A question about the interaction between the ECU and people outside the ECU

Detailed question from Zanudny (not backed by any donations, but it’s always better to give a bore what they want without dragging it out too much)

In the event of abandoning the territorial principle, how will relations between two sovereign entities not linked by any ECU/FPCU, etc., be regulated?

Let’s imagine a statistically realistic situation under conditions of competition among sovereign jurisdictions for territory. Those that establish mandatory laws for citizens (but not for all people in general, including stateless persons, as existing states do for the “human and citizen”). Since they are contractual, not all residents will enter into the proposed agreements. If sovereign jurisdictions are extraterritorial, then opportunists cannot be driven away. Who can convict them and under what laws, if they do not create their own LJ? What will protect citizens from the arbitrariness of “stateless persons,” including violence, if they are not separated territorially and there are no zones of responsibility? What will protect the opportunists themselves from violence by individual “citizens”?

Please note, I am not considering non-recognition or conflict between jurisdictions here. If there are no common rules of the game and no higher authority, looking at history, this seems inevitable. Nor is this a question about the dictate of a local majority, although in the absence of claims to territory, claims to benefits will remain (otherwise there would be no private property). This will not necessarily trigger the “market,” because even entering into trade relations is a contract, and we are talking about sovereign jurisdictions that may autarkize for the sake of security or create a monopoly. The question is: what will guarantee the freedoms of those who would simply like to leave (or even stay) in a given territory without recognizing the legal system of their neighbors, in the event of a conflict, if they have no “protection” behind them?

Answer from Ancap-chan

The questions are getting longer. On one hand, this shows that people are absorbing the previous material. On the other—posts are stopping fitting into the Telegram channel format. Oh well, to hell with the format, I’m used to it.

So, in a certain territory, there are several contractual jurisdictions, as well as a number of individuals who couldn’t care less about all these jurisdictions and do not want to join any of them. This is quite logical, because what is a jurisdiction for? To resolve conflicts with other people using some kind of mediator. But the vast majority of conflicts are perfectly settled without any mediator! How many of you have had to sue someone even once in your life? At the same time, people constantly find themselves in the zone of influence of someone else’s rules. If these rules are known to them in advance and they agree with them, the rules are usually obeyed. If the rules are unknown in advance, people behave as they are used to, and then they are told that there is a different order here, and they adjust their behavior accordingly. If the rules are known and people disagree with them, they try to bypass the rules, sabotage them directly, or obey them but with visible reluctance.

As I have already written, panarchy is an unstable transitional state from territorial monopoly jurisdictions to pure ancap. You are touching upon the problem of how people for whom ancap has already arrived should behave toward those who still have panarchy in their heads. And that’s exactly how they should behave: according to ancap. As long as everything is settled amicably, live as good neighbors. When it stops being settled, organize a movement in your support, with or without the participation of hired professionals.

The most important thing for the unstable situation of panarchy to shift toward ancap, rather than toward the good old territorial monopolists, is the absence of demand for uniform rules, a single order, or a higher decision-making body. On one side of the scale, we have the maximization of convenience—everyone wants rules to be adapted to their ideas of what is right. On the other side will be the desire to save mental effort. It is easier to remember uniform rules than to keep different options in mind.

Thus, the simpler the set of regulations, the more likely it is to become nearly universal. The more complex it is, the greater the chance it will remain purely niche. In a simplified explanation, all libertarian theory boils down to one or two principles. Indeed, based on the bare principles of self-ownership and non-aggression, one can interact superficially with almost anyone, but for various highly specialized legal issues, more substantial codes, longer than a single page, will be required. Fortunately, they will not be needed by everyone and not very often.

*So let’s drink to the right scale continuing to outweigh!*

Discussion on Panarchy and Libertarianism

A detailed question from Vasily, to which a donation of 0.00008257 btc was kindly attached for urgency.

I do not believe that panarchy is libertarianism

Yes, a panarchist structure of power will most likely be freer than a centralized one. But the ideas of panarchy resemble a tool for state or social organization more. There is nothing in them about traditional libertarian self-ownership, and nothing is clear even regarding the freedom to exit a jurisdiction. Most academic articles acknowledge the need for an additional jurisdiction that ensures the legal capacity of people and their freedom from the oppression of panarchist jurisdictions. Panarchism as a tool could well be used by a quasi-statist regime: transforming the power of oligarchs into actual serfdom jurisdictions where corporate slaves have no right to exit. This results in the classic cyberpunk scenario that sci-fi writers warned about. For real freedom, we still need classic libertarian works: the concept of self-ownership, the NAP, and their political implementation, whether it be ancap or minarchism. And only then, if people need FOCJs, the market will decide. In short, there is no guarantee that panarchy leads to libertarianism, and I see no libertarian value in the idea of FOCJs itself.

Proof from your own translation of FOCJ:

One condition is fundamental for the correct functioning of FOCJs: the guarantee of political and economic competition. This means the openness and freedom of markets, specified in the “four freedoms”—the free movement of people, goods, services, and capital—all of which must be protected. At the same time, the political markets of FOCJs must be competitive, meaning that human rights and basic democratic rights must be guaranteed. This includes the right of people to use direct democracy as a tool.
Like states, FOCJs will by nature strive to undermine any competition, following their commercial interests by attempting to build cartels or monopolies. This requires the existence of a “competition oversight board” responsible for ensuring compliance with the rules. This body will also regulate the limits of fees for entry contributions and exit penalties.

In other words, this article explicitly acknowledges that what they call “jurisdictions” must exist within a single legal regime. What the authors call “jurisdictions” looks less like jurisdictions in a political-legal sense and more like providers of certain services; their jurisdictional nature lies only in the fact that they obtain the right to “collect taxes.” A libertarian minimal state does not solve the problems the authors propose handing over to FOCJs, but rather the problems that allow FOCJs to exist and function.

Restricting trade is locally beneficial, which is why historically, people who gained power over a jurisdiction began introducing various fees, penalties, fines, and so on. One could say this was only possible because there was no exit from jurisdictions (and there wasn’t). The thing is, every jurisdiction will be interested in restricting exit, which is exactly what is discussed in the area of the FOCJ article excerpt I quoted above. That is why the authors themselves introduce some minarchist or ancap—it doesn’t matter which—body that stands above and before the FOCJ. And this is exactly what libertarians propose to implement. As for the FOCJs—let the free market decide.

Answer from Ancap-chan

You correctly noted the main shortcomings of the idea of functional overlapping competing jurisdictions proposed by Eichenberger and Frey: it is a certain optimization of existing government functionality without eliminating the key flaws of the state and without guarantees that a management system reformed in this way will not revert over time to a level of oppression as high as it is now. The internal protection against abuse in the FOCJ system is not much higher than in modern states.

The advantage of the FOCJ system is not that it offers the best solution, but that it offers a solution implementable within the specific framework of the European Union. In conditions where, due to flaws inherent in this political Frankenstein, one of the largest European economies is already separating from it, a political force that raises FOCJs on its banners has some chance of success. Moreover, FOCJs can be implemented locally first, and only then can the experience be extended to wider territories.

FOCJ is not panarchy. “Competing,” although it starts with the same letter as “contractual,” is not necessarily contractual, meaning there is no talk of voluntary entry into one jurisdiction or another. As a control mechanism, the authors propose good old representative democracy, which forms the corresponding bodies, as well as direct democracy, allowing local decisions to be made at the level of a particular FOCJ. I have written about the flaws of democracy, so I will not repeat myself.

You suggest the option: “first pure ancap, and then let the market decide if FOCJs are needed.” This brings us closer to Nozick’s speculations: let’s imagine we have pure ancap, and now I will demonstrate to you how it will over time transform into an ultra-minimal state without contradicting libertarian principles. Similarly, based on certain assumptions about human nature and what is just, one could probably derive that pure ancap will inevitably mutate over time into panarchy, i.e., a system of FOCJs.

Either way, for such reasoning to become relevant, one must first achieve pure ancap. Meanwhile, both minarchism and panarchy are ways of reducing state oppression that may or may not lead to pure ancap, and putting the cart before the horse here makes sense only as a thought experiment to determine how stable pure ancap is.

The remaining question is whether the FOCJ system can turn into panarchy over time, and whether that would then turn into ancap. If yes, then it makes sense to support it. If not, then it is a dead end, and FOCJ is as much an obstacle for a true ancap as a regular big state.

Here, as with any forecasts, I step onto the shaky ground of conjecture. My conjecture is that it is easier to bring sparkling cleanliness where it isn’t already heavily soiled, than where the initial cleaning requires bringing the waters of Alpheus and Peneus to the Augean stables. Switzerland, Singapore, North Korea, and Somalia are all far from ancap. For pure ancap to appear there, one must, first, abolish the state, and, second, ensure non-state institutions for the protection of private property. Of course, in Somalia it is easier to abolish the state, and in Switzerland it is easier to ensure the protection of private property, so choosing which of these countries is easier to establish ancap in may prove difficult. But comparing North Korea and Singapore, it is quite obvious that building ancap is easier in Singapore: the state is slightly weaker there, and property is much better protected. Likewise, it is sufficiently obvious that building ancap is easier in a Europe built on the basis of FOCJs than in the current European Union.

So I would wish the esteemed authors of the article on FOCJs a swift adoption of their ideas by European politicians. Even if FOCJ is not libertarianism, with FOCJ, libertarianism has a better chance.

*Let Reiner and Bruno dig the canal, and we will come through with the broom afterward.*

An outside look at Russia and the protests

I won’t venture to judge the details of another round of protests in Russia that took place yesterday, but I am glad that it has increased in size, and it seems to me that either people have learned how to avoid detention, or the Moscow authorities are no longer daring to be so fierce. Either way, there are fewer detainees than a week ago, and no particularly mass cruelty is visible in the photos.

In Georgia, everyone I talk to, upon learning that I am from Russia, immediately asks what is happening in Moscow, from which it can be concluded that in the information space, the protest has long since overcome local boundaries. Moreover, this cannot be attributed to biased coverage of the situation by Georgian media: I was asked questions by tourists from Turkey, Romania, and the Netherlands. I should also note that I am not at some political conference here—all around are carefree vacationers; one would think they wouldn’t care.

Naturally, the sympathy of the global public is on the side of the protesters. However, it is equally on the side of the protesters in Hong Kong, the yellow vests, the Venezuelan opposition, and so on. When volunteers are on one side and salaried employees are on the other, people sympathize with the volunteers. Even regarding the events in Kyrgyzstan, where it seems to be a matter of “the toad and the viper,” the mere fact that people are ready to voluntarily stand up for the former president and fight for him against the authorities already tells people that the government probably shouldn’t have started this whole assault.

I am also constantly assured that I have nothing to fear, that the attitude toward Russians here is still just as friendly. To be honest, this sometimes looks like a mantra for self-convincing. Evidence to the contrary also turns up. I won’t say much, I’ll just provide a few photos.

*Ruining good drawings because of the author’s Russian language*

*But there are also statements that any Russian patriot would sign*

How does panarchy differ from ancap?

Alexander

I don’t need to answer at length here, because the “Antistate” channel did it for me in a post titled “Why Panarchy is Ancap”. In general, this is the reason why I, being an ancap, write quite a lot about panarchy.

To what is stated in the article, I can only add the following consideration. Panarchy as a system where everyone is under their own governments, but governments compete for citizens, and entry and exit are free, is an unstable state of society. Quite quickly, a significant number of people will accumulate who have not entered into client agreements with any governments at all. They cannot be forced to go under someone’s wing; all that remains is to try to sell them some services. Thus, panarchy will gradually become pure ancap for many, where absolutely all goods and services are offered on a free competitive market. I would say that this could lead to the development of government service aggregators, where everyone can pick an option for themselves, or perhaps do without it entirely.

*Shut up and just give me that insurance!*

11th Anniversary of the Georgian War

I am currently in Georgia.

Yesterday I checked into a hotel, and in the evening we sat with the owner and chatted. He told me:

that the cursed Saakashvili started a war with Russia, caused a rift between two good countries, and they still haven’t been able to reconcile.
that under the cursed Saakashvili, the police killed and raped, and now, finally, they have stopped.
that in 2012, Saakashvili prepared to usurp power after losing the elections, but half of the special forces refused to fight the people, and the dictator had to leave.
that during the war with Russia, many officers abandoned their weapons because they did not want to fight for the regime, but wanted Georgia to become Russian; later they were imprisoned for 10 years, but were released under the new government.
that under the cursed Saakashvili, LGBT people became completely unrestrained and felt at home in an Orthodox country.
that this clown has no and never had popular support.

And then I watched a recent interview of Saakashvili with Alexey Romanov, and there Saakashvili says that Ivanishvili’s regime is illegitimate, he no longer has popular support, and decisive clashes between the regime and the people are about to begin.

What conclusion would I like to draw from all this? Value sociological data! As long as you are surrounded by your comrades, you are in an echo chamber. You have no idea how popular your views are in society, and when you decide to hold a rally or participate in elections, unpleasant surprises may await you. On the other hand, if conducting sociological research is for some reason impossible for you, then mass actions themselves become sociology for you. If you managed to bring tens of thousands of supporters to a rally — perhaps hundreds of thousands will vote for you. If you didn’t — then do not be deceived, work on recognition and fight the anti-rating (for example, by changing your leader).

As for the interview, watch it; it is actually mostly not about Georgia, but about Russia.

What does ancap propose for the suppression of poaching? Wouldn’t some greedy people be able, for example, to fish out all the fish in a lake at once for the sake of quick enrichment under it?

Keirin Ni Kennadah

Ancap proposes private property for this purpose.

If some greedy people honestly bought a lake into their ownership and decided to take all the fish out of it for quick enrichment, they will get the fish, sell it, and then they will have to find some other use for their lake. They could breed some other kind of fish there, use the water for irrigation, build a water park nearby — there are plenty of uses for a body of water. These guys are within their rights.

If these same greedy people decide to take all the fish at once from someone else’s lake, then the owner of the lake will, of course, try to oppose this, if not during the process, then certainly demand compensation after the fact. This is not a state fishery inspection where you can wiggle out with a bribe or connections — quick enrichment will not happen.

Finally, they could find an ownerless lake in the deep wilderness, claim it as their own, and take all the fish in the lake at once. But here is the problem: the lake is in the wilderness, which means problems with transporting the catch. They would have to use expensive transport like a helicopter, likely in more than one trip, and this again means that super-profits will not happen; transport costs will eat up all the profit. Therefore, a lake in the wilderness is useful for recreational fishing and selfies against beautiful views, but not for industrial fishing. If, for some reason, the transport costs are not so high, then the new owners of the lake have no reason to fish out all the fish from their lake at once when they can do it regularly without depleting the resource. They aren’t some poachers who are forced to feed on stealthy raids. They honestly claimed this lake as something nobody wanted, and now they will honestly exploit it.

Exactly the same applies to hunting animals, logging the taiga, and so on. It is precisely the ability to not worry that the state will come tomorrow and drive you off your plot that allows one to moderate their appetite and exploit the resource carefully enough. It’s a pity that the entire taiga in Russia is state-owned; now even putting out its fires has become economically inefficient.

*Opposition to the honest homestead of the state sturgeon*

On the topic of the day

You know that my channel is completely non-political in nature. I have no right to call anyone to the barricades, as I maintain my own anonymity; I am quite skeptical about the prospects of decent individuals participating in legal politics, about the prospects of registering a couple of potentially good political parties—and so on. But regarding what has been happening in recent days, I have developed a distinct personal interest. The Russian government is depriving me of the opportunity to listen to people who interest me.

For a month, Aleksey Navalny, the host of the popular weekly program “Russia of the Future,” has been lost to me. The channel’s attempts to find an adequate replacement have not even come close to success so far. For a month, I have been deprived of Mikhail Svetov’s programs on SVTV—now, instead of interviews with various interesting people, the channel shows imperial stormtroopers beating peaceful citizens to touching music. For a month, I have been cut off from the best weekly program on economics, hosted by Vladimir Milov. Even Egor Zhukov’s channel, which provided rather thoughtful content on a wide variety of topics, has now closed for an as-yet-unclear period. Such a violation of my consumer rights by the state, of course, does not add to my affection for the institution of the state in general and the Russian political regime in particular.

I don’t have many opportunities left to somehow harm the state in return. I no longer pay personal income tax or various other personal taxes. I already try to choose stores that do not pay VAT (this is visible on the receipts), and whenever possible, I shop at the bazaar. For the state, I practically do not exist.

However, I have this channel, and I would like to use it to convey a simple thought as widely as possible. The state is your enemy. In open confrontation, it is stronger, but it is very vulnerable to guerrilla warfare. Do not feed the state with your money. If you are forced to work for it, work poorly. View yourself as a spy or even a saboteur in the enemy’s rear. Plunder state property: it will be better in private hands (this, of course, does not refer to various urban improvement items; why spite yourselves). Squeeze all the social benefits out of the state that it has carelessly allowed you to claim. Do not hesitate to do this using fake documents if you have the opportunity. Decorating the city with leaflets and graffiti saying that the state is the enemy is a great idea and a classic of guerrilla struggle. If you want to kill a cop—think thrice.

Before deciding on things that the state opposes particularly harshly, master the art of conspiracy. At least the basics, such as the fact that your smartphone is not only an invaluable assistant but also a spy that will help the state find you, and Vkontakte is simply a garden plot where the state grows criminal cases. Think not only about satisfying your own demand for justice but also about the PR effect. It is better if the direct damage to the enemy turns out to be smaller, while the state loses more in the eyes of society. Ultimately, the state must be expelled precisely from people’s heads, and it would be enough if it were only from ours—but we will have to reach the last grandmother.

As for the recent initiatives of the Russian security forces, I very much hope that they will serve to unite the opposition. For the state, we are all—regardless of the nuances of our ideas about the desired society—equally enemies. Let’s not feud with each other. I hope that Gudkov meets Svetov at the doors of the detention center, they shake hands, and go together to record a stream with prison tales and plans for joint action. I hope that Zhukov then arrives with a bouquet of flowers and is also happily welcomed into the company. I hope that people stop reminding Svetov and Navalny about various ancient questionable posts on LiveJournal, and if someone does, they are snapped at. I hope that Svetov starts collaborating with the Tea Club. Who said what bad thing to whom and how they threatened—it doesn’t matter anymore, we are not in that position now. It would be good if simultaneous imprisonment in a detention center helps the ambitious leaders of the Russian protest reach this simple understanding.

Oh, little apple,
Where are you rolling…

What is this “private slavery” in libertarianism being referred to in the post from July 30?

The anarcho-capitalist camp—Rothbard, for example, analyzed this issue in detail in “The Ethics of Liberty,” explaining the impossibility of defending a slave contract within libertarian theory.

анонимный вопрос

In the final paragraph of the post from July 30, I do indeed mention voluntary private slavery in passing, but in an extremely narrow sense. If there exists a methodology that allows for complete control over a person’s actions through some mysterious subconscious manipulations, yet all these manipulations are non-violent, then the person is de facto enslaved and, from the perspective of an external observer, completely voluntarily performs any actions required by the manipulator.

Such things are the subject of horror stories about the coming dominance of big data, which will compile a full profile of every person and allow for ideal influence over them, so that under this influence, they might go to the polling station to vote for you, go to the store to buy your product, or dance on the Maidan.

In my view, such a dystopia is the flip side of the utopia of a bright communist future, where abundance is ensured by a planned economy managed by benevolent supercomputers—and it has just as much chance of being realized on a global scale. However, I cannot rule out isolated cases of gaining complete control over human motivations through non-violent manipulations, which is why I mentioned them in my analysis of the concept of free will.

This has nothing to do with Rothbard’s argumentation regarding the impossibility of libertarians defending a slave contract, given the absence of a contract.

*It looks as ridiculous as a horse harnessed to a sports car*

Donations and plans

I have updated the donations section on my website, adding several instructions on using cryptocurrencies, so as not to refer to scattered blog posts.

Also, something unexpected happened to me. When Siberia was covered in smog, I complained in the chat about headaches, throat problems, and sleep disturbances. The smog has eased now, but one of my readers suddenly decided to gift me a trip to the sea, so I will soon head to Armenia and Georgia for a couple of weeks. Such generous gestures are, of course, very overwhelming. But I will try to view the trip more as a business trip than a vacation, and from time to time, I’ll write something interesting in the channel.

Thank you for filling my life with such pleasant surprises!

Is it possible in some way to reconcile libertarianism with the idea of the absence of free will in humans?

анонимный вопрос

Very often, these kinds of tricky questions boil down to a lack of clarity in definitions. On the other hand, imprecise definitions provide an excellent opportunity to reflect on the entire topic at hand, which I will gladly do.

Historically, when speaking of free will, it is implied that although God is omniscient and omnipotent, having defined all the laws of existence, and that not a single blade of grass blooms without His providence, He made an exception specifically for humans. Having created man in His own image and likeness, and knowing his entire destiny from beginning to end, God nevertheless does not interfere in his behavior—except in those cases where He does, which is then termed a miracle or divine inspiration, but that is another story.

The concept of free will did not become established in Christian doctrine from the very beginning; in the writings of Augustine, we still see complete predestination, where a person has not a single chance of salvation unless it was predestined for them from the start. Within the framework of this strange doctrine—”I am a slave (that is, a speaking tool) and I will sternly state this”—there was no chance for libertarian ideas to even emerge. Indeed, what self-ownership can be discussed for a speaking tool that does not dare even to sneeze except by the will of the master.

If we shift from theology to a more commonplace understanding of free will, it could be defined as the ability to act contrary to someone’s manipulations. Following this, we can observe that, indeed, quite many people do not possess free will in full, as their choices are determined by context rather than internal preferences (such matters are analyzed in detail in the trendy field of behavioral economics). Can pronounced libertarian relations exist in a society where such manipulative practices are actively applied? Yes, they can. Such images are often painted for us, showing a world of triumphant corporations. As long as manipulations are non-violent, libertarians will clearly point to their legitimacy, whereas violent opposition to them, such as destroying advertising materials, may indeed be suppressed in such a society.

Still, we are not talking about total zombification in our fantasies today, but even if we were, we would have a situation of private slavery, which is either voluntary—in which case we have no legal grounds to oppose it—or forced—in which case, again, libertarian doctrine provides all the tools necessary to counteract such practices.