all know the problems with centralization, so I think that's a good way of putting it.
Part of that is a moral argument. If might makes right, then gassing the Jews is no big deal. It's only when you actually care about the Golden Rule one way or another that it makes a difference.
Well, libertarians don't believe in might makes right. Libertarians believe in the NAP (though there is disagreement to its exact application to each scenario). Government meddling necessarily breaks the NAP. That is why it is immoral.
I have a question about this specific quote from Kinsella's article:
The libertarian seeks property assignment rules because he values or accepts various grundnorms such as justice, peace, prosperity, cooperation, conflict-avoidance, and civilization.
I notice that prosperity is one of the grundnorms he mentions. Does this mean that economic argument must be a part of the discussion about legality of a particular behavior? Or, in other words, does this mean that increasing prosperity is part of the law's function and purpose?
For instance, Kinsella himself claimed that we cannot even start arguing that IP laws increase prosperity, because that's inconsequential: the purpose of the law is justice, not increase of prosperity.
But based on the quote above, it's both. So, when I am arguing with a pro-IPer (or a socialist), I necessarily have to use both economic argument and "conflict resolution" argument (that IP laws increase the conflict where there was none before).
If we imagine for a second the unlikely scenario that an economist could prove that IP laws increase prosperity in a particular situation, in that case, we would have to figure out what we value more: the prosperity or the minimization of conflict.
If you disagree with Kinsella (or my interpretation of him) that increasing prosperity is one of the purposes of the law, then what is the argument that increasing justice and decreasing conflict is the only purpose of the law?
FlyingAxe: If you disagree with Kinsella (or my interpretation of him) that increasing prosperity is one of the purposes of the law, then what is the argument that increasing justice and decreasing conflict is the only purpose of the law?
I don't know why Kinsella used the word "prosperity" in there. Maybe it's part of the original use of grundnorm, maybe it isn't. But the only purpose of law is to resolve conflicts nonviolently, anything else that occurs is extra, whether it is good or bad.
That's what I thought. If you were explaining it to someone who asked: "Who says? Maybe the purpose of the law is mixed: to increase prosperity, to increase justice, etc. Or even just to increase prosperity alone", how would you argue?
(If the answer was in the links above, I apologize. I didn't get to them all yet.)
I've been meaning to post in this thread - sorry I got to it so late!
FlyingAxe:1. In the exchange with Bryan Caplan on fractional-reserve banking, Walter Block argued quite strongly that under libertarian rights, there is no such thing as joint ownership. My question is: a) does everyone in the libertarian community agree with him? b) why does that make sense?
No, not everyone in the libertarian community agrees with Block, because I know of at least one person who doesn't: myself.
I see no reason why two or more people couldn't be considered to jointly own something. Joint ownership has a long legal history as well. What joint ownership requires is a process for the multiple owners to decide how to use the property. One could call this process a "government", but it would only concern the jointly owned property in question.
FlyingAxe:But why can't two people be full owners? If ownership = ability to deny others use of the property, then both are in a position of a denier.
Correct. "Private ownership" to me is a pleonastic phrase, as I consider the word "ownership" to imply exclusion. That is, all ownership is exclusive. Whether a single individual or multiple individuals own something, anyone outside of the set of owners is excluded.
FlyingAxe:It seems like the wife should be able to deny the husband to make any alterations to the car that she doesn't agree with. For instance, if the wife is an anarchist, and the husband is a minarchist, she should be able to veto his adding a "Ron Paul 2012" bumper sticker to the car. If the husband did that without her permission, arguing that "it was his turn to own a car", that would be very strange.
I'd say his argument would only be valid if the established governing procedure involved the two of them taking turns. But that would also mean that the wife would be within her rights to remove the bumper sticker when it came to be her turn. Furthermore, I think a reasonable default governing procedure would require unanimous consent - i.e. any joint owner would by default have the right to veto a proposal by any other joint owner concerning the property.
FlyingAxe:Also, what about parenthood? Isn't that a case of joint ownership (or parental rights)? What about a corporation?
In the case of parenthood, I'd say there'd be joint guardianship rights. I also see no reason why other people could be added to the joint guardianship (friends, relatives, etc.). A corporation, strictly speaking, is also a form of joint ownership, although it's based on unequal shares.
FlyingAxe:2. Specific question: If we assume that joint ownership (in some form) is ok, then imagine the following scenario: A group of people leaves main civilization and settles on an uninhabited island (or creates a colony on a different planet). They create a corporation called New Earth. Each member owns the piece of property he homesteaded and his own stuff (e.g., clothes, tools, etc.), but the corporation, of which each settler is a member, owns some land: e.g., the land between the houses (the "road"), the wall that encircles the settlement, etc. The members decide how to create a governing board for the corporation: maybe they will elect a CEO whose position will be passed down to his children, or maybe they will elect a board whose membership will change every few years. Would there be a problem with such a setup from natural rights point of view?
If we assume that joint ownership (in some form) is ok, then imagine the following scenario:
A group of people leaves main civilization and settles on an uninhabited island (or creates a colony on a different planet). They create a corporation called New Earth. Each member owns the piece of property he homesteaded and his own stuff (e.g., clothes, tools, etc.), but the corporation, of which each settler is a member, owns some land: e.g., the land between the houses (the "road"), the wall that encircles the settlement, etc. The members decide how to create a governing board for the corporation: maybe they will elect a CEO whose position will be passed down to his children, or maybe they will elect a board whose membership will change every few years.
Would there be a problem with such a setup from natural rights point of view?
I see no problem with this whatsoever, as long as the corporation abides by the self-ownership and non-aggression principles.
FlyingAxe:Next, imagine the same scenario, but in this case, the members decided that the corporation owns everything: including the people themselves (i.e., they sold themselves to slavery to the corporation), their clothes, their houses, etc. I.e., all member cast all their possessions in a common pot. Then the corporation votes that for economic reasons, it makes sense to re-institute the idea of private property. In the sense that everyone still gets "rights" (granted by the corporation) for everything he owned before the "casting in the common pot" event, and people may not steal from each other, etc. So, this colony behaves in a way identical to the first colony, with one exception: when the whole corporation (or its CEO or the governing board) decides that, for instance, all houses in the colony must be painted blue, then all the members must comply, since they don't really own the houses. If the corporation decides that a house must be destroyed to build a granary, the owner of the house must comply, since the corporation owns the house. Again: would such a situation be problematic from natural rights point of view?
Then the corporation votes that for economic reasons, it makes sense to re-institute the idea of private property. In the sense that everyone still gets "rights" (granted by the corporation) for everything he owned before the "casting in the common pot" event, and people may not steal from each other, etc.
So, this colony behaves in a way identical to the first colony, with one exception: when the whole corporation (or its CEO or the governing board) decides that, for instance, all houses in the colony must be painted blue, then all the members must comply, since they don't really own the houses. If the corporation decides that a house must be destroyed to build a granary, the owner of the house must comply, since the corporation owns the house.
Again: would such a situation be problematic from natural rights point of view?
Under this situation, private property is not really re-instituted. A semblance of it has been instituted, whereby the corporation allows individuals exclusive use of things until... it says otherwise, really. Strictly speaking, I don't consider that to be problematic from a natural-rights point of view, as long as it was done with the consent of all the individuals involved. What I do have a problem with is the notion that the people themselves are now jointly owned by everyone. Obviously that violates the self-ownership principle. Furthermore, as it's impossible to alienate one's will, whether it's legitimate to do so is a moot question.
FlyingAxe:A friend of mine claims that the second scenario is what a society is. The whole society owns all the land and everything on it, but for utilitarian/economic reasons, a particular society may agree to people having "rights", but such rights are not natural rights, they are rights granted by the society to individuals to avoid the tragedy of the commons, the calculation problem, etc., etc. But, if the society decides to exercise eminent domain over someone's "property", it may. Besides the problem from historic point of view (i.e., we have to point to a moment at which the "casting into the pot" event happened for a particular community, where every single member agreed to the casting of his own property), I was wondering if there is a problem with such a set up in principle from natural rights morality.
Besides the problem from historic point of view (i.e., we have to point to a moment at which the "casting into the pot" event happened for a particular community, where every single member agreed to the casting of his own property), I was wondering if there is a problem with such a set up in principle from natural rights morality.
There certainly is - as I said above, if people are not considered to (fully) own themselves, then that's a violation of the self-ownership principle. Furthermore, the agreement in question only exists for a specific group of people. It would be illegitimate IMO for any children they might have to be "born into" that agreement, as that would preempt their consent.
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@Autolykos
If you read what Block said closely, you would see that Block said no such thing. His point was that there cannot be more than one FULL owner. That is, there can only be one person with the final say. Block specifically said that there could be PART owners of things, just not more than one FULL owner, logically.
You're right. I stand corrected. Thanks for pointing that out.
It seems to me that joint ownership can't be full ownership in the sense of one person having final say. But the joint owners, collectively, do have final say. What do you think?
FlyingAxe: That's what I thought. If you were explaining it to someone who asked: "Who says? Maybe the purpose of the law is mixed: to increase prosperity, to increase justice, etc. Or even just to increase prosperity alone", how would you argue?
They are mistaken about the purpose of law. Is the purpose of physics as a science mixed: to increase knowledge of the physical world arround us, to bring us spacecraft, to bring us faster airplanes, etc? The purpose of physics as a science is purely to better understand the physical world. Anything else is extra, whether good or bad.
It's the same with law. The purpose of law is to resolve conflicts nonviolently. In some communities, law may also bring further prosperity and justice. But in other communities, law may do just the opposite. Would you consider the purpose of law in North Korea to be about icreasing justice or prosperity? Or is it more about the Powers That Be in North Korea taking what they want?
When I say the purpose of law is to resolve conflicts nonviolently, I mean that it is the only thing held constant across all types of law. There is no other aspect of law that applies to all systems of law or even all the current laws in existence (or that could ever exist). To say that the law is about promoting justice and prosperity is to say what the law ought to be, not what the law is. Having an opinion of what the law ought to be is fine, but don't confuse it with what law actually is.
I agree. I also think that the joint owners should sort out beforehand how they are going to resolve disputes about their own property should a dispute arise. It would be foolish of them to become joint owners of something without sorting out the problems before they arise. Of course, it is impossible to foresee all possible disputes, but they could agree to some sort of system that would help resolve most, if not all. Otherwise, the disputes will be left to the law, whatever it may be.