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>What can anything do for you if you are killed? I don't understand the relevance. What is to keep someone from killing me to get their way? Private insurance

>What can anything do for you if you are killed? I don't understand the relevance. What is to keep someone from killing me to get their way? Private insurance? Are they going to go to war for me after I'm dead? >What if you can't afford the fees associated with litigation in the government court system? Well, if the conflict 'resolution' involves the other party resorting to violence or theft, I can turn the matter over to the into the State whether I can pay for it or not. There are hard limits placed on how far the other party can go in getting what they want. >violence is expensive I don't see how violence is expensive. Violence is cheap. Bullets don't cost much. Rocks are even cheaper. In fact, violence can be very profitable. Got $10 in your pocket? Just paid for my bullet and then some. Got a $30,000 car? Well now, that should pay for a few rounds. What you propose is a fantasy, pure and simple. And not even a very plausible one.

baddox 14y ago
> What is to keep someone from killing me to get their way? Private insurance? Are they going to go to war for me after I'm dead? Yes, that's the idea, although "going to war" is hyperbolic. Private insurance would be strongly incentivized to seek out and punish murderers, assuming of course that potential customers would find that service valuable. The leap from the government's monopoly on violence to a competitive alternative is no more drastic or complex than the leap from the government's monopoly on postal service to a competitive alternative. Features that customers valued would almost certainly abound, and ones they didn't care about or like would be less common. The key difference is that the competitive systems get their revenue from willing payers, while the government coerces money from every single employer. > I don't see how violence is expensive. Violence is cheap. Bullets don't cost much. Rocks are even cheaper. I don't mean the cost of weaponry. I mean that you have to pay thugs well, mostly because of the inherent risk I mentioned earlier. There is also risk of massive retaliation which can end up causing a lot of damage to humans and property. > In fact, violence can be very profitable. It can be, sure, but it's extremely expensive and extremely risky. That was my point.
- rprasad 14y ago
  > In fact, violence can be very profitable. It can be, sure, but it's extremely expensive and extremely risky. That was my point. Violence is only risky because government makes it risky to commit violence. Reality does not bear out your claims that turning everything over to private parties would magically solve the violence problem. In fact, places like Somalia and every conflict in Africa and the Middle East are strong evidence that violence would increase tenfold without a strong government. In contrast, the places with the lowest levels of violence are frequently places like Singapore or Europe with the highest levels of government.
  - baddox 14y ago
    > Violence is only risky because government makes it risky to commit violence. Not true. Government law enforcement obviously contributes, but the tendency for people to defend themselves (and for third parties to intervene against perceived injustice) is the primary source of risk. > In fact, places like Somalia and every conflict in Africa and the Middle East are strong evidence that violence would increase tenfold without a strong government. I'm glad someone finally mentioned Somalia. Unfortunately, your beliefs are incorrect, and are in fact the opposite of the truth. See http://rkba.org/libertarian/maccallum/MacCallum-Somalia98.html http://rkba.org/libertarian/maccallum/MacCallum-Somalia98.ht... and http://www.peterleeson.com/Better_Off_Stateless.pdf http://www.peterleeson.com/Better_Off_Stateless.pdf .
    - rbarooah 14y ago
      Those are interesting pieces, and I feel as though my time was well spent reading them. I can't see what they have to do with this argument though. The first one is basically a speculative essay with little to support its ideas, interesting though they are. The second one is more rigorous, but it seems to me that it works against your argument. It contends that Law and Order is provided by Xeer, Somali customary law, which is a tribal artifact that has developed over centuries, and depends on people being recognized as having loyalty to a tribe because it makes the tribe responsible for harms done its by members to other tribes. Thew piece also states that although private courts exist (funded by successful businessmen), Shari'a courts perform an instrumental function in creating legal order. Both pieces also state that the Somali central state, when it existed, was weak, rampantly corrupt and never successfully displaced these tribal and religious institutions. All this really seems to be saying is that, just like everywhere else before the emergence of the nation state, Somalia was governed by tribal law and religion. In the case of Somalia, a functioning nation state never really emerged, and so it fell back to tribal law and religion. This turns out not to be as bad as the failing central state, or the horror stories portrayed by the mainstream media, but although falling back to tribalism and religion might not be as bad as the media portrays, it hardly seems like a model for how to improve on what we have.

baddox 14y ago

> What is to keep someone from killing me to get their way? Private insurance? Are they going to go to war for me after I'm dead? Yes, that's the idea, although "going to war" is hyperbolic. Private insurance would be strongly incentivized to seek out and punish murderers, assuming of course that potential customers would find that service valuable. The leap from the government's monopoly on violence to a competitive alternative is no more drastic or complex than the leap from the government's monopoly on postal service to a competitive alternative. Features that customers valued would almost certainly abound, and ones they didn't care about or like would be less common. The key difference is that the competitive systems get their revenue from willing payers, while the government coerces money from every single employer. > I don't see how violence is expensive. Violence is cheap. Bullets don't cost much. Rocks are even cheaper. I don't mean the cost of weaponry. I mean that you have to pay thugs well, mostly because of the inherent risk I mentioned earlier. There is also risk of massive retaliation which can end up causing a lot of damage to humans and property. > In fact, violence can be very profitable. It can be, sure, but it's extremely expensive and extremely risky. That was my point.

rprasad 14y ago
> In fact, violence can be very profitable. It can be, sure, but it's extremely expensive and extremely risky. That was my point. Violence is only risky because government makes it risky to commit violence. Reality does not bear out your claims that turning everything over to private parties would magically solve the violence problem. In fact, places like Somalia and every conflict in Africa and the Middle East are strong evidence that violence would increase tenfold without a strong government. In contrast, the places with the lowest levels of violence are frequently places like Singapore or Europe with the highest levels of government.
- baddox 14y ago
  > Violence is only risky because government makes it risky to commit violence. Not true. Government law enforcement obviously contributes, but the tendency for people to defend themselves (and for third parties to intervene against perceived injustice) is the primary source of risk. > In fact, places like Somalia and every conflict in Africa and the Middle East are strong evidence that violence would increase tenfold without a strong government. I'm glad someone finally mentioned Somalia. Unfortunately, your beliefs are incorrect, and are in fact the opposite of the truth. See http://rkba.org/libertarian/maccallum/MacCallum-Somalia98.html http://rkba.org/libertarian/maccallum/MacCallum-Somalia98.ht... and http://www.peterleeson.com/Better_Off_Stateless.pdf http://www.peterleeson.com/Better_Off_Stateless.pdf .
  - rbarooah 14y ago
    Those are interesting pieces, and I feel as though my time was well spent reading them. I can't see what they have to do with this argument though. The first one is basically a speculative essay with little to support its ideas, interesting though they are. The second one is more rigorous, but it seems to me that it works against your argument. It contends that Law and Order is provided by Xeer, Somali customary law, which is a tribal artifact that has developed over centuries, and depends on people being recognized as having loyalty to a tribe because it makes the tribe responsible for harms done its by members to other tribes. Thew piece also states that although private courts exist (funded by successful businessmen), Shari'a courts perform an instrumental function in creating legal order. Both pieces also state that the Somali central state, when it existed, was weak, rampantly corrupt and never successfully displaced these tribal and religious institutions. All this really seems to be saying is that, just like everywhere else before the emergence of the nation state, Somalia was governed by tribal law and religion. In the case of Somalia, a functioning nation state never really emerged, and so it fell back to tribal law and religion. This turns out not to be as bad as the failing central state, or the horror stories portrayed by the mainstream media, but although falling back to tribalism and religion might not be as bad as the media portrays, it hardly seems like a model for how to improve on what we have.