Mechanics of Freedom. Chapters 38-40 and postscript to the first edition.

Chapter 38, The Economics of Theft, or the Absence of a Ruling Class, provides an economic analysis of the theft industry, showing that competition in this sphere leads to the impoverishment of society, and that this industry is essentially unprofitable even for the thieves themselves. A similar system of arguments shows that the state, as a variety of theft, is unprofitable even for top politicians, as their costs turn out to be higher than the profits. Of course, this argument seems paradoxical, since it is easy to oppose it with many counterexamples; however, the main conclusion of the chapter does not relate to the denial of the possibilities of individual profit through the state, but to the indication that no single class interest can be seen behind the actions of the state.

Chapter 39, The Right Side of the Public Goods Trap, tells of a very interesting paradox related to the fact that public goods are always underproduced relative to the demand for them, due to difficulties with their monetization. Under a state, such a public good turns out to be good laws that make life simple, convenient, and unburdened, as opposed to bad ones that distribute costs among all while bringing profit to a few. However, under anarchy, it is exactly the opposite: since laws are, in a sense, purchased on the market, good laws turn out to be a private good and are produced until demand is fully satisfied, while bad laws turn out to be a public evil: few are willing to spend on their production for their own profit, and everyone will be able to sabotage their implementation, and cheaply at that. Thus, if it is possible to transition somehow from the state to an anarcho-capitalist order, it will prove quite stable against attempts to bring back the state.

In Chapter 40, How to Get from Here to There, Friedman tells me that I am doing well and correctly understand the strategy of building ancap, and suggests that Mikhail Svetov tone down his zeal in building a vertical of power in the libertarian party and focus on personal educational projects. Thank you, David!

In the Postscript for Perfectionists, Friedman explains which subjects he did not touch upon in the book and why.

This concludes the first edition of The Machinery of Freedom. Subsequent parts were written for the second and third editions of the book.

How to build mutual aid in terms of justice and fairness under anarcho-capitalism?

Vladimir

Thanks to the influence of Mikhail Svetov, many perceive ancap as a stateless society for the most morose individualists—and contrast it with the bright world of contractual jurisdictions, territorial and extraterritorial, where people gather into communities, agreeing to live by common rules, and where the most sacred right of every member of such a community is the right to leave it.

But for a human being, it is actually quite uncomfortable to completely enclose oneself within the framework of a narrow community, perceiving the world beyond the fence as a habitat for cynocephali. Rarely does any community in the world outlive its founder. Even the ideologues of left-wing anarchism, who generally adhered to collectivist values, such as Kropotkin, noted that a bleak existence in a closed collective on the sidelines of life is absolutely not what the vast majority needs.

Therefore, for a person wishing to live in a just society, the most important thing is the ability to build it without falling into self-isolation. Does one have such opportunities under ancap? Let’s figure it out.

Only the most hardline communists or theocrats are willing to expect that humanity will entirely adhere to identical notions of justice; therefore, we can start from the premise that under ancap, these notions will vary among different people.

So, you have certain notions of justice, and you would like the arbitrator to adhere to them specifically in the event that you encounter conflicts, even if the other party to the conflict holds different views. To me, the most workable David Friedman model seems to be the one that assumes competition and natural selection between law enforcement agencies, between arbitration agencies, and between legal systems. Thus, the client only needs to ensure one small thing: that the law enforcement agency they approached for a specific conflict uses the services of a court that operates within a specific legal system that meets the client’s notions of justice.

What do you need for this? To conduct effective propaganda of the principles you follow. The more popular your ideas are, the easier it will be to insist that the court rely on them. In turn, in a free market, ideas will be most widespread in those areas of activity where their application is most convenient and provides the maximum economic gain. So, the less your ideas are detached from reality, the easier it will be for you to promote them.

Finally, if there are not many supporters of your notions of justice, you may prefer not to bother with a court, but to attract like-minded people for mutual aid. In doing so, you will earn a reputation as a community that stands firmly by its own. This has advantages: people will be afraid to touch you without a significant advantage in strength. But there are also disadvantages: people will be afraid to enter into contracts with you. Do you need such a reputation? Decide for yourself. There is no state under ancap that would treat everyone with a one-size-fits-all approach and make things equally inconvenient for everyone.

A small, cohesive community with its own notions of justice

Announcing new translations

I am still far from finishing the editing of Friedman’s translation, yet two more long-term projects have appeared in the Translations section of the website. I haven’t read either book yet and will do so only during the editing process of the translations; that is when I will form my own opinion about them.

  1. Stéphane Molinier, Practical Anarchy. The translation was initiated by the Anti-state channel, while I simply took the initiative and suggested using the workflow already tested on Friedman for the translation.
  1. Eric Mack, Libertarianism. The book itself was recommended for reading by Mikhail Pozharsky. No free access to the English text was found, so I had to buy it on Amazon and then pirate it almost as in the era of paper books: take screenshots of the screen and perform OCR on the images. Therefore, the English text cannot boast good formatting; we will polish the translation itself.

To speed up the work on the translations, your donations to the wallet 1AFkD2bazCs5YZBBrSD7HsRMWLmRbg6QBo will be a great help

Ancap vs. Coronavirus

I was asked to comment on the Dobroum project video about coronavirus. Here is a summary of the content:

Coronavirus highlighted the downsides of the state reaction to epidemics. The first reaction: classify information as secret, suppress leaks. But once the information leaks, clearly excessive measures begin. Officials act strictly according to instructions from above, and the closer the attention to the problem, the fewer people are willing to take responsibility for decisions. Instead of a sensible quarantine, a “security theater” occurs, while maintaining the appearance that everything is under control.

The second part briefly shows how the market solves such issues. Let me reflect on this topic as well.

There is a non-state society that did not emerge yesterday; the transition processes have already died down, and the main institutions associated with ancap are in place. That is, there is decentralized law, a free market, and a developed industry for rights enforcement and insurance. And in this society, an epidemic arises.

Where did it come from? Let’s assume the worst: as with coronavirus, it is either someone’s leaked development or a surge of the local biosphere—all exacerbated by high population density and a relatively low average standard of living by ancap standards.

It doesn’t matter whether the first sick person was insured or not. When they collapse on the street, they will get to a hospital quickly enough. Something unusual happened, and something unusual in a free market is always a signal for entrepreneurs. To interpret the signal correctly, it must be processed. Where is the best place to figure out exactly what happened? In a hospital. Therefore, the sick person will be delivered there.

If they were insured, the insurance company will pay a tip to whoever brought the helpless client to the place of care. The sooner treatment begins, the cheaper it is on average. This means there is an economic incentive to reward the delivery for treatment, regardless of who provides it.

If they were not insured, then again, it is important for all insurance companies to know whether this is an epidemic or a single isolated incident, like food poisoning. After all, if an epidemic is contained quickly, it results in giant savings on insurance payouts; thus, every company has an incentive to pay—whether collectively or independently—for the hospital delivery of anyone who potentially poses an infection risk. And then, of course, to pay for the examination.

Once information about the virus is obtained, it certainly won’t be hushed up, because all stakeholders are driven by the desire to minimize their losses. Therefore, it would likely be possible to organize a compact and sufficiently effective quarantine at a fairly early stage, and the epidemic would fail to develop.

But fine, let’s assume the incubation period is quite long, and the virus is easily transmitted during this period; thus, by the end of the incubation period, there are already many infected, and containing the epidemic failed. Can insurance companies build a hospital in ten days, like the Chinese authorities? Unlikely. It is far more likely that they would rent entire hotels for their clients: one for quarantine, one as a hospital. Sequencing the virus and finding a vaccine formula would be at least as fast as in our reality, because modern private high-tech laboratories handle this no worse than the state. Setting up production and supply would be even faster, as there would be fewer approvals.

Regarding the possibilities of organizing a quarantine under ancap, I have already answered in relation to epizootics. In our case, similar mechanisms would operate.

As a result, I believe that in the worst-case scenario, an epidemic under ancap would affect roughly the same number of people as under a state, but the market would likely slump less, because in the absence of a state, there would be no one to crush it out of panic with sudden regulations. And in any case, it is hard to imagine that humanity, in the absence of “benevolent” state intervention, would find itself helpless against some epidemic.

Here he is, the beauty, in ancap colors

How can a right of ownership (or any other absolute right) arise ONLY from voluntary contracts?

Either I will have to enter into a contract with every person on earth, or there will be some kind of external coercion, wouldn’t there?

katta

On February 13th, on the channel Anarchy Debates, we were discussing property rights with an-coms, so right now, while I’m on a roll, I’ll be happy to elaborate further on this topic.

A right is a claim that is tolerated.

Let’s consider the emergence of a certain right from scratch. There is a group, one of whose members puts forward a claim. For example, “I am taking this chair because I sat on it first.” If the others tolerate this claim, the next person can take any free chair, and from the repetition of similar claims, a legal tradition for this specific group is formed: the right of use belongs to the first claimant.

Suppose someone challenged this right and stated, for example: move over here, I want to sit next to Masha. Regular requests of this kind can supplement the legal tradition with a rule: by mutual consent, usage rights can be exchanged.

Finally, someone may present a claim in the following form: get off, or you’ll get beaten. If such claims are regularly satisfied, congratulations, the right of the strongest has appeared in this group.

The more someone’s claim makes you want to challenge it, the more unjust you consider it to be. But whether you will actually challenge it depends on several other factors. First, your self-interest: how great your costs are from the fact that an unjust claim is implemented. Second, your self-confidence: how high you estimate your chances of forcing the claimant to abandon the claim. Third, your stubbornness: how much cost you are willing to endure for the sake of challenging someone else’s unjust claim.

Thus, first, a right is not absolute: everyone has their own opinion about who possesses which rights. Second, explicit consent of all interested parties, i.e., the conclusion of a contract with them, is not necessary to establish a right. Their non-opposition is sufficient. A legal tradition of a society is formed from the repeated experience of declaring rights and the reaction to these declarations. The fact that a contract with the previous holder of these rights is the most weighty argument for asserting someone’s rights is a widespread legal tradition. The reason for the wide distribution of this specific tradition is that very many believe such a mechanism for asserting rights to be fair.

Nevertheless, you may well encounter a situation where a property right you acquired by contract, which was recognized in one society, will not be recognized in another. For example, you will encounter the fact that hashish, honestly purchased by you in one place, in another place is not only not considered your property, but is also a reason for you to be deprived of your right to freedom of movement. And if you believe that such collisions are impossible under ancap, I am forced to disappoint you. They are possible, although they are unlikely to be so glaring.

What do you mean—I have no right? But I bought this hashish honestly!

Translation of The Mechanics of Freedom. Chapters 35-37

Yesterday David Friedman turned 75. Unfortunately, I didn’t have enough time to prepare the entire translation for the anniversary, so I am publishing the next three chapters.

Chapter 35. When Prediction Amounts to Speculation. Here, Friedman admits to us that he described only one of many options for an anarcho-capitalist society—the agoric one, which is equally alien to both communes and corporations, but tends toward self-employment and small agencies of freelancers (cute!). At the same time, it turned out that the word agorism was coined not by Konkin, but by Robert LeFevre, about whom I, unfortunately, know nothing.

Chapter 36. Why Exactly Anarchy? In this chapter, Friedman has to explain why the idea of a limited state is so unsatisfactory to him, and why he so stubbornly defends the idea of anarchy specifically. Unfortunately, the author answers: we have already tried the limited state; it doesn’t fit into any boundaries and stubbornly moves to sit right on your face.

Chapter 37. Revolution is the Worst Choice. Here, Friedman polemicizes not so much with ancaps as with classical anarchists who are convinced that the state can only be abolished through revolutionary means. The argumentation is not brilliant in its originality, but it is clear enough.

From Dictatorship to Democracy. Overview.

Commissioned by the Tea Club

Gene Sharp’s essay “From Dictatorship to Democracy” could just as easily have been titled “From the State to Ancap” or “From Bad to Good.” In fact, it is simply a collection of reflections on how to change a political regime if you dislike it, feel morally justified, and assume public support for your position.

The central idea of the book is that the most reliable strategy for this is political disobedience, also known as nonviolent resistance. A consistent denial of the state’s legitimacy can indeed make it illegitimate as this denial becomes increasingly stylish, fashionable, and youthful.

The weak point of the approach proposed by Sharp is that everything must begin with strategic planning, and then the resistance develops its activities strictly according to the plan, centrally deciding which of the 198 methods to choose for today and which for tomorrow. Thus, the best tactic for a dictator is to sow discord within the opposition, letting them fight among themselves to determine under whose banners they should unite in the war against the bloody regime.

Decentralized resistance, according to Sharp, is far less effective, and this is bad news for ancaps wishing to act through political methods.

On the other hand, Sharp explicitly points out that one should not just fight a dictatorship, but already at the stage of resistance plant the seeds of a new society that will already be legitimate by the time the regime falls, and this fall will merely provide them with legality. Thus, if the ultimate goal of the resistance is to adopt the construction of a stateless society with decentralized law and a free, unregulated market, then the idea of building the resistance on these very same principles seems damn logical; Sharp simply did not consider such a goal: his political fantasies did not extend beyond the Swiss cantons.

The least useful part of the book turns out to be the most famous—namely, the appendix listing the notorious 198 methods of nonviolent resistance. The book was written in 1993; in 27 years, the toolkit has changed significantly, and those methods that are still relevant are already more or less well-known. So, I can understand Leonid Volkov, the chief of staff of the Russian resistance, stating that the book is weak, but I do not accept his reproaches that it is harmful. It is definitely worth reading. As for using it in practice—do so with great caution. Especially since, since the book was written, dictatorships have increasingly mutated into electoral autocracies, and the set of methods for abolishing them will be very different.

Among the book’s strengths is its modest size; if one wishes, the essay can be finished in one evening.

In Praise of Moderation

On February 1, the Tea Club held a conference with the elegant title “Keep to the Right” in Moscow. Among others, speaking was Mikhail Pozharsky, whom I have quoted many times, who used simple examples from the First World War to explain why you don’t need to fight the left to defeat them.

Today, the state handed down huge sentences in a flimsy case regarding the preparation of terrorist attacks, the so-called “Network” case. But this case was preceded by a real terrorist attack by anarchist Mikhail Zlobitsky, after which security services employees smirked with joy, having received new powers, budgets, and quotas for fabricating extremists. History has known cases where liberal reforms were rolled back or bloody wars were unleashed as a result of terrorist attacks, but I cannot recall a single instance where a terrorist attack prompted the state to loosen its grip on society. At best, the state limits itself to increased security measures for top officials, as happens in the USA, with its traditions of shooting presidents.

The other day, a second round of debates on anarchy took place between a team of ancaps and a team of left-wing anarchists. This was preceded by a long period of personal negotiations and attempts to find common ground; now, they managed to organize a civilized conversation in a public forum. And this is bearing fruit—for example, this review in an anarcho-channel. Each side is discovering the other, searching for conciliatory language, avoiding escalation during the debates themselves—and realizing that the main common enemy is not the left or the right, but the state.

Perhaps, over time, it will be possible to sway the brave left-wing anarchists away from revolutionary rhetoric toward something more moderate, so they stop their meaningless self-sacrifice for the benefit of provocateurs from the security services.

Indeed, I myself have significantly reduced the degree of approval for purely military tactics in my articles. I was quite rightly reprimanded during the discussion of my article on the doctrine of deterrence for the example of eliminating the King of Thailand. Truly, the will of one person does not decide so much that one can expect to solve a problem by eliminating that person or creating a deadly threat to them. It is far more useful if the idea of an attack by state representatives is viewed as ethically unacceptable, and this is achieved through the softening of manners.

So, let us continue our activity of education and persuasion, continue peaceful protest and the creation of a mass feeling of the state’s uselessness—and under no circumstances let us give it a reason to claim its necessity for the sake of fighting various dangerous extremists. The slogan that extremism in the defense of justice is not a vice is false.

As for those innocently imprisoned, they must, of course, be fought for against the state. This means taking to the streets, public appeals from celebrities, and other boring but effective political practices.

P.S. I was immediately written to saying that I confused cause and effect, and that Zlobitsky’s bombing happened precisely as a reaction to the “Network” case. Please forgive the blurred take; however, in such a scenario, the situation only becomes even more tragic.

Translation of Mechanics of Freedom. Chapters 31-33.

I am publishing a few more chapters of The Machinery of Freedom by David Friedman

Chapter 31. Is Anarcho-Capitalism Libertarian? In this chapter, Friedman raises the question in a phrasing that is quite unusual for many. We have grown accustomed to believing that anarcho-capitalism is the most radical and consistent form of libertarianism, but for Friedman, it is not quite so. For him, libertarianism is based on self-ownership and the non-aggression principle, while anarcho-capitalism is based on the decentralization of law and the free market. Therefore, he requires additional argumentation to show that an anarcho-capitalist society is indeed libertarian.

Chapter 32. And, as a free bonus. This is a short chapter where the electoral process is compared to the market process, in favor of the latter, of course.

Chapter 33. Socialism, Limited Government, Anarchy, and Bikinis. Here, Friedman wittily explains that socialism is like the desire to force all girls to wear only bikinis, because the weather, under threat of execution, must be sunny.

To what extent does the GPL license align with libertarian ethics, and how would things actually stand with open source under ancap?

анонимный вопрос

The GNU GPL (general public license) is an interesting example of how, within the framework of modern state copyright laws, it is difficult to permit the acquirer of an information product to do anything with it. Forbidding is a piece of cake, and then you can take that prohibition to court, and the state will help you with the enforcement of that prohibition. In fact, most prohibitions are built into the legislation by default.

The GPL reserves the right for the author to be called the author, while obliging the acquirer to disclose the source code of any products made based on code distributed under the GPL license, and to further distribute them under the same license—the so-called copyleft system. Otherwise, the acquirer of a product under the GPL license has completely free rein: they can resell the product, modify the code, sell the modified version under their own name, and so on.

How is the situation with code distributed under this license likely to change under ancap? Currently, the creator of the code has the right to insist through legal proceedings that an acquirer of their product who has modified the code must further distribute the resulting product under the same license. Under ancap, they would be able to demand compliance with the license in the same way, but they would no longer have any tools of pressure other than reputational ones. I do not think this will significantly affect established practices, as the values of GNU are quite compatible with libertarian ones, and reputational pressure is usually a sufficiently serious argument for IT companies.

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