Economics Questions

Re: Is Slavery Always Bad?

Anenome — Sun, 29 Jul 2012 17:59:22 GMT

pairunoyd:

How do you make sense of someone like Thomas Jefferson? He may not have believed in anarchism but he definitely espoused liberty. How can a man on one hand be so reasonable and so ready to promote and I assume fight for liberty but in his own home have slaves? He was obviously a genius and I assume he could at least have a modest amount of objectivity when reading his love letters to liberty and seeing his ownership of other humans.

Slave ownership was not entirely Jefferson's fault. There are extenuating circumstances, and I'll lay them out and you decide.

A. The most important factor were the anti-manumission laws in place. Jefferson couldn't free his slaves even had he wanted to, for there were laws where he lived which prevented the manumission of a slave unless the community at large allows it. Which they virtually never did. It's an odd law, and I'd never heard of it myself. Believe the source was "Black Rednecks and White Liberals" by Thomas Sowell. So, believe it or not, there were people whom were slave-owners to no fault of their own.

B. Jefferson inherited slaves, whom were dependent economically on him.

pairunoyd:
And what about this libertarian slave owner vs an anti-slavery staist such as Nancy Pelosi? How is it she's not even in the same libertarian league as Jefferson but he owned slaves and she's anti-slavery? I assume the answer is that Nancy Pelosi is going to embrace whatever the popular anti-libertarian stance of the day is and it just so happens that slavery is politically untenable.

Jefferson was an anti-slavery slave owner.

Pelosi is a non-slave owning totalitarian.

Big difference. Jefferson may have been unwillingly a slave-owner, but Pelosi would make slaves of entire countries.

pairunoyd:
I can't argue it. It's nascent and just a passing speculation, but I keep thinking that slavery must always exist and that it'll either be chattel slavery of the few or a watered down enslavement of the many. Wouldn't you be willing to say that a more statist society is less likely to have chattel slavery than a less statist society?

Not at all. Slavery is a product of poverty, meaning the wealthy man doesn't allow himself to become a slave, because he can fight off attempts to overpower him via hired security and the like.

Since a free society is likely to be far more productive and thereby wealthy, I'd say it's the statist society that tends towards slavery. After all, look at the soviet takeovers, there's no more total slavery than that, like the USSR.

Re: Is Slavery Always Bad?

pairunoyd — Sun, 29 Jul 2012 13:01:19 GMT

How do you make sense of someone like Thomas Jefferson? He may not have believed in anarchism but he definitely espoused liberty. How can a man on one hand be so reasonable and so ready to promote and I assume fight for liberty but in his own home have slaves? He was obviously a genius and I assume he could at least have a modest amount of objectivity when reading his love letters to liberty and seeing his ownership of other humans.

And what about this libertarian slave owner vs an anti-slavery staist such as Nancy Pelosi? How is it she's not even in the same libertarian league as Jefferson but he owned slaves and she's anti-slavery? I assume the answer is that Nancy Pelosi is going to embrace whatever the popular anti-libertarian stance of the day is and it just so happens that slavery is politically untenable.

I can't argue it. It's nascent and just a passing speculation, but I keep thinking that slavery must always exist and that it'll either be chattel slavery of the few or a watered down enslavement of the many. Wouldn't you be willing to say that a more statist society is less likely to have chattel slavery than a less statist society?

Re: Is Slavery Always Bad?

Anenome — Sun, 29 Jul 2012 03:42:06 GMT

pairunoyd:

Would the days of kings and their realms be considered states?

Sure. According to Hoppe they'd be classified as privately owned states, meaning the government and realm was literally owned and inherited by one family, the king's family.

pairunoyd:
When theres existed slavery, who has tended to free them?

The movement against slavery took place in the West under the influence mainly of British protestants, such as the Puritans, whom detested slavery. The American cultural movement against slavery predated the founding of the US. Look at the history of slavery abolition for more info.

pairunoyd:
I know that the american slaves were freed by the federal government and thru much centralization of power. Or am I wrong? And this enslavement existed before the founding of the united states.

Essentially slavery was accepted throughout the modern world until the West, particularly the British through the British empire, decided to end the practice and stamp it out around the world. Yet another of the few positive effects of that period of colonialism.

pairunoyd:
Anyone know of a good source for the evolution of slavery in north, central and south america?

How about Black Rednecks and White Liberals by Thomas Sowell. That'll get you a history at least of much of NA slavery and touches of SA.

Re: Is Slavery Always Bad?

JB — Sun, 29 Jul 2012 01:30:15 GMT

Couldn't get past your assertion that, "Over time, the people they work for in essence become their owners. And they inherit their families." Becoming accustomed in no way constiutues ownership of one over someone else or their families.

Re: Is Slavery Always Bad?

Aristophanes — Sat, 28 Jul 2012 23:48:15 GMT

This whole thread could have been summed up with

voluntary slavery = indentured servitude.

Re: Is Slavery Always Bad?

Ancap66 — Sat, 28 Jul 2012 23:44:18 GMT

Slavery cannot be harmonized with private property because individuals are unable to relinquish control over their mental and physical faculties to another human being. Moreover, the nature of contracts is such that either party can cancel it at their leisure, a situation which cannot prevail in this case due to the hegemonic nature of enslavement.

That's not how indentured servitude worked. If someone's living standards are so poor that they are willing to sell themselves into indentured servitude, then at least they have the opportunity to do so.

Re: Is Slavery Always Bad?

pairunoyd — Sat, 28 Jul 2012 19:30:57 GMT

Would the days of kings and their realms be considered states? When theres existed slavery, who has tended to free them? I know that the american slaves were freed by the federal government and thru much centralization of power. Or am I wrong? And this enslavement existed before the founding of the united states.

Anyone know of a good source for the evolution of slavery in north, central and south america?

Re: Is Slavery Always Bad?

Marko — Sat, 28 Jul 2012 17:42:19 GMT

What exactly does it mean for people to be "morally inferior" and how would that have to mean they would be poor?

More importantly how exactly does one go from working for someone to being their slave and owned by them? Magic?

When you say your example presumes we have anarcho-capitalism, do we also have magic?

Re: Is Slavery Always Bad?

Neodoxy — Sat, 28 Jul 2012 17:21:17 GMT

From a natural rights perspective it is always bad. From a consequentialist perspective then within your scenario it can sometimes be good.

Re: Is Slavery Always Bad?

Rcder — Sat, 28 Jul 2012 17:10:18 GMT

Re: Is Slavery Always Bad?

Anenome — Sat, 28 Jul 2012 16:49:36 GMT

In Democracy the God that Failed, Hoppe talks about the process of decivilization caused by democracy and a strong statist government generally.

So, I reject your premise and find much of the rest objectionable generally. In a free society, I doubt you'd have a group of people that continually tended towards poverty and moral corruption--that is decivilization.

Is Slavery Always Bad?

pairunoyd — Sat, 28 Jul 2012 16:35:54 GMT

Let's say that we have anarcho-capitalism. In this society there exists large groups of people that are readily indentifiable based upon certain physical characteristics. Let's say they're of a particular race. These people, just like most everyone else, have a standard of living based upon what they've actually contributed, along with what their families and community have contributed. Let's say these people are morally inferior and tend to engage in behaviors that lead to abject poverty. As many of them go to the brink of starvation they seek out more productive peoples so that they might work for them. Over time, the people they work for in essence become their owners. And they inherit their families.

Peoples nearby or even people within the enslaving community take pity on these enslaved souls. So they start a campaign to free them. At first it's just agitation. Then it becomes planning. Let's say that they eventually raise enough money to pay for their freedom. After a short while, these once enslaved people again are at the brink of starvation and once again come to others for employment. Over time this evolves into slavery. But the slaves remember that they were once freed, so why not again?

Let's say this cycle repeats until there's very little sympathy for the enslaved and very few freedoms are bought or taken back. The only way I can see this enslavement being eradicated is if these enslaved people are somehow given a minimal amount of power at all times, so that they can never again reach the powerlessness of enslavement,. And this power would have to be political. If they're consistently going into dire poverty because of their poor habits and ending up enslaved as a result, the only way to keep them from this fate would be to give them power beyond economic. Remember, this assumes that the market and the charitable have tired of rescuing them with the use of their own resources.

This political power would eventually be utilized by those sympathetic to their cause and by those that are simply politically ambitious. I can't see how these perpetually enslaved can have freedom without their enslaving those more productive. In essence, the perpetually enslaved would have to become enslavers.

If a peoples are persistently unproductive and this unproductivity is transformed into productivity by those we would describe as masters or enslavers, and their rescuers eventually refuse to utilize their wealth to free them, how can these peoples ever be perpetually free lest they be politically empowered? How can they ever be free unless they take freedom from other?

Who is going to perpetually take pity on someone that's own actions tend to put them into their predicaments? I can see if an area of typically good peoples is pillaged and the captive are enslaved and there is an outcry to free them, but would there be much rallying for people that are basically worthless and persistently become enslaved? And if someone's morals are so offended by the thought that someone is being enslaved, then shouldn't it be up to them to free them rather than them take the freedoms and wealth of others to do so?

Can a morally inferior group of people be perpetually free without giving them political power or the power to effect change with a vote?