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The problem with the ancap is between one or both of the following:

1) impossibly high eternal vigilance: without police, courts, etc to enforce property rights… you end up merely possessing them by strength at arms. Technically speaking, that is the ONLY way to ever have it (you own nothing if criminals can take it at will), but a functional government allows you to do things like vacation away from home or work 10-15 hour days away without having to worry about whether you have enough traps/guards/etc defending your place.

2) competition in force: me and my close friends are troupe A. We defend our properties on a rotating basis since there are no police or courts. Another troupe—troupe B—has a dispute about a property line between one member of my troupe and one of mine. Troupe B is being unreasonable about it. Both troupes have a NATO article 5 defense pact. The obvious end result is the same as point 1–the boundary is decided by elimination of the opposing group.

Government, when it is properly subordinated to principle, is the best defender of property rights.

The issue isn’t government as such, but the fact that they have not been properly subordinated to principle since the early 1900s.

Sadly, the mass importation of European immigrants around that time that did not keep or bear arms and could only vote for whatever expanded industry’s pull in government is part of this. I say it as the descendant of that wave.

MoneRogue 2mo ago

1. The problem with depending on the government for protection is that you are effectively ensuring its monopoly on defense will continue. This monopoly is bad for a couple of reasons: First off, it is completely antithetical to the idea of supply and demand, as it profits from both customers and non-customers. Second, due to lack of competition, this means you have to hope your government chooses to fund the right things you want, and the aforementioned reason makes this even more challenging. This is why you are starting to see more private security and private police companies recently because of the police failing to properly enforce laws and punish perpetrators.

2. I don't think the situation you are referring to is likely because if this kind of scenario occurred, both groups you are talking about could simply go to arbitration and figure out a solution that will benefit both parties.

3. A government is only as good as the people running it is, and this is why democracy sucks because literally anyone can be a part of it, even the least-qualified people. Even if the government is run by the most-qualified in society, it is still terrible for defending property rights simply because of the loopholes in the law, particularly things like civil asset forfeiture or eminent domain.

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Discussion

Josephus 2mo ago

1) agreed. The second amendment exists because of the expressed understanding that government force can only be moderated by private force. That being said, vigilantism has its own issues. Private Justice is difficult because a thug can just murder someone and then lie about the deceased and claim self defense. In the case of a functioning government, this is mediated in courts. But our government has not been functioning towards it’s intended purpose since at least the early 1900s. The intentionally designed counter is the “right to abolish” said government as per Jefferson.

You can’t refuse to call the government’s bluff for over 100 years and expect them to take you seriously anymore.

But when the alternative to private Justice is no Justice… the choice must always be Justice.

2) the scenario I’m referring to happens in every third world tribally oriented society you can name on a regular basis. Yes, arbitration can and does often happen. But arbitration is a skill and a relies on a set of cultural precepts that many cultures don’t have. Even in the more advanced and reasonable societies, look at scenarios like the hatfields and mccoys.

3) totally agreed that government cannot be any better than its median member and its median voter.

I wrote a whole article that I called the “stake in franchise amendment” that was a proposed solution to this. I took a page out of Robert Heinlein and the American founding and basically stipulated some requirements including marriage, children with the same spouse, total renunciation of dual citizenship, etc in order to vote.

Long/short: it is better to have a functioning government than no government. But it is better to have anarchy than an expressly evil government. The check to that is supposed to be public force. This is why the “let’s be reasonable” republicans who want to “negotiate” with people who want to enslaved us are traitors. What we have now is an anarcho-tyranny, wherein we have the worst of both worlds between anarchy and tyranny. We have to have external vigilance and arbitrate on our own like an anarchic state, but still have the taxes/regulations of a nanny state on top of it.

I just don’t agree that the proper end state will be actual anarchy. But I agree that that’s preferable to what is going on right now.