Thursday, October 20, 2016

The Process of Voluntary Exchange Tends to be “Civilizing”

By Don Boudreaux
Quotation of the Day… is from pages 373-374 of Benjamin A. Rogge’s 1967 essay titled “East-West Trade,” as this essay is reprinted in A Maverick’s Defense of Freedom, the 2010 collection of Rogge’s essays that is edited by Dwight Lee:
The process of voluntary exchange tends to be “civilizing” in its social impact on the parties involved, including a greater awareness of each other’s basic humanity and a reduction in sheer uninformed prejudice. This civilizing influence, combined with economic interdependence created by trade, tends to reduce conflict between the parties involved and to make for more peaceful relationships, both within a country and between countries.



The above originally appeared at Cafe Hayek.

10 comments:

  1. This is a theme we should pound home over and over, especially in response to the Vox Days, “alt-righties”, racial nationalists and anti-free traders. The mere fact that someone is respecting the private property and bodies of others and fulfilling one’s contractual agreements IS Western Civilization. People on the ground at the micro level would have the Misesian/Hayekian local knowledge to know with whom they are dealing and know if it’s working out or not. Without a social democracy, the foreigners aren’t going to vote away the regime of contracts and private property.

    What’s the alternative? A government bureaucracy deciding with whom you are allowed to enter into contracts? Based upon racial characteristics and one’s “nationhood”?

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  2. Low IQ Libertardians at it again. If voluntary exchange is so civilizing, how come large groups of people who come from uncivilized cultures into civilized cultures continue their violence, lawlessness, poverty etc, TWO GENERATIONS AFTER their families moved into a society that respects property rights and contracts?
    Dogmatic Libertarianism is to Libertardians what the magic dirt theory is to leftists. Libertardians cannot accept the fact that Biology>Culture>Politics/Economics. They just crawl back into their caves and keep reciting "MUH MISES" and "MUH RON PAUL". They cannot acknowledge the blindingly obvious fact that free markets are a necessary but not sufficient condition for prosperity and advancement.

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    1. The example I gave PRESUMES that the participants understand property and contracts and respect them. There is no requirement in a social democratic welfare state for anyone to have even a slight familiarity with those concepts. You have equated a very strict and rigorous private property regime with our current mess where you can be sued for refusing to enter into a contract and where you have claims on the property of citizens just for being born when an illegal sneaks in to have a baby.

      I never thought alt-righties were very smart. Thanks for being part of my focus group for free.

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    2. Re: Valley Sapiens,

      ─ If voluntary exchange is so civilizing, how come large groups of people who come from uncivilized cultures into civilized cultures continue their violence [...] TWO GENERATIONS AFTER their families moved into a society that respects property rights and contracts? ─

      Like who?

      ─ Libertardians cannot accept the fact that Biology>Culture>Politics/Economics. ─

      That's because we're not DETERMINISTIC IGNORAMUSES like you, VS.

      ─ They cannot acknowledge the blindingly obvious fact that free markets are a necessary but not sufficient condition for prosperity and advancement. ─

      Indeed? You mean there's more to prosperity than liberty, trade, exchange and production? Gosh, you could've hit me with a mystical stick!

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  3. Roddis, stop trying to sound smart. It's too much strain on your two remaining brain cells. We've all memorized human action and MES in 5th grade. Some of us graduated while you just keep reciting it ad infinitum, deliriously, like you were the first guy to discover this 100 year old stuff. You are too stupid to recognize the limitations of "MUH LIBERTARIANISM" because you are too stupid to understand other determinants of human behavior and societal evolution. "Strict and rigorous property rights blah blah blah...." is the product of a distinct culture, which in turn was a product of biology and history. Try your "strict and rigorous...." bullshit in liberia and let me know how it works out. Oh wait, never mind

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    1. It appears that I have personally hit a sweet spot. After almost 44 years of trying to convince libertarians to make the unfiltered “legalization” of private discrimination a central feature of their outreach/vision and after decades of being called “RACIST RACIST RACIST” by the left, valley sapien shows up and calls me a “N***** Lover”. I have bookmarked this page for posterity.

      As a bonus, we’ve learned from valley sapien that a system of rigorously enforced property rights actually failed historically in Liberia, just like laissez faire failed in the USA during WWI, the 1920s and in the period leading up to the 2008 crash.

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  4. Actually, valley sapien has a point: the concept of private property *is* cultural, and culture is a product of biology and competitive evolution between cultures.

    To have a functioning private propety-based society you need a major part of the society voluntarily adhering to the rules of private property regime. Mass influx of people from cultures which do not have a clear concept of private property is likely to disrupt and at some level of infiltration destroy the private propety rights. Same goes for unchecked growth of indigenous infestations by collectivist (aka "back to monkeys") ideologies and their carriers. These need to be eradicated: “The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance.”

    That said, doing business with these other cultures would serve to expose people of these cultures to the ideas of liberty, which would in time move these cultures towards more liberty, and thus make them less of a danger to a free society.

    Same goes for small-scale individual migration: if a person voluntarily accepts the norms of private property society, there is no reason to reject this person as a member of free society. However, this also means that if that acceptance was fake - i.e. as soon as the immigrant claims "right" to property of others - he should be treated as a common thief and expelled back to where he came from.

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    1. Under AnCap, you can only "migrate" to your own property or to someone else's property with permission pursuant to specific contractual arrangements. No anchor babies or welfare. VS ignored what I very intentionally and specifically wrote:

      The mere fact that someone IS RESPECTING the private property and bodies of others and fulfilling one’s contractual agreements IS Western Civilization. [This leaves out people who are not so respectful, the theoretical V.S. Liberians]. People on the ground at the micro level would have the Misesian/Hayekian local knowledge to know with whom they are dealing and know if it’s working out or not. Without a social democracy, the foreigners aren’t going to vote away the regime of contracts and private property.

      What’s the alternative? A government bureaucracy deciding with whom you are allowed to enter into contracts? Based upon racial characteristics and one’s “nationhood”?


      Alt-righties also fail to understand that under AnCap, no one could initiate violence against them for having a genetic/racialist/nationalist community if that's what they think will make them happy.

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  5. I am wondering what you mean by "biological factors". Are you saying that some how certain races are predisposed to accepting the idea of private property? Also, I am wondering if you have the ability to explain your position as an adult without slinging petty insults. Also, do you think your lack of civility is due to you being one of the people you talk about as coming from an uncivilized country or do you blame it on your biology?

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    1. Excellent response. I too was wondering if v.s.'s inability to understand the logical implications of private property was due to coming from an uncivilized country and/or "biological factors". If so, would it be OK to mark him so for life?

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