“Truth? You can't handle the truth!”

[The Legendary Shark]

Panther, once again you think it's simply a case of pulling some lever somewhere with "Libertarianism" written on it, going straight from one system to another. I don't know if you've genuinely missed the historical and practical inadvisibility of such a move or if you're just stuck in a groove.

The libertarianism for the wealthy and powerful which you describe is no such thing, if anything it's a kind of Frankenstein socialism; privatisation of profit and socialisation of debt. Freedom for me and f*ck you. The democratic system is the thing that cements their wealth and power simply because they can buy influence all in one place. Take away that support system and they'll have to maintain their power and wealth on a level playing field. And to say that libertarianism leads to a state where everything is permissible if you can afford it is just laughable - that's the system we have now!

People fought and died for these things. A lot of conscripts. And, of course, another word for conscript is slave. What else would you call someone who is forced to do something they don't want to do?

Tordels, yes, some things are better than they were a century ago - but not as good (I hope) as they will be a century from now. The current system might get us there, but I seriously doubt it. As I said, society is a process and we need to be moving it along. Take the good things, keep them and nurture them and strengthen them - but toss out the bad stuff, the theft, the slavery, the coercion, the murder.

Also, note the way that pollution legislation works. Carbon credits being a case in point - carry on polluting as much as you want, just pay someone else to clean up their act so you don't have to make expensive changes to your factories and processes. I've worked in a factory that regularly polluted the environment. It was a big factory, owned by a household name. We knew in advance when the government inspectors were coming because a couple of days before we'd be cleaning and replacing filters that didn't usually get cleaned or changed because it meant halting the process for 48 hours. The locals would complain of pollution, the inspector would make an appointment and find everything in order. Bloody locals, complaining about nothing just for the Hell of it... The only firms getting unannounced spot-checks were the small ones, the ones the Big Boys wanted out of the way. No amount of legislation is going to change practices like that.

Too often, legislation is used as an industrial weapon. For example, recently my boss was telling me that it was ruled that all vehicles of a certain size must have special or additional mirrors added. A good idea for safety, to be sure. But this idea was put forward by the big companies, companies to which this expenditure is negligible. To smaller companies operating on tight budgets to start with, it's expensive - not only the cost of the mirrors and having them fitted but in having vehicles off the road for half a day or more to get the job done. And if it's not done, or not done in time, there's the larger expense of fines and having vehicles put off the road until the job is done. It's just one rule like this after another, adding up bit by bit until the smaller operators are forced out of business leaving more work for the big companies. The death of a thousand cuts - all through legislation.

Eric, once again I agree with you. We might perhaps quibble over the precise definition of harm; I wouldn't class name-calling or harsh language as directly harmful but it is dangerous, as it can lead to physical harm - which is never okay.

[Frank]

Living without law isn't some kind of dry thought experiment. There are, and have always been, areas where no state exists:

Christiania

Zomia

Somalia

[Modern Panther]

Oh, now, Butch, surely you realise that Sharky does mean that sort of lawless.  He mean the nice sort of lawless, where everything works out well because "government" isn't there to force companies to do silly things like comply with anti discrimination laws and pay taxes, and companies can just be replace by enthusiastic locals when they do naughty things, which they'll hardly ever do when they don't have to pay bribes to useless bureaucrats.  We can't trust elected officials that we can replace.

Sharky, I'll repeat my questions.  Is government regulation the only thing that prevents you from running your own oil company, or is a huge amount of money required? Who will benefit from removing anti discrimination laws?

I'll give you a clue...claiming that I just don't understand and that everything will work out okay if we can all just open our minds is not a valid answer. 

[The Legendary Shark]

Nobody said anything about living without law, it's how that law is propagated and upheld that's the question. In this country, we have the police - who are unquestioned paragons of virtue who never lie or cheat and treat everyone with utmost respect and honesty all the time. If you're driving along the motorway and a police car slots in behind you, how do you feel? Protected? Safe? At ease? Is your first thought, "ah, good," or "oh shit"?

If I wanted my own oil company, I could start my own, of course I could. I could buy shares in an existing company or raise capital by borrowing or issuing shares in my own. But say I've discovered an oilfield on an uninhabited island, under unused wilderness land or out at sea - is the "government" just going to allow me to drill? Nope. It's going to stop me and pass on those rights to established oil monopolies. I would remind you that John D. Rockerfeller was on the bones of his arse when he originally struck oil. He used the profits he made to bribe, buy and threaten "government" officials and representatives to help him build one of the biggest and most ruthless monopolies in history.

Nobody would benefit from removing anti-discrimination laws but that's not what I'm advocating. It's a case of shifting from having any laws which society wants from being enforced by government monopolised industries like the police and courts, who have no need to care much about customer satisfaction, to free market industries, like private protection agencies and private courts, whose very survival depends on customer satisfaction.

I'm guessing that when you hear phrases like "private protection agencies" and "private courts" you imagine paid bands of Mafiaesque thugs and dingy back-room kangaroo courts and forget that these things exist already, and have for a long time. Shops and factories employ private police (store detectives, security guards, nightwatchmen) and industry in general employs private courts (tribunals, arbitrators, lawyers). These private entities are employed by their reputations of fairness and conduct. If you need the police or courts these days you have only one choice as who to call - one of the government monopolies; and they're not tied to give a damn. If there were private alternatives, you'd subscribe to and/or call the one you'd heard good things about.

[TordelBack]

Sharky, I think that your utterly shitty treatment at the hands of the police and subsequently the courts is influencing your view here. And why wouldn't it - it makes the blood boio?  Of course there are many things wrong with the police (this week's papers alone...) and they will always be in dire need of monitoring, accountability and reform, but the idea that a better alternative is privately-owned armies ungoverned by law or regulation, but somehow controlled by the sanction of market forces, is, well, terrifying. We've been there before. It wasn't very nice.

[TordelBack]

I'm going to be rude and preempt a response: the police are already a private army, owned by corrupt establishment, and there's no way of removing or reforming them. Except there is, through concerted democratic engagement. That's what's lacking here, genuine thoughtful, informed democracy. That's where energies should be expended.

[The Legendary Shark]

I agree my attitude is coloured by my experience. I don't actually blame the officers involved so much as I blame the system they're working within. I genuinely believe the officers made a mistake and that their system swung into action not so much to protect them from the consequences but to protect itself as a whole.

Control and monitoring of the police now is too reliant on abstracts such as targets. The individual accountability of the officers themselves, who are human beings just like the rest of us, has been absorbed into an amorphous mass. Had the "government" been truly interested in providing a police service dedicated to serving the public and not a force to protect itself, outrages like Hilsborough and minor (in the wider sense) infractions such as my own case, would not take so long to come to light.

A police constable is just a human being in a costume with no more or fewer rights and responsibilities than the rest of us. Placing them behind a shield of "government" protection elevates them above this common status and encourages bad behaviour.

A private police force is not a private army. Let me try and explain how a private police force might, basically, work in a proposed libertarian society.

Imagine there is a large town center area full of shops, I'll use Lord Street in Southport as an example because its close to where I live. Under the current situation, the various shopkeepers and business owners down Lord Street pay taxes (ostensibly) into a central pot and gets whatever policing the local authorities decides it needs and/or can afford. These police are liable to be called away at any moment to other parts of town for any number of reasons, leaving Lord Street without any on-site cover at all. The police themselves decide which laws they're going to enforce or not and some of the officers (but by no means all) are downright rude and overbearing. The shop owners have no choice in the matter. If the police decide they can't afford to patrol Lord Street any more, or need to cut back patrols, the shop owners have little recourse but to complain and hope somebody listens. In the meantime, Lord Street may become so rife with crime that shoppers begin to stay away, harming profits.

The libertarian alternative would be for the Lord Street Merchants' Guild (for example) to pay a private policing company, staffed by properly trained officers, to patrol Lord Street and uphold the law. These officers would have the same powers as any other officers (indeed, the same powers you and I have) but would be directly accountable to the LSMG, their employers. Heavy handed, rude or overbearing officers would not be tolerated because the Guild wants them to be polite to the consumers enjoying their establishments and to treat everyone fairly and with respect. The private policing company, driven by free market forces, would provide a far superior service to the one we get today and strive to be the best in the area to win more contracts and increase profits.

There is no need to dismantle the inefficient and protected state police service overnight but allowing competition in this important field would be a good start. It's not as if the private police companies would just hire anyone off the street and squeeze them into a costume - applicants would be properly trained, as in any business, and the better officers would naturally gravitate to the better firms, as in any business. Poor officers, just like poor employees in any for-profit company, would not be protected by a "government" backed institution but retrained, reassigned to more fitting duties or fired.

[The Legendary Shark]

Not rude at all, Tordels.

Democratic reform is one way to try and reform the police but I don't think it's a very good way, especially as things stand. Another way, as I described above, would be to allow competition - to break the monopoly. Even labouring under the current system, the existence of private police agencies would force the state's force to up its game in response.

Perhaps private forces and democratic pressure working in tandem would be far more effective than just one or the other and be a good example of how we can move the process of society along without the need to suddenly sweep away the state's policing mechanism.

[Modern Panther]

. If you're driving along the motorway and a police car slots in behind you, how do you feel? Protected? Safe? At ease? Is your first thought, "ah, good," or "oh shit"?

If security guards drew up behind me I'd think "fuck 'em, they have no authority here.".

Law and order for those who can buy it.  Kickstarters for everyone else.  Let's hope we don't have to buy any penicillin.

[Frank]

If you need the police or courts these days you have only one choice as who to call - one of the government monopolies; and they're not tied to give a damn. If there were private alternatives, you'd subscribe to and/or call the one you'd heard good things about.

During a heated dispute with my neighbour, he calls the Aldi Value Police. I consider their conflict resolution and breach of the peace services to be of low quality, so I phone the more expensive Apple i-Constabulary to represent my interests.

Obviously my police win, because they're more expensive, better resourced, and have better branding, but my neighbour files to have the case tried in an Uber Court ™. The Uber Judge ® arrives in a Toyota people carrier with one hubcap missing, but I'm unhappy with this rough and ready justice.

I want the case to be tried at my local Waitrose Crown Court, as they offer a greater range of laws, which better fit my modern lifestyle aspirations. They employ artisanal legislators, who'll draft a fresh law, tailored to meet your needs, while you wait. It's more costly, but you get what you pay for.

Who wins; my neighbour and his Poundland justice, or my reading the Sunday supplement in front of the Aga law?

[The Legendary Shark]

If security guards drew up behind me I'd think "fuck 'em, they have no authority here."

Exactly! Breakthrough! Doesn't matter who draws up behind you - unless you're causing loss, harm or damage then the only authority anyone has over you is the authority you give them. Just putting somebody into a costume doesn't make them special.

Law and order for those who can buy it.  Kickstarters for everyone else.  Let's hope we don't have to buy any penicillin.

And you don't buy penicillin now? Through theft taxes?

[The Enigmatic Dr X]

But is there really a problem if all the lawyers are getting big fat fees?

[The Legendary Shark]

That's an excellent question, Butch. Unfortunately, I've just been called into work so I'll have to answer briefly ("Yaay!" I hear you cry!).

In a world with myriad private police agencies, what happens when conflicts inevitably arise? The client of Company A against the Client of Company B?

Firstly, these companies will be professionals and in most cases be able to work out who's right and who's wrong between them.

In case they can't, each company will have a list of private courts/arbitrators whose impartiality and professionalism they trust - say the EDX Arbitration Co - who will, based on previous decisions, common law and evidence presented, rule on the case. Both companies, having agreed beforehand, will abide by this ruling. And the EDX Arbitration Co. makes a few bob in the process!

If you still don't agree, you're free to try another court or arbitration service, possibly a more specialised one or one employing more experienced judges or arbitrators, but that's your choice.

[Modern Panther]

Exactly! Breakthrough! Doesn't matter who draws up behind you - unless you're causing loss, harm or damage then the only authority anyone has over you is the authority you give them.

Not so much a breakthroughs a massive hole in your line of reasoning.  I could have just mowed down a line of pensioners on their way to the soup kitchen.  Private security guards have no authority over me unless I accept their authority.  Same with private courts...they find against me, I can just pick another one and pay them enough money so they find in my favour.  Law and security for the wealthy and to hell with everyone else.

And, yes, I do pay for healthcare through my taxes...unless, of course, I can't.  In which case society pays for me.  In Libertania, if I can't pay I'm fucked unless I happen to have wealthy friends.

Oh. what a brave new world.

[Modern Panther]

Dear Aldi Legal Assistant,

Thank you for recent correspondence regarding our clients' dispute.
After discussion I must agree that my client, on whose good fortune and continued custom my companies relies, is not in the wrong.  I'm glad that we've been able to come to this arrangement like the professionals we are.

In the event that you are not satisfied with this response, we are willing to take the matter further.  In the past we have used EDX Arbitration Services and are happy to refer the issue to them.  Our company has a long history of co operation with EDX.  In fact, we are their biggest client.  I am sure, however, that they will be completely impartial, despite all the money we give them.

Our invoice is enclosed.  Please pay within 28 days, or a private security company will be employed to follow you around. Feel free to employ your own protection should you feel threatened.

Yours,
Apple Legal.