In Anarchy...

Byzantine:

Thus, if you assert a right to host an orgy on your front yard, you will have to pay for protection from people who don't think you have such a right, either by buying them off or hiring a PDA with more guns than them.

I have the right to use my property in any way I see fit as long as I don't aggress against others -- that's what a free society entails. If my neighbors don't like my orgies they can try to sabotage them using voluntary means but as soon as they use violent means they become criminals.

Byzantine:

Recall that virtually all the ruling monarchies were overthrown by democratic majorities.

Monarchies were overthrown by their own breathtaking stupidity and corruption.

Nitroadict:

I hardly see how either one of them must be exclusively correct, given the examples of both in our state (i.e. both "The citizens are not to blame for Slavery being perpetuated" & "The citizens are to blame for not realizing Slavery is being perpetuated").

That's a little different.

I've come to realize that I hold a different view on consent.  I haven't tested it completely yet.

 

liberty student:

Brainpolice:

That claim is nonsense, and if true, legitimizes all states under libertarian reasoning (it's voluntary - RIGHT?).

I don't believe it is nonsense, and I don't think your conclusion is correct.

Byzantine is saying, if I understand him correctly, that the masses haven't revolted, and in fact, keep voting.  It's not that it voluntary, it's majority.  If people wanted anarchism in the majority, we would probably have it.  The notion of the slavemaster on top by force or command, is a fallacy.  The slavemaster is on top, because people do not recognize that they are slaves.  They call him President or Prime Minister or King or Director or such.  But he is there because at one point recently, even today, people want him there.

 

A few practical points against political democracy, if I may:

1. Modern so-called "democracy" isn't usually purely majoritarianian, given that it most often reduces to numerical majorities for chunky districts or states and more than half the population doesn't usually vote to begin with, and the electoral college can nullify the popular vote.

2. Even given such numerical majority numbers, the choices are pre-selected for us in what is most often a two or three party system. We go through a primary process in which the choices are whittled down to two main contenders.

3. Even given the existance of political parties, the political parties, to the extent that they are in power, ultimately still represent different segments of the same oligarchy, with a degree of interconnectivity and interdependance.

4. The decision-making power is not direct, it is entirely transfered to an individual or a bureaucracy, who then goes on to have arbitrary decision-making power over everyone in the society or territorial dominion.

5. The institutional incentives of the state are self-perpetuating and there is no way for the politician or bureaucrat to efficiently allocate resources for the purpose of meeting people's demands even if they wanted to.

6. Everyone who is subject to the political system is effected and must bear the risks and costs necessary to maintain the state apparatus, regaurdless of their degree of largely illusory input into the system.

I think it's important to keep in mind that democracy ultimately reduces to the illusion of control or representation, and the fact that the state relies partially on civil obedience and ideology does not mean that it isn't a fundamentally parasitic institution.

Byzantine:

Not everyone shares your view of what you have a right to do and whether or not they are criminals.

No kidding.

So you either must come up with the money to pay these people to put up with your front yard orgies, or have a bigger, badder PDA than they have.

But that doesn't follow. PDAs in a free society will by definition 'enforce' individual rights. This bigger-badder-PDA-thing sounds like private warfare to me, not private enforcement of individual rights.

Of course, the more likely outcome is the people who don't mind front yard orgies will have their community, and the people who won't tolerate front yard orgies will have theirs.

Probably so. Still a front yard orgy is not a crime but trying to stop it using force is.

If this scenario worries you in that you may find there's no market for protection of your front yard orgies,

Again you believe that rights exist only if there's a 'market' for protecting them. Funny you whine about democracy because your views seem to be based on what majorities want or not.

nazgulnarsil:

in anarchy what stops everything from being exactly the same as it is now?  powerful factions gain control of ever larger pieces of land until everyone is living under one of them.  under anarchy the collectivists eventually win.

Has someone directly answered your question?  I didn't see it, although there have certainly been indirect answers.

You're thinking that anarchy is some sort of free-for-all, and thus, whoever gains the most power wins.  But the most important point of market anarchy or anarcho-capitalism is a rejection of coercive authority.  If we manage to achieve an anarchistic system in the first place, it will be because a significant number of people, if not a majority of people will recognize this and thus reject coercion as a legitimate means to social and economic goals.

In such an anarchy, then, no state will be considered legitimate, and no power grabs will be considered legitimate--people would forcibly reject such power grabs in exchange for voluntary market processes and third party mediation and arbitration.  They would set up non-coercive systems of rights protection and justice. 

Realistically, some people will still try anyway, but without a legitimate power base, i.e. a government, to work with, the costs of taking and maintaining power cannot be socialized onto a large financial base (i.e. taxes), thus making it difficult and expensive to to build and maintain a power base from scratch in a society that doesn't recognize it as legitimate.  Add in the normal problems that those who have power are always subject to the threat of others who also want that power, the likelihood of an increasing concentration of power in anarchy approaches nil, and is much more likely to be temporary, unstable, and dissipate instead of getting stronger.