First, answers to a few campfire questions
> >
> > On the plus side, no Backstreet Boys and so forth.
>
> So what will happen to all the prepubescent girls?
>
They will pubesce at a much later age, since they will be more or less severely lacking in protein due to a diet of berries.
>And if not, what will Camila Pagilia do after the revolution?
We will eat her, roasted on a campfire, in a sauce made with berries. To the accompaniment of banjo players being rhythmically beaten.
And on to the more substantive point:
Justin wrote:
>Thi sin't getting us anywhere, Gordon. You did concede the >point when you
>said that the size of the private armies would be limited by >other
people's
>willingness (and, implicurky, ability) to tolerate them. The >result is
the
>world of part I of the Postman or Nozick's state of nature. >These are
>_illustrations_, not arguments; I don't need to argue >further, since you
>have, in fact, admitted that there will be private armies >limited as
>explained. Indeed,w ithout a state monpology on force, >there is nothing
but
>other force or lack of talent to prevent anyone from >organizing a private
>army and conquering whoever he wants.
Which is requiring "the state monopoly on force" to do a lot of work for an abstract concept. History tells us, for certain, that the size of *public*, *government* armies is limited by people's willingness to tolerate them. This isn't a special thing about private armies.
In fact, there is never anything but "other force or lack of talent" preventing someone (usually an enterprising young army officer) from conquering whoever he wants.
This is a problem, I think, because the phrase "the state monopoly of force" is a dangerous one to use. Is it "the state monopoly on the *legitimate* use of force", the original concept, or is it the *fact* of the state being the only people who happen to own an army and police force in most modern countries? It seems to me that in this argument against Gordon, Justin is having it both ways; "the state monopoly on force" in this passage has all of the ability to get things done of the second, plus all of the abstractness and ability to be implemented by fiat of the second.
The state's factual monopoly on force is made legitimate by common consent to it, and it is also made possible by popular consent. But if you're going to assume by fiat that there is popular consent to recognising the state monopoly on force, I don't see how you can object to someone else making the assumption that in their anarchist utopia, people would happily do the nasty jobs out of pure fellow-feeling.
dd
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