Continuing with Responsibility in Uncertainty pt.2 : What would Voluntarism Do?

03Jan08

    In an anarcho-capitalist society, where persons who have freely chosen* to uphold the extension of property rights** such that those who make legitimate claim to property create voluntary systems to uphold those claims, how would people deal with the uncertainty we have today regarding global warming?

Simpler: How does a stateless society who’s fundamental operative principle is “right to property and the free exchange thereof” handle global warming?

Simplest: How does anarcho-capitalism ‘answer’ something like global warming?

First of all, it is not incumbent on a political philosophy based on voluntarism to answer this. The philosophy is not dependent on this kind of prediction. It is informed on the observations like “free pepole prosper most”, and that certain things are illegitimate, unproductive, illusory, or immoral: classes, states, coercion, violence, socialism, etc.. In this sense it is: Take away what is illegitimate and you have voluntarism.

Furthermore, a core strength of free systems is that nobody has to plan for every contingency. The inherent maximal richness of solutions offered by systems like evolution, or the free market, is such that predictions are neither necessary or relevant to overall success. They are relevant to the individuals of course who try to maximize success within the system by predicting what behaviors will work, but they are certainly not required for the system to work as a whole.

So why bother?

To a certain extent, trying to answer: “What would Voluntarism Do?” is beyond moot. It incubates and maintains the idea that a political system has to offer solutions, when the ‘point’ is that an apolitical system IS the solution. It is a category error on a grand scale. If you are convinced that your raping me is the only way to protect me from invisible demons, then should I take up the argument “Well, if you let me face these demons on my own, I could handle them better because I will take this or that action to control them with force”, I am in some way legitimizing the raping, the demons, and the argument from insanity. I am either lying to get you to stop raping me, or I actually believe that force is legitimate, demons exist, etc..

The basic answer to “What would Voluntarism Do?” is “Could you have predicted the internet 100 years ago?”. “Could you have predicted the automobile 500 years ago?”. “Could you have predicted human beings 5 billion years ago?”. If so, then let me sign up for your investment group. Otherwise, I have some other things I’d rather be doing. However, because its fun to think about, lets take a stab at global warming.

Who owns the air I breathe? Am I responsible for the air I exhale? More soon.

-Alex

* That ‘persons who have freely chosen’ is not an argument from majority, but I couldn’t word it better here. What I mean is that there are enough people who recognize property as a fundamental right such that they can create economic systems which are mutually beneficial and which much take into account this fundamental right. Such a voluntarist system would also have to account for those persons who do not recognize property rights (which is always hypocritical, but we’ll save that for another time). In other words, the protection of property would be a concern of everyone in a voluntary economy, and would be especially pronounced when interacting with those persons who claim not to recognize property rights.

**We own ourselves (a case that has been made quite convincingly elsewhere). We own the things we create with the things we create. We own the things we have come to own through voluntary exchange. I inherit or earn an apple tree and make pies. You trade me property for pies. I own that property. You own the pies.

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Tags: anarchy, capitalism, property rights, responsibility, self ownership, uncertainty, voluntarism