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I'm not an anarcho-capitalist if that's what you're asking. Anarcho-capitalism is a great idealization but remains unsuitable for the real world. It's very har
by andrewjl 6y ago
I'm not an anarcho-capitalist if that's what you're asking. Anarcho-capitalism is a great idealization but remains unsuitable for the real world.
It's very hard to discuss the State without referencing Hobbes, Locke, Montesquieu, etc. Over the past century min-anarchism (of which I at least consider anarcho-capitalism to be a variant of) in general has not offered anything convincing to solve the issues they raised. I'm not optimistic it will do so in the next century either. I'm open to having my mind changed though.
How does one assure security with a minimal "night watchman" State? Note that security does not just mean physical security, but also an intangible feeling of safety in the sense that one can go outside without fear of anything untoward happening to them. And I'm well familiar with Ben Franklin's aphorism. Nevertheless it is a real issue and one that the U.S. Constitution solved reasonably well.
Edit: Also I find it hard to take seriously anybody that references "neoliberal policies" as that article does. What does that even mean? Free markets? Property rights? Movement of capital? All those things are ingredients to prosperity, in my view. Often "neoliberal" ends up just being those parts of capitalism that one doesn't like. And of course everyone has their own subset. Mass confusion, non-stop arguments over I'm not sure what exactly ensue.
- TaylorAlexander 6y agoIt’s interesting that you take your own unfamiliarity with a term to somehow suggest that the person using the term doesn’t know what they’re talking about. You could just look it up. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism
- andrewjl 6y ago> it quickly took on negative connotations and was employed principally by critics of market reform and laissez-faire capitalism - from the Wikipedia article you linked "Capitalism when it does something I don't like" isn't a definition. If you want to criticize laissez-faire capitalism then use the proper term for it, not some squishy, mysterious neologism. Unfortunately when that happens, this becomes a discussion on comparative political economy. Those these critics tend to lose on the merits. Hence they insist on the mystification.
- ClumsyPilot 6y agoNeiliberalism is a proper economic term, used and defined by real economists, and Ha-Joon Chang im particular, in his book "Economics, the User's Guide". If you read it, you might stop criticising other people for things you don't know. You will also find out that neoliberal policies have delivered quite poor ecobomic results conpared to kenzian and shumpeterian alternatives