[Zagadka]

I was pondering the following scenario on a full anarchist/libertarian system (where there is no bureaucracy).

Well, the question is rather simple. How would ambulances work? If roads are private, there are no laws allowing free transit, no structure for dispatch, etc?

[DubiousDan]

Zagadka :

I was pondering the following scenario on a full anarchist/libertarian system (where there is no bureaucracy).

Well, the question is rather simple. How would ambulances work? If roads are private, there are no laws allowing free transit, no structure for dispatch, etc.?

Me:
I might take a crack at it if I knew what an anarchist/libertarian system was.
Anyone?

[Dr House]

Most likely hospitals would pay bulk fees for road owners to allow them free access. Dispatch would be handled by the hospitals themselves, and 911 would be a fee-based service or even a charity.

[Goldberk]

if it was an anarchist system there would be no road owners.

[Dr House]

He said anarchist/libertarian, so he probably meant anarcho-capitalist.

[Goldberk]

the problem with anarcho/capatlism (one of many) is it assumes that without the state private property could be protected, considering that this is the prime purpose of the state it is a big problem, without the states protection any ownership would wither.

[DubiousDan]

Goldberk:

the problem with anarcho/capatlism (one of many) is it assumes that without the state private property could be protected, considering that this is the prime purpose of the state it is a big problem, without the states protection any ownership would wither.

Me:
I think that statement depends on the Universe of Discourse. If we are speaking of the concept of property in vogue, true.
However there are two classes of property. One class goes back before civilization to the persuasive social orders. This is the property that a man had on his person and in his home. His home, perhaps his garden, and some animals, these things a man used and protected. They were his property. Their ownership was based on his possession and use, and perhaps, on the agreement of his peers.
This is more or less the class of property that Pierre Proudhon allowed.
Today, this class has been narrowed somewhat. Now it consists of those things which, if removed from the owner, the burden of proof of their ownership would fall on the owner.

The other property class is that property which exists by decree of the state. For example, if a man owns a house, and has owned it for fifty years, that fact will not avail against someone who can convince the state that they possess the title to the house. Any property which requires a title falls within that class. It is within this class that wealth exist, and this class is controlled by the state.

For capitalism to exist, it requires that the resources of the economy be controlled by the state. Capitalism is a relatively new social mechanism in human history. It required state control of resources. The United States in its first hundred years was not a true capitalism because significant segments of population could live independent of state control. Which wasn’t a problem, because the religion of Capitalism was yet unborn in that time. The word was coined in the late 19th Century. Most of human existence preceded the rise of capitalism. For these reasons, anarcho-capitalism is an oxymoron.

A private road long enough to be a road would require titled land. Without the state, the amount of land allowed by Proudhon would be incapable of supporting a road, a driveway, yes, a road, no.

The Inuit cooperated to hunt whales, Neanderthals to hunt mammoths. Cooperative effort can exist within an anarchy, and the creation of a road system and a hospital system would be a trivial task. Protecting it from coercive social orders is another matter.

[CatoLives]

Whatever the 'purpose' of the state, we should instead concern ourselves with it's function. Is it your assertion, sir, that the primary function of the state today is to protect private property? For it appears to me quite obviously this is not the case - in fact, the state is an aggregious violator of the right to private property. I turn the question on you - not how can we protect private property in the absence of the state, but how can we reconcile our desire to protect private property with the existance of the state.

At any rate, there are any number of ways to protect your property (from whom, I wonder?) without the state. A gun. Friends. Hired guards. Insurance companies.

Now how do you protect your property from the state?

[DubiousDan]

CatoLives:

Whatever the 'purpose' of the state, we should instead concern ourselves with it's function. Is it your assertion, sir, that the primary function of the state today is to protect private property? For it appears to me quite obviously this is not the case - in fact, the state is an aggregious violator of the right to private property. I turn the question on you - not how can we protect private property in the absence of the state, but how can we reconcile our desire to protect private property with the existance of the state.

At any rate, there are any number of ways to protect your property (from whom, I wonder?) without the state. A gun. Friends. Hired guards. Insurance companies.

Now how do you protect your property from the state?

Me:
Perhaps my meaning was a bit unclear. In the final paragraph, I was discussing the stateless state. Anarchy.

As for the purpose of the state. In civilization it is to provide for the elites by taking the harvest from the harvester and giving it to the elites. All other functions are secondary to that. Protecting the state means protecting the structure which maintains the elites. The function of law is to chain the harvester while maintaining order among the elites. However, first the harvester must be chained. Oh, and of course, the consent of the harvester is not involved. I think you should be getting the idea by now.

As long as the state exists, no property is secure from the decree of the state. Even our lives are forfeit if the state decrees. In my previous post, I divided property into two classes. The first class of property, which is the only true class of property that I recognize, is what concerns me. There is no way apparent to me that the existence of the state can be reconciled with my desire to protect that property. For the state is the ultimate predator against which there are no known defenses.
However, the protection of property is not really a great preoccupation with me. There are far more important things, and they too, are irreconcilable with the existence of the state. That is why I am an anarchist.

As for protecting my property from the state. The facile answer is to destroy the state. That would be futile, for another state would replace it. The only answer apparent to me is to create the stateless state. A state with the ability to defend its borders and its citizens yet without coercive government. It is not an easy problem, for five millennia have passed and still no one has resolved the issue. I believe that the problem can be solved. If we had millennia more to solve it, the solution would be inevitable. However, we have, I fear, at most a century. The extinction of Mankind will render the problem irrelevant