Blurred Lines: Total Privatization and Government


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One idea in fiction that's always fascinated me is that of megacorporations. A company with the powers/traits of a government like a military and a police force was just very exotic. It offered a different paradigm for espionage, war, and politics (in a fictional setting, of course). I was able to dive into worlds like that while playing James Bond 007: Nightfire or watching Avatar or The International. I was surprised to learn that such a thing had real world examples such as the British East India Trading Company, the Reedy Creek Improvement District, and Operation Snow White.

My reason for bringing this up is that I think it challenges the coherence of the concept of "laissez faire"/" let it act" and demonstrates that the "public"/"private" dichotomy can be illusory. What do I mean by this? Well I'm not talking "corporatism", "crony capitalism", or what have you, but rather a totally different model of society. For the moment, just forget all the political/economic stuff about markets, supply/demand, regulation, competition, trade, contracts, property, and all that jazz.

Imagine we have an island (chosen because it's easy to distinguish from its backdrop) of decent size, say, fifty square miles. It's proprietary in nature and its law is fundamentally corporate. The society situated on this island is dominated by an alliance of three or four companies--it's a corporate republic. This alliance of corporations maintains a system of schools, passes legislation, conducts foreign intelligence operations, and patrols the roads amongst other things. Most residents are in the employ of these four companies. What we normally think of as contemporary social welfare manifests in the form of employment benefits.

I've designed this hypothetical scenario in such a way so as to remlve what we traditionally think of as government while showing how the traits associated with it could take on a different form. I don't intend for this to comes across as parodic. So, what are your thoughts?

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Historically, the island was colonial America and, chafing at corporate rule, chose democracy. Something similar happened in Australia, another island. Both were offspring of an older island nation, Britain, where civil war and the exigencies of commerce reduced their corporate state to a figurehead atop rudimentary self-rule that evolved into parliamentary democracy. All three islands prospered, attracted immigrants, and democratically voted themselves into bankrupt welfare states, covertly ruled by bankers and corporations. Your megacorporation is not entirely different or distant from current arrangements.

pyramid-300x195.jpg

“I am a Martian. I promise my whole and unqualified service to Mars, giving no thought to my personal safety or my personal happiness. The life of the colony and the welfare of its citizens are superior to any rights enjoyed by an individual or his family. This oath admits of no exceptions, no time limits, because I hereby pledge myself to serve Mars and to obey the directors of Mars Development Company, forsaking all other duties and allegiance, now and forever." [Mars Shall Thunder]
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Samson, we are already there, you just can't see it because the government obscures it. You see, the government is the "mega-corporation" which is why we are headed right into classic fascism albeit with American seasonings. Think 1920s' Italy. Think Nazi Germany. Don't think Soviet communism for while it was fascist at the core it was too stupid, nationalizing instead of merely controlling and directing. The whole world, including China, is going fascist, implicitly but totally, backed by any country's military apparatus. WWIII will be between China and the United States plus Taiwan, Japan and South Korea. The best place in America for an American to live will be in SW Oregon: the radioactive fallout from nuclear blasts on American soil will leave it free from the deadly 14-day radioactive contamination.

--Brant

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Government uses force. Corporation uses voluntary trade.

??

In reality, there are living human beings whose freedom and interest are the subject of this debate. There is no divine right of incorporation, whether as a government, or Subchapter S tax dodge, or a family trust that never dies like a natural person. [COGIGG, p.146]

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Remember that in Heinlein's Moon novel had families that incorporated in order to pass assets to the next generation.

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Government uses force. Corporation uses voluntary trade.

A wee bit simplistic. I don't consider the voluntariness of business transaction to be of any real significance.

Are you speaking as an anthropologist, sociologist, economist, philosopher or politician?

--Brant

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One idea in fiction that's always fascinated me is that of megacorporations. A company with the powers/traits of a government like a military and a police force was just very exotic. It offered a different paradigm for espionage, war, and politics (in a fictional setting, of course). I was able to dive into worlds like that while playing James Bond 007: Nightfire or watching Avatar or The International. I was surprised to learn that such a thing had real world examples such as the British East India Trading Company, the Reedy Creek Improvement District, and Operation Snow White.

My reason for bringing this up is that I think it challenges the coherence of the concept of "laissez faire"/" let it act" and demonstrates that the "public"/"private" dichotomy can be illusory. What do I mean by this? Well I'm not talking "corporatism", "crony capitalism", or what have you, but rather a totally different model of society. For the moment, just forget all the political/economic stuff about markets, supply/demand, regulation, competition, trade, contracts, property, and all that jazz.

Imagine we have an island (chosen because it's easy to distinguish from its backdrop) of decent size, say, fifty square miles. It's proprietary in nature and its law is fundamentally corporate. The society situated on this island is dominated by an alliance of three or four companies--it's a corporate republic. This alliance of corporations maintains a system of schools, passes legislation, conducts foreign intelligence operations, and patrols the roads amongst other things. Most residents are in the employ of these four companies. What we normally think of as contemporary social welfare manifests in the form of employment benefits.

I've designed this hypothetical scenario in such a way so as to remlve what we traditionally think of as government while showing how the traits associated with it could take on a different form. I don't intend for this to comes across as parodic. So, what are your thoughts?

Two questions:

1. Does the corporation tax the residents of the island? And I am not speaking of rents or other market-based fees.

2. Does the corporation act as the exclusive provider/enforcer of justice in the island?

If the answer to either question is "yes," then we are dealing with an extra-market phenomenon known as "the state."

Note: The East India Company was not a creature of the market but of government charter by Elizabeth I. It exercised military and administrative power in India. Thus, "yes" to 1. and 2. above.

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Total privatization? Some things are best in the hands of The Guvmint, like national defense, though private contractors certainly have a place too. But what about those borderline cases that dont involve *rights*?

Gayle Dean wrote on the Objectivism site on Thu, 24 Mar 2005 09:56:42 -0500:

. . . . And I agree with Allen Costell that animal rights does not preclude Rand's fundamentals. It only precludes some of her conclusions. Rand herself a cat lover--told Henry Mark Holzer--her attorney and an animal rights activist, that she would welcome an argument for animal rights, even though she herself could not come up with one. (That fact was confirmed to me recently in correspondence with Holzer.) And knowing that Rand probably would not have maintained a personal relationship with anyone she considered to be "irrational", the fact that she maintained Holzer as her attorney while he was working actively for animal rights is evidence that she didn't reject the idea out of hand. So it is puzzling to me that Objectivists become so emotional over this topic. One would think that up-and-coming Objectivist scholars would find animal rights to be a rich field of exploration, especially in light of the fact that Rand herself invited it. The philosophy could take a big step forward into a new area.

end quote

What worries me about privatization and lack of laws are issues like animal cruelty and pollution.

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Animal rights, such as they are in philosophy and law, primarily devolve on pets and domesticated animals. The best that can be come up with is they are our guests into human society--a kind of rights' sub-section. As a practical matter there are already laws on the books so let the animal abusers defend themselves morally and philosophically a la Howard Roark in court (they won't), but you won't find me there helping them out.

--Brant

I'm going to the circus

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Total privatization? Some things are best in the hands of The Guvmint, like national defense, though private contractors certainly have a place too. But what about those borderline cases that dont involve *rights*?

Gayle Dean wrote on the Objectivism site on Thu, 24 Mar 2005 09:56:42 -0500:

. . . . And I agree with Allen Costell that animal rights does not preclude Rand's fundamentals. It only precludes some of her conclusions. Rand herself a cat lover--told Henry Mark Holzer--her attorney and an animal rights activist, that she would welcome an argument for animal rights, even though she herself could not come up with one. (That fact was confirmed to me recently in correspondence with Holzer.) And knowing that Rand probably would not have maintained a personal relationship with anyone she considered to be "irrational", the fact that she maintained Holzer as her attorney while he was working actively for animal rights is evidence that she didn't reject the idea out of hand. So it is puzzling to me that Objectivists become so emotional over this topic. One would think that up-and-coming Objectivist scholars would find animal rights to be a rich field of exploration, especially in light of the fact that Rand herself invited it. The philosophy could take a big step forward into a new area.

end quote

What worries me about privatization and lack of laws are issues like animal cruelty and pollution.

If you wish to review the government's record on animal cruelty, do not neglect the actions of FDR's New Deal in removing millions of pigs from the market in 1933:

Part of the implementation included the slaughter of millions of pigs in an attempt to drive up the price of pork, under the Hog Reduction Program of the AAA. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agricultural_Adjustment_Act#Goal_and_Implementation

As for pollution, consider the fact that the U.S. government is one of the nation's largest contributors to greenhouse gases: http://www.peri.umass.edu/greenhouse100/

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If you wish to review the government's record on animal cruelty, do not neglect the actions of FDR's New Deal in removing millions of pigs from the market in 1933:

Part of the implementation included the slaughter of millions of pigs in an attempt to drive up the price of pork, under the Hog Reduction Program of the AAA. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agricultural_Adjustment_Act#Goal_and_Implementation

As for pollution, consider the fact that the U.S. government is one of the nation's largest contributors to greenhouse gases: http://www.peri.umass.edu/greenhouse100/

Ah yes, his little Commie buddy who was his future Vice President [this jerk was actually smarter than Biden].

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Brant wrote:

CO2 is not a pollutant save defined into one. It's a trace gas beneficial and necessary to life . . . . let's have some more!

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That won't bring back the dinosaurs will it Brant? The CO2 hysteria is one of the sillier shticks from the Wacko's. For our children's and grandchildrens sake, I wish Disney would bring back their documentary style, hour long shows from the 50's and 60's with some real science. I fondly remember them, though some of their *facts* have been disproved. Of course in todays Degrassi, Cosmo poly-sci atmosphere it would probably toe the global warming line.

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FFS, people. My point is that complete privatization does not eliminate government and give way to anarchy, as some seem to believe. What you end up with are corporate republics. Are there any essential differences, for example, between a private community and a small town? I don't think that there are.

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One idea in fiction that's always fascinated me is that of megacorporations. A company with the powers/traits of a government like a military and a police force was just very exotic. It offered a different paradigm for espionage, war, and politics (in a fictional setting, of course). I was able to dive into worlds like that while playing James Bond 007: Nightfire or watching Avatar or The International. I was surprised to learn that such a thing had real world examples such as the British East India Trading Company, the Reedy Creek Improvement District, and Operation Snow White.

My reason for bringing this up is that I think it challenges the coherence of the concept of "laissez faire"/" let it act" and demonstrates that the "public"/"private" dichotomy can be illusory. What do I mean by this? Well I'm not talking "corporatism", "crony capitalism", or what have you, but rather a totally different model of society. For the moment, just forget all the political/economic stuff about markets, supply/demand, regulation, competition, trade, contracts, property, and all that jazz.

Imagine we have an island (chosen because it's easy to distinguish from its backdrop) of decent size, say, fifty square miles. It's proprietary in nature and its law is fundamentally corporate. The society situated on this island is dominated by an alliance of three or four companies--it's a corporate republic. This alliance of corporations maintains a system of schools, passes legislation, conducts foreign intelligence operations, and patrols the roads amongst other things. Most residents are in the employ of these four companies. What we normally think of as contemporary social welfare manifests in the form of employment benefits.

I've designed this hypothetical scenario in such a way so as to remlve what we traditionally think of as government while showing how the traits associated with it could take on a different form. I don't intend for this to comes across as parodic. So, what are your thoughts?

Two questions:

1. Does the corporation tax the residents of the island? And I am not speaking of rents or other market-based fees.

2. Does the corporation act as the exclusive provider/enforcer of justice in the island?

If the answer to either question is "yes," then we are dealing with an extra-market phenomenon known as "the state."

Note: The East India Company was not a creature of the market but of government charter by Elizabeth I. It exercised military and administrative power in India. Thus, "yes" to 1. and 2. above.

They own and control the island, so, yeah, kind of. Also, a network of private defense agencies and judges actually constitutes a state. The only competition that can be had between them is civil war.

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They own and control the island, so, yeah, kind of. Also, a network of private defense agencies and judges actually constitutes a state. The only competition that can be had between them is civil war.

You can call it "private" if you like, but once an agency starts forcing people to pay taxes and and prohibits competition, it is a state no different than the ones in Albania or Zambia.

Similarly you can call the Presbyterian Church a "state," but that designation would not match reality.

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They own and control the island, so, yeah, kind of. Also, a network of private defense agencies and judges actually constitutes a state. The only competition that can be had between them is civil war.

You can call it "private" if you like, but once an agency starts forcing people to pay taxes and and prohibits competition, it is a state no different than the ones in Albania or Zambia.

Similarly you can call the Presbyterian Church a "state," but that designation would not match reality.

I see no contradiction in terms. A private state is what it would be. Corporatocracies, bankocracies, and corporate republics are all (theoretical) private forms of government. What's more, these four companies own the island. They can do whatever the hell they want with it! And who says you need to be forced to pay taxes for something to count as a state? A small town might not have taxes, but it would still have government. Here is the reality: government is not a monopoly. You talk about voluntary versus involuntary payment making a difference. I just don't see it.

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Define your terms. How exactly is a private state different from a public state? In a private state does one man or family own the government? In a public state does the entire population own the government? Is the U.S. a public state? If so, does that mean I hold one share of the government? If so, why can't I sell my share? In what sense do I own something I cannot sell?

Wasn't the Soviet Union under Stalin a private state? Could not one man do what the hell he wanted with it?

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you're qualified, BTW, to sit on the SCOTUS???

Are you suggesting he sit on his balls (his scrotum?) Now considering how painful that is - that is just plain mean. Isn't it odd how a man so infrequently squishes them after the first time?

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you're qualified, BTW, to sit on the SCOTUS???

Are you suggesting he sit on his balls (his scrotum?) Now considering how painful that is - that is just plain mean. Isn't it odd how a man so infrequently squishes them after the first time?

Uhhhh...?

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