Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
Subject: Re: Monopolies and Cartels
From: tumidity@netlink.cts.com (Joel Garry)
Date: Fri, 09 Oct 92 13:36:15 PDT
Organization: NetLink Online Communications, San Diego CA

pmetzger@snark.shearson.com writes:

    Lawsuits and courts have often existed completely outside the realm of
    coercive government. The entire Icelandic system during its anarchist
    phase was such a system -- there were well developed legal structures
    and court systems, but all enforcement was a private matter. (In so
    far as everyone accepted a monopoly court system, the system may be
    said to be less than perfectly propertarian anarchist, but it was so
    close that we can ignore that for all practical purposes). Another
    famous example was the medieval merchant courts that developed modern
    commercial law -- they were completely private! They had no government
    affiliation and depended entirely on ostracism as a means of
    enforcement. These courts developed virtually everything you are used
    to in contract law. Ever sign a note or endorse a check? Those
    concepts was developed under the Law Merchant.

    People often ascribe some mysterious power to government. Government
    is just made up out of people like any other organization. Provided
    other structures are widely accepted, there is no reason to believe
    they will be less effective. Since competitive entities in the
    marketplace have a strong incentive to improve their effectiveness
    with time, there is in fact a far greater expectation on the side of
    private entities than on the side of public ones, and historical
    experience bears this out.

People also ascribe mysterious power to the market.  While it does have
power, there is no control mechanism to ensure the power has the desired
effect.  Markets are also just made up of people.  Most everyone wants
to avoid scarcity in things they consider important (apologies to those
on this forum who advocate selfless anarchy).  So it becomes extremely
difficult to come up with a control feedback mechanism to have private
parties increase their effectiveness towards a "moral good," as opposed
to increasing their effectiveness at cutthroat competition.  That is the
historical experience I see.  cf downsizing, increasing America's 
competitiveness, companies getting rid of medical benefits for retirees,
all subjects found in every US newspaper's business section just about every
day.

If lawsuits and courts outside of government were such a powerful force,
why don't they exist today?  Without checks, balances and control
feedback, you can't have a stable system without authoritarian control.

Drug dealers are ostracized and outside the system.  They only have 
excessive profits because they ARE illegal!

The genius of Jefferson et. al. was to explain that power arises from
the people.  Is there a difference between private companies exercising
that power and "The Government" as a monopolistic company?  Checks and
balances are simply internal controls so the company doesn't overstep
it's boundaries.  Anarchies big paradox is that it throws out the
government because the checks and balances are inadequate.  Then there are
no checks at all to prevent authoritarians from taking over (Il Duce!
Il Duce! Perot! <savage sarcasm ;-) > ).


--                    
INTERNET:  tumidity@netlink.cts.com (Joel Garry)
UUCP:   ...!ryptyde!netlink!tumidity
NetLink Online Communications * Public Access in San Diego, CA (619) 453-1115
Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy