"Anarcho"-capitalists claim to be anarchists because they say that they oppose government. As such, as noted in the last section, they use a dictionary definition of anarchism. However, this fails to appreciate that anarchism is a political theory, not a dictionary definition. As dictionaries are rarely politically sophisticated things, this means that they fail to recognise that anarchism is more than just opposition to government, it is also marked a opposition to capitalism (i.e. exploitation and private property). Thus, opposition to government is a necessary but not sufficient condition for being an anarchist -- you also need to be opposed to exploitation and capitalist private property. As "anarcho"-capitalists do not consider interest, rent and profits (i.e. capitalism) to be exploitative nor oppose capitalist property rights, they are not anarchists.
Moreover, "anarcho"-capitalism is inherently self-refuting. This can be seen from leading "anarcho"-capitalist Murray Rothbard. he thundered against the evil of the state, arguing that it "arrogates to itself a monopoly of force, of ultimate decision-making power, over a given area territorial area." In and of itself, this definition is unremarkable. That a few people (an elite of rulers) claim the right to rule others must be part of any sensible definition of the state or government. However, the problems begin for Rothbard when he notes that "[o]bviously, in a free society, Smith has the ultimate decision-making power over his own just property, Jones over his, etc." [The Ethics of Liberty, p. 170 and p. 173] The logical contradiction in this position should be obvious, but not to Rothbard. It shows the power of ideology, the ability of means words (the expression "private property") to turn the bad ("ultimate decision-making power over a given area") into the good ("ultimate decision-making power over a given area").
Now, this contradiction can be solved in only one way -- the owners of the "given area" are also its users. In other words, a system of possession (or "occupancy and use") as favoured by anarchists. However, Rothbard is a capitalist and supports private property. In other words, wage labour and landlords. This means that he supports a divergence between ownership and use and this means that this "ultimate decision-making power" extends to those who use, but do not own, such property (i.e. tenants and workers). The statist nature of private property is clearly indicated by Rothbard's words -- the property owner in an "anarcho"-capitalist society possesses the "ultimate decision-making power" over a given area, which is also what the state has currently. Rothbard has, ironically, proved by his own definition that "anarcho"-capitalism is not anarchist.
Rothbard does try to solve this obvious contradiction, but utterly fails. He simply ignores the crux of the matter, that capitalism is based on hierarchy and, therefore, cannot be anarchist. He does this by arguing that the hierarchy associated with capitalism is fine as long as the private property that produced it was acquired in a "just" manner. In so doing he yet again draws attention to the identical authority structures and social relationships of the state and property. As he puts it:
"If the State may be said too properly own its territory, then it is proper for it to make rules for everyone who presumes to live in that area. It can legitimately seize or control private property because there is no private property in its area, because it really owns the entire land surface. So long as the State permits its subjects to leave its territory, then, it can be said to act as does any other owner who sets down rules for people living on his property." [Op. Cit., p. 170]
Obviously Rothbard argues that the state does not "justly" own its territory -- but given that the current distribution of property is just as much the result of violence and coercion as the state, his argument is seriously flawed. It amounts, as we note in section F.4, to little more than an "immaculate conception of property" unrelated to reality. Even assuming that private property was produced by the means Rothbard assumes, it does not justify the hierarchy associated with it as the current and future generations of humanity have, effectively, been excommunicated from liberty by previous ones. If, as Rothbard argues, property is a natural right and the basis of liberty then why should the many be excluded from their birthright by a minority? In other words, Rothbard denies that liberty should be universal. He chooses property over liberty while anarchists choose liberty over property.
Even worse, the possibility that private property can result in worse violations of individual freedom (at least of workers) than the state of its citizens was implicitly acknowledged by Rothbard. He uses as a hypothetical example a country whose King is threatened by a rising "libertarian" movement. The King responses by "employ[ing] a cunning stratagem," namely he "proclaims his government to be dissolved, but just before doing so he arbitrarily parcels out the entire land area of his kingdom to the 'ownership' of himself and his relatives." Rather than taxes, his subjects now pay rent and he can "regulate to regulate the lives of all the people who presume to live on" his property as he sees fit. Rothbard then asks:
"Now what should be the reply of the libertarian rebels to this pert challenge? If they are consistent utilitarians, they must bow to this subterfuge, and resign themselves to living under a regime no less despotic than the one they had been battling for so long. Perhaps, indeed, more despotic, for now the king and his relatives can claim for themselves the libertarians' very principle of the absolute right of private property, an absoluteness which they might not have dared to claim before." [Op. Cit., pp. 54-5]
So not only does the property owner have the same monopoly of power over a given area as the state, it is more despotic as it is based on the "absolute right of private property"! And remember, Rothbard is arguing in favour of "anarcho"-capitalism ("if you have unbridled capitalism, you will have all kinds of authority: you will have extreme authority." [Chomksy, Understanding Power, p. 200]). So in practice, private property is a major source of oppression and authoritarianism within society -- there is little or no freedom within capitalist production (as Bakunin noted, "the worker sells his person and his liberty for a given time"). So, in stark contrast to anarchists, "anarcho"-capitalists have no problem with factory fascism (i.e. wage labour), a position which seems highly illogical for a theory calling itself libertarian. If it were truly libertarian, it would oppose all forms of domination, not just statism. This position flows from the "anarcho"-capitalist definition of freedom as the absence of coercion and will be discussed in section F.2 in more detail.
Of course, Rothbard has yet another means to escape the obvious, namely that the market will limit the abuses of the property owners. If workers do not like their ruler then they can seek another. However, this reply completely ignores the reality of economic and social power. Thus the "consent" argument fails because it ignores the social circumstances of capitalism which limit the choice of the many. Anarchists have long argued that, as a class, workers have little choice but to "consent" to capitalist hierarchy. The alternative is either dire poverty or starvation.
"Anarcho"-capitalists dismiss such claims by denying that there is such a thing as economic power. Rather, it is simply freedom of contract. Anarchists consider such claims as a joke. To show why, we need only quote (yet again) Rothbard on the abolition of slavery and serfdom in the 19th century. He argued, correctly, that the "bodies of the oppressed were freed, but the property which they had worked and eminently deserved to own, remained in the hands of their former oppressors. With economic power thus remaining in their hands, the former lords soon found themselves virtual masters once more of what were now free tenants or farm labourers. The serfs and slaves had tasted freedom, but had been cruelly derived of its fruits." [Op. Cit., p. 74]
To say the least, anarchists fail to see the logic in this position. Contrast this with the standard "anarcho"-capitalist claim that if market forces ("voluntary exchanges") result in the creation of "free tenants or farm labourers" then they are free. Yet labourers dispossessed by market forces are in exactly the same social and economic situation as the ex-serfs and ex-slaves. If the latter do not have the fruits of freedom, neither do the former. Rothbard sees the obvious "economic power" in the latter case, but denies it in the former. It is only Rothbard's ideology that stops him from drawing the obvious conclusion -- identical economic conditions produce identical social relationships and so capitalism is marked by "economic power" and "virtual masters." The only solution is for "anarcho"-capitalists to simply say the ex-serfs and ex-slaves were actually free to choose and, consequently, Rothbard was wrong. It might be inhuman, but at least it would be consistent!
Rothbard's perspective is alien to anarchism. For example, as individualist anarchist William Bailie noted, under capitalism there is a class system marked by "a dependent industrial class of wage-workers" and "a privileged class of wealth-monopolisers, each becoming more and more distinct from the other as capitalism advances." This has turned property into "a social power, an economic force destructive of rights, a fertile source of injustice, a means of enslaving the dispossessed." He concludes: "Under this system equal liberty cannot obtain." Bailie notes that the modern "industrial world under capitalistic conditions" have "arisen under the regime of status" (and so "law-made privileges") however, it seems unlikely that he would have concluded that such a class system would be fine if it had developed naturally or the current state was abolished while leaving the class structure intact (as we note in section G.4, Tucker recognised that even the "freest competition" was powerless against the "enormous concentration of wealth" associated with modern capitalism). [The Individualist Anarchists, p. 121]
Therefore anarchists recognise that "free exchange" or "consent" in unequal circumstances will reduce freedom as well as increasing inequality between individuals and classes. In other words, as we discuss in section F.3, inequality will produce social relationships which are based on hierarchy and domination, not freedom. As Noam Chomsky put it:
"Anarcho-capitalism, in my opinion, is a doctrinal system which, if ever implemented, would lead to forms of tyranny and oppression that have few counterparts in human history. There isn't the slightest possibility that its (in my view, horrendous) ideas would be implemented, because they would quickly destroy any society that made this colossal error. The idea of 'free contract' between the potentate and his starving subject is a sick joke, perhaps worth some moments in an academic seminar exploring the consequences of (in my view, absurd) ideas, but nowhere else." [Noam Chomsky on Anarchism, interview with Tom Lane, December 23, 1996]
Clearly, then, by its own arguments "anarcho"-capitalism is not anarchist. This should come as no surprise to anarchists. Anarchism, as a political theory, was born when Proudhon wrote What is Property? specifically to refute the notion that workers are free when capitalist property forces them to seek employment by landlords and capitalists. He was well aware that in such circumstances property "violates equality by the rights of exclusion and increase, and freedom by despotism . . . [and has] perfect identity with robbery." He, unsurprisingly, talks of the "proprietor, to whom [the worker] has sold and surrendered his liberty." For Proudhon, anarchy was "the absence of a master, of a sovereign" while "proprietor" was "synonymous" with "sovereign" for he "imposes his will as law, and suffers neither contradiction nor control." This meant that "property engenders despotism," as "each proprietor is sovereign lord within the sphere of his property." [What is Property, p. 251, p. 130, p. 264 and pp. 266-7] It must also be stressed that Proudhon's classic work is a lengthy critique of the kind of apologetics for private property Rothbard espouses to salvage his ideology from its obvious contradictions.
Ironically, Rothbard repeats the same analysis as Proudhon but draws the opposite conclusions and expects to be considered an anarchist! Moreover, it seems equally ironic that "anarcho"-capitalism calls itself "anarchist" while basing itself on the arguments that anarchism was created in opposition to. As shown, "anarcho"-capitalism makes as much sense as "anarcho-statism" -- an oxymoron, a contradiction in terms. The idea that "anarcho"-capitalism warrants the name "anarchist" is simply false. Only someone ignorant of anarchism could maintain such a thing. While you expect anarchist theory to show this to be the case, the wonderful thing is that "anarcho"-capitalism itself does the same.
Little wonder Bob Black argues that "[t]o demonise state authoritarianism while ignoring identical albeit contract-consecrated subservient arrangements in the large-scale corporations which control the world economy is fetishism at its worst." [Libertarian as Conservative] The similarities between capitalism and statism are clear -- and so why "anarcho"-capitalism cannot be anarchist. To reject the authority (the "ultimate decision-making power") of the state and embrace that of the property owner indicates not only a highly illogical stance but one at odds with the basic principles of anarchism. This whole-hearted support for wage labour and capitalist property rights indicates that "anarcho"-capitalists are not anarchists because they do not reject all forms of archy. They obviously support the hierarchy between boss and worker (wage labour) and landlord and tenant. Anarchism, by definition, is against all forms of archy, including the hierarchy generated by capitalist property. To ignore the obvious archy associated with capitalist property is highly illogical. Stephen L. Newman makes the same point:
"The emphasis [right-wing] libertarians place on the opposition of liberty and political power tends to obscure the role of authority in their worldview . . . the authority exercised in private relationships, however -- in the relationship between employer and employee, for instance -- meets with no objection. . . . [This] reveals a curious insensitivity to the use of private authority as a means of social control. Comparing public and private authority, we might well ask of the [right-wing] libertarians: When the price of exercising one's freedom is terribly high, what practical difference is there between the commands of the state and those issued by one's employer? . . . Though admittedly the circumstances are not identical, telling disgruntled empowers that they are always free to leave their jobs seems no different in principle from telling political dissidents that they are free to emigrate." [Liberalism at Wit's End, pp. 45-46]As Bob Black pointed out, right libertarians argue that "'one can at least change jobs.' But you can't avoid having a job -- just as under statism one can at least change nationalities but you can't avoid subjection to one nation-state or another. But freedom means more than the right to change masters." [Op. Cit.] Trying to dismiss one form of domination as flowing from "just" property while attacking the other because it flows from "unjust" property is not seeing the wood for the trees.
In addition, we must note that such inequalities in power and wealth will need "defending" from those subject to them ("anarcho"-capitalists recognise the need for private police and courts to defend property from theft -- and, anarchists add, to defend the theft and despotism associated with property!). Due to its support of private property (and thus authority), "anarcho"-capitalism ends up retaining a state in its "anarchy"; namely a private state whose existence its proponents attempt to deny simply by refusing to call it a state, like an ostrich hiding its head in the sand (see section F.6 for more on this and why "anarcho"-capitalism is better described as "private state" capitalism). As Albert Meltzer put it:
"Common-sense shows that any capitalist society might dispense with a 'State' . . . but it could not dispense with organised government, or a privatised form of it, if there were people amassing money and others working to amass it for them. The philosophy of 'anarcho-capitalism' dreamed up by the 'libertarian' New Right, has nothing to do with Anarchism as known by the Anarchist movement proper. It is a lie . . . Patently unbridled capitalism . . . needs some force at its disposal to maintain class privileges, either form the State itself or from private armies. What they believe in is in fact a limited State -- that us, one in which the State has one function, to protect the ruling class, does not interfere with exploitation, and comes as cheap as possible for the ruling class. The idea also serves another purpose . . . a moral justification for bourgeois consciences in avoiding taxes without feeling guilty about it." [Anarchism: Arguments For and Against, p. 50]
For anarchists, this need of capitalism for some kind of state is unsurprising. For "Anarchy without socialism seems equally as impossible to us [as socialism without anarchy], for in such a case it could not be other than the domination of the strongest, and would therefore set in motion right away the organisation and consolidation of this domination; that is to the constitution of government." [Errico Malatesta, Life and Ideas, p. 148] Because of this, the "anarcho"-capitalist rejection of anarchist ideas on capitalist property economics and the need for equality, they cannot be considered anarchists or part of the anarchist tradition.
Thus anarchism is far more than the common dictionary definition of "no government" -- it also entails being against all forms of archy, including those generated by capitalist property. This is clear from the roots of the word "anarchy." As we noted in section A.1, the word anarchy means "no rulers" or "contrary to authority." As Rothbard himself acknowledges, the property owner is the ruler of their property and, therefore, those who use it. For this reason "anarcho"-capitalism cannot be considered as a form of anarchism -- a real anarchist must logically oppose the authority of the property owner along with that of the state. As "anarcho"-capitalism does not explicitly (or implicitly, for that matter) call for economic arrangements that will end wage labour and usury it cannot be considered anarchist or part of the anarchist tradition.
Political theories should be identified by their actual features and history rather than labels. Once we recognise that, we soon find out that "anarcho"-capitalism is an oxymoron. Anarchists and "anarcho"-capitalists are not part of the same movement or tradition. Their ideas and aims are in direct opposition to those of all kinds of anarchists.
While anarchists have always opposed capitalism, "anarcho"-capitalists have embraced it. And due to this embrace their "anarchy" will be marked by extensive differences in wealth and power, differences that will show themselves up in relationships based upon subordination and hierarchy (such as wage labour), not freedom (little wonder that Proudhon argued that "property is despotism" -- it creates authoritarian and hierarchical relationships between people in a similar way to statism).
Their support for "free market" capitalism ignores the impact of wealth and power on the nature and outcome of individual decisions within the market (see sections F.2 and F.3 for further discussion). For example, as we indicate in sections J.5.10, J.5.11 and J.5.12, wage labour is less efficient than self-management in production but due to the structure and dynamics of the capitalist market, "market forces" will actively discourage self-management due to its empowering nature for workers. In other words, a developed capitalist market will promote hierarchy and unfreedom in production in spite of its effects on individual workers and their wants. Thus "free market" capitalism tends to re-enforce inequalities of wealth and power, not eliminate them.
Furthermore, any such system of (economic and social) power will require extensive force to maintain it and the "anarcho"-capitalist system of competing "defence firms" will simply be a new state, enforcing capitalist power, property rights and law.
Overall, the lack of concern for meaningful freedom within production and the effects of vast differences in power and wealth within society as a whole makes "anarcho"-capitalism little better than "anarchism for the rich." Emma Goldman recognised this when she argued that "'Rugged individualism' has meant all the 'individualism' for the masters . . . in whose name political tyranny and social oppression are defended and held up as virtues while every aspiration and attempt of man to gain freedom . . . is denounced as . . . evil in the name of that same individualism." [Red Emma Speaks, p. 112] And, as such, is no anarchism at all.
So, unlike anarchists, "anarcho"-capitalists do not seek the "abolition
of the proletariat" (to use Proudhon's expression) via changing capitalist
property rights and institutions. Thus the "anarcho"-capitalist and the
anarchist have different starting positions and opposite ends in mind
and so they cannot be considered part of the same (anarchist) tradition.
As we discuss further in later sections, the "anarcho"-capitalist
claims to being anarchists are bogus simply because they reject so much
of the anarchist tradition as to make what they do accept non-anarchist
in theory and practice. Little wonder Peter Marshall said that "few
anarchists would accept the 'anarcho-capitalists' into the anarchist
camp since they do not share a concern for economic equality and
social justice." [Demanding the Impossible, p. 565]
What an understatement! Individualist anarchists advocated an economic
system in which there would have been very little inequality of wealth
and so of power (and the accumulation of capital would have been minimal
without profit, interest and rent). Removing this social and economic
basis would result in substantially different political regimes.
In other words, politics is not isolated from economics. As David
Wieck put it, Rothbard "writes of society as though some part of it
(government) can be extracted and replaced by another arrangement while
other things go on before, and he constructs a system of police and
judicial power without any consideration of the influence of historical
and economic context." ["Anarchist Justice," Nomos XIX, Pennock
and Chapman, eds., p. 227]
Unsurprisingly, the political differences he highlights are significant,
namely "the role of law and the jury system" and "the land question."
The former difference relates to the fact that the individualist anarchists
"allow[ed] each individual free-market court, and more specifically, each
free-market jury, totally free rein over judicial decision." This horrified
Rothbard. The reason is obvious, as it allows real people to judge the law
as well as the facts, modifying the former as society changes and evolves.
For Rothbard, the idea that ordinary people should have a say in the law is
dismissed. Rather, "it would not be a very difficult task for Libertarian
lawyers and jurists to arrive at a rational and objective code of libertarian
legal principles and procedures." [Op. Cit., p. 7-8] Of course, the fact that
"lawyers" and "jurists" may have a radically different idea of what is just
than those subject to their laws is not raised by Rothbard, never mind
answered. While Rothbard notes that juries may defend the people against
the state, the notion that they may defend the people against the authority
and power of the rich is not even raised. That is why the rich have tended to
oppose juries as well as popular assemblies.
Unsurprisingly, the few individualist anarchists that remained pointed this
out. Laurance Labadie, the son of Tucker associate Joseph Labadie, argued
in response to Rothbard as follows:
"But when Mr. Rothbard quibbles about the jurisprudential ideas of
Spooner and Tucker, and at the same time upholds presumably in his
courts the very economic evils which are at bottom the very reason
for human contention and conflict, he would seem to be a man who
chokes at a gnat while swallowing a camel." [quoted by Mildred J.
Loomis and Mark A. Sullivan, "Laurance Labadie: Keeper Of The Flame",
pp. 116-30, Benjamin R. Tucker and the Champions of Liberty,
Coughlin, Hamilton and Sullivan (eds.), p. 124]
In other words, to exclude the general population from any say in the
law and how it changes is hardly a "minor" difference! Particularly
if you are proposing an economic system which is based on inequalities
of wealth, power and influence and the means of accumulating more.
It is like a supporter of the state saying that it is a "minor"
difference if you favour a dictatorship rather than a democratically
elected government. As Tucker argued, "it is precisely in the
tempering of the rigidity of enforcement that one of the chief
excellences of Anarchism consists . . . under Anarchism all rules
and laws will be little more than suggestions for the guidance of
juries, and that all disputes . . . will be submitted to juries
which will judge not only the facts but the law, the justice of
the law, its applicability to the given circumstances, and the
penalty or damage to be inflicted because of its infraction . . .
under Anarchism the law . . . will be regarded as just in
proportion to its flexibility, instead of now in proportion to
its rigidity." [The Individualist Anarchists, pp. 160-1] In
others, the law will evolve to take into account changing social
circumstances and, as a consequence, public opinion on specific
events and rights. Tucker's position is fundamentally democratic
and evolutionary while Rothbard's is autocratic and fossilised.
On the land question, Rothbard opposed the individualist position of
"occupancy and use" as it "would automatically abolish all rent
payments for land." Which was precisely why the individualist
anarchists advocated it! In a predominantly rural economy, this
would result in a significant levelling of income and social
power as well as bolstering the bargaining position of non-land
workers by reducing unemployment. He bemoans that landlords
cannot charge rent on their "justly-acquired private property"
without noticing that is begging the question as anarchists deny
that this is "justly-acquired" land. Unsurprising, Rothbard
considers "the property theory" of land ownership as John Locke's,
ignoring the fact that the first self-proclaimed anarchist book
was written to refute that kind of theory. His argument simply shows
how far from anarchism his ideology is. For Rothbard, it goes
without saying that the landlord's "freedom of contract" tops the
worker's freedom to control their own work and live and, of course,
their right to life. [Op. Cit., p. 8 and p. 9] However, for
anarchists, "the land is indispensable to our existence,
consequently a common thing, consequently insusceptible of
appropriation." [Proudhon, What is Property?, p. 107]
The reason question is why Rothbard considers this a political
difference rather than an economic one. Unfortunately, he does not
explain. Perhaps because of the underlying socialist perspective
behind the anarchist position? Or perhaps the fact that feudalism
and monarchism was based on the owner of the land being its ruler
suggests a political aspect to the ideology best left unexplored?
Given that the idea of grounding rulership on land ownership receded
during the Middle Ages, it may be unwise to note that under
"anarcho"-capitalism the landlord and capitalist would, likewise,
be sovereign over the land and those who used it? As we noted
in section F.1, this is the conclusion that Rothbard does draw.
As such, there is a political aspect to this difference.
Moreover. "the expropriation of the mass of the people from the
soil forms the basis of the capitalist mode of production." [Marx,
Capital, vol. 1, p. 934] For there are "two ways of oppressing
men: either directly by brute force, by physical violence; or
indirectly by denying them the means of life and this reducing them
to a state of surrender." In the second case, government is "an
organised instrument to ensure that dominion and privilege will be
in the hands of those who . . . have cornered all the means of life,
first and foremost the land, which they make use of to keep the
people in bondage and to make them work for their benefit."
[Malatesta, Anarchy, p. 21] Privatising the coercive functions
of said government hardly makes much difference.
Of course, Rothbard is simply skimming the surface. There are two
main ways "anarcho"-capitalists differ from individualist anarchists.
The first one is the fact that the individualist anarchists are
socialists. The second is on whether equality is essential or not
to anarchism. Each will be discussed in turn.
Unlike both Individualist (and social) anarchists, "anarcho"-capitalists
support capitalism (a "pure" free market type, which has never existed
although it has been approximated occasionally). This means that they
reject totally the ideas of anarchists with regards to property and
economic analysis. For example, like all supporters of capitalists
they consider rent, profit and interest as valid incomes. In contrast,
all Anarchists consider these as exploitation and agree with the
Individualist Anarchist Benjamin Tucker when he argued that
"[w]hoever contributes to production is alone entitled. What
has no rights that who is bound to respect. What is a thing. Who
is a person. Things have no claims; they exist only to be claimed. The
possession of a right cannot be predicted of dead material, but only a
living person."[quoted by Wm. Gary Kline, The Individualist Anarchists,
p. 73]
This, we must note, is the fundamental critique of the capitalist theory
that capital is productive. In and of themselves, fixed costs do not
create value. Rather value is creation depends on how investments are
developed and used once in place. Because of this the Individualist
Anarchists, like other anarchists, considered non-labour derived income
as usury, unlike "anarcho"-capitalists. Similarly, anarchists reject
the notion of capitalist property rights in favour of possession
(including the full fruits of one's labour). For example, anarchists
reject private ownership of land in favour of a "occupancy and use"
regime. In this we follow Proudhon's What is Property? and argue that
"property is theft". Rothbard, as noted, rejected this perspective.
As these ideas are an essential part of anarchist politics, they cannot
be removed without seriously damaging the rest of the theory. This can
be seen from Tucker's comments that "Liberty insists. . . [on] the abolition
of the State and the abolition of usury; on no more government of man by
man, and no more exploitation of man by man." [cited by Eunice Schuster in
Native American Anarchism, p. 140]. He indicates that anarchism has
specific economic and political ideas, that it opposes capitalism along
with the state. Therefore anarchism was never purely a "political" concept,
but always combined an opposition to oppression with an opposition to
exploitation. The social anarchists made exactly the same point. Which
means that when Tucker argued that "Liberty insists on Socialism. . . -
true Socialism, Anarchistic Socialism: the prevalence on earth of Liberty,
Equality, and Solidarity" he knew exactly what he was saying and meant it
wholeheartedly. [Instead of a Book, p. 363]
So because "anarcho"-capitalists embrace capitalism and reject socialism,
they cannot be considered anarchists or part of the anarchist tradition.
Which brings us nicely to the second point, namely a lack of concern for
equality. In stark contrast to anarchists of all schools, inequality
is not seen to be a problem with "anarcho"-capitalists (see section F.3).
However, it is a truism that not all "traders" are equally subject to the
market (i.e. have the same market power). In many cases, a few have
sufficient control of resources to influence or determine price and in
such cases, all others must submit to those terms or not buy the commodity.
When the commodity is labour power, even this option is lacking -- workers
have to accept a job in order to live. As we argue in section F.10.2,
workers are usually at a disadvantage on the labour market when compared
to capitalists, and this forces them to sell their liberty in return for
making profits for others. These profits increase inequality in society
as the property owners receive the surplus value their workers produce.
This increases inequality further, consolidating market power and so weakens
the bargaining position of workers further, ensuring that even the freest
competition possible could not eliminate class power and society (something
B. Tucker recognised as occurring with the development of trusts within
capitalism -- see section G.4).
By removing the underlying commitment to abolish non-labour income, any
"anarchist" capitalist society would have vast differences in wealth
and so power. Instead of a government imposed monopolies in land, money
and so on, the economic power flowing from private property and capital
would ensure that the majority remained in (to use Spooner's words) "the
condition of servants" (see sections F.2 and
F.3.1 for more on this).
The Individualist Anarchists were aware of this danger and so supported
economic ideas that opposed usury (i.e. rent, profit and interest) and
ensured the worker the full value of her labour. While not all of them
called these ideas "socialist" it is clear that these ideas are socialist
in nature and in aim (similarly, not all the Individualist Anarchists
called themselves anarchists but their ideas are clearly anarchist in
nature and in aim).
This combination of the political and economic is essential as they mutually
reinforce each other. Without the economic ideas, the political ideas
would be meaningless as inequality would make a mockery of them. As Kline
notes, the Individualist Anarchists' "proposals were designed to establish
true equality of opportunity . . . and they expected this would result in
a society without great wealth or poverty. In the absence of monopolistic
factors which would distort competition, they expected a society largely
of self-employed workmen with no significant disparity of wealth between
any of them since all would be required to live at their own expense and
not at the expense of exploited fellow human beings." [Op. Cit., pp. 103-4]
Because of the evil effects of inequality on freedom, both social
and individualist anarchists desired to create an environment in which
circumstances would not drive people to sell their liberty to others
at a disadvantage. In other words, they desired an equalisation of
market power by opposing interest, rent and profit and capitalist
definitions of private property. Kline summarises this by saying "the
American [individualist] anarchists exposed the tension existing in
liberal thought between private property and the ideal of equal access.
The Individual Anarchists were, at least, aware that existing conditions
were far from ideal, that the system itself working against the majority
of individuals in their efforts to attain its promises. Lack of capital,
the means to creation and accumulation of wealth, usually doomed a
labourer to a life of exploitation. This the anarchists knew and they
abhorred such a system." [Op. Cit., p. 102]
And this desire for bargaining equality is reflected in their economic
ideas and by removing these underlying economic ideas of the individualist
anarchists, "anarcho"-capitalism makes a mockery of any ideas they
do appropriate. Essentially, the Individualist Anarchists agreed with
Rousseau that in order to prevent extreme inequality of fortunes you
deprive people of the means to accumulate in the first place and
not take away wealth from the rich. An important point which
"anarcho"-capitalism fails to understand or appreciate.
There are, of course, overlaps between individualist anarchism and
"anarcho"-capitalism, just as there are overlaps between it and Marxism
(and social anarchism, of course). However, just as a similar analysis
of capitalism does not make individualist anarchists Marxists, so
apparent similarities between individualist anarchism does not make
it a forerunner of "anarcho"-capitalism. For example, both schools
support the idea of "free markets." Yet the question of markets is
fundamentally second to the issue of property rights for what is
exchanged on the market is dependent on what is considered legitimate
property. In this, as Rothbard notes, individualist anarchists and
"anarcho"-capitalists differ and different property rights produce
different market structures and dynamics. This means that capitalism
is not the only economy with markets and so support for markets cannot
be equated with support for capitalism. Equally, opposition to markets
is not the defining characteristic of socialism (as we note in
section G.2.1). As such, it is possible to be a market socialist
(and many socialist are). This is because "markets" and "property" do
not equate to capitalism:
"In Western Europe, the homeland of political economy, the process of
primitive accumulation is more of less accomplished. . . .
"It is otherwise in the colonies. There the capitalist regime constantly
comes up against the obstacle presented by the producer, who, as owner
of his own conditions of labour, employs that labour to enrich himself
instead of the capitalist. The contradiction of these two diametrically
opposed economic systems has its practical manifestation here in the
struggle between them." [Karl Marx, Capital, vol. 1, p. 931]
Individualist anarchism is obviously an aspect of this struggle
between the system of peasant and artisan production of early America
and the state encouraged system of private property and wage labour.
"Anarcho"-capitalists, in contrast, assume that generalised wage labour
would remain under their system (while paying lip-service to the possibilities
of co-operatives -- and if an "anarcho"-capitalist thinks that co-operative
will become the dominant form of workplace organisation, then they are
some kind of market socialist, not a capitalist). It is clear that their
end point (a pure capitalism, i.e. generalised wage labour) is directly
the opposite of that desired by anarchists. This was the case of the
Individualist Anarchists who embraced the ideal of (non-capitalist)
laissez faire competition -- they did so, as noted, to end exploitation,
not to maintain it. Indeed, their analysis of the change in American
society from one of mainly independent producers into one based mainly
upon wage labour has many parallels with, of all people, Karl Marx's
presented in chapter 33 of Capital. Marx, correctly, argues that "the
capitalist mode of production and accumulation, and therefore capitalist
private property, have for their fundamental condition the annihilation
of that private property which rests on the labour of the individual
himself; in other words, the expropriation of the worker." [Op. Cit.,
p. 940] He notes that to achieve this, the state is used:
Moreover, tariffs are introduced with "the objective of manufacturing
capitalists artificially" for the "system of protection was an artificial
means of manufacturing manufacturers, or expropriating independent
workers, of capitalising the national means of production and
subsistence, and of forcibly cutting short the transition . . . to
the modern mode of production," to capitalism [Op. Cit., p. 932 and
pp. 921-2]
It is this process which Individualist Anarchism protested against, the use
of the state to favour the rising capitalist class. However, unlike social
anarchists, many individualist anarchists were not consistently against
wage labour. This is the other significant overlap between "anarcho"-capitalism
and individualist anarchism. However, they were opposed to exploitation and
argued (unlike "anarcho"-capitalism) that in their system workers bargaining
powers would be raised to such a level that their wages would equal the full
product of their labour. However, as we discuss in
section G.1.1 the social
context the individualist anarchists lived in must be remembered. America
at the times was a predominantly rural society and industry was not as
developed as it is now wage labour would have been minimised (Spooner,
for example, explicitly envisioned a society made up mostly entirely of
self-employed workers). As Kline argues:
As such, a limited amount of wage labour within a predominantly
self-employed economy does not make a given society capitalist any
more than a small amount of governmental communities within an
predominantly anarchist world would make it statist. As Marx argued.
when "the separation of the worker from the conditions of labour
and from the soil . . . does not yet exist, or only sporadically,
or on too limited a scale . . . Where, amongst such curious
characters, is the 'field of abstinence' for the capitalists?
. . . Today's wage-labourer is tomorrow's independent peasant
or artisan, working for himself. He vanishes from the labour-market
-- but not into the workhouse." There is a "constant transformation
of wage-labourers into independent producers, who work for themselves
instead of for capital" and so "the degree of exploitation of the
wage-labourer remain[s] indecently low." In addition, the
"wage-labourer also loses, along with the relation of dependence,
the feeling of dependence on the abstemious capitalist." [Op. Cit.,
pp. 935-6]
Saying that, as we discuss in section G.4, individualist anarchist support
for wage labour is at odds with the ideas of Proudhon and, far more
importantly, in contradiction to many of the stated principles of the
individualist anarchists themselves. In particular, wage labour violates
"occupancy and use" as well as having more than a passing similarity to
the state. However, these problems can be solved by consistently applying
the principles of individualist anarchism, unlike "anarcho"-capitalism,
and that is why it is a real school of anarchism. In other words, a
system of generalised wage labour would not be anarchist nor would
it be non-exploitative. Moreover, the social context these ideas were
developed in and would have been applied ensure that these contradictions
would have been minimised. If they had been applied, a genuine anarchist
society of self-employed workers would, in all likelihood, have been
created (at least at first, whether the market would increase inequalities
is a moot point between anarchists).
We must stress that the social situation is important as it shows how
apparently superficially similar arguments can have radically different
aims and results depending on who suggests them and in what circumstances.
As noted, during the rise of capitalism the bourgeoisie were not shy in
urging state intervention against the masses. Unsurprisingly, working class
people generally took an anti-state position during this period. The
individualist anarchists were part of that tradition, opposing what Marx
termed "primitive accumulation" in favour of the pre-capitalist forms of
property and society it was destroying.
However, when capitalism found its feet and could do without such obvious
intervention, the possibility of an "anti-state" capitalism could arise.
Such a possibility became a definite once the state started to intervene
in ways which, while benefiting the system as a whole, came into conflict
with the property and power of individual members of the capitalist and
landlord class. Thus social legislation which attempted to restrict the
negative effects of unbridled exploitation and oppression on workers and
the environment were having on the economy were the source of much outrage
in certain bourgeois circles:
This perspective can be seen when Tucker denounced Herbert Spencer as
a champion of the capitalistic class for his vocal attacks on social
legislation which claimed to benefit working class people but stays
strangely silent on the laws passed to benefit (usually indirectly)
capital and the rich. "Anarcho"-capitalism is part of that tradition,
the tradition associated with a capitalism which no longer needs obvious
state intervention as enough wealth as been accumulated to keep workers
under control by means of market power.
In other words, there is substantial differences between the victims of a
thief trying to stop being robbed and be left alone to enjoy their property
and the successful thief doing the same! Individualist Anarchist's were
aware of this. For example, Victor Yarros stressed this key difference
between individualist anarchism and the proto-"libertarian" capitalists
of "voluntaryism":
"If he holds that the landlords are justly entitled to their lands, let
him make a defence of the landlords or an attack on our unjust proposal."
[quoted by Carl Watner, "The English Individualists As They Appear In
Liberty," pp. 191-211, Benjamin R. Tucker and the Champions of Liberty,
Coughlin, Hamilton and Sullivan (eds.), pp. 199-200]
Significantly, Tucker and other individualist anarchists saw state intervention
has a result of capital manipulating legislation to gain an advantage on the
so-called free market which allowed them to exploit labour and, as such, it
benefited the whole capitalist class. Rothbard, at best, acknowledges
that some sections of big business benefit from the current system and so
fails to have the comprehensive understanding of the dynamics of capitalism
as a system (rather as an ideology). This lack of understanding of capitalism
as a historic and dynamic system rooted in class rule and economic power is
important in evaluating "anarcho"-capitalist claims to anarchism.
As with the original nineteenth century British "anti-state"
capitalists like Spencer and Herbert, Rothbard "completely overlooks
the role of the state in building and maintaining a capitalist economy
in the West. Privileged to live in the twentieth century, long after
the battles to establish capitalism have been fought and won, Rothbard
sees the state solely as a burden on the market and a vehicle for
imposing the still greater burden of socialism. He manifests a kind
of historical nearsightedness that allows him to collapse many centuries
of human experience into one long night of tyranny that ended only with
the invention of the free market and its 'spontaneous' triumph over the
past. It is pointless to argue, as Rothbard seems ready to do, that
capitalism would have succeeded without the bourgeois state; the fact
is that all capitalist nations have relied on the machinery of government
to create and preserve the political and legal environments required
by their economic system." That, of course, has not stopped him "critis[ing] others for being unhistorical." [Stephen L Newman, Liberalism at Wit's
End, pp. 77-8 and p. 79]
Much the same can be said of claims that "anarcho"-capitalism is a new
form of individualist anarchism -- as well as completely ignoring the actual
history of capitalism, they ignore the history, social context, arguments,
aims and spirit of individualist anarchism (for more discussion, see
section G). So while, in the words of Colin Ward, Rothbard is "the most
aware of the actual anarchist tradition among the anarcho-capitalist
apologists" he may be "aware of a tradition, but he is singularly unaware
of the old proverb that freedom for the pike means death for the minnow."
The individualist anarchists "differed from free-market liberals in
their absolute mistrust of American capitalism, and in their emphasis on
mutualism" and were "busy social inventors exploring the potential of
autonomy." The "American 'libertarians' . . . inventiveness seems to be
limited to providing an ideology for untrammelled market capitalism." [Anarchism: A Short Introduction, p. 67, pp. 2-3 and p. 69]
F.1.1 Is "anarcho"-capitalism a new form of individualist anarchism?
Some "anarcho"-capitalists shy away from the term, preferring such
expressions as "market anarchist" or "individualist anarchist." This
suggests that there is some link between their ideology and that of
Tucker. However, the founder of "anarcho"-capitalism, Murray Rothbard,
refused that label for, while "strongly tempted," he could not do so
because "Spooner and Tucker have in a sense pre-empted that name for
their doctrine and that from that doctrine I have certain differences."
Somewhat incredibly Rothbard argued that on the whole politically
"these differences are minor," economically "the differences are
substantial, and this means that my view of the consequences of
putting our more of less common system into practice is very far from
theirs." ["The Spooner-Tucker Doctrine: An Economist's View", Journal
of Libertarian Studies, vol. 20, no. 1, p. 7]
"Mere common sense would suggest that any court would be influenced
by experience; and any free-market court or judge would in the very
nature of things have some precedents guiding them in their instructions
to a jury. But since no case is exactly the same, a jury would have
considerable say about the heinousness of the offence in each case,
realising that circumstances alter cases, and prescribing penalty
accordingly. This appeared to Spooner and Tucker to be a more flexible
and equitable administration of justice possible or feasible, human
beings being what they are.. . .
"Political economy confuses, on principle, two very different kinds of
private property, one of which rests on the labour of the producers
himself, and the other on the exploitation of the labour of others. It
forgets that the latter is not only the direct antithesis of the former,
but grows on the former's tomb and nowhere else.
"How then can the anti-capitalistic cancer of the colonies be healed?
. . . Let the Government set an artificial price on the virgin soil,
a price independent of the law of supply and demand, a price that compels
the immigrant to work a long time for wages before he can earn enough
money to buy land, and turn himself into an independent farmer."
[Op. Cit., p. 938]
"Committed as they were to equality in the pursuit of property, the
objective for the anarchist became the construction of a society
providing equal access to those things necessary for creating wealth.
The goal of the anarchists who extolled mutualism and the abolition of
all monopolies was, then, a society where everyone willing to work would
have the tools and raw materials necessary for production in a
non-exploitative system . . . the dominant vision of the future society
. . . [was] underpinned by individual, self-employed workers." [Op. Cit.,
p. 95]
"Quite independently of these tendencies [of individualist anarchism]
. . . the anti-state bourgeoisie (which is also anti-statist, being
hostile to any social intervention on the part of the State to protect
the victims of exploitation -- in the matter of working hours, hygienic
working conditions and so on), and the greed of unlimited exploitation,
had stirred up in England a certain agitation in favour of
pseudo-individualism, an unrestrained exploitation. To this end, they
enlisted the services of a mercenary pseudo-literature . . . which
played with doctrinaire and fanatical ideas in order to project a species
of 'individualism' that was absolutely sterile, and a species of
'non-interventionism' that would let a man die of hunger rather than
offend his dignity." [Max Nettlau, A Short History of Anarchism, p. 39]
"[Auberon Herbert] believes in allowing people to retain all their
possessions, no matter how unjustly and basely acquired, while getting
them, so to speak, to swear off stealing and usurping and to promise to
behave well in the future. We, on the other hand, while insisting on the
principle of private property, in wealth honestly obtained under the reign
of liberty, do not think it either unjust or unwise to dispossess the
landlords who have monopolised natural wealth by force and fraud. We hold
that the poor and disinherited toilers would be justified in expropriating,
not alone the landlords, who notoriously have no equitable titles to their
lands, but all the financial lords and rulers, all the millionaires and
very wealthy individuals. . . . Almost all possessors of great wealth
enjoy neither what they nor their ancestors rightfully acquired (and if
Mr. Herbert wishes to challenge the correctness of this statement, we are
ready to go with him into a full discussion of the subject). . . .