Agorism in action

[Colin Phillips]

Here's a fun video:

http://www.ted.com/talks/benedetta_berti_the_surprising_way_groups_like_isis_stay_in_power

Essentially, one of the major ways that "non-state armed groups" like Hezbollah, Hamas, and ISIS capture territory is by filling the void left by the governments in specific services, such as social support and providing security.

It makes me think about something I've been mulling over for a while:

Is there a difference between a small government, and a weak government?

A government can be called "big" if it has lots of varying activities, and is involved in a large proportion of the society it governs.  So, for example, a government that is involved in setting food prices, labour prices, and deciding who can meet with whom might be considered a big government.  Conversely, a small government would be a government that is only directly involved in a small set of activities, and only in minor ways, such as only performing those activities which are best performed by a single entity with a local territorial monopoly (opinions differ as to the size of that set).

A government can be called "strong" if it is able to perform its chosen activities unhindered, or if it is usually successful in achieving its objectives.  A government can be called weak if its plans and activities are usually insufficient or ineffective at achieving the goals, or if its objectives are usually thwarted. (Note: thwarting can happen from within - i.e. corruption - or from without - i.e. resistance/non-compliance/attack).

It seems to me that the video above is describing the long term effects of having a big, weak government: the government claims vast power, territory, and authority, but the on the ground reality is that the government fails to reach its goals.  Social services are not available.  Security is not available.  Employment and jobs are not available.  Justice is not available.  If the state has promised these things (which it did, in return for the taxes it took), and then failed to deliver, then it makes sense for agorist institutions to fill that gap, and compete for the same tax income.

Does this characterisation make sense?  We could build a classification of all states into four quadrants based on a big-small axis and a strong-weak axis.  Libertarians can be described as people who have a preference for small government, but it seems to me that some of the small-weak governments of the world lead to societies which are awful, and it's the small-strong governments of the world that are best for creating situations where spontaneous order and economic growth can arise.

Libertarians are of course well aware between the difference between a big and a small government, and are quite adept for arguing for the one over the other.

But it seems to me that the difference between a strong (i.e. effective and efficient) government and a weak (i.e. corrupt, ineffectual) government is just as important, and usually ignored.  That can mean that sometimes we will advocate for a policy, simply because it would make the government smaller, without realising that the policy also makes the government weaker, and the costs of doing so might outweigh the benefits.

I'd like to hear your opinions about this.  

Colin

[Garth Zietsman]

It seems by 'strong' you are describing effective or good governance of which power is only a component.

A minarchy (and any government - including private) should at least provide justice, policing and defense effectively - otherwise it has no justification for being.

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[Colin Phillips]

Garth,

Would you say then that "power" is necessary (but maybe not sufficient) for good governance?

I'm not sure exactly how to define power.  Google gives "the capacity or ability to direct or influence the behaviour of others or the course of events", which seems correct.

That seems to make sense to me.  The body corporate of a cluster of houses, responsible for defence of the inhabitants, seems to me to require the ability to direct some aspects of behaviour (e.g. making a rule that inhabitants must close the gate behind themselves).  The same logic seems to apply to larger organisations, such as states or big corporations.  

We can replace "strong" with "powerful" in my original post, without really changing the argument.  

Do you think a small, powerful government is ceteris paribus preferable to a small, powerless government?

Colin

[Stephen vJ]

Yo, the indoctrination runs deep.

Just replace all reference to "government" in the video with "gang of armed thugs"...

S.

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[Colin Phillips]

Stephen,

Watch the video.  Seriously, I think it's incredibly reasonable to describe Hamas, Hezbollah, and ISIS as "three gangs of armed thugs that justify their existence by providing justice, policing, and defence effectively".  If using that definition of government works for you, then that's fine.  I think it's a bit pejorative.  It seems more true for some governments than for others - some focus more on being armed and in control, and others focus more on provision of services.  But I think in this forum, it's basically a given that everyone would agree with the definition (I do).

My question then becomes this:

Do you think a small, powerful gang of armed thugs justifying their existence by providing essential services is ceteris paribus preferable to a small, powerless gang of armed thugs justifying their existence by providing essential services?

I prefer the terms "strong" and "weak" here, because a "powerless gang of armed thugs" sounds funny, whereas a "weak gang of armed thugs" is somehow easier to picture.  A small gang can be armed, but still easily over-powered by a larger, better-armed gang that is motivated to do so.  They're not completely powerless (they can steal your lunch money), but they are weak, relatively speaking.

Colin

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[Stephen van Jaarsveldt]

I did watch the video. What she completely fails to mention is what distinguishes government from the other organizations she mentions. It cannot be a democratic election process, since she would presumably classify North Korea and China as governmental rather than non-governmental organizations, even though the distinction, from where I'm sitting, is entirely arbitrary.

She says that the one type of gang has increasingly been on the other side of peace treaties, but fails to say if the obvious (from her graph) increase in treaties with these non-governmental groups could be as a result of governments being more willing to negotiate, recognize and sign treaties with these non-government groups. Maybe they see some of themselves other in each other... as I do.

S.

[Stephen van Jaarsveldt]

To answer your question, I would rather answer to an employer, home owners association, club chairman, wife, etc. than to the mafia. Weaker forms of authority are better than stronger ones. Less coercion is better than more.

S.

On 20 November 2016 at 13:56, Colin Phillips <noid...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Colin Phillips]

I don't think anyone really has the following choice:

A: Answer to an employer, home owners association, club chairman and wife, OR

B: Answer to a mafia

Rather they find themselves in one of these two situations:

C: Answer to an employer, home owner's association, club chairman, wife, and weak mafia, OR

D: Answer to an employer, home owner's association, club chairman, wife, and strong mafia

I am thinking that maybe D is preferable to C, for the following reasons:

• The mafia in C is likely to be attacked by a stronger mafia, and I might be caught in the crossfire (loss of life and damage to property) - i.e D is better at providing defence.
• The mafia in D is secure in their power, and so can afford to spend a smaller proportion of their funds on guns, and a larger proportion on becoming beloved by their subjects (social services, policing, justice).  Actually, it's less about being beloved, and more about maximising the total value of the territory.  But the point is the mafia in D has the resources to do that.  The mafia in C doesn't.
• The mafia in D knows that their hold over my town is secure in the long term, so a clever gang leader might read up on the Laffer curve, and decide to create a mostly free, minimal coercion environment, so as to maximise the wealth-creating ability (i.e. value) of his subjects in the long term.  The mafia in C has no incentive to do any long term planning or allow any freedom of movement or speech that might unlock value in the long term, since they might not be here in the long term to loot you.
• The mafia in D is secure enough in its power that it doesn't have to pander to special interest groups.  The subjects want to worship a new god, or marry each other, or pay low wages for unskilled menial labour, or wear ugly clothes, or get ugly tattoos?  No problem?  If it doesn't threaten the gang's income or power, it's totally cool.  The mafia in C can't afford to be liberal - they have to actively claim legitimacy anywhere they can get it - by claiming to represent the people, or the gods, or the culture, or the values, or whatever.  They only cling to power because the average subject is too apathetic to resist - something which can change at any moment.

There are other reasons I could come up with, this is just to give a flavour.  

If there was another option:

E: Answer to an employer, home owner's association, club chairman, wife, and have all of your essential services met by a set of organisations that were simultaneously invulnerable to armed gangs and unarmed themselves.

I would of course pick option E, as would anyone.  My question assumes E is off the table, and you must pick between C and D.  What are the strong arguments for C over D?

Colin

[Garth Zietsman]

A government is a government (in the sense of actually doing some governing) to the degree that it is powerful.  Legitimacy, effectiveness and goodness are separate issues.

Stephen in my view (at least so far) a government prevent the profusion of mafias and hence reduce the overall level of coercion that would result without an effective government.  That is what happened over the course of the middle ages (see Pinker) when kings imposed order on barons, and it happens today in Africa and the Middle-East.

One however does not want a government to stray beyond certain strictly defined functions.  Yes I know that isn't easy to pull off.

[Stephen van Jaarsveldt]

Ok, so you're picking D because you fear picking C will lead to getting D ? Okay. I'll pick C.

S.

[Stephen van Jaarsveldt]

No, legitimacy is the core issue here. Some arbitrary thing which nobody has yet pointed out, makes North Korea magically legitimate to be called a government, but ISIS / Hamas / Manbunna not. In essence, they are all one and the same - some governments suck and some militia are surprisingly good... and everything inbetween.

Do you want less ISIS and more Government ? Well, not if said Government is North Korea, thank you very much. It all just seems to be like the Trump vs. Hillary thing did not teach us much - in the end they are all gangsters who want our money. Some of them dish out sweeties while they rape our woman and plunder our village, that's all.

S.

[Colin Phillips]

Stephen,

No, I'm picking D because I fear that picking C will lead to C^2, or C^3.

This is why I want to talk about two dimensions (powerful-weak, and big-small), because it seems to me that C is very likely to lead to big, intrusive, paranoid, insecure government, and D is less likely to do so.  I think the distinction between a big government and a powerful government is a useful one.  Of course a powerful government has nothing from stopping it from becoming big - if that is what it wants to do.  But I'm of the opinion that weak governments are more likely to want to become big than powerful governments are.

.c.

[Colin Phillips]

Stephen,

You've lost me - why does legitimacy matter?  Hamas is not considered a state, but rather a gang of armed thugs - so what?

To the people who are living in the territories they control, they went from no essential services, to having some essential services - why do they care whether Obama/Trump calls the provider of these services a state?

It seems like semantics to me.  If you have a pet definition of state, like "organisation with a territorial monopoly of control over a defined geography", or "organisation given the label 'state' by the UN", then depending on your definitions you can include or exclude anyone.  Likewise with "armed gang" - you could explicitly exclude anyone who is a state.  So what?  Hamas is actually providing essential services, at a considerable cost.  They were able to become prominent because the organisation which was called government in that region was too weak (despite being big and intrusive) to provide these services.  It's possible to argue that a smaller-yet-stronger government in the region would have been able to provide these services, at a much lower cost than Hamas' current costs.  They didn't, so maybe they weren't really a state?  It doesn't seem to matter where we draw the magic line, it's the actions taken and their results that matter, surely?

It seems to me that North Korea is a great example of a big, weak government.  The government in North Korea reportedly is involved in all aspects of their subjects' lives, directing every movement and enforcing compliance at great cost (see, for example, what proportion of the population needs to be in the army and well paid to maintain order and security for the state), but seems unable to achieve any goals (sufficient food production, technological development, creating the Juche New Socialist Man, building effective nuclear missiles, etc.).  Instead, it's reduced to running prison camps and selling slave labour to make ends meet.  This seems to be mostly due to the corruption of the Kim regime.  They have to spend essentially all of their resources on keeping the armed gang/mafia/government in power, and so have nothing left over for essential services.

South Korea (their current hilarious political problems notwithstanding ( https://www.wikiwand.com/en/2016_South_Korean_political_scandal )

seems by comparison to be both stronger/more powerful and smaller (less intrusive).

Stronger because they seem to have more effective justice, policing, and defence capability (though far from perfect, I admit), and smaller in that they interfere less in the lives of their subjects (though far from nothing, I admit).

Colin

[Stephen van Jaarsveldt]

Ok, it's an interesting thought experiment... but in the real world it looks like smaller and weaker governments are better... for example, Monaco, Isle of Man, Switzerland, etc... if by "better" we mean more stable, rich, safe, healthy, equal, clean, etc... who knows, Monaco may well be overrun by Trumpeters or Hillbillians, maybe we have not given weak government enough time to pan out there, only small government.

S.

[Stephen van Jaarsveldt]

You say "you've lost me" and then go on to say exactly what I meant... that's funny. It seems we are actually mostly in agreement, except that I see the whole lot as thugs and would prefer small weak thugs to big weak thugs, big weak thugs to small strong thugs, small strong thugs to big strong thugs and so on, whereas I think you are saying a small, strong thug could be in your interest, provided he is on this side of the fence ?

S.

[Colin Phillips]

Would you characterise the government of Switzerland as weak?  Small, sure, but weak?

I don't know, but I get the impression that the government is actually very secure, both from external actors (although maybe they just got lucky with the neighbours) and from internal threats (nobody is trying to violently overthrow the government in Switzerland, and the people there seem to think there's very little corruption: http://www.thelocal.ch/20160127/switzerland-slips-in-global-corruption-ranking  - they now rank only 7th in the world!)

Yeah, I'm basically saying that having to answer to a small strong thug has the upside of stability in the provision of essential services, and the upside of the thug mostly staying out of your way, which creates growth and value.  A world without thugs of any kind would be nice, but may be unattainable.

So, if a particular policy makes our local thugs smaller, but also weaker, the downsides of the weakness may outweigh the upsides of the smallness.  As a local example, dismantling the Scorpions (https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Scorpions_(South_Africa) ) technically made the government smaller but also made the government weaker ( in terms of its ability to eliminate corruption, supposedly).  With weakened checks on corruption, corrupt officials can interfere more in the lives of subjects.  So while eliminating the Scorpions looks good on paper from a libertarian perspective (One less government agency for us to spit on! Yay!), the result may actually be a de facto bigger government, if corruption is measured as part of the government - which I think is fair to do.

Colin

[Stephen vJ]

Is there a way to classify countries on a strong to weak scale, independent of size, and then plot an index of strength against other measures like GDP, size of gov, etc. ? I think you might be onto something, but I'm hesitant to think that it will change the policy recommendation i.e. when it comes to thugs, less is more.

S.

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[Garth Zietsman]

I do not regard the governments of North Korea, China or Russia (and many other countries) as being legitimate - for what it's worth.

[Stephen vJ]

I don't see any of them as legitimate.

S.

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[Jaco Strauss]

Monaco relies on the French defense force and foreign policy. Similar to the Isle of Man depends on the UK. Not very good examples of independence...

 

Jaco Strauss
Kaapstad

[Stephen vJ]

So they live right next to very big bullies. I think that makes them even better examples.

Let me ask you guys this. Are you scared of the USA taking over South Africa and destroying your culture ? China maybe ? Or the colonialist UK ?

Lets say you're not scared of the USA. I'm assuming that is because our small but strong government will defend us against them ?

Lets say you're scared of China. Is there any amount of socialist posturing that will make them any less of a threat i.e. Is it even possible to "do something" ?

Let's say you're mildly worried about the UK. Don't you think the threat is social and not physical i.e. we eat their food, we watch their TV shows, we speak their language, we use their subjects to teach our kids in school, we even use their metric system to measure out our mielie meal and the length of our wors. They have subtly and slowly infiltrated our way of life and won us over... so I don't see how you even defend against that.

What I'm getting at, is;

- socialism is crap, all of it, particular the nationalist clap-trap that comes with it

- national defense is a whole wad of fear-mongering on a slice of bullshit

S.

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[Erik Peers]

Stephen what you say is true.

However it doesn't address the need that a country needs a bully to protect you against other bullies. And rather a bully democratically elected than one imposed externally.

If it was possible to live in peace undefended that would be wonderful. However that's not the way the world works.

[Stephen van Jaarsveldt]

You're missing what I am saying by a mile. I'm not assuming any kind of peaceful world - far from it. The world is filled with bullies... the scariest ones are those labelled "government" because they "act in your best interest" and "care for the poor". Those who do the worst things are the passive-agressive, guilt-tripping, self-worth-destroying mother figures, not the patriarchs with the big guns and big muscles. The bullies who pose the greatest and most real threat are also the ones in your own neighbourhood - the ones you want to elect rather than have imposed on you. Which bullies run your back yard is, however, not the question at hand - we are talking about whether bullies far away should be labelled ligitimate, pansy bullies or illigitimate, fucking scary bullies... and I'm saying that is none of my business, because I have my own local bullies to worry about. Typically, the bullies from other neighbourhoods don't come into yours and mine... when they do, it does not matter who our local bullies are or how they got to be our bullies. Yet, the local bullies use far off bullies to justify their own megalomaniacal masochism, which is bullie-shitty.

S.

[Erik Peers]

I agree that the local bullies use far off bullies to justify themselves to the sheeple.