[Truth To Power]

The 'right to rule' simply cannot be libertarian.

So private landowning cannot be libertarian. Now you can Google "geolibertarian" and start reading.

[SolarCross]

Ok I have done some more reading and thinking so now I believe I can please nunt by de-coupling "libertarian" from "monarchism". De-coupling and dropping "libertarian". What I am is a monarchist, an absolute monarchist, and my doctrine and praxis is monarchism, absolute monarchism.

Libertarianism is a strain of progressive doctrine that has flown past democracy, run past bureaucracy and found itself looking for utopia in anarchy... It is as I said in the OP the bleeding edge of progressivism and I now see its final doom. What can be found in anarchy? Only chaos, universal crime and the law of the jungle, the smashed ruins of civilisation and the zombie apocalypse. Out of the ashes civilisation will rise again but the form it will take will be monarchy, it is inevitable. This is the universal cycle of civilisations, a uni-directional cycle. Civilisation rises from chaos by Monarchy. Then Monarchy decays into Aristocracy which decays into Democracy which decays into Bureaucracy which finally cracks up into Anarchy (in the original greek meaning). Once the decay of order has resulted in democracy there is no going back, the decay proceeds to bureaucracy and then finally collapse into the zombie apocalypse of anarchy. Fast or slow this is the direction. From the zombie apocalypse you cannot go back to bureaucracy and from bureaucracy you cannot go back to democracy and from democracy you cannot go back to aristocracy.. Only with difficulty can an aristocracy be brought to heel to monarchy, Tsar Ivan the Terrible managed it but not without some very harsh manoeuvres. So this is the role of libertarianism (an-cap or an-com) to take progressivism to its final conclusion so that order, monarchy, can then return.

Progressivism is Ordo ad Chao. Order to Chaos.
Monarchism is Ordo ab Chao, Order from Chaos.

[Truth To Power]

What I am is a monarchist, an absolute monarchist, and my doctrine and praxis is monarchism, absolute monarchism.

Yep: waaaaaay too much Hans-Hermann Hoppe.

Libertarianism is a strain of progressive doctrine that has flown past democracy, run past bureaucracy and found itself looking for utopia in anarchy... It is as I said in the OP the bleeding edge of progressivism and I now see its final doom. What can be found in anarchy? Only chaos, universal crime and the law of the jungle, the smashed ruins of civilisation and the zombie apocalypse. Out of the ashes civilisation will rise again but the form it will take will be monarchy, it is inevitable. This is the universal cycle of civilisations, a uni-directional cycle. Civilisation rises from chaos by Monarchy. Then Monarchy decays into Aristocracy which decays into Democracy which decays into Bureaucracy which finally cracks up into Anarchy (in the original greek meaning). Once the decay of order has resulted in democracy there is no going back, the decay proceeds to bureaucracy and then finally collapse into the zombie apocalypse of anarchy. Fast or slow this is the direction. From the zombie apocalypse you cannot go back to bureaucracy and from bureaucracy you cannot go back to democracy and from democracy you cannot go back to aristocracy.. Only with difficulty can an aristocracy be brought to heel to monarchy, Tsar Ivan the Terrible managed it but not without some very harsh manoeuvres. So this is the role of libertarianism (an-cap or an-com) to take progressivism to its final conclusion so that order, monarchy, can then return.

Progressivism is Ordo ad Chao. Order to Chaos.
Monarchism is Ordo ab Chao, Order from Chaos.

This would be more interesting if there were any shred of historical evidence for it.

[Truth To Power]

Where did you get that list anyway?

It is compilation of three different rankings of GDP per capita made by the World Bank, IMF and the CIA that I found on wiki

I see the three lists, but your choices still look rather idiosyncratic, not to say tendentious. You seem to be looking at one bunch of constitutional (figurehead) monarchies that are prosperous for reasons quite unconnected to their anachronistic kings and queens, and another bunch of absolute monarchies that happen to have a lot of oil and very few people in a time of high oil prices, and have concluded on that basis that absolute monarchy produces prosperity. A generalization based on zero or fewer credible examples.

Um, how prosperous were any of those absolute monarchies in their centuries of absolute monarchy before the first oil price spike in 1974, hmmmmmm?

Did you know less than a quarter of the world's governments are monarchies. The rest being some kind of republic. Only 5 out 196 of world's nations are absolute monarchies yet four of those five absolute monarchies are in the top 12 (world bank gdp per capita ranking)? So tell me why 8 of 10 on your list of top countries are constitutional monarchies instead of being 8 of 10 republics?

Here's a clue: in most of those poor republics, absolute monarchs (or foreign colonial rulers exercising similar powers) ruined them before they became republics, and were consequently eliminated.

Don't trust people who say "in other words" I guarantee to you they are invariably slithering liars.

That's strange. I have found that apologists for greed, privilege, and parasitism are invariably slithering liars.

[Technology]

Yep: waaaaaay too much Hans-Hermann Hoppe.

Hoppe would be displeased then, because Hoppe only intended to argue that if there has to be a government, then democracy is actually the worst form possible, and monarchy the least bad. He wouldn't like the idea that he helped a lot of ancaps drop anarcho-capitalism by interpreting "least bad" as "best".

Hoppe is then inadvertently the nexus between anarcho-capitalism and neo-reaction. Conversely, someone like Jeffrey Tucker is the nexus between anarcho-capitalism and the progressive movement.

[SolarCross]

Hoppe would be displeased then, because Hoppe only intended to argue that if there has to be a government, then democracy is actually the worst form possible, and monarchy the least bad. He wouldn't like the idea that he helped a lot of ancaps drop anarcho-capitalism by interpreting "least bad" as "best".

Hoppe is then inadvertently the nexus between anarcho-capitalism and neo-reaction. Conversely, someone like Jeffrey Tucker is the nexus between anarcho-capitalism and the progressive movement.

I haven't read that much Hoppe but my impression quite closely accords with your estimation. I don't think he ever made the leap from recognising some of the merits of monarchy to thinking it might in fact be the only or best solution to the problem of governance moreover I don't think he even entertained the notion that is was possible as an exit from democracy. He never looked further than the event horizon of anarchy (a utopian and false vision of anarchy shared by all anarchists, left and right). He came within striking distance but did not strike. So the post-libertarian has taken a clue from Hoppe but then left him in the dust flying right through the event horizon of anarchy to the "other side" which must be a reset into monarchy.

[slybaldguy]

Surely corporatism is the ideal form of government?

[SolarCross]

Surely corporatism is the ideal form of government?

Corporatism (also known as corporativism[1]) is the socio-political organization of a society by major interest groups, or corporate groups, such as agricultural, business, ethnic, labour, military, patronage, or scientific affiliations, on the basis of common interests.[2] Corporatism is theoretically based upon the interpretation of a community as an organic body.[3][4] The term corporatism is based on the Latin root word "corpus" (plural – "corpora") meaning "body".[4]

In 1881, Pope Leo XIII commissioned theologians and social thinkers to study corporatism and provide a definition for it. In 1884 in Freiburg, the commission declared that corporatism was a "system of social organization that has at its base the grouping of men according to the community of their natural interests and social functions, and as true and proper organs of the state they direct and coordinate labor and capital in matters of common interest".[5]

Corporatism is related to the sociological concept of structural functionalism.[6] Corporate social interaction is common within kinship groups such as families, clans and ethnicities.[7] Aside from humans, certain animal species are known to exhibit strong corporate social organization, such as penguins.[8][9] Corporatist types of community and social interaction are common to many ideologies, including: absolutism, capitalism, conservatism, fascism, liberalism, progressivism, reactionism.[10]

Corporatism may also refer to economic tripartism involving negotiations between business, labour, and state interest groups to establish economic policy.[11] This is sometimes also referred to as neo-corporatism.

Corporatism is vague enough to cover all manner of authorities from monarchy, through aristocracy, democracy to bureaucracy. What makes for good governance, as a minimum, is unity of command and undivided political will. Thus if corporatism has a single over arching permanent executive then it would be best governance but this is monarchy. If executive will is divided somewhat between leaders of industries and other factions then it is really aristocracy. If it it is divided among a larger number of temporary executives of incoherent mobs then this is really democracy. If it is divided amongst very large numbers of petty functionaries then this is really bureaucracy. The only thing corporatism couldn't be is anarchy because all organisational coherence and order is completely lost by this stage.

[Rei Murasame]

The definition that Slybaldguy is most likely referring to, is the one which creates institutional frameworks where 'negotiations between business, labour, and state interest groups' are mandated to occur.

This of course means that labour must be organised, meaning that a movement involving middle class and working class people working together to take state power must exist. Concepts like the 'path of national labour' which is carried out through a 'national syndicalist offensive', are examples of how it can be done from the bottom up.

[SolarCross]

The definition that Slybaldguy is most likely referring to, is the one which creates institutional frameworks where 'negotiations between business, labour, and state interest groups' are mandated to occur.

This of course means that labour must be organised, meaning that a movement involving middle class and working class people working together to take state power must exist. Concepts like the 'path of national labour' which is carried out through a 'national syndicalist offensive', are examples of how it can be done from the bottom up.

Oh well that sounds to me to be at best a mutation of democracy, at worst a mutation of bureaucracy. Either way, fail.

[Rei Murasame]

Well, what would you rather do? Install an absolute monarch and then see how long it takes that monarch to begin designating that power to others because one family cannot do everything? You'd also be creating a dictatorship which would create a bureaucracy, just with you there is no guarantee as to what that bureaucracy would look like because it would be entirely the whim of the monarch.

[Nunt]

A landowner is effectively king of the area of land he owns. See Saudi Arabia.

I don't think Saudi Arabia is a good example. Did the king become the owner of the land through homesteading and voluntary trade? I don't know the history of Saudi Arabia but it would really surprise me.

Anyway, a landowner is not king of the area of land he owns. A king my have arbitrary powers about the lives of his subjects. For example, a king may punish infidelity by hanging. In contrast, the only real punishment a land owner would be able to dish out would be that of banishment. Not murder, not torture, not imprisonment.

@Tax: are you under the impression that there would be less bureaucracy in a monarchy? There is really not something that you should expect. A monarch may choose to have minimal state, but he can also choose to have a very expansive state with lots of bureaucrats checking what everyone is doing, create a lot of rules that need to be checked, and force people to obtain permits and licences for everything.

[Rei Murasame]

don't think Saudi Arabia is a good example. Did the king become the owner of the land through homesteading and voluntary trade?

No, he became the owner of the land through a series of conquests in the 1920s (which his family had been attempting since 1744), in which Ibn Saud was able to exploit confusion and unpreparedness of residents and rulers around him, to attack and conquer the Kingdom of Hejaz, Najd, Al-Hasa, Najran, Jizan and Asir, which all form the territory presently referred to as 'Saudi Arabia'.

Ibn Saud actually did not participate in the Pan-Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Empire (a revolt that was supported by the British Empire and that support was for good reasons), and instead actually spent the whole of 1916 - 1918 actually fighting against the Al-Rashid group which controlled the Emirate of Jabal Shammar in interior of Arabia, by launching attacks from inside Nejd. The Arab Revolt managed to remove the Ottoman control over Arabia, and Al-Saud simply pressed on and attacked everyone afterwards and forced them all to accept his house's authority.

Saudi Arabia absolutely was not created by consent of the governed.

The whole history of that region going back to 1744, is Al-Saud attacking people and having massive glorified tribal-gang-wars. I can't imagine what world Taxizen or Truth to Power are living in if they want to claim that this is non-violence. Or am I misunderstanding them?

[Pants-of-dog]

There are all sorts of circumstances which will affect a people's prosperity but if form of governance were not one of them then we would expect to find the distribution of democracies and monarchies in the ranking of prosperity to be broadly even. This is plainly not the case though, theoretically and empirically, form of governance does have a (big) impact on prosperity and in any ranking of wealth such as by GDP per capita the top countries are predominantly monarchies and autocracies while the bottom ones are democratic republics. If democratic republics were really better than monarchies, as you believe as a matter of your progressive faith, then the reverse would be true but it isn't.

Since ten out of the top ten most prosperous countries are multi-party democracies, it would seem that mutli=party democracies are disproportionately prosperous compared to other countries.

It is compilation of three different rankings of GDP per capita made by the World Bank, IMF and the CIA that I found on wiki

Why wold you use GDP? That makes no sense. For example, it does not take into account income inequality. If one country has a lord that makes 1000 a year and 9 slaves that each make ten a year (a total of 1090) creating cheap plastic crap for the UK, while a second country has 10 free people each making 100 (for a total of 1000) creating sustainable goods, which country is more prosperous?

According to your logic, the first one. However, you are ignoring the fact that in that nation, only one person prospers and the rest get screwed. In the second country, everyone prospers.

That's a very eurocentric list, even so 8 of 10 are constitutional monarchies. Did you know less than a quarter of the world's governments are monarchies. The rest being some kind of republic. Only 5 out 196 of world's nations are absolute monarchies yet four of those five absolute monarchies are in the top 12 (world bank gdp per capita ranking)? So tell me why 8 of 10 on your list of top countries are constitutional monarchies instead of being 8 of 10 republics?

The debate is not about monarchies versus republics. It is about mutli-party democracies versus those that actually have a monarch in power.

A constitutional monarchy is a multi-party democracy.

As an aside it is well to clarify something about a constitutional monarchy, it is label for a state of affairs somewhere between an absolute monarchy and a full blown democratic republic. Which is a huge range of variation. Since Magna Carta in 1215 it could be argued the English monarchy has been a constitutional monarchy but there is huge difference between the scope and powers enjoyed by Queen Elizabeth I in the 16th century and that of Queen Elizabeth II in the 21st century. It is a very broad label.

This is why I specified that the prosperous monarchies of today are actually multi-party democracies.

Don't trust people who say "in other words" I guarantee to you they are invariably slithering liars.

Even your insults are as subtle as a brick to the face.

Now, do you think it is fine to have a dictatorship as long as the dictator supports a free market?

Any form of governance is a thematic and conceptual violation of the NAP and the more cooks spoiling the broth the worse it gets. Super small government, smaller than a minarchy, is an absolute monarchy. Smaller than that is anarchy and in an anarchy the level of uncertainty shoots goes up dramatically and with it violence, NAP violations. On the spectrum of power absolute monarchies are a libertarian sweet spot between the Reign of Terror (anarchy) on one hand and the mob voting themselves your house, a share of your business, indoctrination of your children on the other (democracy).

You are making the error of thinking that the amount of power that the gov't has is in direct relationship to the number of people who have that power. This is wrong. Monarchies do not have less power over their subjects because there is only one monarch. They have more, because there is no one to oppose them.

[Technology]

I haven't read that much Hoppe but my impression quite closely accords with your estimation. I don't think he ever made the leap from recognising some of the merits of monarchy to thinking it might in fact be the only or best solution to the problem of governance moreover I don't think he even entertained the notion that is was possible as an exit from democracy. He never looked further than the event horizon of anarchy (a utopian and false vision of anarchy shared by all anarchists, left and right). He came within striking distance but did not strike. So the post-libertarian has taken a clue from Hoppe but then left him in the dust flying right through the event horizon of anarchy to the "other side" which must be a reset into monarchy.

Well, I don't suspect he would be convinced by the idea that the ancient Greek cycle of history was correct, but then I haven't read enough Hoppe either to tell you about that. I'm certainly not convinced that the current "decline of violence" (as a trend, big blips though there may be) is about to reverse any time soon, especially not that a monarchy will be the outcome.

Which monarch do you have in mind, by the way?

You'd also be creating a dictatorship which would create a bureaucracy, just with you there is no guarantee as to what that bureaucracy would look like because it would be entirely the whim of the monarch.

This is why monarchy feels like a non-position to me. You have all these post-libertarians who are now neo-reactionaries in that they embrace the most authoritarian form of state possible, but they can't quite seem to let go of the platonic ideal of the free market in which there are lots of buyers and sellers interacting on their own terms. This creates a contradiction, which is resolved by believing that monarchy is especially suited to producing the libertarian ideal of the market, when it's really suited to producing the ideal of one guy having the most power to impress his own ideals (which could be anything) onto the rest of society.

Now, if there was a movement to install an existing would be monarch into power, then this king may have actual ideals someone would want to see impressed on society, and therefore support that particular absolute monarch being brought to power. This position is royalism; more specific than monarchism, it advocates putting into power a particular monarch or lineage. When monarchism was a political force, it's popular support was expressed through royalism, not abstract monarchy.

[SolarCross]

Well, what would you rather do? Install an absolute monarch and then see how long it takes that monarch to begin designating that power to others because one family cannot do everything? You'd also be creating a dictatorship which would create a bureaucracy, just with you there is no guarantee as to what that bureaucracy would look like because it would be entirely the whim of the monarch.

Founder monarchs install themselves by stratagem or the grace of god.

The monarch will of course delegate responsibilities to ministers and other agents such as generals but the authority and rule come from the monarch so this is not bureaucracy. -cracy from the greek kratia is rule. If the bureaus (offices) are obeying rather than ruling then they are not a kratia (greek for power). An aristocracy is when the "best" (aristos - greek for best) men rule and the monarch is a mere figurehead or absent entirely. Democracy is when the leaders of mobs rule. Bureaucracy is when every little council worker or local cop is king of his little domain. Here I am using the terms Monarchy, Aristocracy, Democracy, Bureaucracy and Anarchy by their precise meanings. Delegation is not division.

Saudi Arabia - The House of Saud won its domain through conquest just as Rei says. This might make them illegitimate by the nonsensical libertarian way of thinking but it makes them entirely legitimate by the rule of natural law, the law of heaven and earth.

[Technology]

Saudi Arabia - The House of Saud won its domain through conquest just as Rei says. This might make them illegitimate by the nonsensical libertarian way of thinking but it makes them entirely legitimate by the rule of natural law, the law of heaven and earth.

(earlier)

lol at lefties. You are trying to turn this thread into another mind-numbing exercise of babbling absurdities.

No one wants to be a communist. Monarchies are popular. Go away.

Taking these things together we can expose the vacuity of "might makes right", because if legitimacy is based on the rule of force, then there's nothing illegitimate about The House of Saud acting like socialists in their treatment of the economies they have rule over. Abdullah ibn Abdilaziz could act very much as Stalin did if he saw fit, and this would be legitimate to you by the same reasoning. He could also disband his rulership and it would be just as righteous through concession to his opposition.

On the other hand, if a Marxist group was actually strong enough to defeat him as he is, then that would be legitimate too, as "natural law" would be fulfilled.

This conception of legitimacy contains no roadmaps to any political conclusions. Taking "might makes right" to its ultimate conclusion should not get you to rods and scepters, but to an amoralistic, post-political point of view.

[SolarCross]

Taking these things together we can expose the vacuity of "might makes right", because if legitimacy is based on the rule of force, then there's nothing illegitimate about The House of Saud acting like socialists in their treatment of the economies they have rule over. Abdullah ibn Abdilaziz could act very much as Stalin did if he saw fit, and this would be legitimate to you by the same reasoning. He could also disband his rulership and it would be just as righteous through concession to his opposition.

Yes, Saud could of course turn their domain into an enormous socialist workers hell hole and from the point of view of might makes right it would be right. Luckily for Saudis the house of Saud are smarter than that. So it goes for Stalin and Stalin by the way was very much a monarch in the making, as was Napoleon. Two examples of monarchies arising out of chaos incidently. They both failed because of the prevailing progressive disease was not quite spent so they were dragged under (well that is less true of Napoleon as his failure came more from poor military judgement).

On the other hand, if a Marxist group was actually strong enough to defeat him as he is, then that would be legitimate too, as "natural law" would be fulfilled.

Yes but marxism has too much progressive baggage as a founder ideology to allow stable ordered government, a monarchy, so it would be at risk of degeneration more than a more traditional royalist ideology. Though saying that the Chinese have managed to trasmute marxism / maoism into something that works nearly as well as a monarchy. Of course without the support of religion they have to rely on "might" more than "right" which adds some inefficiency and extra overhead to governance but still it is miles better than democracy.

This conception of legitimacy contains no roadmaps to any political conclusions. Taking "might makes right" to its ultimate conclusion should not get you to rods and scepters, but to an amoralistic, post-political point of view.

It could which is why religion is important. If one has religion then it is less a matter of might makes right and more a matter of right makes might... which is the finest kind of governance..

[Nunt]

This really doesn't have anything to do with libertarianism. Topic should be moved to "Paternalism & Corporatism" or something.

[SolarCross]

This really doesn't have anything to do with libertarianism. Topic should be moved to "Paternalism & Corporatism" or something.

To start with it was but now it isn't, I have moved on. I shall de camp to another sub-forum in future. Though I think "Paternalism & Corporatism" is still too progressive / demotic for what I am now. I shall probably move to "Other Ideologies".