Тег: Ancap

Marriage

Legal marriage is a tripartite transaction. Can an unregistered marriage (a bilateral transaction) be considered ideologically correct from the perspective of ancap and libertarianism? If so, can it be said that a state that has “banned same-sex marriage” (actually just refusing to enter into certain types of transactions, but not criminalizing homosexuality and relationships—as in Russia, for example) is violating LGBT rights? Under ancap, will there be something similar to a registry office (ZAGS)?

Moskvich

Marriage has many functions, but none of them is defining. Marriage can be a union for joint housekeeping, but there are also guest marriages. It can be a cooperative for raising children, but there are childless marriages, as well as raising children outside of marriage. It can be used to establish the right to legally represent one’s marital partner—but in a traditional society, this right may remain with the partners’ parents.

The most general thing that can be said about almost any marriage is that it is a relationship involving a certain sufficiently long-term and sufficiently broad trust between people, which then manifests in the spheres where these people wish to realize themselves. In housekeeping—so be it. In sex—so be it. In children—so be it. In political activism—here, marriage is an indispensable thing.

Why inform others of one’s marital status? Primarily to notify those around that in a certain human collective, its participants grant each other such-and-such rights. Does such a need persist in a stateless society? Yes, it does, because people generally value predictability. This person is taken; one should not hit on them. Great, that is certainty. From this person, one can demand the debt of another person because they have a joint household. Convenient? Convenient. A child should not be unclaimed; someone is certainly responsible for them. If you see an unclaimed child, you know exactly what to do. Little girl, where are your parents?

Thus, as long as people enter into long-term trusting relationships, they will most likely communicate this at least to their constant circle of communication. But do they need to bother and formalize their relationships with a serious formal contract implying the possibility of forced enforcement? That is unlikely. People frequently conduct commercial activities without drawing up papers, let alone organizing daily life, regulating sex, or undertaking a joint crossing of the Atlantic on a yacht. Marriage is a relationship of trust, and people are usually inclined not to spoil these relationships with paperwork.

Another matter is that others may care about what is happening between people in a marriage. What if it is same-sex, closely related, with teenagers, animals, or dolls. Even in the most tolerant libertarian society, those around want to be sure, at the very least, that the marriage is voluntary, and that there is no domestic violence or other archaic chthonic horrors. But even here, it is completely unimportant to others what kind of paper these relationships are formalized with; they will hit the face, not the passport.

I believe that under ancap, a notary system or something similar will be preserved—for example, instead of notaries, volunteers with a good reputation could act as witnesses. These witnesses will confirm the facts of concluding certain agreements, a tiny fraction of which will be marriage contracts. I do not believe in the mass recording of transactions in blockchains; they either have a terrible shortage of space, or their expansion will quickly run into economic and technological limitations. On the other hand, current registry offices are also big data collection points, but this role is already shifting to various online social platforms, and it is unlikely they will handle it any worse.

A book about ancap – describing the problems of the world

I am continuing work on the second part of the book about ancap. If at first I briefly presented a beautiful picture of what an ideal anarcho-capitalist society looks like, now I am starting to explain in meticulous detail what obstacles might get in our dancer’s way. To start, I’m talking about the general imperfection of the world, and so far I have covered the problem of fuzzy boundaries and the problem of externalities.

Beyond that, I’ve taken a pause to think about whether to dump some more global problems here, or to move on to approaches for resolving them.

How will bankruptcy work under ancap?

anonymous mouse Bazhenova

During the Adam Smith Readings, I was live-tweeting individual theses of the presentations, and I specifically noted the report by Artem Seversky, which was dedicated to the phenomenon of bankruptcy from the perspective of economics and normative philosophy. Artem was also kind enough to publish a text version of his report on Liter (I have advertised it before; it is a blog dedicated to libertarian theory under the auspices of the LPR—the one of the two LPRs that includes Fedyukin, Bazhenov, and, in fact, Seversky).

In short, the report boils down to the following. Bankruptcy is a situation of simultaneous claims of legitimate entitlements to a single mass of assets that is insufficient to satisfy them. Such a situation can arise even if all the transactions that led to it were voluntary and libertarian principles were not violated—and yet, there is legal uncertainty: it is impossible to satisfy all claims simultaneously, which means a certain procedure for their satisfaction must be developed.

Next, Artem points out that for the procedure of satisfying such claims to not violate libertarian principles itself, it must follow certain rules. One must account for the possibility that different claims may have different priorities because they arose from different legal relationships. It is one thing to have an obligation to pay wages or pay for the delivery of equipment, and another to settle with an investor. It will also be necessary to reconcile the different time preferences of creditors: some are willing to accept installment payments if they can get more, while others are eager to recover the debt as quickly as possible. In effect, for libertarians, this means the necessity of recognizing common property, however much they may wish to reduce everything to private property alone. Finally, it should be considered that legitimate claims to the debtor’s property are held not only by those who have already demanded payment, but also by those who have not yet done so—however, if the bankruptcy procedure affects their interests as well, it will also draw them into the general conflict. For example, if a house is seized for an unpaid business development loan, the interests of not only the debtor but also his household members will suffer, and they will have legitimate claims against the creditors. In other words, Artem argues that to develop a bankruptcy procedure, libertarians will inevitably have to arrive at the concept of legal entities, however much they may want to reduce everything to personal responsibility without unnecessary red tape.

So how will bankruptcies work under ancap? Naturally, by using all the theoretical developments created back during estatism, but filtering out at least those norms that imply state intervention. Bankruptcy law currently differs from state to state; similarly, under ancap, it will differ across various societies—some nuances will be in use in some places, others in others, while maintaining certain general framework principles. If the counterparties have not agreed in advance on which norms to apply, they will have to improvise, which will likely mean that in settling the conflict, the court will first need to determine which specific bankruptcy law would be most comfortable for all participants in the process, as well as for the judge’s notions of justice.

Of course, under ancap, some communities may retain norms that violate libertarian principles. For example, in the village of Tatarkovo, it might be accepted that a debtor is liable for a debt, no matter what it is, with all their property and even their own body as part of that property. This circumstance will simply have to be kept in mind by potential counterparties of the residents of Tatarkovo village. We can only assume that as greater trust is established in society and as time preferences decrease, business practices—including in conflict situations such as bankruptcies—will evolve toward greater leniency, at least toward honest entrepreneurs who misjudged the risks.

How am I supposed to live with the knowledge that my father, who served in the KGB and early FSB, will be killed under ancap?

Or at least they will force him to pay giant compensations for numerous NAP violations on his part in connection with his service, and those debts that he doesn’t manage to pay off will be passed to me as inheritance, even though I was born after his retirement and am not to blame for what he did. Bitarch, do you also believe that children should answer for the debts and crimes of their parents?

Semyon Persunov (the question is accompanied by a donation of 0.00000546 BTC)

I think that in the early nineties, he faced a much greater danger of being killed, because it only sounds beautiful—revenge, they say, is a dish best served cold. In fact, old events are soon replaced by more current ones, and those who fervently desired to take revenge on KGB employees, but did not bother to do so immediately after the organization was disbanded, now dream of taking revenge on someone else, but they are also unlikely to ever bother to do so.

Ancap means the decentralization of law. A violation of the NAP will not punish itself. Until a specific subject appears who decides to prosecute your father for that specific damage he caused them, there will be no prosecution.

But.

There is such a thing as a herd reflex. It is enough for someone very persistent, for example, Navalny, to actually achieve a trial against a number of FSB employees and recover damages from them through the court—and then others will want to as well. And if the same Navalny manages to provide a convenient service for this, the matter could proceed much more actively. Instead of Navalny, I would put Svetov, but I have much less faith in the latter: he is exceptionally resentful, but he hasn’t been noticed for litigiousness yet, limiting himself to publicism.

However, even in the case where people, with the help of former political prisoner lawyers, begin to mass-file lawsuits against former security agency employees, your father will most likely still end up somewhere far at the end of the list. I suspect that if he had ill-wishers whom he truly had reason to fear, he killed them back when he still wore the shoulder straps.

As for their descendants, the fact that a ghoul who killed their parents lives somewhere will be more of a matter of curiosity for them. Find him, come, look him in the eyes. Humph and leave. I don’t guarantee such an outcome, but it is also completely unrealistic to expect that under ancap everyone will suddenly become real jigits and practice blood feuds.

How do you feel living with the awareness that your father will most likely come out of this scrape unscathed, even if he was up to his elbows in blood in the late Soviet era? Well, I hope this will bother you, but not to the point of serious neuroses. And if he is caught in some way, libertarianism denies the right to recover for actions to which you were not party, so the maximum you face is the seizure of property that your father tries to hurriedly transfer to you once he smells smoke. In this case, the fact of your cooperation with him in the act of hiding assets that may be subject to seizure will be too obvious to ignore.

Following Svetov, I would also advise the father to seek active repentance, but this step, while morally justified, carries more utilitarian risks than potential benefits, so let him weigh and decide for himself.

As for Bitarch, I hope he will share his opinion on this matter in the comments.

The first precedent that comes to mind: https://karagodin.org

How does left-libertarianism differ from anarcho-communism in essence? And in general, why is it needed if there are ancap and ancom respectively?

Semyon Persunov (question accompanied by a donation of 0.00000546 BTC)

Ancom is an ideology based on the premise that individualism spoils people. A person owes too much to society and therefore must take it into account. It may be necessary to seize public resources for one’s own benefit because without this, the existence of the individual is impossible; however, the prosperity of society is primary, and then it shares with people from the common pot. Therefore, for ancoms, any separation of property from society to a specific individual must be justified.

Usually, they distinguish a category such as personal property and define it as things used for consumption rather than production. Personal property is halal, private property is haram. Clearly, this definition relies more on tradition and suffers from many flaws. I would rather suggest a slightly different criterion. It is appropriate to treat items as personal property if their use by an individual seriously reduces the attractiveness of their use for other individuals. For example, a handkerchief, a toothbrush, or socks are more appropriately personal property after the very first act of use, whereas while they lie untouched in a warehouse, they are, of course, public. A cup, for instance, might be personal property in some places and public in others; this is already a matter of local tradition. I also find it more comfortable to use a personal computer rather than configuring a public one every time as I prefer. Although, to a certain extent, the issue is solved by personal accounts on a public computer.

An anarcho-communist society can afford more personal property the wealthier it is as a whole.

Left-libertarianism is an ideology that does not encroach upon individualism as seriously. The interests of the individual are primary. But a person still owes too much to society and must take it into account. Nevertheless, due to the primacy of individual interests, for left-libertarians, any separation of property from the individual to society must be justified.

Usually, they distinguish a category such as public goods and define them as positive effects of human activity for which it is extremely difficult to ensure exclusive access. Due to this characteristic, public goods are difficult to monetize; therefore, they are presumably underproduced relative to easily monetizable market private goods. Thus, for left-libertarians, the production of public goods is a fairly strong justification for forcibly separating private property in favor of society.

Unfortunately, as soon as the production of a public good begins to be provided forcibly, it triggers a positive feedback loop, since the producer of the public good is now interested in producing as much of it as possible and demanding as large a budget as possible for it. And suddenly, the impoverished Soviet Union finds itself ahead of the entire planet in the field of ballet.

I do not know how left-libertarianism solves the problem of “when to stop forced redistribution in favor of society.” In my view, the absence of a clear boundary criterion is precisely what makes this ideology stillborn.

I will note that an ancap has such a boundary condition. When does an ancap decide that he has shared enough with society and no longer intends to? When he wants to. He treated passers-by to rakia, received enough respect, and then went home, happy, to finish the leftovers.

A book about ancap: a second attempt to start the second part

How I love diagrams! Making my first attempt at describing society under ancap, I tried to outline two approaches to how it is done, and then fell into a long stupor facing the question “and so what?”

The thing is, those were two bad approaches; ancap should not be described either by adding capitalism to real anarchy, or by adding anarchy to real capitalism. Ancap must be described based on theory.

So I tossed out the two previously published chapters and composed another one instead, where I briefly described the ideal ancap, how it looks based on theoretical ideas of how it should look. And next, I face a fascinating task: to detail what mechanisms push imperfect people, living in an imperfect world and forming an imperfect society, toward making society more or less correspond to the described ideal after all.

I hope things will move along more briskly now.

Since that’s the case, the picture can be more brisk too

The second part of the book about ancap has begun, and a title for the book still hasn’t been thought of…

The second part of the book is intended to provide a relatively plausible description of an anarcho-capitalist society. I spent a long time considering where to begin, and I started with a tedious methodological introduction on how such a description can be formed in the first place. There is time to build momentum, so I decided that I could afford not to rush headlong into it. After all, it is important to me not to present some single, alternative-free picture of a beautiful future, but to show the principles of how it is all derived.

The first chapter provides a less trivial approach—by adding capitalism to anarchy. This immediately reeks of alternative history and other joys of that sort. The second chapter takes a more obvious approach, by cutting the state out of an existing capitalist society.

Next, there will likely be a large section with a more detailed analysis of how the main institutions of society work, followed by a necessary section describing the difficulties of ancap.

The possibility of transitioning from a failed state to ancap

There is a fragile states index that takes into account many factors, including the state’s provision of public services, the stability of power, and other elements. Is it reasonable to assume that states with a high rating (coincidentally or not, it is easiest in these states to evade taxes, own weapons, and host information without a “censor”) will develop (or degrade) in the foreseeable future into full or nearly full “ancapistans,” after which an era of prosperity will begin?

Katsist

I have already written on a similar topic regarding the possibility of building an ancap state in fourth-world countries. In short: the pros and cons are listed, and some may believe the former outweigh the latter, while others believe the opposite. It is worth trying.

The same applies to forecasts regarding the developmental prospects of one ineffective state or another into an ancapistan. An anarchic regime—that is, the decentralization of law—is established there relatively easily. But it is far more difficult to understand how to preserve or, worse yet, grow capitalism from scratch in an anarchic society that either denies private property (the dream of the an-coms) or is based on clan interests and collective responsibility (the example of Somalia or Libya).

Furthermore, it is not entirely clear how to eliminate the influence factor of surrounding states. These are surprisingly jealous entities that are willing to deal only with other states, demand that their neighbors be as similar to themselves as possible, and if someone dares to start getting by without a state, they inevitably send their peacekeepers. However, the global trend is clearly changing now, and after the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, it seems that violent attempts to reformat other societies in their own image will gradually go out of fashion.

It seems to me that if we are to talk about the prospects of transitioning to an ancap regime for certain states, the prospects for countries with parliamentary democracies look slightly more realistic—where, for example, a political layout has emerged that precludes the possibility of forming a government coalition, and if one can be assembled, it must be done by yoking together parties of swans, crayfish, and pikes in one wagon, as a result of which their ability for effective lawmaking and even budget adoption becomes blocked.

And so: unable to pay civil servants because the budget has not been passed, the government sends most officials home. People live almost entirely without government services, but they retain civilized traditions of respect for private property and the market; after some time, they begin to spontaneously use market substitutes for former government services, and at some point realize that they actually like it. The idea that we should fundamentally stop trying to choose a single government for everyone and each individual begins to find understanding among the people.

It is from such state incapacity that something might actually grow. To neighbors, it is still the same state, just experiencing a temporary parliamentary crisis, but that’s fine—someday the politicians will agree, and we will continue to settle matters with them. This is what politicians from surrounding countries think, so they don’t force their recipes for state organization on them. How many years it will take for a temporary crisis to finally solidify into a stable status quo—I cannot say.

In short, it seems to me that to build an ancap society, it is far more important to have a mature, rational society rather than a gathering of supporters of simple and effective solutions that are just as bandit-like as those of the state.

Nothing special, pay no attention, just a small crisis, it will definitely pass, like May thunderstorms, so to speak

Is flying an aircraft over territory belonging to another person trespassing under ancap?

Do you need to ask them for permission before flying? Is it necessary to somehow amortize the risk of the aircraft falling on the property of people located beneath it, and how to compensate for the noise of the engines/propellers? What is your personal/Montelibero/Montenegrin position on this issue?

L29Ah (the question is accompanied by a donation of 0.012345678901 Monero)

I like how David Friedman analyzes this and many other questions (sorry for buzzing your ears with him so much). He analyzes the topic in great detail in the book The Machinery of Freedom. I have managed to get through about a third of it so far. Much more concisely—in one of the chapters of The Machinery of Freedom. There, economic analysis of law is also used as a basis for reasoning. This often allows for a fairly clear generalization of those specific answers that I have to give from time to time.

To put it very briefly, the lower the transaction costs for proposed deals to purchase rights to actions that violate others’ interests, the more convenient it is to recognize the owners’ right to prohibit such actions. If necessary, the potential trespasser will buy the right of passage. And the higher the transaction costs, the more convenient the procedure of judicial settlement of such cases becomes through claims for damages. No one defines a specific threshold altitude at which one can fly over someone else’s property, but if the flight caused damage, it will have to be compensated in court. Flights over someone else’s territory at a sufficiently high altitude (so as to at least not crash into terrain irregularities in normal mode and not frighten people with the wild roar of engines) are clearly the second case; obtaining permission to fly from all owners over whose territory it may occur is an unrealistic task.

Specifically in Montenegro, there is state licensing for the import of drones into the country, certain weight restrictions, a ban on flying above a certain altitude, and other highly sophisticated restrictions, some of which can be bypassed, while in others it proves too expensive, and it is simpler to accept that a certain application of drones is too troublesome to engage in systematically. Naturally, we in Montelibero find the complete repeal of all these regulations desirable, because drones can at least be used to take beautiful photos, which is useful for promoting the project. But, of course, the drone owner must be prepared for the fact that if their expensive toy falls on someone else’s plot, they may well lose it. The plot owner is not responsible if a cow steps on the fallen drone, or if his underage son decides to break something off this unexpected gift. He is not even obliged to let the drone owner onto his territory—here, the right of prohibition applies, because the transaction costs for purchasing the right of passage are small.

Here we filmed our plot with a drone, but this required flying over the neighbors as well

Book about ancap – the first part, theoretical, is completely finished

Since the last update, I have slightly reworked the chapter on the market, added a brief summary, and in terms of formatting, I finished the navigation between chapters. Now it can be read as a fully independent work with a sufficiently complete, yet maximally concise presentation of the libertarian worldview.

The book is available to read online by chapter, as well as in epub format for those who prefer the e-book format.

If you know any sufficiently competent libertarian theorists, please pass this text to them for review. Before starting the practical part of the book, I would like to ensure that I haven’t forgotten anything important in the theory. If they don’t mind publishing their reviews, please let me know about that as well.

In the second part of the book, I will attempt to describe an anarcho-capitalist society in a sufficiently structured and also maximally concise manner—what features it might have and which are highly unlikely.