leftlibertarian.org

Check out Roderick Long's Liberalism vs. Fascism. A sample:

While both libertarians and Marxists complained of the power of wealthy elites, they disagreed on the remedy, because they disagreed on the origin of the problem. For the Marxists, plutocracy was a product of the market; the ruling class emerged through commerce, and only subsequently seized control of the state in order to consolidate its already established hegemony. (Marx himself was ambivalent on this question, but Engels solidified the orthodox Marxist position.) Hence for the Marxists it was the market that needed to be suppressed; this is the origin of the left-wing view that fascism is simply a manifestation of free-market "capitalism." For the libertarians, by contrast, a ruling class depends for its power on the power of the state, and so it is the latter that needs to be suppressed.

The libertarians did not, however, make the mistake of supposing that state power by itself was the sole problem. Since rulers are generally outnumbered by those they rule, these thinkers saw that state power itself cannot survive except through popular acceptance, which the state lacks the power to compel. In Spencer's words, "In the case of a government representing a dominant class . . . [t]he very existence of a class monopolizing all power, is due to certain sentiments in the commonality." ("The Social Organism.") Likewise Dunoyer writes:

The first mistake, and to my mind the most serious, is not sufficiently seeing difficulties where they are�?not recognising them except in governments. Since it is indeed there that the greatest obstacles ordinarily make themselves felt, it is assumed that that is where they exist, and that alone is where one endeavours to attack them. . . . One is unwilling to see that nations are the material from which governments are made; that it is from their bosom that governments emerge. (Industry and Morals.)

Lately I've been chewing on some thoughts about the connections between "thick" and "thin" libertarianism, as well as Sciabbarra's dialectical libertarianism. Dunoyer's quote here reminds of the importance of the issue. More to come . . .

Gus diZerega has raised some interesting and important objections to the plausibility and perhaps even coherence of anarcho-capitalism. If you don�t already know Gus�s work, you should check it out. I think he�s one of the most important thinkers in the current left-libertarian milieu (though he doesn�t call himself a libertarian, but a left-Hayekian liberal). I also think his criticisms are answerable from a market anarchist perspective (I�m not an anarcho-capitalist, but his criticisms seem to me aimed broadly at all flavors of market anarchism).

He begins:

This will be a brief criticism of all kinds of anarcho-capitalism that assume we will have a modern technological economy. As a consequence it will not say anything about medieval Iceland other than I suspect all emigration to or from there to here would be in one direction - and old Iceland would rapidly become depopulated. It is perhaps significant that Murray Rothbard live in New York City for most of his life and Las Vegas for the remainder.
As an ethical system, anarcho-capitalism depends on the following assumptions, all of which are wrong:
1. The market is a neutral means for facilitating voluntary exchange, and so simply reflects the values of those entering into voluntary transactions.
2. People's values are adequately reflected in the exchanges they make within a market order.
3. Some non-controversial theory of property rights is possible that is able to make all possible voluntary exchanges into either market exchanges or simple verbal agreements (science, marriage, etc.)

On the first point, no form of market anarchism need make this strong assumption. What must be assumed is that the market is the best available means for facilitating voluntary commercial exchanges. Other forms of voluntary exchange may not be part of the market at all. Markets are a means of voluntary coordination for certain kinds of transactions, but voluntary coordination is a superset of market coordination. Moreover, there is no need to think that markets are neutral or that they simply reflect the values of those entering the transactions. On the other hand, to the extent that anarcho-capitalists do make the kinds of strong assumptions diZerega points out, they are overstepping and fetishizing the market.

On the second point, I�m not sure what to make of the claim because I don�t know yet what constitutes �adequate� reflection. Can people�s market exchanges be in tension or conflict with their all-things-considered values? Of course! But if the divergence becomes too great or too systematic, we begin to lose a grip on what reflects what. If one strongly professes a value but then basically always acts in a way contrary to that value, we start to think that it�s your professed value that doesn�t reflect your true values. But there�s a big middle ground here. Moreover, it seems to me that coercive intervention and institutional privilege systematically distort the exchanges available to people and therefore create greater and more systemic divergences between all-things-considered values and the market order. Thus, hopefully, a truly free society would bring these closer into accord.

On the third point, perhaps some anarcho-capitalists do make some such assumption, but they don�t need to and they ought not to. I�m a pluralist about real property regimes (which is not to say that I don�t have favorites). On the one hand, I think there can be more than one equally acceptable system of property rights (which does not entail that just any system will be permissible). On the other hand, even if I were convinced that the demands of justice dictated only one system (Lockean, Georgist, Mutualist, whatever) it does not follow that I have the right to impose such a system on other communities that use a different system. I take the polycentric law part of anarchism seriously.

Now diZerega raises what I think are important and under-appreciated points.

Thus, at a minimum, if we are to serve people's choices, or their freely chosen values, we have at least two levels of questions to consider: what range of things should be possible, and second, within the range of possible things, what will we choose to do? The market economy answers the second question very well, but it assumes the first has already been answered, its solution institutionalized in a system of property rights.But how are we to determine what are appropriate property rights?

To the degree they seek to treat all fairly, a community of people will therefore seek to create a system by which certain kinds of basic problems can be settled in such a way that all can use the framework that results in living their lives.

I think ultimately most devastatingly, it cannot answer the objection that its primary coordination mechanism, the market order, will demonstrably lead to kinds of outcomes where most reject the result, no matter how profitable it may be in market terms.

diZerega�s own scholarly work emphasizes that the market order is not the only spontaneous order (in Hayek�s sense) in society. We should remember that language, common law, custom, science, and in diZerega�s view, democracy are also spontaneous orders. And none of these orders are neutral; each has its own inner logic and value-bias. Thus, if I understand his work properly, diZerega is making that broader point that we can�t have a functioning society without an ongoing dynamic balancing of the spontaneous orders of society. And insofar as anarcho-capitalists wish to make the market order the dominant order in society, an anarcho-capitalist society will fail to do this.

So we have (at least) two levels of questions that communities must be able to answer. �What range of things should be possible?� and �Within the range of possible things, what will we choose?�

Can a market anarchist society deal with this? Let�s first take a single community: Tuckerville. Tuckerville is a mutualist town in Arkansas. The legally enforced property system is thus mutualist. How did they come to this system amongst all the others? Well after the revolution, Kevin Carson and others formed the town by starting a community cooperative. Each member of the town over the age of 16 (or whatever) is a member of the Tuckerville co-op (Kevin Carson wanted to name it Carsonville and Larry Gambone wanted name it Gamboneville, but there was an honorable compromise). Land tenure is based on occupancy and use and the public spaces and public services are owned by the co-op. When decisions need to be made about co-op policy (i.e., public policy) there are town meetings with specified decision-making procedures. All members maintain specified exit rights.

Now this is an example of diZerega�s own idea: the citizen�s co-op. It is a form of voluntary democratic community. The democratic procedures are endorsed by and binding on the members (though there is a right of exit). Such an institution is designed to be able handle the second-order questions above, but it is perfectly consistent with market anarchism. Moreover, why should we think that the market order must be dominant in Tuckerville? Perhaps it will be the shared cultural life of Tuckerville that will dominate, or the shared exercise of civic virtue in the democratic anarchist polis, or none will dominate. The point here is that what anarchists want is truly voluntary social orders, but not necessarily purely market orders. Tuckerville might decide that it is in the best interest of the community to restrict certain market transactions within its boundaries. If this decision was made within the fair and agreed-upon decision-making procedure of Tuckerville, then those who disagree may decide to go along with it anyway. Or they decide to leave, or lobby to get the rule removed, or commit civil disobedience, etc. These are all familiar problems for democratic theory. I�m just pointing out that voluntary democratic communities are not ruled out by anarchism.

Of course, there will be problems about how to interact with other communities (what else is new?), but I don�t really have anything to add to the extant discussions of common law, federations, secession, agreements, third-party adjudication of disputes, etc.

In any case, diZerega�s post forces anarchists to get clear on what kinds of voluntary orders are required for a truly flourishing free society. It is a mistake, made by both proponents and opponents of market anarchism, to think that it can only countenance the market order.