Define violent sociopath though. Clearly a stick up boy is a violent sociopath, pretty easy to figure out. What about the drug dealer though? You and I think that he's doing a purely voluntary transaction, whereas mothers against narcotics think he's perpetuating an evil upon our children. What's to stop them from privately continuing their war on drugs? What's to stop the militant anti-abortion groups from going after doctors, according to their definitions those doctors are slaughtering innocent children, pretty clearly a violation of the NAP. Now I guess the answer is that we're currently doing some of this anyways and that under AC we'd simply see the marketplace act more efficiently (for example, instead of 100% of the population forced to fund the war on drugs, you'd only have the hard core 5% funding it), so you'd see a decrease in the amount of coercive enforcement actions, but I don't see how AC land would be free of coercive law enforcement, it would just be more fragmented.

None said it would be free of coercive law enforcement, it's not utopia. It is a vast improvement though. Also a drug dealer in a free society can have a legitimate complaint. He has not said that it's ok to use violence to get what you want he just wants to sell a product that people want to buy.

Who does he complain to?

Except your fellow evil-doers in the life-of-crime underworld.

Several threads' worth of material there I'll wager.

Cue: sound of crickets chirping.

The improvement being that, in ACland, the barriers to entry into coercive law enforcement would be much lower than with government, where it's a monopoly.

Can you guys chill out, so I can answer properly and catch up, please??

I mean a legitimate moral complaint that makes sense and is logically consistent. Unlike the gangster.

No the improvement is that if you want to coerce someone you have to pay for it yourself rather than passing the costs onto the general tax base.

And if you are being coerced by someone (including organized crime), likewise.

But if you can afford it, would it not be easier to coerce people in AC land than it is now? I think that's why I'm more of a libertarian than an AC.

Huh? If I'm fully legitimate and pre-subscribed to my court and insurance system I'm fully protected against crime organised or disorganised.

This is basically the answer, but to answer in a more serious way:

What did the gangster supposedly do? If he bucked someone in the kneecap and refuses to agree to an arbitrator, the victim would be right to seek justice on his own. Under libertarian law, using proportionality theory, the victim would be right to shoot both of the ganster's kneecaps. Additionally, he is right to seek "costs of capture". If the victim spent $15 in gas driving around for the guy and took off work missing $200, he would be in the right to take the gangster's bling and sell it off, returning the excess money. Of course, a private security firm would often take on these costs. Finally, there is what is called "a premium for scaring", or as I prefer to call it a "terror premium" (TP).

Before I explain the TP more, it should be clear why agreeing to an arbitrator is good even for the criminal already. He probably prefers not being shot in both kneecaps. Proportionality is based on the notion of making the victim whole again. Of course this is impossible in practice to owe someone "a life", but the theory compared to the positivist approach is sound if we examine it fully. I would prefer if we can stay on topic for now because I know that this will raise a lot of questions, but no big deal. I will catch up with responses and post more chapters.

Exacting justice on your own as the victim without an arbitrator poses its own risks. Likely a victim would refer to their own private defense and arbitrators of choice to collect evidence and decide how fully he wants to press for justice up to what may be found as a maximum. (A main point that differentiates proportionality from the positivist approach is that there is no supposed "crime against society", or optimal amount of punishment vs. crimes committed. Only a maximum is set, and the victim is allowed to forgive the aggressor in full or part. Deterrence is not part of the equation, just a side effect that can be expected.)

There is an example I have read of the Hatfield killing the McCoy. A McCoy then goes and kills the suspected Hatfield on his own with no evidence or arbitration. He then runs the risk of being punished for murder as well if it is shown that Hatfield #1 didn't do it but #2 did. In less severe cases, the criminal may become a partial victim. Maybe you sold his bling for $300 thinking only the silver was real. It turns out to have been proven real and you now owe the gangster $10,000 or something. Maybe you shoot him in the kneecap and leave him for dead, like he did to you, but you were 20 feet off a major street and 2 blocks away from the hospital. When you buck his kneecaps, he is 15 blocks from a hospital and nobody finds him for 3 hours almost having bled to death.

This brings us back to the obvious question: Why does he get shot in both kneecaps and that is fair? Well, why was anybody getting shot in the first place? Maybe it was senseless or maybe the 'original victim' owed a huge gambling debt and the gangster failed to seek proper recourse with arbitration. In either case he did wrong in some way, because we assume that this is the start of the chain of kneecap shooting. It goes back to the sole principle of libertarianism to not initiate aggression.

A 'transaction' of kneecap shooting was initiated against the victim's consent and must be returned to be consistent. In reality, people do stuff and realize they are wrong. They can find a way to rectify things. "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind" only if the society is so wholly unstable that agreements on arbitration and acceptable forgiveness can be made. Let's be honest that we would rather get something that can be used in a worthwhile way than just getting revenge. A victim can make voluntary mutual agreements with the gangster that he sells his bling to pay of the victim's medical costs, rehabilitation, and have some cash left over to enjoy.

Murray Rothbard advanced this theory, which is based on ancient law having been in use for many times the span of life any here may expect. He is wrong in some minor ways as I understand it, as some theories have been advanced. That deals with the terror premium or "defining a violent criminal". Until we can get down the basics, I am not even trying to explain that for now.

What tools are your private law enforcement agencies going to have? Will they only protect against dumb criminals who are caught red handed, or will they have some sort of search warrant policy to be able to act beyond simple surveillance? If they do have some sort of search warrant ability, how is it limited? I fail to see how in AC land the rights of the accused will be protected since firms will obviously cater to their victims, aka the ones footing the bill.

Meaning subscriptions for services on your behalf in courts where organized criminals voluntarily appear? Or does your provider go to war for you against whatever mafia based on the premiums you paid them?

Well if someone is coming to my house or business and demanding money I would expect my defense company to protect me from that. Why you then paint that as declaring war blah blah blah I don't know. A mafia gang isn't going to want to outlay millions of dollars and men to take on my large insurance company just for the benefit of extorting a few thousand a month of me.

Private Production of Defense

This is a great read.

Neither is your insurance company going to outlay millions of dollars and men to stop the gang extorting a few thousand a month from you for just the monthly premiums you're paying them.

Saying there was ever an agreement, or that democracy's "representation" meets the tests of typical forms of representation, is about as silly as saying that I own everything I can see. We have been over this Strawn, and I don't really have much more to say on it, unless someone besides you really has a problem understanding it. Chapter 9 covers democracy IIRC.

What AK said makes sense. Lemonade stands run just fine without without arbitrary approval. There may be something that could be called compatible with libertarian law hidden within state regulations. That the two are similar or compatible in any way then though is a non sequitur. Trying to pass off "human lemonade" would be a crime in both cases.

The logical extension of what you are originally arguing (through all the obsfucation and handwaving) is that all corporations and any amount of free market exchange is wrong. This goes back to the painfully obvious situation that humanity is in, stated in the thesis of this book. Some of us will do anything to legitimize their use of coercion. It may be derailing with nonsense like Brian (did I miss some 2+2 meme? I didn't think it was funny.) or becoming utterly worthless posters that make strawmen all the time. A lot of the "liberal" or statist posters here seem to be state employees when not just militantly ignorant and confused. It is human nature to defend yourself even when you know that you are dead wrong, so maybe forgivable, but not inexcusable. If I continually fail to respond to a person, it can be assumed they are acting like "the gangster".

I'm just going to point out that the bolded is horrendously wrong, and leave it to you to figure out why

Exactly so it will never escalate that far. The gangs will just stop coming around.

Government regs against "human lemonade" are not "arbitrary". Everyone is against arbitrary.

You're bluffing.

Or the insurance companies will.

Profits and losses, most certainly.

What do you think would happen if, say, baptists and MADD decided to wage open war against Budweiser? How long do you think they would be able to fund such an activity on their own, assuming they are unable to externalize costs onto taxpayers?

Prohibition is only attractive when you can make it cheap by forcing others to pay for it.

Don't blame me if you're not willing or able to figure it out

So, some bad guys decide to keep to their own and help each other out.

What's the problem?

And lose all their customers?

Let me not care if you know wtf you are talking about and not google that word for you. Go on wikipedia for arbitrary and read some links. You will see the ugliest side of illegitimate government rearing its head.