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Tags: defense • feudalism • John Locke • just war • limited government • mercantilism • Natural Law • nozick • slavery • statism • Thomas Hobbes • war
Did Locke Really Justify Limited Government?
John Locke (1632–1704) was a physician, statesman, and political philosopher, filling that last office in a dry, “empirical,” and militantly antipoetic English mode. Locke’s stock has risen and fallen over the years. Contemporaries called him a Socinian (a precursor of Unitarianism), a deist, a Muslim, and an opportunist. Later critics have seen Locke as the Whig Oligarchy’s spokesman (Basil Willey), abandoning the authentic natural law (John Wild), and leaving behind “right” and “left” Lockeans stressing either property or its labor justification (Christopher Hill).
Locke’s fame rests on his Two Treatises of Government. Thanks to Peter Laslett’s introduction (1960), we know Locke wrote his First Treatise answering Sir Robert Filmer’s Patriarcha (1680) at a time when his Second Treatise was well underway. The Second Treatise defended (prospectively) the conservative revolution of 1688. Its argument owed much to a Calvinist political tradition in which certain political authorities oppose other authorities that are breaking the social compact. Seeking to justify government by consent regardless of historical specifics, Locke deployed a version of natural law.
The point of the rights adduced—labor-based property and so on—was to buttress an argument that the king could not (should not) expropriate English gentlemen–a rather meager result, unless of course all their rights eventually “trickle down” to the rest of us. To reach his goal Locke undermined the natural-law assumption that God gave the earth to men “in common.” First, Locke set up each individual as a self-owner, rightfully appropriating natural resources to sustain life. By “mixing” their labor with resources (land), individuals rightfully acquired property, provided enough was left for others: the famous “proviso.” (You could not, for example, grab all the acorns and then leave them to rot.) Next, he introduced money, an “invention” of civilized men, which can accumulate without “spoiling.” A monetized economy overcame the problem of “waste” (spoilage) and allowed men to build large estates through production, exchange, and purchase. The increased productivity of larger estates assured that enough was left for others (provided bare subsistence from wage labor is “enough”). Arguing from economies of scale, Locke built an apology for the land enclosures into his system (not to mention a kind of Lockean multiplier whereby enclosed lands yield 10 times the product of commons). Paying wages made other men’s efforts count as “mine” in appropriating property out of common resources (“The turfs my servant has cut,” and so on).
These market activities precede the creation of states. Since individuals’ personal “execution” of the natural law caused predictable problems, property holders created government through a social contract to provide impartial judicial services and common defense, putting their rights in trust. Accordingly, Locke held that property cannot (normally) be alienated even by conquest. Locke’s applied system was less obviously liberal. From the theoretical high ground we suddenly descend to actual English property holdings in the late seventeenth century, with Locke pretending they rest on individual labor and free exchange rather than on conquest and expropriation.
So far Locke appears to be an advanced Whig and founder of liberalism with a nice rationale for infrequent and minimally disruptive uprisings by a consensus of great landholders, gentry, merchant capitalists, and bankers, duly supported by respectable tradesmen, shopkeepers, and farmers who survived enclosure. These are “the people,” moderately and prudently redressing their grievances, even if (as Christopher Hill notes) Locke never actually defined who “the people” are. Americans took Locke fairly literally during our Revolution, and as a result his ideas sometimes seem the only American political tradition, as Louis Hartz complained.
Locke’s Problems
Since at least the eighteenth century, frustrated readers of Locke have “corrected” his system to purge it of apparently foreign elements. Some take Lockean rights as a starting point and move on (see Robert Nozick); others reject Locke’s system while extracting congenial points from it (Murray Rothbard). Truncated or not, Locke has left us some serious problems.
Social Contract. Whether seen as historical possibility or useful fiction, the social contract was always nebulous. The key perhaps was that something like a social contract “must have” happened, otherwise governments would not rest on voluntary consent. Further deductions from that premise would grind to a halt. Deductions were saved, but at a considerable cost in realism.
Mercantilism and Colonial Empire. As a political associate of the First Earl of Shaftesbury, Locke had access to the highest Whig circles. He was both a policymaker and theorist, serving as secretary to the Lords Proprietors of Carolina from 1668 to 1675 and writing (presumably with Shaftesbury) that peculiar neofeudal document Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina in 1669. He was a substantial stockholder in the slave-trading Royal African Company, and in 1696 we find him serving at the Board of Trade.
No stranger to mercantilism and colonial imperialism, Locke nevertheless argued that land is not rightly acquired by conquest unless it has been lying idle. This exception is extremely important, since Locke artfully fitted his “natural” right to property to English Protestant practices. Non-Europeans need not apply. Locke conceded that God had given land to mankind in common. On the other hand, the “industrious and rational” can—indeed must—prevent its being “wasted.” They can “mix” their labor with land to acquire it but must maximize the product. Anyone failing to maximize could rightfully be dispossessed—Indians in America, non-enclosing peasants at home. In effect, Locke promoted freedom for a minority of industrious Englishmen—a freedom to be paid for through constant growth premised in part on overseas empire. Like his successor Adam Smith, Locke favored relaxing the rules “within one part of the system” (as William Appleman Williams put it), which otherwise continued to require overseas expansion.
Locke and Slavery. For Locke slavery arises in a sort of social-theoretical Guantánamo. It was not part of any social contract but arose in “war,” private or public. In Locke’s view anyone who (in a state of nature) attacks another or steals his property “forfeits” all rights and becomes an “unnatural man” subject to death, outlawry, or enslavement in lieu of death. (Paragraph 19 of the Second Treatise wonderfully conflates defense with “war.”) Reject one step here, and the whole thing falls to the ground. (Locke’s reasoning nonetheless seems to inspire those war-prone libertarians who characterize the U.S. government’s enemies of the day as “pirates,” “common enemies of mankind,” and so on.)
This apparent “exception” to liberty hidden inside liberal State theory causes much interpretive anguish. Some writers see Locke as departing here from his real views. Others have him bending his theory to achieve a desired end. Still others believe Locke’s slavery doctrine reveals hidden premises in his system. Given Locke’s investments, it was perhaps convenient that he could accommodate slavery. His moves here involve some of his favorite hobby horses—aggression, forfeiture of rights, and enslavement.
Locke had labored to get around men’s “in-common” right to the earth and thought he had justified English gentlemen’s large estates. Looking abroad, however, he argued that some lands remained common, after all, owing to non-Europeans’ waste (failure to maximize). It seems a fair implication of the text that where such people resist European efforts to develop those “idle resources,” wars with them would be “just” and they might rightfully be enslaved if the conquerors forwent their “right” to kill them. In fairness, Locke never specifically said that “just wars” in West Africa accounted for the current supply of slaves, although Laslett believes Locke rationalized the matter thus.
Bastard Feudalism
Land and State. Why should anyone born after the imaginary social contract obey the current government? Here Locke’s claims about political obligation and consent reach their goal through what I shall call the Law of Conservation of Feudal Assumptions. As George Gale suggests, territoriality was Locke’s key (but hidden) premise: that is, civil society’s (the State’s) sovereign jurisdiction over a given territory to the exclusion of other States. But where has this come from? After adducing so many unlikely natural rights, Locke has suddenly become very conventional.
Now Locke might be describing a mere contract between neighboring property holders establishing a common defense agency (á la Murray Rothbard and Hans-Hermann Hoppe). In time this agency might assert a monopoly over “its” territory (the lands of its principals) and successfully march from Dominant Agency to minimal State (as in Nozick). Now the erstwhile agency would start commanding its former principals. But Locke took a shortcut and tied “Enjoyment of Land” to “a submission to the Government of the Country of which the land is part.” Civil society turns out to have a spatial dimension. All the “voluntary” consent Locke relied on to ground the social contract seems to vanish when he states that no one can withdraw himself and his lands from civil society. No secession here. He can of course emigrate, forfeiting his property.
State ownership of land has arrived, quite unexplained. One wonders what the State has “mixed” its labor with. Perhaps it has mixed its swords and cannon with another State’s soldiers or civilians. In any case, the social contract has somehow “annexed” individuals and their property to the community (State), and State control of land tenure becomes a chief means of enforcing obedience. So much then for all the “natural law” grounding of Locke’s system.
Naturalized immigrants have to pledge express allegiance. Native citizens are bound by the State’s not-so-hidden power to vacate their property titles. Further, the State is free to enclose outliers and renegades (and their lands) politically, without limit—no proviso here about leaving “enough” for others. Actual State practice has supplied Locke’s rules, leaving individual “owners” at the mercy of the State. Now Locke seems about as liberal—or as feudal—as William Blackstone.
Locke meant it when he described the “chief end” of government as “Preservation of Property.” But if the State is in some way the ultimate owner, the chief end now amounts to preserving the government’s claims—suggesting a modernized “bastard” feudalism, that is, feudalism without the advantages of the real thing: decentralization and reciprocal obligations. Like the Common Lawyers, Locke helped bridge the intellectual transition from one form of State to another. Accordingly, his liberalism is not in too much tension with his feudal recommendations for the Carolinas. Longstanding assumptions about (State) superiorities over land persist, while a modernizing State replaces feudal intermediaries.
Executive Liberalism. A closely related theme involves unknowably large emergency powers. Henry Parker, parliamentary propagandist in the Civil War (d. 1652), domesticated Machiavelli’s “reason of state” with all its unknown powers “outside” the law. Hobbes and Locke inherited this principle. Uniting a broad “Federative” (foreign affairs) power with ordinary executive power, Locke extended the executive’s arbitrary wartime capacities into domestic life. (On these matters, see Sheldon Wolin, “Democracy and the Welfare State,” Political Theory, November 1987.)
But Locke hardly bothered grounding this dual-use (“prerogative”) power and merely derived it from what men surrendered on becoming “one Body.” With men’s personal enforcement of the law ceded to the State, the king had a roving, “at-will” commission to do good at home or abroad. The king could suppress customary law to foster increased productivity (and thus greater State revenue) so as to outdistance his foreign rivals. Here is Locke the near-Hobbesian, employed by defenders of Lincoln’s executive dictatorship (“outside” or “beyond” the Constitution) and by latter-day “securitarians,” who dwell on eternally returning emergencies and national survival.
Seventeenth-Century “Natural Law” Swindles
How we got here on the high road of natural rights is an interesting tale. In it Locke is but one of many theorists who packed new content into the old shell of natural law in a kind of seventeenth-century Wrong Turn. The new international lawyers Suarez and Vitoria, seconded by Grotius, Locke, and others, asserted various unlikely “rights” belonging to natural individuals in hypothetical stateless societies. (I rely here on Richard Tuck, Brian Tierney, and Heinrich Rommen, among others.)
There were two jokes here. First, these “rights” derived from the observed behavior of States—such as Locke’s claim that someone has a “right” to kill his defeated enemy out of hand, and therefore may enslave him. Next, the theorists aggregated these State-like “individual rights”—private war-making, private death penalty, private enslavement—and gave them (back) to the State by way of imaginary general consent. Taken seriously, this “consent” bound actual persons even tighter, the gains being therefore rather murky. State practices were now justified by a collectivization of “rights” that individuals never had and which in the genuine, Christian natural-law tradition might never arise. Locke’s generously broad war powers—first private, then governmental—lead away from any serious just war theory toward total war.
These unhappy results hinge crucially on an explicit premise of the seventeenth-century “natural law” writers, namely, that promises must always be kept. (Hobbes claimed that even promises made under duress were valid; Locke disagreed.) “Will,” once expressed, supposedly provides full justification for both a contract and its enforcement. Skepticism seems warranted, especially regarding fictitious “contracts.” Justification, if we find it, will probably not be in some bare union of “wills” and nothing further.
The Devious Locke?
C. B. Macpherson remarked on the common “underestimate” of how much Locke subjected individuals to political power. He wondered why Locke’s landowner-State should have any jurisdiction over rural and town proletarians. The analogy that came to his mind involved merchant companies chartered by the king and empowered by sovereign bluster to use native labor (or imported slaves)—and land—wherever their enterprises took them. After all, if Locke’s property holders have created a real State—and on Locke’s account they have—they will use it. Once again Locke and imperial practice are not far apart, especially since Locke’s community (State), having eliminated law enforcement by individuals, does everything through legislation or prerogative. Here Locke’s model begins to approach legal positivism.
In Locke’s finished model a majority of qualified property owners controls the State, while the State commands each individually. Once more, property—considered as part of an imposed mechanical order—counts more than specific owners of naturally occurring property. And security of property requires obedience. It is not surprising that Locke took rather little interest in constitutional issues or bills of rights, despite his involvement in Shaftesbury’s revolutionary Whig projects.
It is the contrast with Thomas Hobbes that makes Locke seem a great liberal. True, he does give us some “outs” (very narrow ones), which Hobbes denies us. But with the Whig Oligarchs’ triumph in 1688, Locke’s ideas gave valuable rhetorical cover for newly entrenched interests. Soon enough they shifted over to simple Hobbesian practices buttressed with feudal-statist legalisms. (Enter Blackstone.)
In connecting Locke to colonialism, slavery, and more, the point is not to condemn him but to ask how much we want to owe him. (After all, Hobbes seems a better guide on how States actually operate and on what premises.) Anticipating the Thatcher-Reagan program of “free market and strong State,” Locke wanted an active imperial State, along with liberty for the right sort and their right to revolt if things went sour. The point is not that Locke “failed” to be an anarchist; it is that despite appearances, he did not make a case for genuinely limited government. He would, however, have made a wonderful contemporary Republican politician.
Pingback by The Mandated Health Insurance Outrage | The Freeman | Ideas On Liberty on 24 February 2010:
[...] John Locke is a beloved figure among libertarians, but is there less to him than meets the eye? Can he really be proclaimed the father of limited government? Joseph Stromberg’s answer may surprise you. [...]
Comment by Carl Milsted on 24 February 2010:
Most interesting. It is high time that freedom lovers ditch the property-as-core-premise approach to natural rights and have a look at the old Bible based rights. Or simply look at what a human’s rights would be in a state of nature without any other humans to get in the way.
With this broader set of natural rights we have the important conclusion that real property rights are a compromise of natural rights, just as the existence of the state is a compromise. Perfect preservation of natural rights is impossible given today’s high population. We can, however, think productively about compensation and optimal trade-offs. We cannot derive robot-friendly algorithms doing so, but we can come up with order of magnitude better political prescriptions than either Libertarian or mainstream politicians do today.
Comment by Daniel Shapiro on 25 February 2010:
Natural “rights” are a philosophical trap that led to political tyranny. Locke’s lasting legacy is his natural concept of property derived from the individual’s life; not from the state and where the function of government is to protect property – nothing more; nothing less. It was Andrew J. Galambos who independently discovered Locke’s concept of property and used it as a definitional basis for a unified theory of property and total property protection production as the positive approach to societal freedom per Volitional science.
Comment by Daniel Shapiro on 26 February 2010:
I should add to the above that Locke’s natural conception of property was a major input into liberalism: the physiocrats laisez-faire, and Paine’s American Revolution. Nature does not provide man with any “rights”. The old traditional centralized, top-down, command and control statist political paradigm (which reduces to might makes right)has been unable to provide the individual with property sanctity. Might makes right leads to tyranny.
Comment by British Whig on 2 March 2010:
A thought-provoking article. Putting Locke into his context and critiquing both his social contract underpinnings and the implications of his philosophy relative to slavery and imperialism is relatively easy and not wholly original of course (that’s not a criticism of a synthetic article by the way). Locke does have many flaws, even allowing for the context, and like any text in political theory, should not provide a ‘Word of God’ by which to live or establish a political system, but a platform for argument and debate of the issues concerned in doing so. We can happily reject the unsatisfactory features but take on board any concepts that are applicable and useful. Also, Locke compares favourably to contemporaries or predecessors – think about Jean Bodin. Divine Right of Kings anyone? Locke might be a far from perfect Libertarian in an ideological sense (clearly he wasn’t trying to be a Libertarian!) but he’s more so than others.
The problem for conservative Whig philosophers like Locke and Burke is that they have to defend an existing system not against reform but against wholesale revolution which would undoubtedly have worse consequences. Compare the need to defend against internal or external eg. Revolutionary France, Facism or Communism – genuine existential threats to property rights that did justify employment of raison d’etat. So Locke might have looked like an apologist for a bad system, but that was a defence against a worse one, in all likelihood. Unfortunately, expediency trumps ideological purity if the result otherwise would be less pleasant.
Putting Locke in today’s world – as the author does – we should allow the possibility that Locke would have been horrified at the use of his doctrines to justify an overwhelming statism. He might have turned out an apologist for the status quo and have justified this position, however, by arguing that the alternative may not be less state and more freedom but instead forcible revocation of property rights at the hand of a revolutionary mob and a rise of extremist totalitarian political movements. The most effective position is probably Burke’s – a defence of the imperfect status quo against the Revolutionaries, whilst acknowledging that gradual reform towards greater liberty is where we should be headed. Pre-existing property rights might be ‘unjust’ philosophically e.g. obtained by prior force and inheritance, but how else is property to be distributed? The key is to ensure that existing private property rights are defended by law, whilst that same law does not mitigate against social mobility and liberty (sadly the good intentions of welfare statists are doing exactly this).
Locke’s position on Carolina is interesting – I’m speculating rather here but should the author not consider that the colony was in danger of existential destruction by foreign threats? This might explain or justify some of his position given that destruction of the colony and the enslavement or murder of the individuals within it might be a worse fate than sacrificing some limited (emphasis on limited) liberties to state power to protect it? This might sound dangerously like communitarianism but where a society DOES face imminent destruction I think that’s justifiable in that context, but not in ours, which takes us back to Just War theory via Michael Walzer.
‘Might makes right’ may lead to tyranny, but we should recognise that lack of might can lead to our being tyrannised by others. Daniel Shapiro (great book on the Welfare State by the way!) is correct that the state does frequently fail to protect property but I do think we should recognise that there have been some occasions where it has done so – even if at some cost – and might need to do so again if we completely abandon Might ie. means of defence which may have to be offensive! In sum, there is a fine line between justifying the necessary functions (defence of property from expropriation by internal or external action) of a state in terms of political philosophy which was what Locke was largely thinking about, and using that same justification to introduce unnecessary functions such as healthcare, welfare etc.
Comment by Daniel Shapiro on 4 March 2010:
This comment is in response to British Whig’s comment above. I think you made some good points in evaluating Locke’s ideas in their proper historical context. It’s easy to criticize and point out errors made by our antecedants with 300 years of experience and 20-20 hind-sight.
I was wondering to which book you are referring in your statement?:
“..Daniel Shapiro (great book on the Welfare State by the way!)..”
Your statement regarding the age old question of finding or establishing some fine line to distingish “necessary” good state coercion and “unnecessary” bad state coercion is unanswerable. This is what politicans quibble about ad nauseum. Any conjectured crisis (real, politicogenic, or imaginary) moves the line in the direction toward increased state power and ultimately to a state of tyranny.
History cannot be denied.
An alternative to might makes right was unequivocally established by Isaac Newton (who was a friend of Locke’s). In physical science, the rightness of an idea is established by both truth and validity.
Comment by British Whig on 8 March 2010:
Daniel Shapiro
I’m assuming you’re the author of ‘Is the Welfare State Justified’ Cambridge UP 2007? If not my apologies, if so then my admiration! If you’ve authored others I’d be pleased to hear about them.
Thanks for your points. Not being an historical determinist I’m not sure a crisis does necessarily lead to expansion of state power, if that’s your point. It often does, but then again one can cite examples (e.g. the Thatcher/Major governments in the UK or New Zealand in the 1970s, Sweden in the 1990s) where political/fiscal crises have lead to – albeit to a debatable degree – a rollback of the state. Of course, if one were to believe Naomi Klein’s The Shock Doctrine, she presents exactly the opposite effect occuring i.e. crises lead to a growth in ‘capitalism’ – not that I broadly agree with Klein of course, most of the traffic is in the other direction especially at the present time.
Anyway, I stand by the broader point that Locke was defending necessary state action in defence of property rights, but not unnecessary state actions which abrogate them (viz. the welfare state). He may have done this from a problematic perspective – social contract – but just because he was wrong on social contract does not mean he was wrong on property rights. I disagree with Carl Milstead’s views on compensation – inevitably it would entail forcible confiscation of property by the state! Moreover, any view of how we can construe social relations from an hypothesised ‘state of nature’ are inherently problematic and seem to me to be contrary to von Mises views that behaviour in complex situations cannot be determined by observing behaviour in simple situations.
Newton’s logic may be philosophically correct, but suffers from ‘real world’ problems. Unfortunately, some social groups will not apply this test to their thinking and, moreoever, will attempt by the use of Might to impose their subjective notions of Right onto others who may not concur with them (Soviet Russia being a prime example). My point was that we sometimes need Might to defend Right – I think Locke would agree!
Comment by Daniel Shapiro on 8 March 2010:
To British Whig:
Thanks for you lucid comments! I did not write this book you referred to and have not read it though I am in agreement with the basic thesis contained in its title.
I’m pleased you used the term “historical determinist”. I’ve never hear this term before. Yes in way I am a historical determinist in the same sense that Newton was a determinist based on the application of laws of nature that he discovered regarding the dynamics of the physical world. The fundamental knowledge that Newton discovered (and the epistemological method he employed, i.e. empirical/rational) made possible very accurate prediction of complex celestial and terrestrial motion from an analysis of the acting forces (and vise versa) deduced from a common set of general laws of motion and gravitation. This was revolutionary both scientifically and philosophically!
It’s clear to me the Locke was a Newtonian and attempted to comprehend complex social phenomena using this same empirical/rational approach, i.e. the scientific method. His identification of “property” as a natural derivative of the life of the individual was a fundamental principle along with the idea that the function of government was to protect property. Thomas Paine’s American revolution was an attempt to establish a society based upon these natural principles asserted by Locke et al. Capitalism is a derivative philosophy of social relations based upon property sanctity and voluntary relations. It’s clear to me that the Industrial revolution is based upon technological derivatives of both Newton’s ideas regarding physics and capitalism’s ideas regarding a contractual structure of productive relations that are mutually profitable.
I’ve come to believe that a comprehension of complex social phenomenon can be derived from a more fundamental knowledge of human nature. Certain predictions can be made by observing the structure of social relations. Because of human volition and unpredictable circumstances this is not totally determinant, yet in many respects is ultimately determinable. It seems man is, by his very nature, self-determinant.
Historia est vitae magistra (History is life’s teacher) – Cicero. The Roman Empire collapsed. The question is what was the fundamental cause? Is it the same reason why all historical civilizations have risen, declined, and fallen?
These fundamental principles regarding man’s volitional nature were discovered by the late Andrew J. Galambos and disclosed in lecture form in his introductory course on Volitional science called V-50. Perhaps one the most far reaching ideas he asserted was a precise identification and definition of societal “freedom” based upon a precise definition of “property” akin to Locke’s in his 2nd Treatise. You may be interested to know that the Austrian capitalist economic philosophy can be derived as a sub-case from Galambos’ fundamental scientific definitions and postulates.
Comment by Sheldon Richman on 9 March 2010:
One of the important contributions that Joseph Stromberg makes in this article is to show that what Locke gives with one hand he appears to take away with the other. Locke’s theory of “tacit consent” is troubling. Failure to leave a jurisdiction and to abandon one’s land is taken as consent to the political authority. I don’t see how that passes libertarian muster. What happened to natural rights?
Comment by British Whig on 10 March 2010:
Daniel Shapiro – sorry, it’s just a co-incidence of names then!
To keep this brief, that is an interesting insight into Locke and I think you might well be correct. However, I come from a very different epistemeological belief which (as I intimated) is more in line with von Mises’ praxeology which in many respects runs counter to the Newtonian one, even if it arrives at the same point (?). As I read ‘Human Action’ I take it to dismiss the predictability of human action via scientific rationalism of the Newton/Locke sort, via Praxeology. Each set of circumstances (e.g. the Fall of the Roman Empire) in complex (ie. social) situations is unrepeatable and unverifiable therefore we cannot apply the same methodology. I read the end result of your line of thought – that we can predict outcomes – as an argument for huge government action because it falls into a belief that governments, forseeing a known end, will act to avert it. But that ignores the falibility of human foresight. As an historian, I agree that history should educate rather than teach. Teaching implies a known set of outcomes ‘if I do x, y will result’, which I’m afraid leads to atavism, whereas education implies a form of mental training that allows for a rational, logical approach to understanding causality – but it does NOT seek a simple formulaic approach to historical understanding. History is an educative tool, not a crib sheet for future action, in my view. Historical determinism is a flawed philosophy as it ignores unique circumstances, conditions and the unpredictability and complexity of human action etc. Karl Marx, to name one, was an historical determinist, that should make you immediately sceptical!
Going back to Locke – praxeology undermines the social contract and thus the underpinning of his whole approach as it leads us (as the author and Sheldon Richman point out) to some very ‘unlibertarian’ positions if we take the philosophy to logical extremes. I’m unhappy with doing that anyway, and I’m unhappy with putting Locke into a contemporary straightjacket. Locke was the better alternative for the 17th century, libertarianism has come a long way since!
Comment by Daniel Shapiro on 10 March 2010:
To British Whig:
Once again thanks for your comments! You made one statement that I wanted to remark upon:
“I read the end result of your line of thought – that we can predict outcomes – as an argument for huge government action because it falls into a belief that governments, forseeing a known end, will act to avert it.”
I was not making an argument for huge government actions, au contraire. FA Hayek provided a rational argument to show the absurdity of centralized government action based upon lack of information. His argument is sound. I think the title of von Mises little book “Planned Chaos” says it all. I think this relates to “ends and means” and will predict that a society where political state government is relied upon will ultimately fail because the means employed are not compatible with the end sought.
I need to make a distinction before proceeding which is between “government” and “state”. These terms are very often used synonymously. Yet one is a end; the other a means to an end, respectively. In my analysis, government is a function to provide a service; namely to protect life, liberty, and property. This is the end sought or the purpose of government. I’ve never met anyone who didn’t prefer to have this security – I think this is part of human nature.
The million dollar question is: what is a rational means to achieve this universally desired service. In a real way, the locks on the doors to my house and automobile are a government product or technology. Furthermore, most of the products and services that we voluntarily produce and purchase in the marketplace provide a form of security.
Historically, a state political mechanism has been utilized to provide government. Unfortunately, this non-market relation based upon involuntary transfer of wealth cannot deliver government to the individuals due to a contradiction that emerges upon analysis, namely: The individual must be robbed in order to be protected.
The obvious alternative is government through proprietary capitalistic production and market mechanisms based upon mutually profitable voluntary exchange. This proven method of production based upon science, technology, and contractual relations could actually provide this critical and valuable governmental service! It’s clear to me that each individual has the greatest proprietary interest in the quality of his life and can naturally make the most appropriate choices.
My teacher Galambos stated the fundamental problem that explains the decline and fall of historical civilizations in a nutshell: “The ideological demand for security is met with a political supply of tyranny.”
If you analyze the basis of all historical state government mechanisms, they reduce to a primitive epistemology, namely “might makes right”. Political democracy (as opposed to market democracy) was an invention of the ancient Greeks to prevent bloodshed based upon superior strength of numbers. Constitutions are an attempt to create a universal social contract and are also established and maintained according to might makes right.
In closing I wanted to add a couple of paragraphs from a paper I’m working on regarding “inflation”. I think this gets to the root of things:
A determination of “market value” can only occur when a real market exchange or promise of future exchange occurs. A declaration of market value is just that – a hypothetical assertion. The corroborating test to determine market value is by accord between a buyer and a seller. This is the true and valid (i.e. rational) basis for the identification and measurement of “market value”. Furthermore, a determination of market value is true and valid for only the particular buyer and the particular seller who agree to it, i.e. it is not necessarily a general determination.
Money was a rational innovation of honest and productive individuals and is a tool applicable to those who choose to relate to each other voluntarily and for mutual benefit. But like any tool, once invented, it can later be perverted by criminals for nefarious purposes, and used as a weapon in an attempt to obtain something for nothing. Please recognize that the statists decree the value of their so-called “services” without the necessary market accreditation signified by voluntary exchange. Without voluntary exchange to corroborate value, brute force or fraud must be applied to maintain any involuntary property transfer relation.
British Whig, I find this discussion with you to be thought provoking and profitable. Perhaps this blog is not the most appropriate venue for this digression. If you prefer, you can email me at: dshapiro@surewest.net.
Cheers!