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From: carnes@gargoyle.UUCP (Richard Carnes)
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Free Riders
Message-ID: <231@gargoyle.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 2-Nov-85 21:20:36 EST
Article-I.D.: gargoyle.231
Posted: Sat Nov  2 21:20:36 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 3-Nov-85 09:08:16 EST
References: <3476@topaz.UUCP> <28200073@inmet.UUCP>
Reply-To: carnes@gargoyle.UUCP (Richard Carnes)
Organization: U. of Chicago, Computer Science Dept.
Lines: 53

STella Calvert writes:

>Thank you for pointing out that willingness to punish defectors from
>non-aggression has to be a primitive.  To me, with MY blindspots, it
>was axiomatic to the point of invisibility. Thank you sir! So let me
>restate.  I will not form a libertaria with people who do not agree
>that any instance of coercion  is a threat against their personal
>right to be free of coercion, nor will I continue to contract with
>people who renege on this minimal requirement.
>....
>I am not dying for other people's rights.  I
>am risking my life to punish defection from the game "Non-Aggression."  

STella Calvert states that in her hypothetical Anarchia she would
punish defectors in the game "Non-Aggression", including those who
prefer to free-ride rather than fight to defend Anarchia from
aggressors, by ostracism, boycotts, and other noncoercive means.
I'll accept STella's word that she would do so, but why does she
believe that anyone else would?  Punishment of noncooperators
provides a public good, spread evenly over the population, but such
means as boycotts impose private costs on the boycotters.  So it
seems we have a second-order free-rider problem, if the marginal
private cost of becoming a boycotter outweighs the marginal private
benefit.  

Secondly, why does STella expect that such punishment would be a
sufficient deterrent?  If the choice for me was between risking my
life to provide a public good, and enjoying a free ride while facing
an unknown amount of ostracism, boycotting, and disapproval from an
unknown number of survivors, I think I would choose the latter.  

Further, I'm not sure I understand what type of society STella
envisages.  Does she really mean that no one would coerce X if X
decided to "borrow" her car for a few years, or pick the apples in
her orchard?  If the only punishment for theft is ostracism and
boycotting, I think theft would be an attractive option, if X could
take whatever he wanted and sleep in anyone's living room or back
yard.  Or would theft be punished coercively (assuming that property
rights, and hence theft, are specified)?  In that case, Anarchia does
not sound particularly "noncoercive," if the threat of coercion must
be omnipresent in order to safeguard property rights.  

Would the founding compact of Anarchia include a specification of
property rights?  If so, what would be the enforcement mechanism?

It may be that STella has already answered these questions implicitly
or explicitly, and I have missed them.  In any case I would
appreciate some clear answers to these questions.  But if STella
cannot explain how Anarchia would plausibly work, then we have a case
of handwaving:  "People would do this, people would do that, you'll
just have to believe me."
-- 
Richard Carnes, ihnp4!gargoyle!carnes