| badgenome said:
I don't think that's correct at all. Libertarians know very well that all power will be abused, but as Jefferson said, the price of liberty is eternal vigiliance. I'm not even really sure what the alternative is to a monopoly on law enforcement, as it seems inevitable that you will always end up with territorial monopolies. Ultimately, having two or three major (that is, viable) competing law enforcement agencies wouldn't be significantly different than having two or three political parties, all of whom want to fuck you over as soon as attain take power. It's just easier to vote out political parties than it would be to dislodged an entrenched, semi-militarized police force. The real problem is that abuses of power will occur under any system as long as people are willing to put up with them, and it seems that people are generally willing to put up with them to varying degrees - usually a depressingly large degree as long as it isn't actively affecting them personally and they are basically able to get along with their lives. I can see the allure of anarchism, but ultimately it seems to me but an adolescent pipe dream. But you're a smart guy, and I'd be interested to hear any compelling arguments you might have for it. |
Haha, well, I'm still a bit weak on my debating ability regarding such areas of ancap philosophy, simply because I haven't read enough about it to be able to cover counterpoints as effectively as I'd eventually like to. So, rather than me weakly describing it to you, I'd rather just hit you up with a talk which argues the "reader's digest" case quite well, and you can take it further from there, if you so wish.
It's about an hour long, but it's good. Plus, the guy is one of the top economists out there, at the moment. Arguably the Austrian School's Paul Krugman.
