Per Bylund

Business Scholarship with a Swedish-Austrian Twist

Per Bylund

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What Is Property?

[ad]Pierre-Joseph Proudhon is not the only one to ask the question of what is property. Many throughout history have asked that very same question, yet no one has managed to answer the question satisfactorily. At least, that is my conclusion after having read many treatises on property.

John Locke, in the second part of his famous 1690 work Two Treatises of Government, maintained God has created man more or less as a self-owner and through working his mind and body, through labor, he creates new value and has a right to the fruits of that labor. Whenever he mixes that which is unowned (unclaimed) with his own labor he gains a right to the product, be it a cleared field, a harbor, a backyard…

The Lockean concept of property is without question the most universally accepted concept of property, it was both a defense of status quo at the time of writing (at least regarding how property was defined) and is a guideline for governmental definitions of property and the origins thereof. The Lockean property rights theory is the one that has gained most following theoretically or philosophically, and is the one closest to the real world property privilege in state society.

However, the Proudhonian anarchist concept of “possession” rather than property is interesting. Rather than accepting the Lockean “absolute, unrestricted right forever” the possession right is volatile and temporary – it makes a more efficient use of resources possible through not making it temporally exclusive. At the same time, however, the possession concept might (depending on how it is interpreted) work at the direct opposite – through only allowing temporary “occupation” it might discourage or deter investments thereby making the use of resources monstrously inefficient.

The two concepts are fundamentally different and seem to be at two extremes. While the Lockean property concept, often championed by “the right,” distributes rights to property “forever and ever” and “without limits” to how they are used (except for regulation through state coercion) , the Proudhon possession concept is extremely volatile and temporary. Is there no Aristotelian “golden mean” or “middle way” between these concepts?

Such a “middle way” concept of property/possession should be able to abrogate the inherent problems with both extremes: it should not accept the problems of “absolutism” in the Lockean concept, and it should try to compensate the negative effects of a very volatile possession type of ownership.

I tried to establish such a concept in a thesis in political theory (2005) through launching the concept of “use-right” to resources. The use-right is a Lockean concept in the sense that the right is awarded through “mixing one’s labor” with that which is unowned, but it is not a Lockean concept in that it awards ownership only of the fruits of the individual’s labor – not the matter itself. Thus, the right is gained to the function rather than the physical object.

The right is enjoyed for as long as it is not abandoned, which makes it distinctly different from the Lockean concept – as soon as the owner dies or leaves it behind it is “for the taking,” while a Lockean property is owned “forever” if the owner does not award it to someone else upon his/her death. Also, a physical object can be “owned” by a number of people at the same time but for different (non-conflicting) uses, thereby ensuring efficient use of resources. For instance, a piece of land can be used for hiking, mining, bird-watching, berry-picking, etc. as long as any added use does not conflict with the uses already established.

Comments appreciated.

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DIY – “Do It Yourself”

[ad]In a previous post (How About Some Honesty?) I touched on a subject of immense importance: honesty when arguing a political point of view. But honesty is a much more important concept than I maintained in that previous post. Actually, when arguing for a certain state of things, i.e., a normative, there is no reason to assume someone else will do the work. If you really want something to change in a certain direction with a specific end goal, then why would you not invest time, labor, and money into making it happen?

Normatives usually include how to organize society, how people should act, morals, ethics, the meaning of liberty. They almost always involve people and how people act or in what ways they are allowed to act. When this is the case, would you say it is consistent, that the person arguing a normative is believable, to not act the way explicitly preferred or even prescribed?

In the previous post I argued many so-called “pro war libertarians” are inconsistent because they do not in any way act or take part in the war they advocate. They don’t join the army. Many of them don’t even pay the taxes that finances the war. (I do pay such taxes, I’m afraid.)

This might seem as a dishonest argument, but I don’t think it is. When arguing for normatives, for how people should act, then the least one could expect is for the person supporting and arguing for a certain point of view acts that way. Why do you argue you know what others must choose while not making the same choice for yourself? Actions speak louder than words.

This is not to say there aren’t circumstances that could make it impossible to act the way one would prefer. It might also be too costly. In such cases it might not make sense. But to argue for a normative without even trying – or consider trying – to act that way yourself? That is hypocrisy.

Advocating killings without yourself killing (or trying to kill) is hypocrisy.

Advocating rape without yourself raping (or trying to rape) is hypocrisy.

Advocating theft without yourself stealing (or trying to steal) is hypocrisy.

This type of behavior can be summed up as politics. Politics is about making others act a certain way without oneself taking the lead; politics uses force and coercion to make people act according to someone’s preferences without demanding that that someone acts the same way. We see this all the time: politicians prohibiting or wanting to prohibit private health care or health care insurance while making sure to have the most expensive insurance themselves; politicians raising taxes while not paying them themselves; politicians advocating torture while they would never use such methods themselves (or subject themselves to such horrible treatment); politicians advocating war while never themselves ever risking a bullet (or killing someone).

Hypocrisy.

The reasoning above shows clearly the beauty with the anarchist position, which does not have the intrinsic contradictions of most statist positions advocating “liberty,” and the methodology of direct action – do it yourself. This position, at least in theory, is non-hypocritical: it does not include contradictory statements (it includes only your right to do with your life as you please as long as you do not restrict others’ doing what they wish with their lives) and it ultimately requires that you act yourself rather than make others act on your behalf. This is the only moral position (at least for as long as it does not include force/violence/coercion).

This is, however, a theoretical view of the anarchist position. There are plenty of anarchists who do not “do as they preach” or that even act in a way directly opposite to their expressed ideals. In such cases the anarchist is a hypocrite.

Nevertheless, anarchists tend to be less hypocritical than others. For two reasons:
1) Anarchists don’t support a coercive system thought “necessary” for liberty; and
2) Anarchists don’t believe in political means.

Let us take a look at these two specific points.

Liberty and the State. Liberty is the absence of restrictions, the absence of force, coercion, fraud and involuntary hierarchy. How can one combine such a concept with the concept of a state, which is ultimately defined as a “monopoly of [the use of] violence”? Imagine a society in which people only act voluntarily, add a structure with monopoly power – what do you have? It is difficult to imagine the result is more liberty. The result is necessarily less liberty.

This is, very simply summarized, the reason most political movements are developing dogmatic terminology and their own definition of words, struggling with trying to limit language in such a way that the fundamental lie will never be exposed. Liberty under a state is always, and can only be, liberty at the mercy of power. Liberty under the state is limited to actions accepted by its rule(s).

Political means. I have previously discussed the implications of engaging in the political process, i.e., using politics as a means, on many occasions. Political means, in the sense of using the state to achieve certain goals, always means using power to force people to act in a certain way. Be it removing a certain restriction or regulation or enacting another law to outlaw available alternatives.

Politics is a methodology of hate – it makes people rulers on all levels, and teaches people to obey those higher in hierarchy. It makes people develop brown noses and hard feet – in order to “succeed” or accomplish anything you need to brown-nose your superiors and keep inferiors in line (by force, if necessary). Even in local chapters of political organizations people “secretly” band together in factions and fight each other for “influence” or power.

Anarchism, and generally also anarchists, do not condone the state nor political means. This should always be the case for those advocating and championing universal liberty. But it is not.

As has already been mentioned, some anarchists have no problem with engaging in party politics. Also, there are a lot of so-called libertarians – “minarchists” – supporting both a state and political means as necessary for liberty. What about this position?

It should be fairly obvious by now that the minarchist position is strictly hypocritical. The so-called minarchists claim to be champions of liberty while advocating a centralized power with the monopoly to use force; they claim people have “a right” to do whatever they wish “as long as they don’t hurt anyone” but use political means (effectively striving to acquire the power to “legitimately” force others) to accomplish their goals.

If one were to construct a way to calculate the “level of hypocrisy” for a political or philosophical position, I have no doubt minarchists would end up with a “high score.” As a matter of fact, the level of hypocrisy should be lower the more “open” and undisguised the advocacy for power is. Nazism and fascism, for instance, would score low – being less hypocritical – simply because they advocate force openly and use forceful means to acquire the power to use it. Republicans and democrats are, in this respect, more hypocritical than nazis and fascists.

Having said this it is not difficult to realize why it is so uncommon to “do it yourself.” The ideologies and political programs themselves are fundamentally hypocritical. What you wish to achieve is usually an end goal for society where others act as you want. You want the power to make it happen, i.e., the power to force others to act the way you want. I despise nazism in every possible way, but at least they are not hypocritical – they want power to use it, they are explicit about it, and they attack, abuse, coerce and kill to get it.

The way I see it, anarchism and anarchists (in general, there are exceptions – especially when engaging in violent action against people and/or possessions) are superior morally and philosophically. Not only because of their belief in themselves, in man, and in freedom – but because they advocate freedom and they take it on themselves to achieve it. Collectivist anarchists generally do it in clubs (not seldom with internal structures of hierarchy) whereas individualist anarchists do it individually or organized in networks. In either case, they want freedom and they do what it takes to get it – and they do it themselves.

It is my personal opinion that the late Samuel Edward Konkin III – SEK3 – had the best theory on how to achieve a free society. But no matter what you believe of his theory, he was not hypocritical: he advocated freedom through counter-economics (SEK3 on counter-economics here) – where market anarchists take it on themselves to act on the market out of reach of the state’s oppressive apparatus.

SEK3 also recognized that it might not be possible to advocate liberty, in the purest sense, and act 100% freely. There are costs of acting in an oppressive state society. Such costs can make it practically impossible to act the way one would like to. Konkin recognized this impossibility and simply stated that it is every market anarchist’s moral obligation to act as much as possible without the realm of politics.

Each and every one of us is to some extent acting hypocritical – this is a necessary condition in a society so totally entrenched with state control and state power. What separates the hypocrites from the non-hypocrites is whether the advocate for liberty makes sure to act as little as possible in the political realm or not. If you take it on yourself to change the world, not just talk about it, you are not a hypocrite – even if you are “forced” to accept some oppressive measures. If you talk of changing the world and strive for the power to force that change on others rather than acting yourself, then you are indeed a hypocrite.

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On the “Ron Paul Problem”

[ad]My previous Strike the Root article on libertarianism and Ron Paul’s campaign for the republican nomination for the presidential election (here) has gained some attention. I expected to receive a large number of e-mails from “Ron Paulians” about how Ron Paul and the “rEVOLution” is about to save the world. To my surprise, most e-mails I received were from libertarians sharing my analysis.

This fact should mean, and I am generalizing of course, that the support for Ron Paul is real in the sense that it is not only a libertarian phenomenon. The thousands of people supporting Ron Paul’s campaign are not simply libertarians calling themselves republicans only to vote for “their” candidate. There are no doubt many such people too, but I suspect a large number of his supporters are actually republicans or “independents” in the party political sense. His support is real.

All comments I have received, however, are not positive. In a debate on Strike the Root following the publishing of my article, a number of points have been raised about the analysis in my article and arguments have been articulated to show how I am wrong. I dedicate this post to discuss two such points that I find particularly interesting – and that I think strengthens my view.

Initial remarks

Before beginning the discussion I would like to make one thing very clear in order to avoid confusion. I do not in any way support politics or political means, neither as a possible nor a moral means of change or liberty. In my view, I do not see politics as something that could ever bring about liberty – politics is a game of and for power, and as such it is utterly immoral and evil. This does not, however, mean I do not recognize differences between regimes; I would certainly be better off in one of the fifty united states under the constitution as it is written than in, e.g., Hitler’s Germany or Stalin’s Soviet Union.

But I find those differences only different in degree, not in principle. The American constitutional republic is an oppressive state system of power just as Stalin’s USSR was, it is just that the systems grant their subjects different sets of rights and “freedoms.” Call it what you will, but both are state systems and as such I do not support them. One should not refrain from calling things what they are – and one should certainly not support something that is evil but “less evil” than other possible alternatives.

Some say it is a matter of semantics to not support but be “against but not as much against as other alternatives.” That statement is a mistake: support means action in favor of, whereas I have dislike for Stalin’s and Hitler’s state systems just as I dislike the constitutionalist union (federation). There are degrees to dislike without “less degree of dislike” necessarily transforming into support.

Having said this, I should admit that I would of course rather see Ron Paul as president than any other republican or democrat candidates. It is rather obvious to me that Paul might cause a lot less harm (perhaps even some good) to me than the others. But this doesn’t mean I support him as president – I don’t. Choosing between evils means you choose an evil, and I refuse to take on such responsibility. The fact that the political system is a system for creating a sense of legitimacy for power and rule should make it clear to all libertarians that the involvement in such a system (and thereby support of it) is not compatible with the non-aggression principle.

Now, to the points raised. The first one is about Ron Paul’s rhetoric and what he can possible do – and why he supports certain things simply because they are in the constitution. I call this argument “He is against the state – but follows the law.” The other argument is more practical and claims Ron Paul as president would make a hell of a change.

He is against the state – but follows the law

It may very well be true that Ron Paul is a man who is strictly opposed to the state. I personally doubt it, but I don’t know him and therefore I won’t say it isn’t true. However troubling the statist libertarian (read: minarchist) view is, I find the supporting argument much more annoying. “Ron Paul follows the law.”

Of course, this argument is usually not stated this way, but rather in terms such as “he has taken an oath to uphold the Constitution” or that “he uses the constitution as an argument against his fellow law-makers.” It is true that presidents and members of Congress alike take an oath to uphold the constitution. But it is equally true that very few throughout history have ever taken that oath seriously. So why would anyone who is against the state take that oath seriously, with the only effect being to restrain one’s possibilities to get rid of the state once and for all?

Since no one else on “the Hill” cares at all about the constitution and they frequently move to enact laws contradicting it only to further the state’s (their own) powers, then what good does the only person opposed to such behavior taking the oath seriously do? If this is really the case, if the libertarian on “the Hill” is really pro liberty, then the oath has only one real effect: it stops moves for liberty while having no effect whatsoever on those working against liberty. That should be reason enough to not care about the oath nor the constitution.

Another reason for working to uphold the constitution while not really believing in it might be that the person in office takes his or her word seriously. This is a ridiculous argument – if the person elected for congress is really for “more liberty” than allowed by the constitution, then being a member of congress itself is so evil and contradictory a position that breaking an oath to uphold something one does not believe in doesn’t change a thing. It only means tying one’s own hands – for what reason?

In either case, the libertarian on Capitol Hill has no reason to obey and uphold the constitution. It could be a strategic move with underlying good intentions, but the road to hell is paved with good intentions. There are no arguments for working politically for the constitution unless one either 1) believes in it or 2) has as [sole] aim to “stop the others” – or both. If one believes in the constitution, which I believe is the case for Ron Paul, one cannot be anti state (and thus the argument above falls). And if one is only trying to stop the ongoing destruction in Washington, DC, then there is no reason to believe this person is at all libertarian – what are the ideals and ideas?

I believe that Ron Paul fits both – he both believes in the constitution (and is thus not anti state) and works mainly to stop the “madness” in the federal government.

Now to the second and final point:

He can and will make some real change

There should be no doubt this statement is only possible to make if one has a fundamental belief that change is, in fact, possible through the system. Without such a belief the statement simply wouldn’t make sense. At all.

It isn’t enough to claim the system has, indeed, been changing – I do admit to the factual statement that the system isn’t perfectly stagnant, it changes all the time. But I realize that the system continuously changes for the worse, not for the better. The system, no matter how “system” is defined, has never worked to strengthen liberty or roll back the powers of the state (these are really synonymous statements).

There are nevertheless events to the benefit of liberty, usually as a result of popular distress and risk of revolution or “losing control” or “chaos” (the latter two are usually used to describe such times when the masses no longer accept the authorities’ oppressive measures). But these events are only temporary setbacks for those with power – they realize they have tried to increase their powers a little too fast, and thus “take it back” only to do the same thing again at a later time when people aren’t watching (or have calmed down or are focused on something else).

The fact is that real change in society to the benefit of liberty only comes about as revolutionary leaps forward rather than gradual change. Such leaps may be the result of a tipping point having been reached, but the change is always great and happens almost all at once. Lady Liberty never approaches taking baby steps.

That said, what could Ron Paul do as president? With George W. Bush having made the U.S. presidency more powerful than admitted in the constitution, there should be some possibilities of change. Setting aside the fact that all such powers are unconstitutional (and thus president Ron Paul, taking the oath seriously, wouldn’t be able to use them – only to abolish them), Paul could make use of the presidential power as commander in chief and stop the slaughter and bring all troops home.

But what about spending? What about the welfare state? Those are matters for Congress and for president Paul to accept Congress’s decisions. Will Congress change because Ron Paul is president? He seems to think so, and maybe it will. But will it change radically? Hardly.

It seems to me what people in general hope for is that Ron Paul as sworn president means something much more than someone taking the oath seriously. It means the whole American society has changed, that the people has gotten sick and tired of government and wishes to abolish most (or all) welfare state programs. With such a change Congress will no doubt change radically as well – the reps and senators love their privileges too much to have ideals, and thus would throw out whatever agendas they have in order to stay in power and keep the people’s “confidence.”

But such a change really has nothing to do with Ron Paul and it has nothing to do with his presidential campaign. Rather, a Ron Paul presidency would then be an effect of a radical change that has already happened. So radical change by president Ron Paul is not an option – radical change would happen anyway, not depending on who is president. And if this is really the case, then why would Ron Paul have to adopt the view that he must restore the constitution (assuming the claim that he is in reality an enemy of the state)?

If there is no such radical change, which to me seems a lot more plausible, then Ron Paul as president would have to work with a lot of resistance – from both the people and Congress. Why anyone would believe such a presidency would mean real and concrete change I do not know. Politics, after all, is a means for oppression and destruction of liberty – not a means for liberation.

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On Anarchist Forum Statism

[ad]In a recent article published on Strike the Root, I discuss another inconsistency in the anarchist movement. The issue discussed is, at least from a greater philosophical or political point of view, neither important nor big – it is about how anarchist web forums are managed. And the problem I discuss is that they are, in fact, managed.

Of course, it may not be a problem to moderate or censor or even require personal information when you have a forum. As I mention in the article, one reason such “managerial” behavior can be legitimized is, for example, if the anarchist believes in property. It is also, I guess, possible to claim the forum is in the “owner’s” possession and thus certain restrictions on what other people can do with it are justified.

However, the point I wish to make with this article is that if you are strictly against control, against property, against censorship and thus pro free speech, yet moderate your forum, then you are a hypocrite.

Despite this fact, and the point being pretty clear (at least, I would like to think so), there has been some criticism toward the article. I agree that it is probably not one of my better articles, it is absolutely not the best, but the point I try to make should be very clear. Also, it should be read in a context – I explicitly link to another article on a certain kind of “anarchist statism” – that many anarchists have a rather statist mindset, at least with regard to certain issues, and generally engage in what I prefer to call blueprintism.

The point I make is not that all forums aren’t the way I would like them. It also isn’t a disguised way of advertising my own very open anarchist forum on the Anarchism.net web site. I personally don’t care what people do with their web sites, but I do care about ideas and principles. As a single issue it might not be a big deal that an anarchist forum is moderated, censored, and only open to registered users. But from the point of view of principle it sure is.

Are these anarchists moderating and censoring the forum the same people who demand freedom to express themselves, to choose for themselves, and even “freedom” from private property? In many cases they are, yet they treat their web sites – especially the forums – exactly the way as they accuse capitalists of treating their property: controlling, excluding, and as a means to make a profit. Is this consistent? Hardly. Is it legitimate? From a principle point of view – absolutely not.

I doubt that many anarchists would agree on these three points. My guess is they can somehow rationalize the fact that they are using what they identify as property the same way as their “enemies” use their property. Perhaps they “must” moderate their forums in order to protect them from the state? Perhaps the capitalist system and the culture it feeds makes it impossible to have an open forum without it being destroyed by “capitalist lackeys”? But some anarchists, I believe, would still agree on some of the points – or maybe even all three.

Of course, most anarchists would not agree on the latter point even if they do agree with the first two. The reason for this is no doubt the use of the word “profit” rather than the real meaning of “making a profit.” As any economist knows, profit is not only a monetary concept; it means to be better off. It doesn’t matter in what way – even if it is but an illusion, you are still better off and thus you have made a profitable choice. It is a matter of utility.

To make a profit does therefore not necessarily mean that you make dollars, pounds sterling, or rubles. It could also mean you do something that gives you satisfaction to some degree – and the reason you do it is simply that it gives you more satisfaction than any other alternative use of your time and energy that you can think of. To moderate a forum no doubt has benefits for the person doing it: you get to be a central figure, a needed person, and you might even become a celebrity in a limited circle of users. And in the forum you have the power.

This is definitely a driver for many of the people having and running forums on the web. And it is certainly a driver for many of the people who run anarchist forums too. They are driven by the profit motive, and it is because of the possible profit they observed or identified they are doing what they are doing.

This should be hard to swallow for many an anarchist, and I would believe it is. This, in turn, sets very human protection mechanisms in motion and thus we will (I presume) hear a number of arguments why this is not true (there is no profit motive), but most such arguments will be but rationalizations of the choices already made. It is difficult to accept that you have acted in the exact opposite way you preach people should act.

Let me add that this should be even more difficult for an anarchist, since statists often find themselves in situations where there is nothing they can do but choose one alternative of many that contradicts everything they have said, written, and believe. The state is itself a contradiction of human life and liberty, which calls for contradictions also in the lives and thoughts of statists.

But the problem here is not the state – it is the dogmatic use of words. There is nothing inherently wrong in the word “profit.” It is only wrong in a certain context and used in certain connotations. Profit is a bad thing for many anarchists not because it means someone is being better off (even though there are some who seem to believe this is the case) – profit is bad because it is the result of acts of exploitation carried out in a system based on enforced privilege. The problem of profit is not what it is, but what it implies.

This is why so many anarchists (and others as well) tend to direct their energy to fight the wrong things. If capitalism is truly a system of privilege making a certain class able to make enormous profits through their “right” to exploit the masses, then it can only be a system existent in a state framework. Which means capitalism, in this form, is necessarily dependent on the state and a symptom of the state. If we were intelligent we would cure the disease, not work to remove the symptoms. The former could make real change, whereas the latter simply makes sure there is an eternal, never-ending struggle.

Actually, you might even claim that it would be dishonest or even hypocritical to try to remove the symptoms without trying to find a cure to the real problem. Painting over the stains does not remove the causes of the problem, just like putting another guy in office doesn’t remove the problems of statism. This equally true with the state and capitalism as well as with saying you are an anarchist while not acting like an anarchist.

Consistency is very, very important. It is not only important for the cause or movement, but – more importantly – it is important for your belief in self and your values. Your self esteem is based on you honoring your principles. I need not say a principled mind is superior to the mind based on contradiction and conflict. A principled position is a strong position – a moral position – even if you are alone against the world.

Also, dishonesty and inconsistency is a problem for the movement. If anarchists aren’t principled in both thought and actions they will try to rationalize their imperfections and the contradictions they discover. Such rationalizations make you vulnerable, and this may very well lead to dogmatism and factionism. And this is what we are seeing in the anarchist movement – people seem more interested in denouncing fellow anarchists who don’t agree to 100% with the views put forth than fighting the common enemy.

In this sense, it is extremely important to do away with “anarchist forum statism.” This may only be a small issue, perhaps even unimportant in itself, but it is a symptom of inconsistency and unwillingness to live by one’s principles. And the result of such inconsistency is an anarchist movement in constant war between factions rather than a strong, united movement that can actually make a change.

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On Inequality – the Threat to Liberty

[ad]What is so special with a uniform? It is not the case that we generally respect a person in uniform – if someone approached us in the street dressed in a school uniform and ordered us to stand back we would probably not obey. At least, we wouldn’t automatically obey and make sure to quickly and silently communicate (using body language or whatever) that we have every intention of following orders.

Add a shiny plaque in the guy’s wallet and the reaction is the same. We would probably wonder what the hell is wrong with him and why he is flashing his wallet as if it gave him the right to boss us around. Many of us would think he was crazy, some might even think of calling for help. Some of use would definitely refuse to follow orders and perhaps even argue with the guy in school uniform and with shiny plaque in his wallet.

But if we change the design of the uniform so that it looks more “official” (which really means “intimidating” or “aggressive” or “militarist”) nobody would think the guy to be someone who had escaped a nearby sanitarium. Rather, we would accept the authority of the clothing and the shiny thing in the wallet at face value and obey the orders. How many of us would ask for this person’s authority, critically check what the uniform is about, or look closely at what the shiny thing in the wallet is?

Most people would definitely not do that. Especially if the person claims he is a “police officer” we would not even consider looking at the “badge.” Actually, we would accept his authority and obey whatever orders given without even thinking of checking the badge. The interesting thing is that most of us would probably not even have a look at the badge or even the uniform – if the “police” just sounds very sure and decisive we would obey.

This is a very interesting psychological effect, in part. We, as humans, tend to believe a person who tells us something if he or she makes the impression he or she is confident it is correct. It should be fairly easy to make people believe the most outrageous things – it has been done before. “This guy really knows what he is talking about,” is the general response.

Add to this the so-called “respect” we have been brainwashed with since we were infants, and it is easy to understand why people so easily can be told what to do and obey the orders of anyone. In any social context the person being a police officer would not be an authority – it is the uniform that makes him one. We have learned to “respect” (meaning obey) the state’s authority no matter who is calling for our “allegiance.” And most of us never question what we have been taught.

What we do not realize is that it is not the person’s natural authority that we accept and choose to take into account when we act (or don’t act). It is the uniform.

Part of the reason we immediately and without question do what we are ordered to do is of course fear – we know this person telling us he is a police officer will be protected by the state and thus can, with the help of the guns of government, lock us up more or less indefinitely – or use physical force only because he is not content with us or our actions.

But the underlying threat of the use of force, ultimately deadly such, is not the only reason we back away and obey whatever orders tossed at us. Many of us voluntarily choose to do things even though they can definitely mean we might get killed – we drive way too fast just for the fun of it, we stay out late in cities we don’t know very well, try foreign and domestic foods in restaurants where we are pretty sure we don’t want to see the kitchen. A lot of things we do can very well be the end of it all.

As the bad joke from medical school goes, the most severe condition a person can have is life – because it has a 100% death rate.

No, the reason we accept the stupidest orders from alleged police officers is not primarily that we fear them. Actually, there are numerous examples of people witnessing obvious police brutality where their victims are close to suffocating – without anyone doing anything. Is it because we fear the police officer, even if the people witnessing the brutality are 50-1? No, in most of these cases these people have much greater fear for the life of the victim. Yet they do nothing.

The problem is that no one takes the first step. If someone would take one step forward and state clearly that they will not allow for this brutality to take place many will most certainly follow their example. And they can all tell the same story in a court of “law” if there will be a trial. The police officer will definitely be acquitted and found guilty on all charges (if any), this is always the case (not surprisingly when the state is to judge whether the protectors of the state acted “justly”). But so would probably the people stopping the obvious brutality – it cannot be fear of repercussions that stops people from helping a fellow human being from being brutally assaulted and perhaps even killed before their very eyes.

No, we hesitate because we have been taught every day of our lives that we have a duty to obey when the state or the representatives of the state give us orders. And since we all hesitate nobody ends up doing anything. We all wait for someone to take the lead, to show us the way – to act in such a decisive manner so that we can interpret it as an order.

We are thus back again to authority and our desperate need for someone to show the way, for a leader – a Führer.

The centuries living under a state’s rule have made most of us so unable to act, and so uncomfortable with making decisions ourselves, that we are in every sense sheep looking for a shepherd. And we believe everybody else is also sheep, which means that if we actually do something we will be the only ones.

This is the most fundamental problem with the state system – we have lost the confidence in being men and women. We gladly accept authority wherever we see it and in whatever shape it is shown to us. It is, from this perspective, strange that kidnapped often end up working for the kidnappers against those who try to set them free? This “phenomenon” has been studied extensively, but no one has made the connection between our society of sheep and the need for authority that we have been force fed since we were born.

What this means is not only that we subject ourselves to authority and the state; it means not only that we subject ourselves and everybody else; and it does not only mean we feel uncomfortable with people without uniform (in whatever form) taking the lead. It means we have fundamentally accepted that some people have the right to do whatever they think necessary with other people’s lives. It means we have accepted inequality.

Inequality is necessary for every oppressive and exploitative relationship between people or groups of people. The sad truth is that there cannot be freedom as long as there are different “kinds” of people – with inequality there is no chance for freedom.

My latest article published on Strike the Root, Inequality Is the Threat to Liberty, discusses this relationship between inequality and freedom.

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How About Some Honesty?

[ad]In recent discussions with so-called pro-war propagandists I have begun to think about the validity of arguments. This is not validity in a philosophical sense, but rather an assessment of the argument’s validity in terms of the proponent’s honesty. Of course, one shouldn’t “shoot the messenger” even if the message itself is fundamentally offensive or disturbing. But it should be fair to require some honesty from the proponent of certain policies or advocates of certain measures.

Too many people have very clear and convinced positions on issues without making the connection between the view and the values, or the view and their own persons. Is it possible to advocate certain views without also advocating the values necessary for these views? Is it possible to advocate certain views without accepting them if they were applied to one’s self?

I would call such an advocate dishonest, the very opposite of a serious debater. To me, it is obvious and necessary that I myself accept the content and consequences of my views if I advocate them. I cannot advocate what I cannot personally accept; I cannot believe what I cannot personally endorse.

But to most people it seems totally acceptable to advocate something for other people that they would never ever accept if the same happened to themselves. This is where the war issue is interesting – war proponents seem to have no problem with advocating and even calling for war, bombing, and murder on foreign soil, and they have no problem with torture, warrant less searches, phone taps in their own country. The argument is often that is is for their own “security” and that the alternative is worse. Yet none of the war proponents I have discussed this issue with would accept the authorities torturing them, searching their homes without warrant, or listening in on their private phone calls.

I guess they reason they are not the enemy. After all, they didn’t do anything (except for advocating that these measures should be used on other people).

Sure, I’m not being completely fair. Most of us think murderers should be locked up for decades in jail or even get “the chair” without accepting the state locking us up or frying our brains. We didn’t murder anyone, so the analogy isn’t perfectly valid.

It is however true that advocating torture, even though most people know anyone tortured would willingly tell the torturer whatever he wants to hear (rather than the truth), doesn’t mean only the guilty will be tortured. It doesn’t mean the advocate of torture will not be tortured – there may be coincidences or leads making it “necessary” to torture the torture-advocate sooner or later. So the analogy is also not as bad as you might think.

But there are other arguments that even more clearly show that people generally leave themselves out of the “equation.” And this is, I’m afraid, a thesis that is valid no matter if the person advocating whatever measure is a member of the large number of average Joes, a powerful politician, or a philosophy scholar.

Take for instance the argument for war. I have personally no understanding whatsoever for this position – I cannot understand how anyone can actually argue for such a terrible thing. And I cannot for the world understand how someone could claim the right to argue for something that effectively and violently ends the lives of thousands or even millions.

I could perhaps see the logic if war is argued for as a despicable but “necessary” last resort, that all other means have been tried and it is the only way to not become extinct yourself, to engage in war. But to advocate waging war in order to stop someone from having a weapon that they might be trying to make, which they might then use, and – in that case – perhaps could use against “us”? (Read: USA vs. Iran.)

This is certainly not a last resort kind of argument – this is advocating war.

So what if you advocate war? The argument usually goes something along these lines: It is “necessary” to wage war for “our safety” and [sometimes] “we” have a “responsibility” or “duty” to protect our culture/traditions/values/part of the world/…

Now, if this argument is valid philosophically (and let’s assume it is), then what can we say about the “messenger”? If it is really “our duty” to go to war, then it should be each and every individual’s duty to do so. It should also be the duty of the person using the argument – I would say it is especially this person’s duty, since he or she uses the argument and makes the claim that there is such a duty.

In the case of Iran, or Iraq for that matter, any person advocating the war should have the same duty as any other person using that argument or being included in the “we” used. The duty is his or hers as much as the it is the duty of the people who have signed up with the US Army. Actually, since it is so easy to join – even if you are not an American citizen – practically anyone could do it.

So what about this duty of ours, how many of the advocates for war have joined the Army (or Navy or Air Force or whatever)? It is safe to say most of them haven’t. Now how could this be?

I haven’t found a universally acceptable answer to this question yet, and I’m sure there isn’t one right answer for all of the war advocates. But I would believe the argument would usually include some kind of avoidance of the issue at hand – either the person would claim to be “too important” to leave their current job/community/family/whatever or they have already “done their share” or “fulfilled their duties” (whatever that means). I would also expect most of these arguments are really ways to hide the fact that these people would never go to war themselves, but they all want to “enjoy” watching the slaughter on CNN with their team “winning” while having a few beers.

This is certainly an utterly dishonest position, no matter what made-up argument they use for not enlisting themselves. (By the way, would they support members of their families enlisting? No?)

I have come across a large number of Swedish conservatives and libertarians supporting the war on Iraq and a future war on Iran, but none of them have joined the US Army. Many of them have even managed to avoid the Swedish draft! Is this an honest position? Can you really argue for war yet yourself act to not be part of the war machine and be credible? I doubt it. I find it utterly dishonest.

But this problem of debating, the inability of some people to connect their arguments with their actions, is a general problem in argumentations per se. It is not specifically a war problem, even though it is much more evident in this issue since it so obviously is possible and even rather easy to “do you duty” yourself. This problem of advocating one thing but not doing it yourself is prevalent in discussions on philosophy, morality, and politics. Where does it come from? And, more importantly, why do we accept it?

As far as I am concerned, an American saying pinpoints the problem at hand with these dishonest debaters: they don’t “put their money where their mouths are.” They certainly don’t, they call for certain precautions and actions taken by the anonymous masses while never ever thinking the same argument should be equally applicable to themselves. Actually, the guy next door might very well be arguing for the same thing – having you in mind as front-line trooper for the next “surge.”

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On Government-Sponsored Schooling

[ad]I have received quite a few comments on my latest article published on LewRockwell.com. In the article I discuss a reason for concluding government-sponsored schooling has failed that isn’t usually discussed: the fact that there are some individuals, after nine or twelve years of schooling, who still do not share the values of the so-called mainstream.

As I claim in the article, the diversity in values and beliefs should be much greater among the kids entering the school system than is showing among the same kids when they have “finished” their education. The reasons for this homogeneity in values, thoughts, and views on the world could be many. It is reasonable to assume people are likely to adopt each others’ views when interacting, especially when interacting in small groups for a long time (such as in school classes). It is also reasonable to assume kids 7-15 years old have not yet established a “fixed” world view yet, which means the difference between the individuals’ values as 7-year-olds and then as 15-year-olds might not be a good variable to analyze. (It should however also be true that 15-year-olds generally are often at the hight of their development to being adults, and thus even more confused and “unknowing” than they will ever be.)

However, these problems set aside it should be possible to study what happens with people’s values and convictions when they are educated. In our thoroughly statist western societies it is not unlikely that the state’s interest in schooling as well as in the media has propaganda reasons. There is reason why dictators take over the media and schools among the first things they do – there is value to them in doing so, they get the upperhand in educating the grown-up population and its children, they get to say what is truth and what is lie.

So one does not have to be a conspiracy theorist to understand some of the drivers for states to control education; at least one of them (if not all) is about ensuring and increasing control and power.

But the article is not about the “why’s” of government-sponsored and government-run schooling. It is about how this schooling is failing and how we can most easily see that it is in fact failing. Many libertarians have pointed to the fact that some people go through school without learning the essentials, thus telling us the state is inefficient and ineffective and therefore shouldn’t run schools. This is true, but we should perhaps be glad this is so.

Assuming it is true that there is a reason for the ruling class to monopolize education so that they can make sure their power is not questioned, there is reason to appreciate the fact that some people are forced to spend nine or twelve years in class without learning what is being taught. It might not make sense to say it is a good thing that some people don’t learn to read and write even though teachers try to teach them for a decade. To be able to read and write is of course a quality, and it is necessary in our western societies to have this quality.

However, if schools fail to educate children in the most basic knowledge taught, there is reason to assume schools also fail in other areas: they should fail to brainwash students to the same degree as they fail to teach people to read and write.

This is one of the points in my article, and it is an important point to make. If people have the same views and beliefs when graduating – then something is wrong. People shouldn’t have the same ideas, values, views, and beliefs. If schools really only teach knowledge and do not try to teach our kids how to be “good citizens,” there should be a bunch of kids graduating every year with a great variety of world views. People grow through forming their own beliefs and values – with or without the help of others. If this is really what is done in government schools, then people should come to different conclusions.

So why don’t they? Is it because government has found The Truth and therefore has the right to make us believe it? Or is it that government has reason to make us believe certain things?

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Man, a Threat to Nature?

Discussions on the environment and environmentalism are often assuming a “man vs. nature” point of view. According to this view, man is a “threat” to nature and whatever man is doing causes harm to nature and, in the long run, to man.

But the exact view of what is man and what is nature is very seldom communicated. It should however be reasonable to assume there are at least three ways we can discuss man and nature. The most extreme view should be that man and nature are different in any way – that nature is whatever man is not and vice versa. If this view is adopted, we will end up with what is sometimes called Ecofascism, a view that essentially describes man as the threat to nature. Some ecofascists claim the “best” thing for the world is simply to wipe out humankind, or at least a big part of the world population.

The opposite extreme would be the claim that man is a part of nature and that everything man does is therefore also a part of nature. This view makes more sense historically, since man, following the theory of evolution, is a product of nature and is always acting in and with respect to nature. This should not, however, be interpreted as a view that is basically apologetic to everything man does to his environment. On the contrary, since man is part of nature and fundamentally dependent on “nature” he destroys the basis for his own existence if harming “nature.”

A third view would be to adopt a view somewhere between these two extremes, which would mean man is both part of nature and could be seen as a distinct part of it that might be acting in a way threatening nature (and also his own existence). Most people, I believe, would adhere to this “middle” position, even though the rhetoric used is often borrowed from a somewhat ecofascist view.

The question we ask is, Is man a threat to nature? The answer needs not be discussed at length, since most people would agree (whether correct or not) that this is so. We are often described as non-reflecting, non-understanding profit-seeking machines that care not for nature or the well-being of the next generation of our species.

This view of man being very focused on short-term profits and generally neglects or ignores long-term costs is often confessed to in discussions on environmental issues. Even in the “balanced” middle between the two extremes discussed above, man is seen as a parasite on nature and the main reason for the imbalances in the ecological system.Examples often used are the mining for natural resources and the drilling for oil, or the overcutting of the rain forests (the “world’s lungs”) . In the former case, our quest for riches devastates large areas of land just so that we can “be richer,” even though it is at the expense of our own well-being long term. Or we, as humans, exploit the treasures of nature in order to make use of the energy stored in the depths of the earth (or the sea) just so that we can produce more goods and products. And the rain forests are devastated and essentially threatened by our shallow quest for materials and comfort.

In this view, it seems man is identified as a special condition in nature. Man is a product of nature, but a product that does not honor the contract – man does not contribute to the harmony of nature and is in most ways a threat to life on earth per se.

Locusts and Elephants

This view is however too simplistic and narrow. If man is really defined as an absurdity, a creation of nature that is responsible for the imbalances in nature, then nature is the balance and man is that which causes the imbalance. This, essentially, is the view of the ecofascists – man is a threat to nature.

But even if this view is accepted as the definition of man vs. nature, there are obvious problems we must deal with. Man as a short-term profit-seeking animal put aside, there are other species in nature that definitely fit the characterization of man.

Elephants are well-known to be a migrating species. The reason they migrate is simply that they eat everything that can be eaten in an area, and are forced to move when they run out of food. When elephants arrive to a green and naturally “prosperous” part of the savanna it is only a matter of time until all the green “riches” are devoured. Are elephants a threat to nature?

The same story can be told of locusts. Big swarms of locusts, as described in many historical documents as well as in the Bible, devour everything and leave when there is nothing more to feed off. This may be a problem to farmers, but it should also be a problem to other animals living in the area taken hostage by a swarm of locusts. Are locusts a threat to nature?

The Role of Technology

The answer to this question is always “no.” Even though both elephants and locusts fit the description of man, in the sense that they are short-term profit-seeking animals that fundamentally upset the balance in nature, they are not thought of as a threat to nature. Rather, they are – as being non-human – often seen as parts of the ecological system. Furthermore, they are seen as a necessary part of the system, making room for new plants, insects, and mammals through their devastation of status quo. Then how and in what way is man different?

The difference between man and elephants or locusts is often said to be technology. The reason man is a threat to nature when causing imbalance in the system, while other animals having the same effect on their environment are not, is that man uses technology. Man’s not being limited to the state in which he was brought to the world means he has overstepped the “authority” he has been given by nature; man has, through adopting technology, not honored the natural contract.

The essence of this argument is that development and progress is seen as a bad thing. This is an argument for primitivism, an argument saying any kind of creation that isn’t directly the effect of “nature” is a perversion. But this argument too doesn’t supply good reason to condemn man as an anti-nature creature.

If the use of tools and the creation of shelter and community are threats to nature, which is essentially what this argument says, then all species making use of such things should be condemned. What about beavers making dams through establishing shelter? What about chimpanzees using tools to find food? What about birds making nests in the crowns of trees? What about animals digging holes to provide shelter?

These animals aren’t condemned as humans are, even though they are obviously making use of technology. Rather, their technologies are deemed “natural” and “part of nature” (even though they are created by these animals just like a hammer is created by humans).

The argument is thus not about technology per se, the argument is against human technology.

There may be many reasons for singling out human technology as a threat to nature whereas other kinds of technology are not. For instance, it is rather obvious that the level of complexity and efficiency of human technology is (at least for the latter centuries) much higher than other animals’, which means human technology could – at least theoretically – be a graver danger to life. (Talking of, for instance, the atom bomb this should be an obvious conclusion.)

But if technology in itself is not the problem, which is obviously the case, and thus that only certain types of technology is – then what is the reason for condemning a whole species? Shouldn’t it be much more legitimate and honest to condemn that kind of technology? Or even better: shouldn’t the argument rather supply a legitimate basis to condemn certain uses of certain types of technology that pose an obvious threat to our environment?

The argument and the conclusions drawn from it don’t go well together. It seems the argument could, if restructured in such a way that it becomes a legitimate argument, supply a good basis for identifying high risk technologies and thus take the necessary precautions so as to minimize risk or at least limit damages of its use. It should also allow us to identify which technologies can be adopted in order to protect or even strengthen nature’s natural balances.

But these are not conclusions championed by the proponents of the argument – the “environmentalists” wish to abolish technology. One might wonder what is their real goal. As has been shown above, man cannot be singled out as the only short-term profit-seeking animal (if that is an established truth) and it also cannot be established that technology per se is a threat to “nature.” It is not even true that all human technology is a threat, but the conclusion is still that it should be abolished.

What is the real goal? Perhaps the real goal of this argument, the agenda of the environmentalists adhering to this view, is something other than finding a way to establish harmony between “nature” and “man.” The agenda, it seems, is to establish that man is basically unnatural and thus not a part of nature, which makes the argument fundamentally circular. One might wonder, if the purpose is to identify man as something external to nature, something not part of or created by nature, then what is the ultimate goal?

What are the conclusions to be drawn from identifying man as literally unnatural?

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Ronald Coase & Market Bias Towards “Socialism”

In his well-known 1937 article “The Nature of the Firm” Ronald Coase explains the reason for firms as a solution to inherent problems in a market context. The argument is basically that firms arise because their hierarchical and process-controlling structure offer a way of arranging and supplying the factors of production that is in many ways cheaper than the “normal” market solution.

The market solution, according to the main body of economic theory, is based on the assumption that there are no real costs of transacting, since there is no cost of knowledge. All actors in the market have “perfect knowledge” and thus there cannot be costs associated with “finding” and communicating knowledge. This “ideal” situation may offer a number of simplifications important to the numerous, but is essentially wrong if thought of as descriptive of the real world.

In the real world, whether the market is free or regulated, there is no such thing as perfect knowledge. Rather, every action and interaction entails cost only in order to come about. Any seller and buyer need to find each other, negotiate terms, as well as monitor the other party so that he or she complies with the terms of the contract. These costs, generally called “transaction costs” since they occur to make the transaction happen, are generally high and difficult to overcome (if at all possible).

Since transaction costs permeate the real market, which is not the case in the economic theory of the market, every action and interaction is costly. Every decision that has to be made in order to bring about production of or trade for goods and services entails these costs. Coase’s argument for the firm is here that the firm, through management planning, can internalize these costs and make them part of the interior workings of the firm and thereby avoid the lion’s share of these costs.

This is done through establishing for instance employment contracts, where the employer pays the employee to “follow orders” rather than negotiate and establish contracts with other actors in the marketplace each and every time a new type of task needs to be carried out. As long as the manager of the firm manages to plan the internal processes in a way that is at least as efficient as the workings of the price mechanism in the market this internalizing makes sense.

Following the assumption that the manager, or “entrepreneur” to use Coase’s terminology, is a profit-maximizer (as is usually the case), he or she will want to internalize costs as long as the marginal benefit is at least as high as the marginal cost. In layman’s terms, the manager will choose to hire more people as long as the cost of doing so does not exceed the costs of carrying out the same tasks “on the market.”

We will thus, if Coase is right, see firms find internal solutions rather than rely on the market and its price mechanism for as long as:

Marginal benefit (MB) > Marginal cost (MC)

But this should not be interpreted as firms will internalize costs whenever MB > MC and “externalize” these costs again as soon as something in the market changes (e.g. price) so that MB < MC and there is actually reason for “outsourcing.” These processes are subject to tardiness – they take time and require the firm to focus and invest money in restructuring production processes rather than producing. Thus, we should, to a certain degree, be able to truthfully claim the firm will only act if there is a sufficient amount of savings to be made from acting.

Does this tardiness work the same way for both internalizing and externalizing? Can we claim a firm will always choose to restructure as soon as the difference between marginal benefit of internalizing (or keeping internal) and marginal cost of externalizing (or keeping external) is above the sufficient level?

The answer to this question should be no, and there are multiple reasons for this.

Firstly, the costs of internalizing are explicit and in general more “visible” than costs of making transactions in the market place. This should mean that if a firm chooses to internalize a certain function or process, it is done because it is believed that the firm “can afford it.” It is not as easy to calculate the real costs of externalizing, which means there should be a greater tardiness for the latter simply because understanding and predictability of the two situations is fundamentally biased towards internalizing.

Secondly, there are psychological reasons for internalizing and not externalizing. The firm, following Coase’s argument and definition, is about control. It is through control of the production processes, established by the set up of “open ended” employment contracts, the entrepreneur manages to outdo the market, at least in the short term.

It is reasonable to assume that the entrepreneur, a person who (at least initially) knows what to do, seeks control. (Control should here be interpreted as in “setting up production processes” or “organizing/arranging inputs in a specific way to make outputs.”)

This point can be further understood when considering the so-called endowment effect. The theory of the endowment effect states that a person tends to place a higher (subjective) value on objects they own than in “desirables” they do not [yet] own. Ownership is a form of control – the property right is the right to control the owned object, to be the ultimate decision-maker for what is to be made of the property (at least with respect to other people).

Would it not, considering the endowment effect, be reasonable to assume there is an endowment effect in firms too? The entrepreneur, again using Coase’s definition of the term, seeks and establishes control of the production process through founding the firm. The control of the production process through the firm is a form of ownership/control, and thus we should be able to safely conclude that there is a psychological tardiness to externalize – the entrepreneur should thus hesitate to give up control, and thus ownership.

What we see here is that there should be a psychological bias towards control, hierarchy, and firm-building as opposed to market solutions. And there is also a bias (see 1 above) regarding information: the entrepreneur can more easily foresee the effects of internalizing whereas the effects of externalizing are difficult, if not impossible, to foresee.

Of course, the entrepreneur can overcome such information problems in the case of externalizing, but that would undoubtedly lead us back to transaction costs and the Coasean argument for the firm.

Can we then conclude that there is an overall market bias towards structure and control rather than decentralization and competition? At least the two aspects discussed above – the information problem and the endowment effect with respect to the internalizing/externalizing decision – seem to suggest that the market “calls for” firms rather than independent contractors. This view, if true, fundamentally undermines the common understanding of the market.

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Rules for the “Weak”?

Have you ever made a request only to be bluntly turned down with the comment “sorry, but those are the rules”? Part of this phenomenon has already been covered in my comment on the Nuremberg Trials. In this post, however, I wish to discuss rules from another point of view: why do people wish to blindly accept and carry out orders?

I have consciously chosen the somewhat provoking title Rules for the Weak, but it is actually straight to the point. Thinking of business, some would say rules are there only to protect Capital and make sure the labor worker is exploited – breaking the abundance of rules leaves the worker totally in the hands of the manager or owner of the firm.

I don’t believe this view or “exploitation theory” is totally wrong, there are surely both managers and owners making up rules simply to make the lives of people working for them miserable. This does not, however, explain why people choose to work where there are rules – and especially not why quite many people choose to rely on the rules to escape personal responsibility.

Of course, the latter point can be interpreted as a choice made under the systematic threat of state capitalism where most sound alternatives have effectively been precluded from the market. Also, the fear of punishment might very well make people “blindly” adopt whatever rules available to protect themselves from possible harm.

These are all good points, and in the contemporary economic system – whether you call it a “free market,” “state capitalism,””state socialism,” or whatever – I would say they are valid arguments. But even though they are valid, I don’t think they explain the magnitude of the phenomenon.

The opposite view offers another explanation to why people “hide” behind rules: the rules of businesses are simply there to protect the working men and women from taking on responsibility for decisions they do not have mandate to make. The strict following of “procedure” is thus protects the worker – management indirectly takes responsibility through formulating rules that employees have to follow, and thereby alleviate workers of responsibility they don’t want and cannot take on.

I would personally think this is how many managers think – they make rules in order to control what is going on in their organizations. They may not always do it to protect the workers (rather, they might do it to control their actions), but the chain of actions isn’t hard to believe. It probably explains, at least in part, why there are rules for workers and employees to follow – and perhaps even why employees refer to the rules rather than try to find the best solution in the particular situation.

However, there is reason to believe the adoption of rules isn’t one-sided and one-way. It is not only the case that people are forced or lured to “blame” the rules. The rules aren’t used in everyday business only to control or protect them. It is also the case that people choose to abide by rules and regulations and readily refer to rules as a way to avoid taking personal responsibility. This is not only the case in business while carrying out one’s work, but also in private interaction.

People like to hide behind rules and regulations. They find satisfaction in evading personal responsibility – especially if they at the same time can can make someone else worse off.

This is not a general rule for “everybody,” but there are quite a few people gladly taking on positions where they get the “power” to make decisions that affect other people but don’t have to take responsibility for the effect of these decisions.

It should now be clear that I am not talking only about a phenomenon among workers and people in “weak” positions. Rather, I am talking about a human phenomenon that has nothing to do with the person’s situation or social status. A wide variety of people are part of the same phenomenon; they gladly make decisions that they know they will never be held accountable for. This is especially common in politics – politicians is the only group of people I can think of in which almost every member acts this way.

Back to the title of this post: the word “weak” does not refer to the direct situation in economic or social terms. I do not mean weakness as in absence of power or absence of influence. It does also not mean weak in the sense “not strong” or “not intelligent.” Weakness, rather, is here meant as a state of mind and feeling of confidence. As I have written elsewhere:

Only people not able to grow tall from their own efforts and achievements seek to subdue their fellow man; only people not being able to find comfort in their own mind seek to silence others; those who are unable to produce their own wealth aim to confiscate the wealth of others.

The same kind of people find strength in making other people weak, they enjoy making other people miserable – at least if they themselves can avoid personal responsibility. This is a state of frailty in body and mind, a lack of self-confidence, a weakness.

This is where the previous post on the Nuremberg Trials comes in. In the Trials each and every individual was held accountable for his or her actions – no matter if they were ordered or if they were threatened to carry out their actions. Acting means gaining responsibility for you action, and the converse is equally true: not acting makes you responsible for you inaction. This was the morality that was guiding principle in the Nuremberg Trials (it was at least the principle used by the victors of the war to legitimize continued killings of the losers).

Whether this was the common view on morality in the 1940s or not, this view has no doubt been diluted since then – not many would acknowledge this morality or principle steadfastly. The number of “weak” people, in the sense discussed above, is increasing and the number of principled proponents of individual responsibility is decreasing fast.

I personally hold the state responsible for this undermining of private morality. The state feeds off disconnecting action and responsibility. Where action does not cause responsibility the state claims power to “correct” disequilibrium. And the state continuously asks the citizenry to increase its powers so that it can take responsibility for people’s actions. The state ardently asks to be of service – to alleviate people of their responsibility.

But responsibility, even though it often is made to sound like a curse, is synonymous to liberty. Where there is no responsibility there can be no liberty – where no one takes responsibility for their actions, no one can experience the liberty to make choices. If no individual is held accountable and responsible for his actions, every individual’s range of possible actions is necessarily restricted.

It should thus not be surprising that the number of people “hiding” behind rules rather than standing tall and taking responsibility is increasing. The numbers are most likely increasing at the rate our liberties are restricted. And the state is growing at the same speed, always asking for more.

And it is a slippery slope: as soon as an individual is relieved of his or her responsibility, situations arise where someone else has to pick up the bill. This unfairness and injustice is used as a catalyst for the state – as soon as such injustice arises and becomes known the people will face the following:

1) someone will call for the state to “help them out,” and
2) the state will ask for powers to “make sure” such injustice will not arise in the future

Many will, of course, agree that such injustice is unfair and awful and must be avoided. Most will sympathize with the former and see the latter as a “solution.” The result? A society in a position even further from the liberty–responsibility equilibrium; a society facing more frequent and more severe injustice; a society with a larger state.

The trend is very clear and society has moved in only one direction throughout the 20th century: towards limited responsibility and restricted liberty. I have called this century of world wars The Endarkening, an era of anti-reason, anti-rationality, and anti-liberty. This era has no doubt continued in the 21st century.

The number of people “hiding” behind rules, regulation, and procedure is increasing – and it will continue to increase. The number of times you face someone totally unable to understand you or your situation, while blankly and bluntly referring to “the rules,” will also increase. They may be weak, but they are in a position of power and they intend to use it, it is the only way they can feel strong – through subduing you and making you subjected to their “good will.”

This is not a phenomenon that is limited to a few – it is everywhere and growing: The person “unable” to help you out because they were supposed to have closed “a minute ago;” the twenty-something guy in the convenient store refusing to sell a six pack of beers to a 77-year-old who refuses to show ID; the construction company not taking responsibility for substandard “death trap” buildings because the followed “the law;” the food producing corporation selling poisonous food but following FDA regulations; politicians getting rich from screwing the taxpayers while following the “moral code.”

The actions and situations are different, but the principle is the same. These are weak minds at work, finding ways to elevate themselves at others’ expense. They find pleasure and fulfillment in seeing others suffer while avoiding responsibility through blaming faceless “rules.”

The rules are for the weak, but not in the sense it is usually understood. The rules are not established to protect people in need of help and support. No, the rules are there for the weak-minded to avoid having to take responsibility for their actions – the rules are there for them to elevate themselves at our expense. They need to rules to feel superior, to me “super-human.”

Why? They cannot stand the thought of being one of us, the same as everybody else. And they are prepared to do whatever it takes to get the high of a sense of power, to be taller through pushing others down, to replace the feeling of discomfort with an artificial sense of being needed. Even if it kills the rest of us.

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