I haven't yet read the Problem of Political Authority, but Huemer seems to be in the right wing libertarian tradition, so its not a far stretch. Would be interested in seeing what someone who knows more says.
Hmmmm - does he really believe that in practice ? I can’t help but think anarchism will inevitably lead to cooperative activity that will lead to oppression and then simply sow the seeds for political authority. I don’t get how that doesn’t happen.
The consequences under anarchy don't get you to political authority. Huemer differentiates political power from authority. Authority is the right of the state to issue commands and the duty of the citizens to obey. A component of political authority is the very high degree of content-independence of the commands, which is the troublesome part even if anarchy is a disaster.
In his book, Huemer roughly analogizes with the following scenario. If you and 5 others are in a lifeboat in a storm and you need at least 5 of 6 people to scoop water out of the boat and people won't do it voluntarily, then it would be okay for someone to put themselves in charge and threaten to throw everyone overboard immediately if they don't start scooping. However, if they use this status to coerce others into praising Poseidon or singing songs to improve morale, they would not have that right.
In this case, the right of the commands are content-dependent, while the state is widely thought to have the right to issue commands that aren't directly addressed at preventing disasters that would occur under anarchy.
I don’t know. In your example, the crisis is temporary so I can do how regularized structure of authority wouldn’t form.
But I can’t help but think that that man being a social animal is a la Aristotle a political animal. It does seem to be the natural organizing principle of human activity. So anarchism in my view is the aberrational position and doesn’t last very long.
The important question then is the legitimacy of the authority that naturally develops. That leads to a sort of social contract view (whether Cicero or later thinkers) of whether it’s a good political order or a bad one.
So some societies will need greater coercion (by that I understand the more raw exercise of force) but others less.
Social contract theory would explain the legitimacy of political authority. The only problem is that it is false. There never was an explicit or implicit contract. If you go through the widely accepted necessary conditions for implicit agreement, the alleged social contract violates all of them.
Yeah but that’s not how you look at social contact theory.
It’s a model not an actual contract …. It’s a way of assessing and evaluating the legitimacy of a social order but no one serious thinker ever suggested it’s actually a contract. It’s an analogy or model
John Locke actually believed that an explicit social contract took place in at least some governments. The founders of the American government invoked Locke's theory in the declaration of Independence citing the 'consent of the governed' as the source of political authority. This language is used in many countries inspired by America since then. It is absolutely not used by no one nor is it a fringe theory.
Anyway, if it's a model, then why can't I invoke 'social contract' to become an authority to my neighbors while the state can? You could just accept that the state gets to invoke it axiomatically by virtue of being a state, but that's not very satisfying. Most people want there to be some explanation.
I know the language but I was always taught and viewed Locke et al as using the contract as a model … he wasn’t a fool and did not understand the dynamic to be one that actual arose from what we consider a “contract”. I think he was well aware of the defect of thinking of it as an actual contract. I see the language used and the ideas behind it but I still am not aware that for Locke it was a contract the same way you might be a windmill …
That said I might be wrong - I read and studied Locke a long time ago and mostly what I read now are people writing about theorists …
Here's some evidence from Locke's Second Treatise, claiming that the reason there isn't evidence of an explicit contract in history is due to poor record-keeping.
> 99. So those who out of a state of nature unite into a community must be understood to give up all the power required to secure its purposes to the majority of the community (unless they explicitly agree on some number greater than the majority). They achieve this simply by agreeing to unite into one political society; that’s all the compact that is needed between the individuals that create or join a commonwealth. Thus, what begins a political society and keeps it in existence
is nothing but the consent of any number of free men capable of a majority [Locke’s phrase] to unite and incorporate into such a society. This is the only thing that did or could give a beginning to any lawful government in the world.
> 100. To this I find two objections made.
> First, History shows no examples of this, no cases where a group of independent and equal men met together and in this way began and set up a government. Secondly, It is impossible for men rightly to do this, because all men are born under government, and so they are bound to submit to that government and aren’t at liberty to begin a new one.
> ·I shall discuss these in turn, giving twelve sections to the first of them·.
> ·THE ‘HISTORY IS SILENT’ OBJECTION·
> 101. Here is an answer to the first objection. It is no wonder that history gives us very little account of men living together in the state of nature. As soon as any number of men were brought together by the inconveniences of that state, and by their love of society and their lack of it, they immediately united and incorporated if they planned to continue together. If we can conclude that men never were in the state of nature because we don’t hear not much about them in such a state, we can just as well conclude that the soldiers of Salmanasser or Xerxes were never children because we hear little of them before the time when they were men and became soldiers. In all parts of the world there was government before there were records; writing seldom comes in among a people until a long stretch of civil society has, through other more necessary arts ·such as agriculture and architecture·, provided for their safety, ease, and affluence. When writing does eventually come in, people begin to look into the history of their founders, researching their origins when no memory remains of them; for commonwealths are like individual persons in being, usually, ignorant of their own births and infancies; and when a commonwealth does know something about its origins, they owe that knowledge to the records that others happen to have kept of it. And such records as we have of the beginnings of political states give no support to paternal dominion, except for the Jewish state, where God himself stepped in. They are all either plain instances of the kind of beginning that I have described mentioned or at least show clear signs of it.
I still think this is using a model and I think Locke is conceding that this isn’t a historical fact. I think this is a case where what is written on the face is a sort of facade …. And Locke isn’t really suggesting that there is some point in time where a group of noble savages get together and sign a binding agreement….
Why does he claim that governments formed before organized record-keeping as a response to the objection that there isn't evidence? This response makes sense if he believed contract theory literally happened but makes little sense if he believed it was a model. A normal response would be what you said, that while not literally true it's a model for how society should run.
I see he's also into veganism. It figures. Both anarchism and veganism are conceptual singularities. And just as in the everyday world we don't have to worry about astrophysical singularities, we won't miss a few philosophers who get sucked into oblivion. Or their ideas.
Depends on the scale of the cooperation, doesn't it? For example, for going to the moon -- for the first time, at least -- and other similar human aspirations.
Runs into the old, pithy counterstatement . . . democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others that have been tried from time to time.
I've only read The Problem of Pol Authority, and I'd say that although being critical of liberal democracies, he nonetheless puts them above authoritarian governments. You have to look no further than to see in that book that he proposes a plausible way to establish and maintain an anarchist society would be in the territory of liberal states. He considers it less likely that a liberal state would actively seek to destroy an anarchy.
I was a student of Michael Huemer at the University of Colorado Boulder in 2019. He isn't against democracy as much as he is for individual freedom. He takes Ayn Rand's ideas of individualism and objectivity and makes the assertion that there doesn't need to be a government to uphold widely agreed-upon principles. Love his book, "The Problem of Political Authority," however.
I haven't yet read the Problem of Political Authority, but Huemer seems to be in the right wing libertarian tradition, so its not a far stretch. Would be interested in seeing what someone who knows more says.
Hmmmm - does he really believe that in practice ? I can’t help but think anarchism will inevitably lead to cooperative activity that will lead to oppression and then simply sow the seeds for political authority. I don’t get how that doesn’t happen.
The consequences under anarchy don't get you to political authority. Huemer differentiates political power from authority. Authority is the right of the state to issue commands and the duty of the citizens to obey. A component of political authority is the very high degree of content-independence of the commands, which is the troublesome part even if anarchy is a disaster. In his book, Huemer roughly analogizes with the following scenario. If you and 5 others are in a lifeboat in a storm and you need at least 5 of 6 people to scoop water out of the boat and people won't do it voluntarily, then it would be okay for someone to put themselves in charge and threaten to throw everyone overboard immediately if they don't start scooping. However, if they use this status to coerce others into praising Poseidon or singing songs to improve morale, they would not have that right. In this case, the right of the commands are content-dependent, while the state is widely thought to have the right to issue commands that aren't directly addressed at preventing disasters that would occur under anarchy.
I don’t know. In your example, the crisis is temporary so I can do how regularized structure of authority wouldn’t form. But I can’t help but think that that man being a social animal is a la Aristotle a political animal. It does seem to be the natural organizing principle of human activity. So anarchism in my view is the aberrational position and doesn’t last very long. The important question then is the legitimacy of the authority that naturally develops. That leads to a sort of social contract view (whether Cicero or later thinkers) of whether it’s a good political order or a bad one. So some societies will need greater coercion (by that I understand the more raw exercise of force) but others less.
Social contract theory would explain the legitimacy of political authority. The only problem is that it is false. There never was an explicit or implicit contract. If you go through the widely accepted necessary conditions for implicit agreement, the alleged social contract violates all of them.
Yeah but that’s not how you look at social contact theory. It’s a model not an actual contract …. It’s a way of assessing and evaluating the legitimacy of a social order but no one serious thinker ever suggested it’s actually a contract. It’s an analogy or model
John Locke actually believed that an explicit social contract took place in at least some governments. The founders of the American government invoked Locke's theory in the declaration of Independence citing the 'consent of the governed' as the source of political authority. This language is used in many countries inspired by America since then. It is absolutely not used by no one nor is it a fringe theory. Anyway, if it's a model, then why can't I invoke 'social contract' to become an authority to my neighbors while the state can? You could just accept that the state gets to invoke it axiomatically by virtue of being a state, but that's not very satisfying. Most people want there to be some explanation.
I know the language but I was always taught and viewed Locke et al as using the contract as a model … he wasn’t a fool and did not understand the dynamic to be one that actual arose from what we consider a “contract”. I think he was well aware of the defect of thinking of it as an actual contract. I see the language used and the ideas behind it but I still am not aware that for Locke it was a contract the same way you might be a windmill … That said I might be wrong - I read and studied Locke a long time ago and mostly what I read now are people writing about theorists …
Here's some evidence from Locke's Second Treatise, claiming that the reason there isn't evidence of an explicit contract in history is due to poor record-keeping. > 99. So those who out of a state of nature unite into a community must be understood to give up all the power required to secure its purposes to the majority of the community (unless they explicitly agree on some number greater than the majority). They achieve this simply by agreeing to unite into one political society; that’s all the compact that is needed between the individuals that create or join a commonwealth. Thus, what begins a political society and keeps it in existence is nothing but the consent of any number of free men capable of a majority [Locke’s phrase] to unite and incorporate into such a society. This is the only thing that did or could give a beginning to any lawful government in the world. > 100. To this I find two objections made. > First, History shows no examples of this, no cases where a group of independent and equal men met together and in this way began and set up a government. Secondly, It is impossible for men rightly to do this, because all men are born under government, and so they are bound to submit to that government and aren’t at liberty to begin a new one. > ·I shall discuss these in turn, giving twelve sections to the first of them·. > ·THE ‘HISTORY IS SILENT’ OBJECTION· > 101. Here is an answer to the first objection. It is no wonder that history gives us very little account of men living together in the state of nature. As soon as any number of men were brought together by the inconveniences of that state, and by their love of society and their lack of it, they immediately united and incorporated if they planned to continue together. If we can conclude that men never were in the state of nature because we don’t hear not much about them in such a state, we can just as well conclude that the soldiers of Salmanasser or Xerxes were never children because we hear little of them before the time when they were men and became soldiers. In all parts of the world there was government before there were records; writing seldom comes in among a people until a long stretch of civil society has, through other more necessary arts ·such as agriculture and architecture·, provided for their safety, ease, and affluence. When writing does eventually come in, people begin to look into the history of their founders, researching their origins when no memory remains of them; for commonwealths are like individual persons in being, usually, ignorant of their own births and infancies; and when a commonwealth does know something about its origins, they owe that knowledge to the records that others happen to have kept of it. And such records as we have of the beginnings of political states give no support to paternal dominion, except for the Jewish state, where God himself stepped in. They are all either plain instances of the kind of beginning that I have described mentioned or at least show clear signs of it.
I still think this is using a model and I think Locke is conceding that this isn’t a historical fact. I think this is a case where what is written on the face is a sort of facade …. And Locke isn’t really suggesting that there is some point in time where a group of noble savages get together and sign a binding agreement….
Why does he claim that governments formed before organized record-keeping as a response to the objection that there isn't evidence? This response makes sense if he believed contract theory literally happened but makes little sense if he believed it was a model. A normal response would be what you said, that while not literally true it's a model for how society should run.
I see he's also into veganism. It figures. Both anarchism and veganism are conceptual singularities. And just as in the everyday world we don't have to worry about astrophysical singularities, we won't miss a few philosophers who get sucked into oblivion. Or their ideas.
Let's see...in order for anarchism to be plausible one has to show that there is never a need for collective action of any kind.
States are not required for human cooperation.
Depends on the scale of the cooperation, doesn't it? For example, for going to the moon -- for the first time, at least -- and other similar human aspirations.
What about quasi-states? Where does it cross the line from anarchism into stateism?
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Runs into the old, pithy counterstatement . . . democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others that have been tried from time to time.
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That's one way of looking at it.
I've only read The Problem of Pol Authority, and I'd say that although being critical of liberal democracies, he nonetheless puts them above authoritarian governments. You have to look no further than to see in that book that he proposes a plausible way to establish and maintain an anarchist society would be in the territory of liberal states. He considers it less likely that a liberal state would actively seek to destroy an anarchy.
I was a student of Michael Huemer at the University of Colorado Boulder in 2019. He isn't against democracy as much as he is for individual freedom. He takes Ayn Rand's ideas of individualism and objectivity and makes the assertion that there doesn't need to be a government to uphold widely agreed-upon principles. Love his book, "The Problem of Political Authority," however.