Тег: Panarchy

Incels, a discussion

I received a wealth of feedback on the article about how to cook incels.

There were so many absolutely enthusiastic reviews—more than any of my other articles have ever gathered—that I’m bewildered. By all journalistic standards, the article is terrible because a hostile attitude toward the subject matter literally seeps through. On the other hand, standards are one thing, and reader sympathies are another!

But there was criticism too.

I’ll start with the simplest. A photo of a decision-maker’s secretary was used as a clear illustration of the fact that a woman’s success is roughly not determined by male appearance, and therefore, the entire high-minded incel theory simply crashes against practice. Perhaps the caption for the photo wasn’t clear enough, but generally, I wanted to pay a compliment to the subject of the photo. It didn’t work—oh well. Here, I am in an extremely advantageous position, where taking offense means raising suspicions of one’s own affiliation with the group being studied.

A huge number of extremely detailed recommendations were received regarding the nuances of using psychoactive substances. Among the unusual suggestions, cocaine is recommended to increase self-confidence. Well, that’s for the truly desperate; I wouldn’t prescribe that to just anyone. I’m glad my readers are experienced and well-educated people.

But the most serious complaint was the accusation of failing to fully explore the topic. I was reminded of my joint article with Bitarch about the targeted promotion of libertarianism, and people wondered why, in this case, I am admitting helplessness and writing some off-topic piece about individual salvation instead of putting together universal arguments for representatives of the group in question. My mistake. Here it comes.

Targeted promotion of libertarianism for incels

1. The state benefits from the destruction of the institution of the family because it wants the individual to depend only on the state and not be able to rely on their loved ones. But if the state becomes a nanny for the person, the person becomes infantile, and the woman does too. Instead of looking at truly important things, like a groom’s wealth or his prospects, she acts on the principle of “this one is handsome, I want him, and this one is ugly, get him out of my sight.” Without the state and its hyper-protection, a woman would have to behave more responsibly, and a man’s appearance would be far from the primary consideration when choosing.

2. The state caters to immigrants. In the US, these are sultry Latinos. In Europe—sultry Arabs and Blacks. In Russia—hot southern guys as well. This further increases the competition for women. Without the state, the local community would quickly kick out outsiders who do not respect local cultural norms.

3. Speaking of cultural norms. There is such a thing as panarchy. You can establish your own contractual jurisdiction, and it will have everything you need: fines for refusing sex, a ban on divorce, no prosecution for so-called marital rape, and so on. The only restriction is that joining the jurisdiction must be voluntary. Do you think too few girls will join your jurisdiction? Well, then choose the jurisdiction of some Puritans; there, submission to the husband and all that other stuff will be preached, and paying a tithe and attending church on Sundays is not such a high price for strict biblical family morality. But first, of course, you’ll have to push the state aside.

Look, so many submissive tyans! Just lovely!

New translation!

We present for your consideration a translation of the article by Rainer Eichenberger and Bruno Frey “Functional Overlapping and Competing Jurisdictions (FOCJ): Developing the Idea of Modern Federalism”.

The article examines a model for a soft, evolutionary transition to a libertarian society through functional panarchy. The model was developed for actual implementation via political means (which is why it is non-radical and complies with the requirements of legislation on political parties). It could serve as a strong foundation for updating the program of the Libertarian Party of Russia, as it is well-suited for heterogeneous political entities such as the Russian Federation. Although a significant portion of the article is dedicated to proposals for reforming the European Union, a separate chapter analyzes the specifics of implementing FOCJ in developing countries.

Translation: Kreadon
Editing: Ancap-chan
General coordination: Bitarch

Minarchists are not marginals? Well, excuse me.

Yesterday I published an article by Bitarch “Minarchism is a Marginal Ideology”. In it, the author criticizes the minarchist approach, arguing that minarchists are unable to come to power through democratic means if they run openly on a minarchist platform.

Indeed, this thesis does not contradict history. The USA was formed as a result of a revolution, Georgian reforms happened after a revolution, Chilean reforms after a coup; in Singapore and New Zealand, minarchist reformers came to power through deception, broadcasting a social-democratic agenda before the elections. Only Margaret Thatcher was honestly elected under the banner of shrinking the state, and indeed honestly pursued it, but she failed to achieve stable success in this matter, and today statist reaction reigns supreme in Great Britain.

Bitarch concludes that minarchists, understanding their marginality, will gravitate toward violent methods of imposing their ideology, which gives him reason to state that from the perspective of the average person, minarchist politicians are liberal fascists. Naturally, such a loud thesis could not fail to provoke a sharp reaction.

Alex Kotov, host of the Crypto-Libertarian channel, published an article with objections today. Due to the somewhat disjointed nature of the article, it is difficult to comment on, so I will touch upon just a couple of theses.

Bitarch writes that a minarchist state assumes the unity of laws throughout the entire territory, meaning that conditional leftists will miss their leftist laws. Thus, they will simply vote against the minarchist party and keep their labor code, minimum wage, veteran benefits, and other achievements of the welfare state. Panarchy, however, assumes a peaceful separation, where each interest club has its own rules, including those regarding the organization of social security and the resolution of labor disputes.

Alex responds that the forced redistribution of income contradicts libertarianism, and therefore panarchy is not a variety of libertarianism, and accordingly, the article criticizes not only minarchism but libertarianism as a whole.

This is a slightly strange thesis, since within the framework of contractual relations, a subscription fee for an agreed package of services can be stipulated. Another matter is that any contract can be terminated at any moment; otherwise, it is already slavery. So it is not surprising that another of Alex’s theses — “minarchists leave only the function of ensuring the fulfillment of contracts to the state, regardless of the content of the contract” — will logically be perceived by any anarchist (and even a supporter of panarchy) as a very bad sign. It happens that people sign oppressive contracts because at that moment they see no other way to make ends meet. When circumstances change, they leave these oppressive relationships with a sense of deep satisfaction, and, of course, a court of a minarchist state that decides to demand compliance with the original terms of the contract at that moment will be perceived as a violation of justice. A well-known ancap like Mikhail Svetov speaks quite extensively and in detail about the importance of the fact that any contract can be refused.

Now, another argument against panarchy seemed quite interesting to me. Supporters of panarchy claim that free competition between contractual jurisdictions will lead to the victory of the most free in the competitive race, so that leftists will gradually dissipate on their own. However, in the real world, the opposite is observed. Free competition between states with different laws leads to the fact that freedoms are curtailed everywhere, and governments are happy to adopt each other’s experience specifically in curtailing freedoms. Thus, competition alone is not enough; a moral compass is needed. Therefore, natural law rules, and contractual law sucks.

Overall, this is a fairly strong argument, but I want to draw attention to a very important difference between territorial and extraterritorial jurisdictions. It is much easier for extraterritorial ones to expand. Take such a wonderful liberal territorial jurisdiction as Hong Kong. People are practically climbing over each other there, so great is the desire of residents of neighboring China to live under liberalism. If this jurisdiction were extraterritorial, there would be no need to go huddle on an island; you simply sign a contract and live under Hong Kong law, pay Hong Kong taxes, and receive Hong Kong social services. And if you want handouts in your old age, you enter into a contract with some leftist jurisdiction where you are entitled to a basic income. What will the competition between such jurisdictions lead to? Either leftist jurisdictions will begin to impose entry restrictions, admitting only the young and healthy, or they will break under the weight of the social burden.

So, progress in social mores occurs not by ethics alone, but also by the competition of economic systems.

In conclusion, I want to announce an article where I intend to bring ancap, minarchism, panarchy, and agorism into a more or less coherent picture. I hope to release it within a week and count on the fact that there will be fewer such disputes after that.

Minarchism is a marginal ideology

Bitarch’s Column

While reading Aleksei Shustov’s book “After the State”, I came across an interesting thought:

“Such ‘choices’ [the choice of ECU], obviously, provide a fundamentally different level of freedom and ensure real justice compared to choices in a majority democracy. The latter does not take into account individual differences and forces everyone to live by the rules of the majority. After all, if one person feels great in a system with broad independence and high responsibility, while another prefers social security and is ready for high taxes, then either one or the other will inevitably be oppressed in their self-realization.”

The author of this book cannot be called a libertarian in any way. Perhaps he had not even heard the word when he wrote his book. He arrived at the idea of panarchy purely from an understanding of the destructiveness of the “majority democracy” model, which has now become synonymous with the word “state.” Accordingly, he looks at the world impartially. Unlike many libertarian authors, Shustov takes into account the demands of broad layers of the population, whom some ideological libertarians contemptuously call “lefties.”

Be realistic — such people are the majority even in Switzerland, which is “ideal” for many libertarians. Active attempts to promote minarchist ideas did not yield tangible results even with full freedom of choice and huge funding. Let alone Russia, with its paternalistic mentality and impoverished population.

As can be seen from the quote from the book, a “lefty” will feel oppressed under minarchism and will offer the maximum possible resistance to the ruling party (most likely, simply not allowing the libertarian party to come to power). From the perspective of a conditional “average Joe,” minarchism is a certain form of “liberal fascism” — where liberal values are forcibly imposed on people who wish to live under paternalism (since under minarchism, courts hold a territorial monopoly, and laws are mandatory throughout the state’s territory).

It turns out that in the eyes of voters, minarchists will look exactly as “lefties” look in the eyes of libertarians. As a libertarian, would you vote for a “lefty” proposing to impose ideas of social justice on the whole society? I don’t think so. And will a “lefty,” seeing that you propose to impose the exact opposite on the whole society, vote for you? I don’t think so either. Given that the majority of society supports at least some form of social support, the electoral chances of minarchists tend toward zero. Many of them do not want to acknowledge this fact and begin to hint at the usefulness of applying physical violence against their opponents (“Pinochet’s helicopter tours”), showing that in their methods of struggling for power, they will not be inferior even to their extreme ideological opponents — the Stalinists.

To achieve electoral success, any libertarian party must either become a kind of “people’s party,” attracting people from as wide a spectrum of views as possible, or form a bloc with a left-wing party based on a shared agenda, which is somewhat harder to imagine. Perhaps the LPR should discard the idea of imposing liberal values and change its program from minarchist to panarchist? As history shows, the chances of success for such a program are very high (with it, Abraham Kuyper won the elections in the Netherlands — read the article on pillarization).

minarchists examining their electoral rating

Extraterritorial identity. The example of the Netherlands.

Bitarch’s Column

Critics of libertarianism often express the idea that libertarians (both ancaps and minarchists) are very similar to Marxists. In Marx’s teaching, the base (economic relations) plays a decisive role in the development of society, while the superstructure (culture, religion, morality) merely follows it and has no particular influence. This is often said by right-wing nationalists and conservatives; for example, Olgerd Semyonov in his stream criticizes libertarianism precisely from these positions.

Whatever one may say, there is a grain of truth in this criticism. Human behavior is not determined exclusively by economic incentives. German Sterligov is unlikely to want to sell his bread to a gay person, even if the latter is willing to pay a “cosmic” price for this obviously overpriced product. Similarly, a believing Christian would not serve in the Swedish army for any amount of money if he were asked to participate in a hypothetical Swedish war against Nigeria, launched to support LGBT rights in the latter. This is also seen as a weakness of ancap and minarchism—an ideologically cohesive opponent may have a strong advantage in a war against an economically motivated libertarian army. Of course, this would only happen if they gained possession of modern high-tech weaponry. But, as we know, even the “barmaleis” from a certain well-known banned organization learned how to manufacture UAVs. Technology, although slowly, inevitably flows to “backward” peoples.

But identity does not have to be territorial. Under panarchy, when there is a free choice of the set of rules by which a person will live within an ECU, extraterritorial identity (the sense of belonging to one’s ECU) will be even stronger than the national identity (the sense of belonging to one’s ethno-territorial nation-state) so beloved by right-wing conservatives.

A good example is the history of pillarization in the Netherlands (Holland). At the beginning of the 20th century, Abraham Kuyper and his religious-conservative party “ARP” (Anti-Revolutionary Party) came to power, and they began to implement the ideology of “sphere sovereignty.” The goal of the reform was to stop the growing influence of leftist ideas by dividing society into so-called pillars (English: “pillar”, Dutch: “zuilen”). In terms understandable to us, a minarchist state was created where almost all state functions, except for the security functions, were transferred to the pillars (which could be called proto-ECUs). The pillars were completely extraterritorial and included people with specific political-religious views. There were four: Catholic, Protestant, Social-Democratic, and Liberal. Each of them had its own schools, trade unions (which regulated labor relations at the time), media, and healthcare system. Confederations of entrepreneurs were also included among them.

After World War II, leftist forces devoted enormous resources to the depillarization of Dutch society. Given the high popularity of ideas of equality in the post-war period and rapid economic growth, the functions of the pillars gradually shifted to the central government, and society began to unify. Nevertheless, remnants of pillarization exist in the Netherlands to this day. The sense of belonging to one’s political-religious group could not be completely destroyed, no matter how hard the social democrats and euro-liberals tried.

What conclusions can be drawn from all this? First—under panarchy, it is very likely that there will be a division of ECUs based on political-religious-cultural principles. People will feel a real belonging to their group and a willingness to defend it not only for money. Second—no matter in what form minarchism exists, it will eventually lead back to a “big state.” Even “panarchic minarchism” proved unstable. If Abraham Kuyper had gone further, transferring the security functions to the pillars and thereby fully completing the transformation of the state into a full-fledged panarchy, leftist forces would not have been able to impose uniform values on the entire society again.

Commentary by Ancap-chan

As far as I understand from the provided Wikipedia article, pillarization was undermined not only from above, through the desire of politicians to expand into new electoral groups, but also from below, since far from everyone wished to live in a strictly segregated society where you study at the school of your pillar, spend your leisure time within your pillar, and even make daily purchases within the same pillar. Then two compatriots accidentally meet, for example, abroad, and are surprised to discover that people in neighboring pillars are also human, and then, for example, an inter-pillar marriage occurs, and that is where the problems arise.

And delegating security functions to the pillars would not have helped. During the Second World War, resistance to the Nazis was pillarized. I would not be surprised if service to the Reich was also pillarized. The erosion of extraterritorial identities occurred not because of the forced absorption of some by others, but because of the weakening of contradictions in society that no longer required the maintenance of strict, permanent internal boundaries. Now, by the way, pillarization may find a second wind, as a powerful Muslim pillar is already de facto operating in these countries, just not formally organized at an official level.

In general, the idea of panarchy is indeed quite organic for Europe with its rich experience of religious wars—that is, wars between specifically extraterritorial identities. Russia has no such experience. Although, for instance, in Dagestan, some rudiments of pillarization are present—too many nationalities on a tiny patch of land with a high population density. As for the prospects of living peacefully in neighboring jurisdictions with those who, for example, are nostalgic for the USSR, that personally seems unlikely to me. Although recent debates between a nationalist and a communist moderated by a libertarian show that at least some semblance of dialogue is beginning.

So I would summarize more simply: do not stop people from finding ways to live peacefully with each other, and they will pleasantly surprise you.

P.S. Bitarch disagrees with a number of points in my commentary and intends to release an article on the doctrine of deterrence soon, where the issue of mutual coercion to peaceful coexistence will be examined in more detail.

Foundations of Panarchism

Michael Rozeff

Translation: Egor Vasilchenko, edited by Ancap-tyan

Original publication: July 1, 2009

Panarchism is a new political philosophy based on and extending the concept of the consent of the governed, the roots of which trace back, primarily, to John Locke. The idea of government based on the consent of those governed permeated revolutionary America. Evidence of this can be found in Article 6 of the “Virginia Declaration of Rights” and in the “Essex Results,” in the words of Benjamin Franklin, who wrote: “In a free society, rulers are servants of the people, and the people are their master and sovereign,” and even the Declaration of Independence itself asserts that “to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

Panarchism proposes a comprehensive expansion of freedom for the consensual choice of government in form and content. It proposes the creation of a government whose status will be agreed upon with all persons participating in its organization for themselves, and conversely, for all those who will not agree to be subject to such a government, it will not have power.

Panarchy is a form of human relations in which every person has the freedom to choose their own social and political governance without outside coercion. Panarchism means that people can freely enter into social and political relationships and freely exit them. And this means that government exists only with the consent and thanks to the consent of those whom it governs.

Panarchism gives a new understanding of who the governed are, what government represents, and what consent between the former and the latter means. This gives rise to a new concept of the non-territorial state and provides a new look at things such as power and sovereignty. By viewing government as non-territorial, panarchism shifts the emphasis of the movement for freedom from the destruction of the state, which some may prefer, to the creation and acquisition of such governments that could suit each of us.

Free people in a free society already practice, to some extent, the principles of panarchy. By personal consent, they interact with those they want to interact with (if the other person also wants to interact with them), and do not interact with those they do not want to. Their social ties change over time, by place, by duration, and in other aspects. They choose their friends, place of residence, work, hobby clubs, and church parishes based on individual wishes, doing so without social coercion. Free people form, on the basis of voluntary consent, various organizations, associations, and groups. They form sub-societies and “peoples,” representing groups of people voluntarily united by various characteristics and interests. In doing so, they at the same time create many coexisting forms of social organization and governance, the basis of which is not territorial (although, likely, it can be), but built on the interrelationships of people.

Panarchism proposes simply to extend the already existing and realized in life principles of panarchy to the state (or individual functions thereof), so that people are free to create peoples and choose their own forms of governance.

But why? Why can the desire for such changes be considered justified? Because today the possibility of consent of people is too limited to provide them with significant sovereignty. Because today the state and rulers have become the sovereigns, and the people — their servants. Because complex systems of elections and parties have reduced the role of human consent to zero. Because many potential new peoples are limited in the right to self-determination. Does freedom of choice mean — choosing when voting for one of two parties, which will govern a single monopolistic government? No, rather active consent regarding the very form, as well as the content of the governance relations, fits this definition.

Why panarchism? Because under today’s organization of governance, the state is far from our needs, and we have no right to choose its form. Because the whole planet is covered by states that too often bring injustice, threats to security, disorder, waste of resources, suffering, death, and destruction, as they have done throughout all the history of humanity. Because states and governments concentrate and increase power, using it for purposes that many of us do not share. And because today’s governments legitimize and support the contentious struggle for dominance, where the victory of one group means losses for another, a struggle that consumes more and more resources and diverts energy from productive to unproductive use.

The freedom provided by panarchy promises us hope for a better life, since it will provide the opportunity for each of us to participate in social and political relationships based on our own choice and in accordance with our own beliefs. When people stop putting up with governments that only worsen their situation, the free choice of governments will provide a kind of system of checks and balances in case of governmental failures and errors — it is precisely the absence of this that is the most critical missing part of the current political system.

Panarchy presupposes the existence of many societies and sub-societies in one country, region, or area. There should not be a single sovereign power extending the effect of the law everywhere, without the consent of those people whom it tries to govern. In panarchy, numerous and diverse sources of self-sufficient sovereignty exist side by side with each other, drawing their legitimacy from the consent of those who are ready to live by the set of governance relations they propose. At the same time, people will be able to voluntarily join diverse governance associations, different from those that on a geographical basis are prescribed to them by authority.

When the American revolutionaries called for the consent of the government and the governed, they were paving the way for a non-territorial state structure, but at the same time, they were veering off this path. Just as they avoided the question of slavery, they avoided the question of how a legitimate government and people are formed, how consent between them is determined, and the people’s right to secede. In its Article 14, the “Virginia Declaration of Rights” sought to “preserve the sovereignty of Virginia over its restless, extensive western counties.” It proclaimed that “the people have a right to a single government,” and that therefore “no separate or independent government can be created or established within the government of Virginia.” This particular territorial concept of the state was justified by a false appeal to the mystical “right to a single government,” the goal of which was to prevent the formation of West Virginia. About 85 years later, West Virginia, which for many decades had had plenty of reasons not to obey Richmond, was finally able to secede.

Since then, little has changed. Despite hundreds of separatist movements across the world, the idea of the territorial unity of the state has not changed. And indeed, most of such movements themselves perceive the state as attached to a specific territory. American federalism became nationalism. Modern governments sacrifice society, basing their claim to legitimate power not so much on the consent of the governed, as on territorial claims.

The idea of government must be separated from the idea of the territorial state and from the notion that the government of such a state is everything a government can be and what it is. Since the state is single, territorial, and uses violent methods, due to this idea, the opinion is formed that government must necessarily possess all the aforementioned characteristics. The territorial concept supports the power of current states over the territories they occupy. It devalues the opinion of the people and strips it of real significance, replacing it with manipulations with votes, party platforms, lobbying, gerrymandering, force, and the monetary flows of election campaigns. The idea of territorial rule without the consent of the people condemns humanity to life without one of the most important freedoms — the freedom to choose one’s government.

It is mistaken to equate government with the executive and administrative apparatuses of the monopolistic state. When this is done by supporters of the state, they leave no or almost no room for those who do not agree with them and want to live with their own structure of governance. When this is done by its opponents — they also act against government, from a position that does not allow those who want to have various forms of their own government, to realize their choice.

Government is social coordination of personal human relationships. Government is inevitable to the extent to which the interaction of people with each other is inevitable. Opponents of government, if they do not avoid all social interaction, will be able to do without government no more than statists. But the necessity of government does not mean that it must be coercive and territorial. We have an alternative to living in a single territorial state that constantly creates and imposes all kinds of rules for each of us. Panarchy is this alternative.

We ourselves govern vast areas of human activity — with the consent of people, without being tied to territory, and without a state. It has been so throughout all history — it is so now. People in society create systems of governance from the most diverse and numerous sources, which can be moral and ethical norms, customs, precedents, rules, principles, manners, religion, treaties, agreements, concepts, and contracts, and implement them with the help of various social mechanisms, institutions, and organizations, including the family, associations, churches, schools, corporations, and business firms. Society, in this sense being a multitude of separate interconnected and diverse societies, already reflects a high degree of panarchy. Societies everywhere already use panarchy as a beneficial principle of social organization and order.

Panarchism presupposes the extension of panarchy even further. It means a world in which people will be able to live, choosing for themselves governance relations at their own discretion, and allowing neighbors to do the same. A society with such freedom will hold together, maintaining order, just as it has always happened: through a complex network of common values, beliefs, lifestyle, language, and other similar traits, acting through the personal interests of each person, embodied in individual, joint, and collective efforts. It will be even more cohesive than today’s society, since the imposed government, which today creates the ground for political and economic confrontations, uprisings, and civil wars, will be eliminated.

Different people understand differently what independence and freedom are, and even when they agree with each other, they put different meanings into the concept of freedom. One woman might choose to work for another person for a salary, while another — perceive wage labor as slavery. One man might voluntarily join the army, another — consider the draft slavery. These different views on good and bad social organization and government can coexist in panarchy. Freedom and government are not at opposite poles. The abolition of government in itself will not bring freedom for all, the abolition of government and the replacement of it with one’s own, personal vision of freedom also will not be able to do this. Freedom for all presupposes the possibility for everyone to choose their own government, one whose structure does not contradict their views. In panarchy, men and women are free to be unfree (in the eyes of others) to any desired degree. They can enter into any governance relations they want. This separates panarchy from those political concepts that deny the right of a person to choose a government and a state. Panarchists do not seek to destroy governments that others want. They do not deny others the freedom to be unfree. However, they deny others (people, governments, or states) the freedom to make them unfree.

As soon as we reflect on the question of what government is, we will be able to leave behind the idea of “some” government and a “specific” government. Government consists of a set of functions that can be clearly defined. The choice is not between today’s government and none; there are many intermediate options.

National governments took from local communities such important functions as the protection of the elderly, aid to the needy, and medical care. They did this with the help of the convoluted rule of the majority and voting procedures designed to bypass the real consent of the governed. Governments throughout the world often suppress various minorities. The introduction of nationwide laws discriminates and suppresses all those who do not agree with them and do not want to trust their government with the decision of some critically important issues. A medical assistance program, for example, includes the seizure and redistribution of wealth. Such a program could well be non-territorial and consensual. Mr. K. may subscribe to such a program and relate to the government that will deduct contributions for it from his salary, while Mr. D. may not do all this. And they can at the same time live next door.

Many of today’s government functions can remain for those who are ready to use them, but become voluntary for those who do not want to. The main idea here is not to destroy government, but to make it voluntary. A huge number of regulations of labor relations, energy, education, healthcare, and social security are such that one neighbor can peacefully live without some of them, even if another, conversely, wants to follow them. Instead of trying to cancel a medical assistance program or convince voters to vote for it, accepting the rules of the game of a monopolistic and territorial government, panarchism approaches the problem of lack of consent and the unjust power of government from another side. Let those who want this program — receive it, and those who do not — be free from it. Panarchism stands on the ground of high morality. Why should those who do not want to participate in a program be involved in it by those who want it? How is this different from forcing everyone to belong to one church? What consent of the governed can there be when we are driven, whether we want it or not, into programs that affect our life?

Coordination problems related to human interaction will not disappear. Governance reform, even in those cases where it is not related to coordination, can be sufficiently difficult. Panarchism does not deny these difficulties. But it offers a fair and peaceful alternative, which can be achieved peacefully, and in which the state renounces its territorial claims. One can move toward it slowly, step by step, or through sharp leaps. Most likely, consensual and non-consensual governments will exist side by side with each other for some time. Changes, small and large, are unpredictable. People themselves must ensure their advancement and accomplishment. Every step, peaceful and non-aggressive, that people take toward a life with their own and voluntary government, will be a step on the path to a more complete panarchy and greater freedom.

I express my gratitude for the helpful comments of Adam Notte and John Zewb, and I take full responsibility for all errors that I may have made here.

Parasite or symbiont?

Today I was in Bangkok, at the Temple of the Emerald Buddha. There is nothing to do there: the Buddha is small, photography is forbidden, talking is forbidden; you can only stand and think about the meaning of all existence. That is what I did. I have never been into meditation, so I don’t know how similar this was to it, but at some point, I suddenly grasped the entire beautiful and amazing picture of spontaneous orders—how the simplest rules followed by people give rise to the most complex and exquisitely coordinated mechanisms of human interaction.

The state was there too, and it also appeared in the form of something very similar to spontaneous orders. After all, it also grows out of people following fairly simple and uniform rules, but it forms the most complex and sophisticated mechanisms of robbery and deception. There were no total clichés in this revelation, such as identifying society and the state as yin and yang, eternally struggling and interpenetrating; rather, the state became increasingly indistinguishable from society.

Anyway, then I left the temple, shook myself off a bit, and began to reflect in the usual European way.

Zolotoryov defines spontaneous orders as the stable result of people observing simple rules, which is formed unintentionally and is useful for the members of society. The word “useful” in this definition smells of voluntarism, and it would be better to do without it. The state is also formed from people observing simple rules, and for some time now, the result of their observance has also become quite stable. What are these rules?

Early states were formed by following the rule “take your neighbor as an accomplice and rob the stranger.” Such states, as Zolotoryov correctly notes, usually disappeared without a trace shortly after the death of the founder, and people returned to the familiar stateless society.

Then, having established themselves where people had nowhere to flee, states mutated—that is, basically, the rule that formed them began to change. Now it became this: “there is a special breed of shepherds; they have the right to eat the sheep, but in exchange, they are destined to protect them from wolves.” To be more precise, that is how I phrased the ideological justification for the new type of state, but the rule became something like: “if you feel you have the strength to lead the herd, become the shepherd, and it is yours.”

This is an extremely stable construction that still works perfectly in paternalistic societies, and especially vividly in Thailand, where the authority of the royal power is very great, criticism of the king is unthinkable, and yet, regarding each king, people proudly tell not of what lands he annexed or how many captives participated in his triumph, but how many temples, universities, and bridges he built.

But liberal ideas ripened in European society, and the state mutated again—that is, the rule whose observance forms the new type of state changed once more. Now it sounds roughly like this: “if you can convince a sucker that you know how things should be done, then lead them.”

So here it is. The consistent observance of this rule should lead to a state that is exclusively herbivorous and, generally, harmless, because if you don’t convince the sucker that you know how things should be done, you will have to leave them alone. And if the sucker is convinced by someone else, then they are that person’s cash cow. In other words, such a rule should produce panarchy, which has been mentioned several times on this channel.

It’s just that from the time of the French Revolution until roughly the Cuban Revolution, a strange intermediate version of the rule worked: “if you have convinced enough suckers that you know how things should be done, then take them as accomplices and rob everyone as best you can.” Obviously, the resulting state turns out to be very unstable: suckers make poor accomplices, and they lose faith quite quickly—while they have to be paid an enormous amount for their complicity in the robbery. This gave rise to the total debt crisis of modern democracies, constant popular unrest over trifles that would have been completely unnoticed by the subjects of a shepherd-type state, and other symptoms of malaise.

Well, the next mutation of the state-forming idea after panarchy should logically be (okay, not logically, but in my revelation, it is exactly so) a formulation like this: “don’t treat people like suckers, and you will be able to sell them more.” And that, kids, is ancap.

Om!

Insurance State

Bitarch’s Column

This book is a structured collection of the most significant articles from the LiveJournal blog of the well-known libertarian philosopher Oleg Tarakanov (“Laxy Catal”). The articles are presented in full and unaltered, without edits from the compiler.

In the opinion of the compiler, Tarakanov’s work examines the most realistic model of social organization in terms of current implementation possibilities. It is designed to solve the ever-multiplying problems of people in nearly all modern states based on territorial monopoly and the “tyranny of the majority.”

Oleg Tarakanov himself uses the term he coined, “insurance roofs,” instead of the word “panarchy,” but the compiler found it possible to use the more commonly accepted concept. Panarchy does not aim for the complete destruction of the state, but advocates for the abolition of its territorial monopoly and for voluntary participation in it. It is a system of extraterritorial contractual (and/or competing) jurisdictions (ECJs), in which different people can choose their own “virtual state” while residing in the same territory.

Such an approach ensures competition between jurisdictions, forcing them to spend budgets more efficiently and not infringe upon the personal and economic freedoms of citizens. But more importantly, people gain the opportunity to live by the rules that are closest to them personally, rather than those that were imposed by the will of the majority living in a particular territory. After all, in an ordinary territorial state, only a small portion are actually able to emigrate, while others are forced to endure anything, which is precisely what governments exploit, ignoring their interests.

I can assume that some convinced followers of Rothbard will not consider panarchy to be true libertarianism. Nevertheless, compared to unstable minarchism and difficult-to-implement anarcho-capitalism (ancap), panarchy is the most realistic and easily “sellable to people” option for moving away from the current sad state of affairs. In a mode of panarchy, diplomats already live according to international agreements, so we are talking merely about the large-scale implementation of a ready-made mechanism that has already proven itself.

If you did not like the potestatic (“force-based”) approach to bringing under jurisdiction and the enforcement of court decisions in Oleg Tarakanov’s model, do not turn away from the idea of panarchy entirely. Consider the Bitnation project, where all of this is carried out absolutely without any coercion based on a blockchain reputation system.

You can ask your question regarding panarchy and libertarianism on the Ancap-tyan website, in the VK public “Anti-state”, and on my page.

Bitarch

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The Westphalian state, panarchy, and ancap using IT as an example

Column of Bitarch

Three main types of system organization can be identified: centralized, decentralized, and distributed. This applies to all complex systems with multiple nodes, both technological and social. In a centralized system, there is a single point of control (a server) through which all interaction of regular nodes (clients) occurs, both with the server itself and with each other. In a decentralized system, there is no single server; instead, there is a certain number of super-nodes connected to other super-nodes as well as to clients (client-to-client interaction occurs with the participation of super-nodes). In a distributed system, the network is entirely peer-to-peer, and clients interact with each other directly, without any intermediary.

Let’s consider the history of the Internet. In its early days, if you wanted to distribute a file to other people, you had to upload it to your own server (Web, FTP), from where anyone interested could then download it. As the flow of visitors increased, your server might fail to handle the load, or the bandwidth of the communication channel could be exhausted, which ultimately made downloading the file impossible. I don’t think it’s necessary to mention the extreme vulnerability of such a system to a “forceful” server shutdown—that should be obvious.

Later, decentralized file-sharing systems appeared, such as Kazaa, eDonkey, and BitTorrent. These no longer had a central server that could easily fail. User interaction occurred through many independent super-nodes (for example, torrent trackers), which provided file search and coordination of data regarding the availability of files on regular users’ computers. For greater resilience and improved quality of service, fully peer-to-peer (distributed) networks later emerged, such as BitTorrent with DHT, which can operate without a torrent tracker at all, or the InterPlanetary File System (IPFS) on the blockchain, which is fully resistant to censorship and individual node failure.

Decided to create your own internet resource? You’re in luck! Today there is a sea of options for hosting it. A quarter of a century ago, it would have been significantly more difficult. Back then, you needed to possess a huge sum of money to buy a physical server, place it in a room with a high-speed Internet connection, powerful power supply, cooling, etc. It is not surprising that there were practically no individual online projects at that time.

The boom of the Internet coincided with the appearance of virtualization technology, which allowed several virtual machines (VMs) to run on one physical server simultaneously. For example, there are the well-known VirtualBox and VMware. Each virtual machine allowed it to be treated as a physical server, solving the problem of running several applications simultaneously (each may require its own versions of system libraries and OS settings, so running them simultaneously under one OS could create a conflict).

The number of applications grew, but the ability of a physical server to run VMs is limited by memory and disk space. A solution emerged—containerization—virtualization at the operating system level (e.g., Docker). It uses the shared kernel of the physical server’s operating system, and each container encapsulates only the application itself, the required versions of libraries, and specific OS settings (rather than a full OS, as in a VM). This allows for a significant reduction in the size of the container image compared to a VM (which makes it easier to move from server to server), and also reduces the load on the physical server (meaning more applications can be run on it, lowering the price for end users).

How does all of this relate to social organization? Currently, we live in a fully centralized state with a territorial monopoly (the so-called Westphalian state) and constantly encounter it. As in the previous example with different versions of system libraries for different applications, different people have different values, religions, and ideas about life. It is complete absurdity to believe that, for example, Turks and Kurds can live by the same laws! And, as we see, any attempts by the Turkish authorities to impose uniform rules are met with resistance, up to armed struggle.

The simplest solution in this situation seems to be a transition to a decentralized system in the form of panarchy (a system of contractual jurisdictions – CJ), where each group with shared views has its own government, not tied to a territory. Some libertarians may not like this option, as they want to choose “components” on the market entirely according to their own tastes and not depend on a CJ. This results in a fully distributed model, which we call anarcho-capitalism (ancap).

History has many examples of transitioning from a centralized system to a decentralized one, and then to a distributed one. Here is another example—electronic media. First, there was fully centralized radio and television, then came the decentralized Internet with websites, and only now are the sprouts of fully distributed applications appearing (such as Bitcoin, or Ethereum with smart contracts). I cannot even provide examples of a transition from a centralized system directly to a distributed one (bypassing the decentralized), so I consider such a thing extremely unlikely. This also applies to social organization, and it is naive to believe that we can move directly from a centralized state (even a minarchist one) to ancap. I provided practical arguments in my article “Realistic Libertarianism”.