Empirical Examples of Anarchy

• John Vandivier
This article lists some empirical examples of anarchy
  1. Bob's \"Bright line test for anarchy\"
  2. \"Tiv people\" State + additional layers of government = anarcho-capitalism? not really
    1. sole provision of legal and enforcement services = \"real anarchy\"
    2. seasteading, cryptoanarchy/permissionless
    3. optimal level? typical AD/AS w Inada indicates SOME State is good...but how?
    4. If some state is good how do we know whether we hit that level or not yet?
      1. To Bob's bright line test
      2. \"vote with your feet\" = nah
      3. War? nah
      4. Efficiency = yes!
Government vs law: Your parents govern you, so does your employer, you govern yourself; law Anarchism vs Anarcho-Capitalism vs Polycentric Governence knowledge and reciprosity http://www.criticalreview.com/crf/jf/11%203%20libertarianism.pdf http://www.afterecon.com/economics-and-finance/bad-objections-anarchy-historical-objection/ https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_anarchist_communities http://www.afterecon.com/theoretical-development-and-application/can-an-anarchic-nation-exist/
  • Anarcho-Capitalism = free market governance, not an absence of a reliable legal system.
    • Pay money, get reliable law enforcement
    • Competitive policies: Like you can choose your policies for paying enough
  • Anarchism = no government (or at least no formal state)
    • Underdeveloped and uninhabited lands count.
    • A country in a state of civil war
Don't equivocate between:
  1. The lack of a reliable legal system (anarchy)
  2. The existence of competitively supplied law and enforcement (polycentric law, Friedmanian anarcho-capitalism)
    1. this is the one with efficiency
  3. The absence of hegemon (Rothbardian anarcho-capitalism)
  4. Having a state with black markets or criminal gangs, and claiming those criminal gangs are \"competitive suppliers of law.\"
  5. Government and the state
    1. Government is inescapable; in the absence of all other people we have self-government and the law of nature; to govern is to control or direct action. In the real world we have people, parents, employers, government of polite society, etc
  constant dealings (or at least possibly constant dealings), schelling points, reputation mechanisms; how markets regulate \"What about when we don't have repeated play?\" Then by necessity we are subject to some coercion? homogeneity and anarchism? with perfectly homogenous population, there are no efficiency differences other than scale when distinguishing between locally determined policy and nationally determined policy. Cooperation has a cost; homogeneity reduces these costs. Eg hard to contract with no common language. I think our discussion and also the larger discussion of political and economic theorists and industry or lay people can be improved by more clearly dilineating between government and the state, and also between kinds of anarchy, the market for law, and the market for security. Does anyone have an argument that a non-friedmanian anarchy (no competitive supply) is efficient in the same sense as a friedmanian anarcho-capitalist society? It seems clear to me the latter would face better property rights, lower costs, and higher quality services. Anarchy in Somalia vs Government in Somalia...Anarchy does better! (Per Leeson, but I'd like to see a treatment-discontinuity analysis) Early modern Europe also had anarcho-capitalism like Middlemen Iceland with competitive law and enforcement. no government provided police until middle of 19th century! (in the midst of the industrial revolution of the richest economy in the world at the time) Why does violence alone \"not get us there?\" It seems to me that efficient law in the friedmanian sense directly entails \"might makes right\" (at the coalition level, not individual level)
  • why should bandits steal once? why not continue to steal, eg enslave...but then productivity is improved by freeing the slaves and taxing them.
  • bandits strong enough to topple society do not seem to be a sustainable institution. It seems to be that strong bandits will only sustain where society is already ill-functioning and unable to defend itself (weak bandits will crop up, but they will be dominated by social order)
Interesting concept: Exit costs as a character of government. What is a state? Perhaps an entity which is expensive to escape. Has obv problems, i like monopoly on use of force, but it's interesting. The market solves Madison's Paradox; competitive checks between profit motivated firms...similar to what Madison was getting at, although Madison was a pinko time and information as weapons: Consider a bully and a wimp: The wimp can win a fight if he has a gun. Perhaps even just a sharp stone tied tightly to the end of a stick. If the relative strength difference is less severe then he can get a tactical advantage in the environment, by taking the high ground or something. On the origins of free society: The Wimp and The Bully
  • if there are no bullies then the market can flourish
  • as time goes on, it is less and less feasible for people to be bullies (society, but also individual defense eg 3d printed guns)
anarcho-capitalism is necessarily a post-democratic society
  1. Zomia
    1. More on Chinese Anarchism
  2. Early 18th Century Carribean and Atlantic pirates.
  3. These 9 locations
    • Yurok Indians and Their Northern California Neighbors
    • The Legal System of the Ifugao of Northern Luzon
    • The Kapauku Papuans of West New Guinea
    • Free cities of Medieval Europe
    • Medieval Iceland
    • American Old West
    • Gaelic Ireland
    • Law Merchant, Admiralty Law and Early Common Law
    • Somalia from 1991 to 2006
It's also worth noting that seasteading and cryptoanarchy are continuing to develop quite well. A deep philosophical argument for the morality of efficiency:
  1. Whatever is sustained throughout time is real; anything temporal isn't real in this atemporal, permanent sense
    1. Suppose existence is a great making property
    2. Eternal existence is greater than temporal existence
    3. Then, efficiency
  2. ought from an is, why not?
    1. practical argument
      1. consequentialist argumentation ftw
      2. \"policy change is impossible until it is inevitable, then everyone supports it\"
      3. the morality of the inevitable - who can oppose something for which there is no alternative?
      4. efficiency is going to happen, in fact research says it will make us happier
    2. logical argument ftf (for the fun)
      1. moral argument: from Christianity = consequentialism (know the good folks by their fruit)
      2. NOT ROTHBARD...it doesn't hold up
      3. ontological argument
      4. \"happy coincidence\" (to borrow from Rothbard, who used the phrase incorrectly) of Christianity and efficiency
      5. Whatever is is better than what is not (great making ontological argument)
      6. argument from moral potential
        1. Free will is a great making property
        2. Efficiency improves free will
          1. by increasing and multiplying feasibly and effective activities
          2. whether said activities are morally good or evil; efficiency per se is a neutral multiplier
        3. Therefore, efficiency is good
  3. response to slade: Economic development leads to anarcho-capitalism: it is our latter destination we are heading toward
    1. The wimp and the bully; the wimp will invest in weaponry and defense over time and eventually become equal
    2. 3d printed guns are an especially cheap and plentiful empirical case; weaponry will continue to become better, cheaper, more available
    3. In conclusions, in the future no one will be able to bully. so people will seek gains thru cooperative rather than conflict based means