Usually after explaining our position to statists and going over things like inter-subjective consensus, private property rights, initiation of force, etc…we anti-statists tend to run into a problem. “Ok,” the statist will say, “I get what you’re saying, but if everything is simply a matter of inter-subjective consenus, then how does abolishing the state change that? Why is a state different, if it too, relies on this inter-subjective consensus?” Truly, this is a very good question and central to the problem of statism. If anti-statist conceptions of ownership are correct, then just why is the state so bad and what does it have to do with inter-subjective consensus?
To begin with, I think that one of the problems that statists have with anti-statists is that they think we don’t recognize private coercion and that we only focus on the state’s coercion, when in fact the state protects us from this very coercion they say. The people who believe this, however, miss the point. The point of anti-statism (at least the version I subscribe to) is not about eliminating all coercion whatsoever from society. That is impossible and utopian. The idea is to eliminate institutionalized coercion.
Nearly everyone views serial killers, muggers, and robbers with contempt and believe they should be restrained. People also recognize that these types of people employ coercion to attain their ends. But the anti-statist position does not concern these people, per se. It concerns the one institution in society that employs similar means as these people, the state. The difference between these petty criminals and the state is not one of substance, but one of scale. The state is viewed as legitimate coercion, yet if common criminals were to engage in many of the same activities of the state, such as land monopoly, robbery, and murder, they would be immediately condemned for their actions. In this sense then, one group of people have the legitimate right (as decided upon by the inter-subjective consensus of society) to initiate force, whereas in all other cases of common criminals, it would be deemed illegal and morally bankrupt.
“Ah,” but the statist will say, “you don’t realize that it is the state itself that creates the law that makes these common thugs criminals in the first place.” The correct response to this is that it is not statist law that prescribes people who commit murder, theft, and rape as criminals, but the inter-subjective consensus upon which the belief that these people are criminals rests on. If the vast majority of people truly did not believe that murder was bad, then there would be no way for the state to restrain them simply by passing a law. Laws depend upon at least the implicit approval of the general populace in order to function and be enforced by coercion.
It’s not that anti-statists don’t recognize that private coercion will exist, it’s that we don’t want to legitimize that coercion. The only way to legitimize private coercion is by making it public, thereby affecting everyone within its land monopoly.
And thus we come back to the problem with the state. When one legitimizes the coercion of the state, what they are really saying is that it is ok when one group commits violent crimes, but not when another group does it. This violence leaves the coercive apparatus of the state unchecked since it is viewed as legitimate. And any institution that is viewed as having legitimate coercive power, will be unable to restrain itself, since it’s power to do good rests in force. If the people believe that it is ok to use force for these ends, then they have already sealed their fate and made the state totally unaccountable.
When people believe that it is right to have one group of people who are above the law and standards of that society, it makes it ok and civil for people to use force against their fellow men. This is wrong, however, because it supplies hypocrisy of the highest sort. The people condemn so-called “private” criminals, yet often hail the state as the engine of “social progress”. If the state acts in the same way as criminals, then how can it be viewed as legitimate and criminals be viewed as illegitimate? The answer, of course, is that it can’t.
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