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From: janw@inmet.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Laws of Libertaria
Message-ID: <28200663@inmet.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 14-Feb-86 20:44:00 EST
Article-I.D.: inmet.28200663
Posted: Fri Feb 14 20:44:00 1986
Date-Received: Sun, 16-Feb-86 20:55:18 EST
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Nf-From: inmet!janw    Feb 14 20:44:00 1986


 [Mike Huybensz  ...decvax!genrad!mit-eddie!cybvax0!mrh]
>> >> You are quite right that arbitration doesn't work  when  one  of
>> >> the parties is powerless. This is a point that needed to be made.

>> >Not generally powerless: powerless with respect to one party at one
>> >particular time is all that is necessary.  

>> Sure: but, in an interdependent society, one kind of power at one
>> place  can  be  negotiated  into another kind of power in another
>> place. I once wrote a senator about a dissident friend of mine in
>> Russia,  and  got  a very helpful reply.

Where was the exercise of power: did anything change in Russia?

Well, he did send a telegram to Chebrikov, the KGB chief, and the
harassment  of my friend did abate. The causal connection is not
certain. More generally, if you doubt a VIP here  has  some  pull
behind  the iron curtain, then you are wrong. In some cases, even
the family of a defector has been extricated from there, and that
is  really  hard.  Interdependence at work: Russia, like everyone
else, has a lobby in Washington. 

>> >So then how does an aggreived but "powerless" party get satisfac-
>> >tion in your libertaria?

>> Two sides should be discerned in this question: the *mechanisms*
>> of getting satisfaction; and the *motive force* activating
>> these mechanisms. E.g., in our society, the Congress, the press,
>> the lobbies etc. are the machinery through which the *interests*
>> of, say, polluters and anti-polluters work. 

>You also need to consider the efficiency of the machinery for
>transmitting power.  That's a strong point of one government, and a
>weak point between governments.

In a complicated, civilized  society,  everyone  needs  everyone,
directly  or  indirectly. When the flow of goods, favors, and in-
formation is intense enough, the problem is no more that  of  too
weak power transmission mechanisms but (as Nat pointed out), of
too strong ones. Delete the government, there is still more  than
enough.   Consider North America, or Western Europe. They work as
holistic systems without a super-government. 

>> The difference between [Libertaria] and status quo is that no institution
>> has an artificial *monopoly* on the functions it is supposed
>> to serve. The advantages are many.  Competition is an incentive
>> for the institution to *really* serve the supposed function. Thus, even
>> where de facto there is a monopoly (a natural monopoly)
>> it works better and is sensitive to customers. 

>By the definition of a natural monopoly, it is uneconomic for anyone to
>compete.  So why would there be efficiency and responsiveness?

It is only uneconomic as long as the monopoly behaves.  It has to
keep  undercutting  *potential*  competition.  Coercive  monopoly
doesn't.

Suppose the cost of a unit of service  is  $10  for  the  natural
monopoly  (being  already  there);  but $15 for any newcomer. The
monopoly charges $14 and makes a nice profit. If it tries to  get
$20, it loses the market, and loses it for good. If it gets arro-
gant and insensitive, or fails to make use of  new  cost-reducing
technology, it comes to the same thing. 

>For that matter, what do you think is an example of a natural monopoly,
>and why aren't governments natural monopolies by that standard?

(1)Utilities.  (2)They may well be, with respect to some of their
functions. This is part of my argument.

			Jan Wasilewsky