Refuges for Libertarians?

[lpetrich]

I've seen various proposed kinds of places for libertarians to take refuge in and build libertarian communities in. I'll list some common ones and add some additional ones. Along the way, I'll note various problems with them.

• Cyberspace -- a purely informational sort of existence? However, its participants will still have physical bodies and their computer hardware will still be physical objects.
• Special districts in existing nations -- the goal of the Free State Project in New Hampshire, involving 20,000 libertarians moving there. What Galt's Gulch Chile tried to be. Has the problem of being subordinate to a statist government.
• Creation of a libertarian nation. This would presumably be by FSPing: doing what the Free State Project is trying to do. However, its supporters risk being deported as secessionists or coupmeisters -- or worse. Or else they'd have to form a political party or do a lot of influence-buying.
  • FSPing an area and then making it secede
  • FSPing an area and then dissolving the national government
  • FSPing an entire nation
• Floating cities -- seasteading. Farm barges vs. importing food, and likewise for energy and manufactured goods. Who will do the manual labor? Governments can be difficult to protect against, because they can be hard to outdo them in guns. Consider the Kingdom of Tonga vs. the Republic of Minerva.
• Seafloor cities -- though they do not need to be buoyant, they need to resist the great pressure of the ocean around them
• Underground cities -- the same jurisdiction problems as special districts on the surface
• Space colonies -- seems like the best way to escape governments. But it has most of the difficulties of seasteading multiplied by humongous factors.

The solutions from floating cities to space colonies present some severe difficulties for libertarians. Those are all places where space will be at a premium, where one will have to live next to several people whom one may not necessarily like. These are also all places where one's actions can endanger the whole city, and not just oneself. Has anyone here lived and worked in a boat / ship / submarine? Is it fair to say that it's a rather un-libertarian sort of environment?

Floating Utopias - In These Times, Some Men Would Like To Be Islands: The Hows And Whys Of Seasteading - The Awl note numerous problems with seasteading, like authoritarianism and dependence on outside resources. Space colonies will be even worse:

Space Cadets - Charlie's Diary, after noting how hostile the rest of the Solar System is,

In particular, the fetishization of autonomy, self-reliance, and progress through mechanical engineering — echoing the desire to escape the suffocating social conditions back east by simply running away — utterly undermine the program itself and are incompatible with life in a space colony (which is likely to be at a minimum somewhat more constrained than life in one of the more bureaucratically obsessive-compulsive European social democracies, and at worst will tend towards the state of North Korea in Space).

 

[dystopian]

It's always amusing to see libertarians talk in all seriousness (and plenty of zeal) about establishing these sort communities/nationstates. It's always so unrealistic and disconnected from reality. I particularly like the ones that are almost literally Andrew Ryan's Rapture city.

 

[laughing dog]

I think refuges from libertarians would be more popular.

 

[untermensche]

This contradicts Libertarian dogma.

It is just each seeking his own advantage in a heartless jungle.

There is no such thing as community or communal considerations.

 

[braces_for_impact]

These things never work.

 

[lpetrich]

Previous link, titled: Addicting Info – Libertarian ‘Utopia’ Styled After Ayn Rand Book Spectacularly Falls Apart Almost Immediately
Another link: Atlas Mugged: How a Libertarian Paradise in Chile Fell Apart | VICE | United States

That's about Galt's Gulch Chile, a would-be libertarian community in that nation.

About would-be floating cities, I've found Freedom Ship International | the City at Sea -- as of 2015, they still haven't started building that one. However, they seem to have selected a contractor that will do so. Any others? I don't know of any that have been built. A site about such projects, The Seasteading Institute | Opening humanity's next frontier, isn't advertising any built ones.

 

[dystopian]

Previous link, titled: Addicting Info – Libertarian ‘Utopia’ Styled After Ayn Rand Book Spectacularly Falls Apart Almost Immediately
Another link: Atlas Mugged: How a Libertarian Paradise in Chile Fell Apart | VICE | United States

That's about Galt's Gulch Chile, a would-be libertarian community in that nation.

About would-be floating cities, I've found Freedom Ship International | the City at Sea -- as of 2015, they still haven't started building that one. However, they seem to have selected a contractor that will do so. Any others? I don't know of any that have been built. A site about such projects, The Seasteading Institute | Opening humanity's next frontier, isn't advertising any built ones.

The whole concept of seasteading is an exercise in futility. It harkens back to the old days of off-shore pirate radio stations. The idea that they were untouchable because they were in international waters proved to apply only so long as governments ignored them. Not a lot a pirate radiostation on a ship or offshore platform can do to stop a bunch of marines shutting them down. The same, of course, would apply to any such libertarian 'haven'. They'd exist for about as long as it'd take for a nearby country with a navy to decide that they're breaking some law; which given the whole point of this libertarian exercise, is likely to be sooner rather than later. No such seastead/ship could get closer than about 400KM of any claimed landmass if it doesn't want to risk a government being easily able to justify action against them. Which makes it logistically implausible for these sort of microstates to function.

 

[Nice Squirrel]

I understand the nunataks of Wilkes Land are open and would be a wonderful place for all Libertarians to occupy.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Previous link, titled: Addicting Info – Libertarian ‘Utopia’ Styled After Ayn Rand Book Spectacularly Falls Apart Almost Immediately
Another link: Atlas Mugged: How a Libertarian Paradise in Chile Fell Apart | VICE | United States

That's about Galt's Gulch Chile, a would-be libertarian community in that nation.

About would-be floating cities, I've found Freedom Ship International | the City at Sea -- as of 2015, they still haven't started building that one. However, they seem to have selected a contractor that will do so. Any others? I don't know of any that have been built. A site about such projects, The Seasteading Institute | Opening humanity's next frontier, isn't advertising any built ones.

Well, those weren't real libertarians.

 

[lpetrich]

The whole concept of seasteading is an exercise in futility. It harkens back to the old days of off-shore pirate radio stations. The idea that they were untouchable because they were in international waters proved to apply only so long as governments ignored them. Not a lot a pirate radiostation on a ship or offshore platform can do to stop a bunch of marines shutting them down. The same, of course, would apply to any such libertarian 'haven'. They'd exist for about as long as it'd take for a nearby country with a navy to decide that they're breaking some law; which given the whole point of this libertarian exercise, is likely to be sooner rather than later. No such seastead/ship could get closer than about 400KM of any claimed landmass if it doesn't want to risk a government being easily able to justify action against them. Which makes it logistically implausible for these sort of microstates to function.

Great job on expanding on one of my points. A floating city could get used for drug smuggling, gun running, or financial shenanigans. There was an approximation of the latter in the career of  Robert Vesco, a daredevil US financier who got investigated by the US Securities and Exchange Commission in the late 1960's. He fled the US, and for the rest of his life, he lived in several Caribbean and Central American nations, dying in a hospital in Cuba. It seems to me that some latter-day Robert Vesco would want to operate from a libertarian floating city.

 Minerva Reefs has a short history of the Republic of Minerva, the closest approximation of a libertarian floating city that has been created so far. A certain Michael Oliver wanted to create a society with "no taxation, welfare, subsidies, or any form of economic interventionism." Just like what libertarian floating-city advocates want to create. In 1971, he arranged for barges full of Australian sand to be towed to those reefs, where the barges' sand was then dumped on those reefs. Eventually enough was dumped to get above sea level and create a tiny island. This was enough for the island's creators to call it the Republic of Minerva and declare independence on 19 Jan 1972.

However, that republic's neighbors were very suspicious, and delegates from those neighbors (Australia, New Zealand, Tonga, Fiji, Nauru, Samoa, and territory of Cook Islands) met on 24 February 1972 to discuss what to do about it. Tonga claimed those reefs and the others endorsed that claim. On 15 June, the Tongan Government officially claimed those reefs, and the next day, it sent out an expedition to enforce its claim. "It reached North Minerva on 18 June 1972. The Flag of the Tonga was raised on 19 June 1972 on North Minerva and on South Minerva on 21 June 1972." Tonga thus conquered the Republic of Minerva.

 His Majesty's Armed Forces (Tonga) has a navy:  Tongan Maritime Force. Its warships are three  Pacific-class patrol boats. A very wimpy navy, but more than a match for the Republic of Minerva.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Well, if they didn't want to get conquered, why didn't they just get their lazy asses up off of the couch and start up an international armaments conglomerate so they'd have a superior military to Tonga and be able to fight them off?

Libertarian ideals shouldn't be besmirched simply because these losers weren't willing to put in a little bit of effort.

 

[untermensche]

Some Libertarian ideas are good ideas.

Some of the social ideas are pretty good.

The economic ideas are naive madness that removes any checks from the power of wealth.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

This contradicts Libertarian dogma.

It is just each seeking his own advantage in a heartless jungle.

There is no such thing as community or communal considerations.

Uh, sure. Yeah, whatever you say. After all, communal considerations don't exist unless forced upon people.

Some Libertarian ideas are good ideas.

Some of the social ideas are pretty good.

The economic ideas are naive madness that removes any checks from the power of wealth.

Libertarian economic ideas and libertarian social ideas derive from the same premise.

 

[untermensche]

Uh, sure. Yeah, whatever you say. After all, communal considerations don't exist unless forced upon people.

The ability to have enforceable contracts exists only due to force.

Libertarian economic ideas and libertarian social ideas derive from the same premise.

Unfortunately the economic ideas are naive and neglect to even consider the inherent power contained within collected wealth.

They are blind to the inherent danger of unchecked collected wealth.

Today the danger consists in control of the media and the government as a result.

 

[Canard DuJour]

There was an amusing article (which doesn't seem to be online now) detailing how most Libertarian-Land schemes fall apart due to property disputes before a single person moves in. Property disputes for which there's often no clear adjudicating authority. A few people have made quite a lot of money from ostensibly failed schemes. Rather like those scams where the victim implicates himself so he can't go legal when he twigs.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

I think refuges from libertarians would be more popular.

Let them have Wyoming. We're not really using it anyway.

 

[Togo]

There's an interesting science fiction story on setting up a notionally libertarian enclave - the Ecolitan series by Modesdit Jr. I don't think the description of politics is all that accurate to libertarian ideals, but it's not for me to judge. But the practical difficulties involved in declaring a libertarian revolution and then defending their planet from the neighbours, without having a government-controlled military force and minimal taxation, is gone into in quite some detail.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Some Libertarian ideas are good ideas.

Some of the social ideas are pretty good.

The economic ideas are naive madness that removes any checks from the power of wealth.

Well, their social ideas are just as naive, but only in the sense of a complete lack of forward thinking.

A libertarian imagines a world where he is left to his own devices as a sovereign in his own estate. He has his home, his property, and the means to defend it from invaders. He has the community he works for, and an agreement with his neighbors to respect their property and they his. He has service providers in his community (1-800-The-Cops) who agree to provide him with services he needs in exchange for a fair price. All of this, balanced by a paradigm of enlightened self-interest.

What could possibly go wrong?

The same thing that ALWAYS goes wrong. Somebody cheats.

Your neighbor decides that he wants to build a swimming pool right where your house is and in order to do that he needs to get rid of you. You assume that in this libertarian paradise, your capacity for violence is roughly equal to his; you furthermore assume that his use of violence will alienate him from the rest of the neighborhood and that chasing you out of town runs too high a cost of ill will for him; you can also assume that somebody in town provides a "security service" that you and he both pay into specifically to keep somebody from pulling that kind of crap. You feel like your position is pretty secure.

Until you wake up the next morning and you find ten people on your lawn all asking the same question: "Aren't you a pedophile? Didn't you get kicked out of your last township for touching little girls? We heard you like to feel up children when you get drunk. You get drunk ALOT too."

Fifty times you say it's not true and fifty one times they ask you the same question. And your neighbor produces accusation after accusation without an OUNCE of evidence to support it and the neighbors eat it up because he just sounds so sure! And finally the rub: you hear a scream in the middle of the night and a clatter downstairs and you run to your front door just in time to see the guy's 12 year old daughter running half naked across your lawn screaming for help.

Now when your neighbor and five of his buddies drag you out of your house and lynch you, they're not alienating themselves from the community, they're not demonstrating themselves to be untrustworthy or violators of rights. Now they're doing the neighborhood a favor by getting rid of your pedophile ass. And the security company (1-800-The-Cops) that could/would/should have run your background and proven all those allegations were lies? The company that should have stepped in to make sure you didn't get lynched by a bunch of vigilantes? Their board of directors is REALLY looking forward to having a new swimming pool in town.


But let's say you manage to escape. Let's say you don't get lynched, but empty your safe and jump in your truck and drive twenty miles to the next libertarian burbclave. And you drive into town and you find a house for sale, you head to the realestate office to make the down payment...

And you're immediately shot and killed by the local Enforcer. Because this is the Black Panther burbclave, and they don't take crackers in this town. Which you didn't know, and had no way of knowing, because they didn't tell anyone about their "honkeys will be shot on sight" rule. Because telling neighboring burbclaves about that might risk an embargo. And even the Enforcer who shoots and kills you later publicly declares that he saw you going for a weapon (which he later planted on you), that you were acting aggressively and confrontationally, and by the way, there's a report that you were run out of town at your last burbclave for raping your next door neighbor's daughter.

Libertarianism is a wonderful fantasyland that sees life as a chess game where everyone gets to play. The problem with this vision is that there's nothing you can do if you get outmaneuvered: you loose the game and they burry you alive, and the only consolation you might have is the notion that if you loose to an amateur, somebody else, sooner or later, might wind up beating them too. "Dog eat dog" seems like a wonderful idea only if you can guarantee that YOU'RE not the one who's going to get eaten.

 

[James Brown]

Two people can play chess together for a lifetime with no issues. (Call this Scenario One.)

As soon as one of them proposes playing chess games for money, they can still play together for a lifetime with no issues. (Call this Scenario Two.)

But sooner or later, something goes wrong. One of the players makes an error, or as Crazy Eddie states, one of the players cheats.

The solution to these problems is a third-party referee. Someone who can monitor the games, enforce rules, and make sure no one accidentally or deliberately cheats.

But a referee with no power is merely a spectator. The players have to agree to abide by the referee's rulings.

But the problem still isn't solved. One of the players could be in league with the referee. And of course, the referee needs to be compensated for his time and expertise.

The solution to these problems is more third-party regulation, and some sort of taxation to keep the referees incentivized.

By this point, a libertarian might ask why all this bureaucratic apparatus is necessary to let two people play a game of chess (the original scenario), but it's not. It's necessary for two people to play chess for scarce resources (the second scenario).

It seems to me that libertarianism in its purest form can't work until everyone acts ethically all the time. Once we get that little problem licked, then we can start to dismantle regulatory mechanisms.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

It seems to me that libertarianism in its purest form can't work until everyone acts ethically all the time. Once we get that little problem licked, then we can start to dismantle regulatory mechanisms.

Yeah, that problem has never occurred to libertarians. Uh-huh.

One can believe what you wrote if one has never even attempted to look at what libertarians have written on the issue.