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Historical an-caps?

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im_retarded Posted: Fri, Feb 4 2011 12:57 AM

Any historical figures that are "anarcho"-Capitalists, and their works? I read "Our Enemy, the State" by Nock, but was disappointed to find out the guy seemed to support a minarchist government.

-Some people will bring up that even private defense sectors in a free market stateless society could be seen as "miniature" governments, but I'd like to avoid the semantics issue here.

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Gustave de Molinari is recognized as the first anarcho-capitalist; that is to say, a laissez-faire economist who believed security and law could be provided through free enterprise. I think most other anarchists you find before the latter-half of the 20th century had issues with interest, rent, etc., largely due to belief in a labor theory of value. Still, I think a charitable reader, considerate of context, can find a whole lot agreeable in the writing of Benjamin Tucker, Lysander Spooner, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon and others. Same for William Godwin, who is considered the first person to advocate anarchism of any kind. (of course, if we're to believe Edmund Burke was serious with his Vindication, then Burke deserves the honor)

Molinari's The Production of Security is still one of the best arguments for a competitive system of law and order.

"People kill each other for prophetic certainties, hardly for falsifiable hypotheses." - Peter Berger
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