bitbutter
4 HN recommenders · recommended in 13 months, 2012–2020
23:16 · 164K views · Apr 4, 2012
An illustrated 23-minute summary of David Friedman's talk based on The Machinery of Freedom. It describes how law, police and courts could work as market services in a stateless society, covering private law, polycentric law and objections.
HN commenters use it as a short introduction to anarcho-capitalist ideas about private law and how disputes could be resolved without a state.
15 comments from Hacker News
> There would be no courts for those who cannot afford to pay for them. That's one major difference. There would be no police, fire agencies, etc etc, I highy recommend you watch this video, it's an illustrated talk by David D. Friedman, explaining how police, courts and other things would exist and work in a world without government: this video All of those things are just services. And the poor would be able to afford them too, just like the poor can afford cars, shoes and computers. > So it is outright impossible for groups of people to gather to cause serious violent harm towards members of a minority, leading to loss of life with no potential legal recourse? Is this what you are saying? It's possible, but they'd be paying for violence out of their own pocket. How many people, do you suppose, would oppose gay marriage or, say, pot if they were presented with a bill for outlawing it? My guess most of them would prefer to keep the money and make their peace with it. But because the cost of outlawing certain things is paid by all the taxpayers, they essentially pay for what they believe is right out of everyone else's pockets.
> Okay, let's say there's no governing body. Now, there's a dispute. How is it resolved? Fight to death? You've got an excellent question and I've got an excellent answer for you: this video It's a short video, but I highly recommend it to you (skip the first minute or so for a short historical intro). Please come back here and let me know if it answered your question. I also hope it doesn't just answer your question, but sets in your in a different mode for thinking, mode in which problems that seemed unsolvable can now be solved.
Funnily enough, as an anarchist, I never heard before that removing the government (or hierarchical use of violence) would remove violence from the world. There are plenty of ideas on how to keep law and order in an anarchic society. I recommend you to read The Machinery of Freedom (by David Friedman) or check out a summary here: this video TLDR: One way to keep order is having private law enforcement / private insurance you voluntarily subscribe to. This can be provided by multiple companies competing on the market. These entities can agree between each other on how to settle disputes, use a third party private arbitration system or physically fight against each other. A war between law enforcement agencies would be expensive and hard to predict, so I think these businesses would pick peaceful resolution over war. How contracts are resolved by law enforcement agencies can become a selling point, letting consumers decide with their wallet what kind of laws they agree with. Charities can collect money, voluntarily provided by citizens, and pay the fee required to protect people without money.
> However, in my experience they seem to try to vastly simplify many issues by waving their hands and talking about the non-aggression principle as if that automatically solves everything. The truth is, while there may be laws which are unjust, unfair, or plain silly, most of them were created to meet a need or solve a problem. This is very true, but it doesn't represent the views of all libertarians or even all anarcho-capitalists. For a much better approach to anarcho-capitalism—one that focuses primarily on economics and not on morality—check out David Friedman's writings and talks. Here's a basic introduction to his proposal of a polycentric legal system where the market produces all goods and services including law, law enforcement, arbitration (courts), and even national defense: this video . Along with Murray Rothbard's primarily moral/ethical/legal arguments (which seem slightly more prominent, and seem to be the ones you've encountered), Friedman's economic arguments make up the main "branches of anarcho-capitalism."
This is similar to, although one step removed from, the anarcho-capitalist proposal in David Friedman's 1973 book The Machinery of Freedom [0]. In this proposed society, monopoly government is replaced completely by a market for everything that government currently does, including law production, law enforcement, arbitration (courts), roads and infrastructure, and even "national" defense. I'm admittedly a big fan of Friedman's proposal, and I wonder what supposed advantage this futarchy provides over Friedman's proposal. There's a decent 20 minutes illustrated summary video on YouTube [1]. [0] [LINK] [1] this video