I have bad news for you. On the one hand, the market was not invented by Jews; long before them, the Phoenicians made their mark in this field in this region. On the other hand, the ancient Persians—the most natural Aryan overmen, whom Nietzsche cosplayed with his Zarathustra—rejected the concept of the market and criticized their Greek neighbors precisely for having a special square in the center of every city where people gather to deceive one another. We are speaking, as you may have guessed, of the agora and, accordingly, of the market.
So, the market is not the path to the birth of the overman. It is the path to the overthrow of arrogant overmen by ordinary enterprising people.
The Polystate is an idea by American writer Zach Weinersmith. In the book Polystate: A Thought Experiment in Distributed Government, a simple but radical idea is proposed.
Currently, under conventional democracy, we live by laws established by the party chosen by the majority. Weinersmith believes this is wrong, and that a citizen who voted for a certain force should live by the laws of that force. They should pay taxes to it, rather than to the winners or competitors. For example, supporters of communists would pay more, while libertarians would pay less. However, the pensions and social benefits for communists would be higher, while libertarians would have to save for their own retirement.
Voted for the left — go to the army. For the right — pay for contract soldiers. In essence, this creates several states within the territory of one country. Zach’s system can be compared to choosing a mobile operator or an internet provider. Some have more coverage but lower prices, and vice versa. On the other hand, new opportunities arise. For instance, you could choose not to pay taxes for the storage of nuclear weapons. In theory, this would help citizens truly delve into political programs and encourage parties to maintain a consistent line.
The foundation of communist ideology lies in the same values of justice, equality, rejection of slavery, and the pursuit of cooperation between people as the foundation of libertarian ideology. Therefore, there is nothing terrible about someone being inspired by these wonderful ideas.
The difference between communists and libertarians is that communists do not believe in people. They believe that, left to their own devices, people will be unable to establish orders that lead them to prosperity, therefore communists must lead them and bring them to victory through armed struggle. Meanwhile, the soft-hearted libertarians, conversely, are filled with a strange, irrational confidence in the benefit of spontaneous orders established in the course of natural human activity; they say that the market will put everything in its place, that aggressive violence is unprofitable in the long run, and that the institutions practicing it are becoming obsolete.
Communists talk a lot about how desirable the nationalization of the means of production is, but when you show them someone like Sechin, it immediately turns out that such nationalization does not suit them. They usually prefer a situation where the enterprise is managed by those who work there. And this is already a normal, understandable starting position for a calm dialogue about the economic efficiency of various enterprise management models, and their compatibility and stability.
Communists talk a lot about the fight against exploitation, and libertarians about how taxes are theft. Nothing prevents us, in communicating with communists, from stating that taxes are exploitation. In doing so, we would not be sinning against the truth; we would simply be translating our thesis into a language understandable to them. Their ideal is a classless society. Our ideal is a stateless society. From the perspective of communists, the state is a tool by which the ruling class oppresses the others. I would say that this is a similarity to the point of confusion.
Therefore, one should not laugh at communists, or reject the entire complex of their ideas outright from the start. It makes sense to debate with them about the permissible means of achieving the goal. Does the love for investing full power in a charismatic leader contribute to the achievement of equality? Can the habit of seizing property from people without clear and unambiguously interpreted criteria as to why this is being done lead to civil peace? Can a classless society be achieved by appointing a hegemonic class? At what point does beneficial cooperation become harmful exploitation, and can the identification of this boundary be entrusted to the exploited themselves?
So, having a communist father is, generally speaking, not a bad thing. It means you always have an excellent topic for conversation. Practice on him; it will be useful in life. And within the family, communism is indeed in most cases the optimal system, so things are probably quite good in your family with a communist father. Well, or your father is an incorrect communist, which is also not surprising—the world is generally full of incorrect communists. It is these incorrect communists who create incorrect communist regimes, from the Soviet Union to Venezuela, but someday they will surely succeed if they start using the correct methods. You know, things like respect for human dignity, for property acquired through honest labor, for freedom of contract, and many other things dear to the heart of every true communist.
I have already given a brief overview of some Telegram channels here, explaining why I subscribed to them and why I recommend them to others. Today will probably be the most exotic recommendation.
Paris Burns is a channel run by hardcore classical anarchists. There is little reasoning there; it is more of a report on practical activities. Direct reports on the life of the yellow vest movement in France, news about the case of Azat Miftakhov and other anarchists persecuted by the state, reports from crypto-forums and squats, practical techniques for online anonymization, and much, much more. I don’t encrypt my activities with the same thoroughness as these guys, but if the state starts picking on not only left-wing anarchists but also ancaps, I will have someone to learn from.
If you have a lot of strength and energy, I separately recommend browsing the channel for the “stigmergy” tag and considering whether to participate in a fun direct-action quest. If the idea seems attractive, contact the special bot, where they will explain the details, and then you can finally decide for yourself whether you are ready to join in.
Have you encountered similar strange announcements in public places?
Not all libertarians intend to build a Russian national state. However, the principle of contractual jurisdictions or communities does not preclude the construction of one.
First and foremost, the principle of federalism presupposes a confederation and voluntarism. Numerous communities enter into agreements regarding the voluntary joining and leaving of the confederation. And people reclaim their natural right to live by the rules they have devised for themselves.
Those wishing to build an RNS can unite, acquire land, or combine their holdings, choose a form of governance, and create laws there. For a jurisdiction to be considered libertarian, they must renounce the initiation of aggressive violence (“don’t tread on me”) and recognize freedom of contract (anyone can become a citizen of the RNS by agreement with other participants in the jurisdiction, and anyone can terminate their RNS citizenship upon fulfilling all obligations under property contracts). The border will be defined by the boundaries of the holdings of the individual owners participating in the RNS and the owners of legal entities—contractual jurisdictions. As for what you decide within the jurisdiction, that is your right as free people united with a common goal, as long as you do not step on the tail of some rattlesnake (another community-jurisdiction).
Comment by Ancap-chan
Since 2014, Putin has been killing the idea of the Russian World. There will be no Russian national state. Libertarians, even less so, will not build it.
There are many other ideas and interests around which people will unite. The only Russian thing around which it makes sense for them to unite now and in the foreseeable future is the Russian language, somewhere abroad. This somewhat facilitates communication, although it far from always facilitates understanding.
And nations… Just forget about nations, you funny, touching little Hitlers.
After all, both can work equally well if punishment is inevitable. Do prisons (they will exist in ancap, right?) violate the NAP? Or even not prisons, but any restriction of freedom or coercion. I understand that the punished person violated the NAP themselves, but then it becomes a kind of “eye for an eye” principle. Personally, in my understanding, it should not be that way.
Kirill
I have already had to answer the question of how the NAP differs from contractual jurisdictions, and now I am similarly being asked to find differences between heterogeneous things, between a general principle and specific prescriptions, which may be based on this principle, or may not be.
The NAP is a principle stating that no one has the right to initiate violence with impunity—it specifies nothing about what the measure of retribution should be. State laws, by contrast, regulate the measure of retribution both for NAP violations and for many other types of actions, but at the same time, they mandate that this retribution be carried out through the mediation of specialists paid for by taxes, denying this right to those who are, in fact, directly interested in retribution.
Is someone who has been robbed by a private individual willing to voluntarily pay the state so that it keeps the robber in prison for several years? Usually not, so the state reaches into the citizen’s pocket itself and carelessly pulls out the required sum, after which it spends it haphazardly on whatever it feels like, though some of it does end up going to prisons.
Is someone who has been robbed by a private individual willing to voluntarily pay some private company of their choice to keep the robber in prison for several years in the absence of a state? Obviously, they are no more willing than under a state. This means the only person who could pay for the cost of keeping someone in prison under ancap is the person hiding in the prison itself, and I have written about this in sufficient detail. On the other hand, for example, if I have purely property claims against a robber, there is hardly any reason for them to lock themselves in prison; one can always agree on the payment of compensation, like civilized people.
Will that very inevitability of punishment be ensured under ancap? Not necessarily. The damage may be too small to pursue independently. But if someone is engaged in the seizure of other people’s property on a systemic basis, they will almost certainly be caught eventually. They might get lucky, and a substantial compensation will be politely demanded from them. Or they might be unlucky and be shot on the spot. A dangerous trade, to be sure.
But the richer and more prosperous a society is, the more likely it is that the capture of various gangsters and thieves will be streamlined and handled by specialists. After all, until the state over-regulated the detective market beyond all reason, the Pinkerton agency in the US flourished quite a bit.
Lately, the question of “Time to get out” has been discussed in Vzglyad. First, there was a little article about the results of the latest Levada Center poll on this topic. Then there was an article continuing the theme: who should get out, where to go, and who gains what from it. How does Ancap-chan view this issue? Does she feel drawn to be closer to other chans?
Dad
Am I drawn specifically to Japan, oto-san? Not particularly: I don’t know the language, the customs are strange, and foreigners are not well-liked. It’s a magnificent country to visit and marvel at, precisely because of its exoticism, but I have absolutely no desire to stay there for long. Although, of course, I associate my desired future even less with North Korea or Haiti…
I read the suggested links and was quite surprised that even in a fairly loyalist publication like Vzglyad, mass emigration and significant emigrant sentiments in the country are being discussed not only at the level of “a foreign agent was paid for another lie,” but also more or less thoughtfully.
To be honest, I don’t understand at all how, in the 21st century, one can seriously talk about the desirability of a permanent residency in any particular territory. Mobility has become one of humanity’s most important achievements during the scientific and technical revolution. People are gaining the ability to move further, more often, and more cheaply, and any retreat from this trend is perceived as stagnation or even degradation.
Until the 20th century, the vast majority lived and worked within a single village. In the 20th century, people became accustomed to pendulum migration: to the factory in the morning, back to the residential district in the evening. In the 21st century, it is gradually becoming the norm to live where it is comfortable, inexpensive, and not yet boring, to work remotely where the pay is higher, and meanwhile travel occasionally to where it is more interesting. Well, if there is enough money to always travel where it is more interesting, then one doesn’t even have to worry about finding a place to live cheaply for most of the year. States, with their ridiculous bureaucratic rituals performed when crossing borders, are perceived as a nuisance whose disappearance a person would not regret in the slightest, since besides the issue of obtaining a visa, a person practically communicates with the state about nothing else. At least, that is how the world looks through the eyes of those who feel in tune with the new trends.
As the share of such nomads in the global economy continues to grow, more and more services, which are currently traditionally more concerned with the opinions of residents, will reorient themselves to satisfy their specific needs. That is why scare stories like “what if someone buys a road and forbids crossing it?” look quite ridiculous. He will lose clients, that’s what. Land and infrastructure objects on it are bought to maximize profit, and in the new realities, this means that any visitor should easily navigate local rules; otherwise, they will simply go where they aren’t bothered by such greedy people.
As for permanent residents, who feel no urge to change places, in the coming reality they will find themselves in the role of service personnel who ensure the operation of local infrastructure and create local color. If they create it well, there will be a flow of clients. If poorly, the surrounding area will turn into a sparsely populated hinterland. There will be some kind of life in the hinterland too. Look, someone even lives in the Amazon jungle, and it’s fine.
After all, for example, when using streaming services, a completely free contract is concluded with the user, which specifies how the content can be used. If you don’t like it—don’t enter into these contractual relations! The problem arises perhaps when buying physical media, as I haven’t seen any contracts there (but usually the relevant laws are cited, which, roughly speaking, are the same contract, as they are voluntary). In conclusion—is it possible that under ancap, after publishing a book, I wouldn’t be able to forbid readers, for example, from reading it on the street during the day? Where would you disagree?
Atomic Tram
Answered by Alex Murin
Let’s start with how copyright is currently protected. That is the entirety of Part 4 of the Civil Code. To properly manage the fruits of one’s creativity, one must know the laws. Currently, the law prohibits copying without permission, assuming that the author did not grant such permission initially. And it assumes that your interests can be protected without your knowledge by some organization, like the Russian Authors’ Society. The law also protects your descendants, who haven’t written a single line of music or a single kilobyte of code.
No one intends to limit the freedom of contract under ancap. If you like such a contract, then you offer the user or the new owner to enter into it. Ask them to write a paper stating that they have indeed read it, understood everything, like the terms, and have paid. If you believe that your book cannot be read during the day in public places, then write that and get the buyer’s consent. Not in the form of “by opening this link, I acknowledge that I am now the eternal serf of the publisher, who bought the author two beers and thereby gained exclusive rights to the work,” but ask them to perform a conscious action: write a paper or an electronic document and sign it. And preferably without hidden pitfalls, so that the buyer understands what they are doing. And without state lobbying, under which the actual author ends up in holey shoes in a cold shed.
And yes, you will have to independently find a court that will compel the payment of compensation to you, rather than giving three hundred rubles to the Ust-Labinsk District Court, by whose order the bold offender will be caught, brought in handcuffs, and put in a cage with robbers. If you like copyright, take the trouble not to create traps when executing such a contract, otherwise someone might consider it a direct attack. Voluntariness must be truly voluntary, not a pit that a user falls into by clicking the wrong button. Or one where the state finds a song remaining in the browser cache, even if they didn’t listen to it.
Addition from Ancap-chan
I have nothing much to object to in this harsh rebuke. Yes, you can demand certain restrictions on the use of your content from the consumer, but you will have to pay for the enforcement of these requirements yourself. So it’s better to think ten times before setting any requirements at all, because it will be far more reliable to win the loyalty of consumers rather than trying to oppose their will with your own. For instance, some Kirill Yeskov or Pavel Usanov writes a new book, publishes it, and warns readers: “Guys, let’s let the publisher make some money, let the book be sold only on paper for about three months, and then I will release the text for free access myself, and you won’t have to deal with piracy technologies.” And it works! And then, when the text becomes freely available, grateful readers even send donations. Because you don’t need to be an asshole; it doesn’t pay off.
I’ll start from the end. My personal sympathies, of course, lie with the residents of those Russian regions who regularly pay for the gas supplied to them, while the inefficient monopolist, enduring losses in the Caucasus, justifies every new tariff increase with non-payments. This time, the regional legislative assemblies, impressed by the fact that Chechnya was once again declared a privileged subject of the federation, also began to compete in demanding the cancellation of their residents’ far more modest debts.
Whether this trolling was successful, or simply competing Caucasian security officials used this quirk to assert themselves at each other’s expense, interesting facts began to emerge immediately following the court decision to write off the debts. It turned out that the debts being written off were pinned on the population without any basis, whereas in reality, the gas was either stolen or squandered (while money for infrastructure repairs was stolen) at a higher level. And now, cases are being opened against those who managed the gas distribution, and in general, it seems that quite a few heads will roll as a result of all this.
In a peaceful region, a utility non-payer will quickly have all supplied resources cut off, and recovery for what has already been consumed will begin. In regions like Chechnya, whoever makes such a decision will be forced to start worrying about their health, so they will prefer to ignore the problem for as long as possible, although with a much greater probability, being unable to defeat the theft, they will lead it.
It is unlikely that as a result of all these investigations, Gazprom will recover any noticeable part of the stolen money. The most sensible thing its management could do is try to get rid of the loss-making asset and sell its Caucasian divisions to those ready to conduct business in the region according to the much more brutal local rules. Gazprom would then only have to honestly supply gas to a regional private gas operator at domestic Russian rates and on a prepayment basis. Let them continue to sell it at three times the price on the spot and try to get at least some money for it.
Since ancient times, representatives of the military aristocracy have considered it shameful to pay for what can be taken by force, for then allies might consider them weakened and turn away, and enemies, for the same reasons, might decide to attack. Therefore, of course, the costs of ensuring the fulfillment of contracts in Chechnya and other bandit enclaves must be monstrous. In such an inefficient system, maintaining even a modicum of stability requires a constant influx of external resources, but those are exactly what are starting to run out.
So, in the foreseeable future, we will see fierce infighting there over dwindling flows of budget funds, over any poorly controlled resource supplies, and simply for the right to dispose of people. Unfortunately, there is also a high probability that violence will spread outward from there even faster.
However, if one does not try to drown the problem in money—which only makes it swell—then all these inefficient practices die off relatively quickly, especially if there is strong opposition to attempts to spread archaic orders to territories where more efficient ones are adopted. And this applies not only to Chechnya, but also to the wonderful, tolerant Europe, which also prefers to appease its internal bandits with handouts rather than presenting them with the fact that this is not that place, and things are not done this way here.
Actually, Chechnya has its own hydrocarbons, but it’s like in Venezuela: the political regime is not the right one for extraction
Suppose the owner of a private garden with trees files a lawsuit against one of the neighbors, claiming that the neighbor breathes oxygen produced by the garden’s trees but does not pay for it, and demands payment for this oxygen at a price of 1 ancapodollar per liter. What decision is a court following libertarian principles most likely to make?
анонимный вопрос
Answered by Alex Murin
Most likely, the greedy plaintiff’s reputation will suffer greatly, and the court will fine them for attempting to enrich themselves through the court. The burden of proof lies with the plaintiff. Consequently, the plaintiff would have to prove that the defendant is actually breathing their oxygen. For example, by finding oxygen molecules produced by their plants within the defendant’s body. Not to assume it, but to provide real evidence. Since the service was not ordered and no promise to pay for it was made, the defendant had no malicious intent to obtain the plaintiff’s property in the form of oxygen. The plaintiff did not take proper measures to preserve their property—for example, by installing a dome over their garden. Furthermore, the plaintiff themselves breathes, and they breathe air containing oxygen not only from their own garden. The plaintiff somehow obtained the carbon dioxide needed for photosynthesis. Is the gas they received cheaper than the one they released into the common space?
For every plaintiff who loves to reduce things to absurdity, there is a judge who can take the absurdity even further: force them to enclose their garden with a dome and stop giving their expensive oxygen to the general atmosphere and shamelessly stealing carbon dioxide.
An important point: the share of oxygen in the atmosphere from the owner of a couple of hectares of forest is negligible, and a hermetic dome over a couple of hectares of land is a very expensive pleasure.
Addition from Ancap-chan
An important factor is that a court handling a property dispute between two neighbors is obviously an arbitration court. Its task is not the formal consideration of a claim, but the resolution of a conflict. These people still have a vast amount of time to live side by side, and if such ridiculous litigation begins between them, it makes sense to find out what the real grievance is, what the real conflict is—and then, based on this, try to resolve the issue so that conflicts no longer arise.
Ideally, the court’s decision should look, in my view, something like this: 1) carry out a mutual offset of the oxygen supplied by the plaintiff’s garden and the carbon dioxide produced by the defendant’s breathing; 2) oblige the defendant to include the plaintiff among the invited guests when having a barbecue in their backyard to monitor additional carbon dioxide emissions from grilling meat over coals; 3) oblige the plaintiff to compensate the defendant for the additional carbon dioxide emissions from the barbecue with supplies of garden produce.
Breathe deeper, the trees need more raw materials for photosynthesis!
