Free-market anarchism:
Free-market anarchism (sometimes called market anarchism[1]) refers to an individualist anarchist philosophy that harmonizes the abolition of the state with a free market by proposing to replace the monopoly of force held by government with a competitive market of private institutions offering police protection, justice, and other defense services[2] - "the private allocation of force, without central control."[3] Providers of force would be paid for voluntarily by those who wish to receive the services rather than individuals being taxed without their consent and assigned a particular provider without their consent. The belief, among free-market anarchists, is that this competition thus will tend to produce cheaper and higher quality legal and police services including "a high-quality good of impartial, efficient umpiring of conflicting rights claims."[4]
Mutualism differs from true individualist anarchism because mutualism is a theory of association and cooperation.[5]
Notable proponents of free-market anarchism include Murray Rothbard,[6] David D. Friedman,[7] and Benjamin Tucker.[8] Free-market anarchism has been traced as far back as the 1840s, as conceived by individuals such as Julius Faucher and Gustave de Molinari.[9][10]
[edit] Origins
One of the first individuals to discuss to propose the possibility of privatizing protection of individual liberty and property, i.e. free-market anarchism, was France's Jakob Mauvillon in the 18th century. Later, in the 1840s, Julius Faucher and Gustave de Molinari advocated the same. Molinari, in his essay The Production of Security, argued, "No government should have the right to prevent another government from going into competition with it, or to require consumers of security to come exclusively to it for this commodity."[9] Molinari argued that the monopoly on security causes high prices and low quality. He says in Les Soirées: "The monopoly of government is no better than any other. One does not govern well and, especially not cheaply, when one has no competition to fear, when the ruled are deprived of the right of freely choosing their rulers...The production of security inevitably becomes costly and bad when it is organized as a monopoly."[11] The brunt of Molinari's argument for free-market anarchism is based in economics rather than on moral opposition to the state.[12]
[edit] Later development
In the 19th century, Benjamin Tucker in the United States theorized free-market anarchism: "defense is a service like any other service; that it is labor both useful and desired, and therefore an economic commodity subject to the law of supply and demand; that in a free market this commodity would be furnished at the cost of production; that, competition prevailing, patronage would go to those who furnished the best article at the lowest price; that the production and sale of this commodity are now monopolized by the State; and that the State, like almost all monopolists, charges exorbitant prices."[13] He noted that the anarchism he proposed would include prisons and military.[14] Later, in the mid 20th century, free-market anarchism was revived by Murray Rothbard. David D. Friedman proposes a form of free-market anarchism where in addition to security being provided by the market, the law itself is produced by the market."[15]
[edit] Ideological variance
- See also: Issues in anarchism
Beyond their agreeing that security should be privately provided by market-based entities, proponents of free-market anarchism differ in other details and aspects of their philosophies, particularly justification, tactics and property rights.
Murray Rothbard and other natural rights theorists hold strongly to the central libertarian non-aggression axiom, while other free-market anarchists such as David D. Friedman utilize consequentialist theories such as utilitarianism.[16] Following Max Stirner, some found their political philosophy on egoistic justifications. Some free-market anarchists in the nineteenth century, such as Benjamin Tucker, subscribed to a labor theory of value which lead them to embrace a surplus value exploitation theory.
Agorists – followers of the philosophy of Samuel Edward Konkin III – propose to eliminate the state by practising tax resistance and by the use illegal black market strategies called counter-economics until the security functions of the state can be replaced by free market competitors. Rothbard's "anarcho-capitalism" advocates the use of any non-immoral tactic available to bring about liberty.[17] Agorists oppose intellectual property as an unjustified restriction on the free market.[18]
[edit] Views on land
Benjamin Tucker, who abandoned the natural rights conception of property rights in free-market anarchism for a Stirnerite egoism.
Classical liberal John Locke, argues that, as people mix their own labor with unowned resources, they make those resources their property. People can acquire new property by labor on unowned resources or trade for created goods. Rothbardian free-market anarchists believe that property may only originate by being the product of labor, and may then only legitimately change hands by trade or gift.
Mutualism does not grant that this creates property in land, but holds that when people customarily use given land (and in some versions goods), other people should respect that use or possession. But, when that use stops, ownership is no longer recognized, unlike with property.[19] The mutualist theory holds that stopping from using or occupying land reverts it to the commons or to an unowned condition, and makes it available for anyone that wishes to use it.[20] Geoanarchists hold the possession principle on land only, while all other goods are based on property.
Benjamin Tucker believed that it is in opposition to natural law to protect land while it is not being used or occupied and that there would be no market in land that is not in use. Tucker later abandoned natural rights theory and said that land ownership is legitimately transferred through force unless specified otherwise by contracts: "Man's only right to land is his might over it. If his neighbor is mightier than he and takes the land from him, then the land is his neighbor's, until the latter is dispossessed by one mightier still."[21] He expected, however, that individuals would come to the realization that the "occupancy and use" was a "generally trustworthy guiding principle of action," and that individuals would likely would contract to an occupancy and use policy.[22]
[edit] References
- ^ Gerald F. Gaus, Chandran Kukathas. 2004. Handbook of Political Theory. Sage Publications. pp. 118-119. Source refers to David D. Friedman's philosophy as "market anarchism."
- ^ Lavoie, Don. Democracy, Markets, and the Legal Order: Notes on the Nature of Politics in a Radically Liberal Society. Published in Liberalism and the Economic Order, by G. Tyler Miller. Cambridge University Press, 1993. p. 115
- ^ Sanders, John T. & Narveson, January 1996. For and Against the State: New Philosophical Readings. Towman & Littlefield. p. 197
- ^ Gaus, Gerald F. & Kukathas, Chandran (eds.). Handbook of Political Theory. 2004. Sage Publications. p. 119
- ^ Woodcock, G. (1962). Anarchism. NY: World Pub., 20.
- ^ "This volume honors the foremost contemporary exponent of free-market anarchism. One contributor aptly describes Murray Rothbard as 'the most ideologically committed zero-State academic economists on earth'." Review by Lawrence H. White of Man, Economy, and liberty: Essays in honor of Murray N. Rothbard, published in Journal of Economic Literature, Vol XXVIII, June 1990, page 664; "[Rothbard's book, For a New Liberty,] synthesizes an advocacy of Lockean rights to life, liberty, property, and defense, an appeal to the free market as the most efficient and decentralized "social" device for the allocation of resources, and a sociological and historical analysis of the State as being inherently aggressive and exploitive. The product of this synthesis is Rothbard's free-market anarchism." Review by Eric Mack of For a New Liberty by Murray Rothbard, American Political Science Review, Vol 71, p. 332
- ^ Paul, Ellen Frankel et al. 1993. Liberalism and the Economic Order. Cambridge University Press. p. 115
- ^ Editor's note in "Taxation: Voluntary or Compulsory". Formulations. Free Nation Foundation. Summer 1995 [1]
- ^ a b Raico, Ralph (2004) Authentic German Liberalism of the 19th Century Ecole Polytechnique, Centre de Recherce en Epistemologie Appliquee, Unité associée au CNRS
- ^ Rothbard, Murray. Preface. The Production of Security. By Gustave Molinari. 1849, 1977. [2]
- ^ Molinari, Gustave de. 1849. Les Soirées de la Rue Saint-Lazare
- ^ Rothbard, Murray. Preface. The Production of Security. By Gustave Molinari. 1849, 1977. [3]
- ^ Tucker, Benjamin. "Instead of a Book" (1893)
- ^ Tucker, Benjamin. Liberty October 19, 1891
- ^ Friedman, David. The Machinery of Freedom. Second edition. La Salle, Ill, Open Court, pp. 116–117.
- ^ Danley, John R. (November 1991). "Polestar refined: Business ethics and political economy". Journal of Business Ethics (Springer Netherlands) 10 (12): 915–933. doi:10.1007/BF00383797.
- ^ Lora, Ronald & Longton, Henry. 1999. The Conservative Press in Twentieth-Century America. Greenwood Press. p. 369
- ^ Copywrongs, by Samuel Konkin
- ^ Swartz, Clarence Lee. What is Mutualism? VI. Land and Rent
- ^ Carson, Kevin, Studies in Mutualist Political Economy, chapter 5.
Long, Roderick, "Land-Locked: A Critique of Carson on Property Rights," in the Journal of Libertarian Studies, vol. 20, no. 1.
- ^ Benjamin R. Tucker, "Response to 'Rights,' by William Hansen," Liberty, December 31, 1892; 9, 18; pg. 1
- ^ Benjamin R. Tucker, "The Two Conceptions of Equal Freedom," Liberty, April 6, 1895; 10, 24; pg. 4
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
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