Anarcho-semantics

Some have written about anarcho-capitalism as if it were the ultimate answer to individual liberty.

Imagine that the anarchists win. All old-world governments are abolished and replaced with a global free market. Competition will drive out the inefficient, and society will thrive -- for awhile. But what happens if the most talented and competitive individuals achieve monopoly power? Whatever company (or trust, more likely) controls the market for a particular product will be able to charge whatever prices they like, especially if the product qualifies as a basic human need.

The answer for the anarcho-capitalist idealist is that smaller competitors will crop up to undercut the monopolist's prices, thus restoring balance to the market. This may work in most cases, assuming that the smaller competitors have adequate protection from the larger company's police firms (which may be a daunting task). (1)

However, this monopoly power is even more pronounced in regards to one commodity in particular: land. Anarcho-capitalists generally treat ownership of land with a certain reverence, believing that whoever owns a piece of land should have complete control over that land; in effect, they should be the monarch of a very small government. But what happens when a talented investor corners the market in real estate, even on a limited scale? Though living in a world of anarchy, the individual has become an old-world dictator by default.

This is not meant to suggest that anarchy is a bad thing. What it is meant to suggest is that anarchy is neither good nor bad, but simply is. Anarchy is what we have right now. Anarchy is what we have always had, and is all that we can ever have. It is the base from which other systems grow. It may disappear into the background as soil disappears beneath grass, but it is still there.

This in mind, I suggest that we change the semantics of the argument.

Right now, most people think of a government as "the entity that governs an area of land" or something similar. Furthermore, whoever has the strongest hereditary or contractual claim to an area of land (recognized by the state) is said to "own" the land, while anyone who pays the owner for the use of the land is said to "rent."

What if we were to change the definition of a government from "the entity that governs an area of land" to "the entity that owns an area of land?"

Those currently defined as "landowners" become "tenants."

"Owning land" becomes ";renting land from the state."

"Property taxes" become "rent paid to the state."

"Monarchy" becomes "an area of land owned by one person."

"Oligarchy" becomes "an area of land owned by a group of persons."

"Democracy" becomes "an area of land owned collectively by all the persons who live there." (2)

Any form of taxation or regulation becomes, in effect, just a contractual agreement between the owners of an area of land and the tenants. Thus, a true social contract exists, and one must love it or leave it.

Note that, in the above scenario, nothing about the world has changed. All that has changed is our frame of reference. With a simple change of variables, we go from having a planet full of semi-fascist states to a simpler world filled with various types of land ownerships, none of which are technically immoral in the sense of the non-aggression imperative. Dictators who abuse their populace are just exercising their property rights - anyone who lives on their land (in their country) without following their wishes (laws) is guilty of trespass, and can be dealt with accordingly. Any force used against the trespassers is defensive. This is true whether it is a classic dictatorship or a dictatorship of the people.

Looking at the world through this lens raises several questions.

If a state is simply a collection of land owned by someone, then at what point does a state's government become immoral? Can it become immoral?

At what point does the legitimate exercise of property rights become "government" in the regular sense?

Is libertarian moralism meaningless in this kind of situation, given that any oppression is coming about via property rights rather than divine right?

Again, we have changed nothing about the world but our point of view. Answers to the above questions apply not only to a theoretical anarchist utopia, but to the world of today.

Notes:

1. An important fact about money and power: once it has been achieved to a certain degree, competitors can be destroyed by bullets and bombs rather than price and quantity, and their protectors bought off or similarly destroyed. It may be more difficult to control the police if there is a free market for police forces, but that does not make it impossible -- especially if one has the clout to control one or two of the larger police or military firms. Many would like to believe that there is no profit in murder, but history seems to disagree.

2. Note that, by this definition, democracy is an exercise in communism.