# Minarchism: How "min" is too "min"? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 6, 2013, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617 "2013-05-06T14:44:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![krunen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@krunen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/krunen)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/21 "2013-05-06T19:08:02Z")
Is this government going to be a democracy? How are you going to keep it minimal and democratic at the same time? While I’d quite like a Bernardo de la Paz-designed society, I think, like him, that it wouldn’t survive democracy for very long. Maybe we’d have to breed “better” humans? ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/22 "2013-05-06T19:09:29Z")
> [@krunen](#): > > Is this government going to be a democracy? How are you going to keep it minimal and democratic at the same time? Constitutional democracy. So that the constitution has clear and unambiguous (unlike in the US) limits on what the government is allowed to do. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/23 "2013-05-06T19:11:59Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > I’m not a fan of either minarchy or anarchy or libertarianism. There are certain things that government does a whole lot better than anyone (highways, TVA, etc)… Agreed, and this notion is the core of minarchism: the government is better at some things, so it should only do those things. > [@BobLibDem](#): > > …some regulations that nearly everybody agrees with (food inspections and the like). As a moderate libertarian and a minarchist, I have no problem with laws mandating disclosure. As an example, labelling food that passes an inspection standard promulgated and even carried out by the government as USDA certified or whatever you want to call it. Or, requiring credit card issuers to include a notice with their statements stating how long it will take the balance to be paid off if only the minimum payment is made. This is just correcting for information asymmetry. I do have a problem with going further, and instead of making sure choices are informed, to flatly, paternalistically, _prohibiting_ choices. > [@BobLibDem](#): > > When your ideology says you have to throw out the sensible in search of the ideal, then I think your ideology is bunk. Isn’t that a “feature” of every ideology? Liberal Democrats tend to reject nuclear power, for instance. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/24 "2013-05-06T19:14:59Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Constitutional democracy. So that the constitution has clear and unambiguous (unlike in the US) limits on what the government is allowed to do. And how do you ensure that changes to this minimalist constitution will not be made? ---
**Author:** ![Cyros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a698b9/32.png) [@Cyros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cyros)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/25 "2013-05-06T19:18:12Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Constitutional democracy. So that the constitution has clear and unambiguous (unlike in the US) limits on what the government is allowed to do. The problem is that clear and unambiguous (The right to bear arms shall not be infringed) is subject to the, “Well, they really didn’t mean that.” and “No rights are absolute so we can allow this small infraction”, mentality. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/26 "2013-05-06T19:22:38Z")
> [@krunen](#): > > Is this government going to be a democracy? How are you going to keep it minimal and democratic at the same time? > > While I’d quite like a Bernardo de la Paz-designed society, I think, like him, that it wouldn’t survive democracy for very long. Maybe we’d have to breed “better” humans? There’s no way to keep it minimal short of the people wanting it to be minimal. If the new Constitution or equivalent doesn’t have an amendment process and over time people want the government to do more, it’ll just end up scrapped. This isn’t unique to minarchism, though. If enough Americans decided tomorrow that they didn’t want unpopular speech to be tolerated, in short order it wouldn’t be. ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/27 "2013-05-06T19:28:39Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > I’d like to inject this into the discussion: that government is not some third-party element, be it predator, parasite, or separate benign or beneficial entity; it is **us** , doing collectively what needs to be done for everyone who needs it. I absolutely loathe the current base for discussion, used by assumption by even by the smarmiest big-gummint libbrals, that it’s “us v. them” or even “us and them” and not just… us. Murray Rothbard might help on this point: > [@](#): > > With the rise of democracy, the identification of the State with society has been redoubled, until it is common to hear sentiments expressed which violate virtually every tenet of reason and common sense such as, “we are the government.” The useful collective term “we” has enabled an ideological camouflage to be thrown over the reality of political life. If “we are the government,” then anything a government does to an individual is not only just and untyrannical but also “voluntary” on the part of the individual concerned. If the government has incurred a huge public debt which must be paid by taxing one group for the benefit of another, this reality of burden is obscured by saying that “we owe it to ourselves”; if the government conscripts a man, or throws him into jail for dissident opinion, then he is “doing it to himself” and, therefore, nothing untoward has occurred. Under this reasoning, any Jews murdered by the Nazi government were not murdered; instead, they must have “committed suicide,” since they were the government (which was democratically chosen), and, therefore, anything the government did to them was voluntary on their part. One would not think it necessary to belabor this point, and yet the overwhelming bulk of the people hold this fallacy to a greater or lesser degree. … > [@](#): > > We must, therefore, emphasize that “we” are not the government; the government is not “us.” The government does not in any accurate sense “represent” the majority of the people.[1] But, even if it did, even if 70 percent of the people decided to murder the remaining 30 percent, this would still be murder and would not be voluntary suicide on the part of the slaughtered minority.[2] No organicist metaphor, no irrelevant bromide that “we are all part of one another,” must be permitted to obscure this basic fact. > [@](#): > > No, it’s not “government’s” job to do these things; it’s ours. We form a government of the necessary size and complexity to achieve these goals, even though none of them has 100% approval by “us.” Many people might think that it is not “our job” to disenfranchise one class in society for the benefit of another. > [@](#): > > I have yet to meet a small- or min-government type who was willing to cut anything that benefited hir peculiar needs, no matter how self-serving and contradictory that stance was. Pleased to meet you. I favor the abolishment of the FDA, government roads, and a host of others. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Slant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c57346/32.png) [@Mr.Slant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Slant)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/28 "2013-05-06T19:33:00Z")
> [@CoastalMaineiac](#): > > Well, in my hypothetical, fictitious society, a non-violent thief would be made to pay back double what he stole. The odds of being caught committing burglary and the like are WAY less than 1 in 2. Under your proposal, I’m hiring a bunch of guys and buying a bunch of vans and opening up a thieving business TOMORROW. I’ll be able to retire inside of 3 years, guaranteed… May want to rethink that factor of 2 there. Anything below 20 and I’m setting up my fictitious business. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/29 "2013-05-06T19:35:46Z")
> [@CoastalMaineiac](#): > > Justice should be based on making whole (as nearly as possible) the wronged party. If there is no wronged party, then “Justice” should but out. So what do you do about murder? Shrug? ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/30 "2013-05-06T19:37:44Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > There’s no way to keep it minimal short of the people wanting it to be minimal. If the new Constitution or equivalent doesn’t have an amendment process and over time people want the government to do more, it’ll just end up scrapped. Exactly. The problem is recognizing arbitrary government force as legitimate in the first place. If an institution can jail you for not paying taxes (in essence committing robbery) then that institution will be manipulated and eventually taken over by a certain class of people who wish to live at the expense of another class. Minarchism was tried and has failed in the United States. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/31 "2013-05-06T19:39:52Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > And how do you ensure that changes to this minimalist constitution will not be made? Stringent requirements for changing it, in the Constitution. If in spite of that it gets perverted by amending it, then the society deserves what it gets. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/32 "2013-05-06T20:04:35Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > I favor the abolishment of the FDA, government roads, and a host of others. Which are of no value to you but of inestimable value to millions of others. Suck it up. Oh, and look around you… “if you’ve got it, a truck brought it [on government roads]”… so just how much are you prepared to give up having, or get only at extreme overland/toll road delivery rates? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/33 "2013-05-06T20:19:49Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > > [@Czarcasm](#): > > > > What about the setting of minimum standards when it comes to wages and/or welfare? Can a nation remain strong if a race to the bottom takes place between the states? > > That’s not a power the government needs to continue to exist and function, no. Yes, it IS a power that the government needs if it is to neither fall or be forced into become a dictatorship. Because otherwise power will go to whomever promises food & wealth to the starving and desperate. Keeping down the starving masses requires something like North Korea, not a “minarchy”. It _absolutely_ cannot be a genuine democracy, or the starving voters will simply vote out the government that’s letting them starve. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/34 "2013-05-06T20:22:24Z")
How about the right for all to have an equal voice come election time, and the power to enforce said right? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/35 "2013-05-06T20:28:03Z")
Also, considering the GIGO rule(garbage in, garbage out), should the government have a hand in the education of it’s children? ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/36 "2013-05-06T20:46:13Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > Which are of no value to you but of inestimable value to millions of others. Suck it up. > > Oh, and look around you… “if you’ve got it, a truck brought it [on government roads]”… so just how much are you prepared to give up having, or get only at extreme overland/toll road delivery rates? I was merely addressing the claim, delivered from your high horse, that you’ve never met an individual who both supported limited government and supported the abolishment of government enterprises that were of benefit to him. I specifically mentioned government roads and the FDA because i benefit from them. I have no doubt that trillions spent on war machinery are of “inestimable value to millions” of defense contract workers. Or that billions spent on government schools are of “inestimable value to millions” of union hacks and their lobbyists. Is “suck it up” what you say to other victims of robbery and extortion? I have no problem paying the price for what it actually costs to bring me my orange from Florida. I do have a problem with another individual who grows his own oranges sharing that cost of transportation with me. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/37 "2013-05-06T20:47:09Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > Also, considering the GIGO rule(garbage in, garbage out), should the government have a hand in the education of it’s children? They are not the government’s children. They are the parents’ children. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/38 "2013-05-06T20:59:59Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > They are not the government’s children. They are the parents’ children. They will soon be both the country and the government of the country. ---
**Author:** ![krunen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@krunen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/krunen)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/39 "2013-05-06T21:07:11Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Stringent requirements for changing it, in the Constitution. If in spite of that it gets perverted by amending it, then the society deserves what it gets. Well, unfortunately I think you will continue to be disappointed. Most humans will react to bad things happening by demanding anyone “in charge” to “do something”. If they don’t, they won’t be in charge anymore. It’s a self-selecting process that kills that minimalist constitution before the ink even dries. That’s why I said we require a “better” kind of human. Strict libertarianism or minarchism requires radical cultural changes. It will take a very long time to get there. Personally, I have libertarianism as an ideal, but I will not put it before the ideal of democracy, nor accept a stratified society of the haves and the have-nots. But I will consider any plan to change our culture to one in which everyone take personal responsibility for themselves and the society they live in. I don’t think we’ll ever get there without a conscious process. But even just the thought of someone actively guiding long-term changes in our culture is frightening, isn’t it? ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2013, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617/40 "2013-05-06T21:07:34Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > I was merely addressing the claim, delivered from your high horse, that you’ve never met an individual who both supported limited government and supported the abolishment of government enterprises that were of benefit to him. I am only on the high ground to further my view of the rabble who claim they don’t need no goddamn gummint. I’ve met many who say so. It takes about two minutes to reduce them to raging contradictions along the lines of “I don’t want to pay for anyone else’s benefits but I’ll be goddamned if I’ll pay a dime more for my (universally subsidized) ones.” It’s horseshit, and maybe someday someone will show me the pony in there. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minarchism-how-min-is-too-min/657617.md?page=3)