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From: mwm@ucbopal.BERKELEY.EDU (Mike (I'll be mellow when I'm dead) Meyer)
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Government and stability
Message-ID: <141@ucbjade.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: Tue, 5-Nov-85 01:22:31 EST
Article-I.D.: ucbjade.141
Posted: Tue Nov  5 01:22:31 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 5-Nov-85 17:54:16 EST
References: <1473@teddy.UUCP> <28200189@inmet.UUCP> <1496@teddy.UUCP> <131@ucbjade.BERKELEY.EDU> <1542@teddy.UUCP>
Sender: network@ucbjade.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: mwm@ucbopal.UUCP (Mike (I'll be mellow when I'm dead) Meyer)
Organization: Missionaria Phonibalonica
Lines: 131

To refresh your memory, the question at hand is: Does government provide
stability, and is that stability necessary for production. To induce you to
read, there's a discussion of government and a definition of a new
government type at the end.

In article <1542@teddy.UUCP> lkk@teddy.UUCP (Larry K. Kolodney) writes:
>> [ME]
>>So, let's look at #1. Governments are neither necessary nor sufficient for
>>stability. Consider the Louisiana Territory before the last wave of
>>immigrants (whites) showed up. A very stable society, with little or no
>>government above the intertribal level. Now, consider the same Territory
>>after the US government has moved in to stabilize things. The buffalo die
>>off, the people living on the land are thrown off, trees start growing in
>>the Great Plains, etc. Most decidedly *not* stable. [Other examples of both
>>cases provided for the asking.]
>
>Right.  When only Aborigines lived on the great plains, there was no
>need for a global government, becuase there was no global society.
>When the white men came and destroyed everything, this may have been
>bad for the Indian, but, in the long run, it was good for the white
>man, and led to the thriving economy that exists there now.

Granted, but not relevant. Government was not needed to provide the
stability. Before you state it, I'll conceed that government is needed to
provide stability (your definition, see below) to a society.

>>Now, consider #2. Stability is *not* necessary for production. Just consider
>>what production in the US did during the *very* unstable period from 1939 to
>>1945.
>
>What do you mean there was no stability? 

From you own attempt to define stability by example:

>Stability means I can make an investment in a house (or business), for
>instance, and be relatively sure it won't be bulldozed over the next
>day by my neighbor.  Stability means I can get a job, and not be fired
>from it arbitrarily (and if I do, that I won't starve).  

I notice you neglected to mention having your home made inaccessible by
other means, whether it was destroyed or not. I don't know what the
government did to the property it took from Japanese Americans during that
period, but I wouldn't be surprised if some of them were bulldozed over.
Likewise for being fired arbitrarily (if firing you for your race isn't
arbitrary, I don't know what is!).

So, here we have a case of production in the face of government-caused
instability. Best example to negate your argument (that governments cause
stability which is required for production) that I could possibly have!

>You're confusing types of change.  Government needn't prevent change
>to insure a stable FRAMEWORK.

No, I'm working with the definition for stability from OAD, since you didn't
provide one. You have, so I'll deal with that later.

>The government is like the operating
>system of a computer.  Like Unix, most (all) are full of bugs, but
>wouldn't it be horrible there were NO operating systme, and each user
>simply had direct access to the computer hardware, with no tools,
>no protocol, no restrictions and no documentation?

You just described CP/M. There are probably more of those little beasts than
Unix systems around. An inadequately managed Unix system is *much* worse
than a well-managed CP/M system. [And all of this is completely off the
topic. Sorry.]

>Stability means I can make an investment in a house (or business), for
>instance, and be relatively sure it won't be bulldozed over the next
>day by my neighbor.  Stability means I can get a job, and not be fired
>from it arbitrarily (and if I do, that I won't starve).  Stability
>means I will be protected from natural disasters (and medical ones).
>Stability means that my money will be accepted wherever I go.
>Stability means that my language will be understood wherever I go.
>Stability means I will not be captured by vigilantes (or foreign
>soldiers).  Enough?

No. That's an attempt to define by example, and you left out something I
consider very important: Stability means I can build (and not necessarily
just material things) without having to worry about somebody taking it away
from me. You've also got stuff I would call consistency (money & language)
and security (disasters & unemployment).

Though I agree that all of these are good things, it's not clear which of
them should be the responsibility of the government. More on that later.

Of course, the things on the list that you want people kept from doing to
you have been done by governments to its citizens. You'd better quit
claiming that governments provide stability if that's what you mean by
stability. You can, of course, claim that governments *should* provide
stability.

>In order to
>build a rich and nurturing civilization, in which people are able to
>be more than mere animals, the builders of such need to
>stop having to worry about personal survival all of the time.
>Government allows them to do that.

Horsefeathers. Government doesn't allow people to not worry about personal
survival, technology does. Without the technology of agriculture, we're
back to a hunter-gatherer society. Further advances in technology allow
people to quit working on survival (spelled F O O D) and work on luxuries
(housing, etc) or produce those luxuries more efficiently. Since one person
can run a garden, you don't need government for agriculture.

When you noted that during WW II, the US government insured that "the rule
of law" still applied, you're getting close to what government must do.
Government defines property rights, by deciding which rights it will
protect. If it doesn't protect any rights, there are no property rights.

This is why some government is necessary - somebody has to protect property
rights, whatever those rights are. Any other situation is, as you yourself
described it in another article:

>Bingo!  There is no world government, there are "the powers that be."
>Since the world political situation is anarcho-libertarian, we have a
>perfect example of what we might expect.  A few strong nations
>divide the world up into spheres of influence, most other nations are at
>their mercy.

To confess to a small lie - I'm not going to describe a new government type
here, but provide a new term for an old one. What Larry calls
"anarcho-libertarian" is (I assume) a state with no central government, but
some general agreement about what property rights are and how they should be
enforced. It also attempts to tie libertarianism up with anarchism, which is
a false connection. Some libertarians may hold views resembling anarchism,
and indeed may be anarchists, but that isn't true of all libertarians. I've
been using the term "rationalized anarchy" to describe such a system. I
prefer - I just don't think it will work.