Year: 2013

Лицо терроризма в России

Evgenii Grigorev Current Events , ,

Я возвращаюсь с новой записью. К сожалению, она лишена праздничного настроения, так как за минувшие сутки в России произошли два ужасающих, бесчеловечных террористических акта, перечеркнувших так называемую “атмосферу Нового Года”.

Я даже не знаю, с чего начать… Думаю, многие из вас смотрят новости по вашим информационным каналам и в курсе террористических актов, которые произошли сегодня и вчера в одном из городов России. Я говорю про город Волгоград, крупнейший южный транспортный узел России, который за последние три месяца трижды подвергался атаке террористов. И вот, сегодня – два новых теракта, с интервалом в 17 часов. Террористы-смертники привели в действие взрывные устройства в здании городского вокзала и в троллейбусе, битком набитом людьми в час пик. По предварительным итогам, пострадало более 100 человек, погибло более 30. Среди тех, кому оказалось не суждено дожить до 2014 года – несколько детей, а также женщин.

Не буду углубляться в подробности. Слишком тяжело про это писать. При желании вы и сами можете поискать в интернете информацию.

За последние 20 лет лицо терроризма в России сильно изменилось. Если раньше мы имели дело с лидерами бандитов, управляющими достаточно крупными бандами, то сейчас имеем кучу разрозненных террористических шаек исламистского характера. Раньше с боевиками можно было хоть как-то договориться. У них была своя программа, требования, и исходя из этого их действия можно было хоть как-то предугадать и предупредить. Сейчас же мы сталкиваемся с фактами неприкрытого насилия против мирного населения. Не выдвигается никаких требований. идет откровенная война. Терроризм ради терроризма. Скажите мне, какие политические последствия может иметь взрыв в автобусе или метро? Да никаких. Жертвами выступает исключительно мирное население. От террористов, которые действуют ради самого процесса терроризма нет спасения. Их действия не предугадать, потому что в них нет логики и последовательности. А отсутствие хоть каких-то требований сводит на нет возможность конструктивного диалога.

Взять хотя бы для примера террористов, с которыми воюет Америка. Там все более-менее понятно. Какие-то требования, какие-то известные исламистские группировки. А у нас что? Никто не может понять. И судя по терактам, спецслужбы не могут их предотвратить или предупредить… Это ужасно, и у меня больше нет слов.

Я все сказал. Эта запись сделана “на эмоциях”. Надеюсь вы никогда не столкнетесь с тем, с чем сталкиваемся мы. Счастливого Нового Года. Я атеист, но тем не менее, сохранит вас Господь.

Related articles

California’s Neighborhood Legislature Initiative

Fred Foldvary Current Events, Politics , , , , , , , ,

In California, the voters are able to put proposed laws on the ballot if they gather enough signatures. This process is called an “initiative.” The legislature may also place propositions on the ballot, a process called a “referendum”.

One of the ballot propositions for 2014 is “The Neighborhood Legislature Reform Act,” which would decentralize the election of representatives in order to reduce the political power of special interests such as corporations, labor unions, and trial lawyers. This reform would shift political power to the people of California. (For the text of the initiative, see this.)

Like the US Congress, the California legislature has two houses, a Senate with 40 members and an Assembly with 80 members. The population of California is 38 million. The districts for the California Senate now have 950,000 persons, a greater number than for Congressional districts, while about 475,000 people live in each assembly district. It now takes a million dollars to win a California Senate seat.

The Neighborhood initiative would instead create Senate districts of 10,000 persons and Assembly districts of 5000. These neighborhood districts would form a greater association of 100 neighborhood districts within the current districts. The association council would elect a representative to the state legislature, thus keeping the same number of representatives in the state legislature. However, the final approval of a law would require a vote by all the neighborhood district representatives. That vote could be done on an Internet web site, as corporations now do for their elections of board members and propositions.

The Neighborhood Legislature proposition was initiated by John H. Cox, who has been a lawyer, real-estate management executive, and local office holder. The aim is to have the measure on the November 2014 ballot. That will require over 800,000 valid signatures, 8 percent of the votes cast for governor in the last election, by May 19. That is a high hurtle, which usually requires several million dollars to pay for signature gatherers. This initiative has already made a splash, with articles in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, and other media.

I have been writing for years on reforming democracy with tiny voting districts in a bottom-up structure. Back in 2007, I wrote an article, “Democracy Needs Reforming”, proposing that the political body be divided into cells of 1000 persons, each with a neighborhood council. A group of these would then elect a broader-area council, and so on up to the national congress or parliament. The state legislature would then only need one house, rather than a bicameral legislature that mimics the US Congress and British parliament. This “cellular democracy” would eliminate the inherent demand for campaign funds of mass democracy.

The Neighborhood Legislature Reform Act would not be quite as thorough a reform as a cellular democracy based on tiny districts, but it has the same basic concepts: smaller voting groups, and bottom-up multi-level representation. This initiative would indeed greatly reduce the demand for campaign funds that are needed in today’s huge California electoral districts.

It will be a great challenge to obtain the needed signatures. It could happen if the media provide editorial support and coverage. At any rate, the fact that this initiative is taking place will go a long ways to publicizing the gross corruption of democracy that is taking place, and the only effective remedy to the inherent dysfunction of mass democracy. Many reforms are needed in today’s governments, reforms in taxation, pensions, environmental protection, transit, criminal law, and economic deprivation. The main reason that useful reforms are not taking place is the subsidy-seeking and reform-blocking induced by mass democracy. The initiative process in California and other states is a way to circumvent the corrupt legislature, but in a large state like California, that process itself requires big money.

It will be interesting to watch the progress of the Neighborhood Legislature initiative, and to watch the special interests jump in with misleading negative ads. If this goes on the ballot and wins, it will be a victory for the people and a defeat for the moneyed special interests.

(Note: this article first appeared in The Progress Report)

Around the Web

Brandon Christensen Current Events, Links , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
  1. An Israeli (grad student) and an Iranian (grad student) on the way forward
  2. An Anarchist’s Proposal for Limited Constitutional Government
  3. Red White: Why a Founding Father of Postwar  Capitalism (Keynesianism) Spied for the Soviets
  4. Is Fascism Returning to Europe?
  5. Freedom of Speech: True and False (Duck Dynasty edition)

Предновогодняя запись

Evgenii Grigorev Current Events

Привет, друзья! В этот раз не хочу говорить о политике. Нельзя же о ней вечно говорить. Сперва хочу поздравить всех с наступающим Новым Годом и Рождеством! Желаю всем читателям и авторам блога исполнения желаний в новом году, а также разумных мыслей в голове и реализации своего творческого потенциала. В современном сложном мире очень сложно оставаться индивидуальной личностью. Обилие высокотехнологичных устройств, стандартизированных образов мышления (это касается не только внешнего вида, но и принятых обществом норм мышления) и прочих обобщений оставляет нам все меньше и меньше шансов развиваться как индивидуальные гармоничные личности. Я надеюсь, что думающие люди (коих в блоге NOL большинство) смогут сохранить “собственное я” и не растерять весь тот энтузиазм, который так присущ их исследованиям. Пусть в новом году сообщество будет развиваться.

Хороших выходных!

Cronismo…você sabe o que é isto?

Claudio Shikida Current Events, Economics , , , , ,

Não??? Então você não deve estar morando no Brasil. Ok, você mora, mas não sabe do que se trata. Um livro que divulgou este conceito no Brasil é o do Lazzarini. Mas você pode aprender também sobre isto neste video. Este blogueiro (junto com o Leo Monasterio) já falava de rent-seeking no Brasil desde o final do século passado. A galera, contudo, custou a nos acompanhar na literatura. Ao longo destes primeiros 13 anos do século, vimos vários autores e artigos sobre o tema. Claro, tudo começou com o Jorge Vianna Monteiro (embora muita gente não pareça saber fazer pesquisa científica direito e, portanto, não faça a revisão da literatura corretamente).

O termo rent-seeking nunca saiu muito das conversas de economistas e alguns poucos cientistas políticos esclarecidos. Claro, havia também a competição dos marxistas, sempre receosos de perderem sua platéia para teorias concorrentes. Mas, aos poucos, as coisas mudaram. Aí alguém, acho que foi o Gary Becker, popularizou o termo capitalismo de compadres (ou de compadrio). Paralelamente, a mudança de gerações nas redações de jornais e a tecnologia ajudaram a popularizar as idéias de Tullock, Olson, Buchanan e outros. Mesmo assim, convenhamos, “capitalismo de compadres” não é um termo muito retórico, no sentido da McCloskey.

Aí, agora, veio este novo termo, o tal “cronismo”. No fundo, no fundo, fala-se do mesmo fenômeno. Mas parece que este termo está se popularizando com certa facilidade. Ajuda, claro, a corrupção desenfreada que assistimos no Brasil desde a primeira administração da Silva (agora também conhecido como “Lula”, “Lula da Rose”, “o Barba”, dentre outros divertidos apelidos). O desencanto dos eleitores não deixa de ter um impacto positivo: o aumento do ceticismo e do grau de exigência quanto às suas demandas políticas. Claro que isto não necessariamente melhora a qualidade do setor público ou diminui a corrupção, mas o realismo trazido pelo ceticismo é sempre saudável.

Still on vacation but wanted to make sure everyone saw this…

Adam Magoon Current Events, Economics

Weigh in below on this meddling in India by their reserve bank.

Happy Holidays

Brandon Christensen Liberty

I hope everybody is enjoying their holiday season. I know I have been. My apologies for how slowly things have been going here at NOL, but things’ll pick up again once the holidays are over and life gets back to normal.

I hope you all stay tuned!

Amo muito o bem público produzido pelo setor privado

Claudio Shikida Current Events, Economics , , , , ,

20131227_101803

Pois é, leitor. Sempre que alguém vem a BH eu fico sem saber o que dizer. Aqui, convenhamos, não tem nada. Nada mesmo. Mas aí o setor privado, muito mais do que esta prefeitura ineficiente (vem assim desde a época do Célio de Castro e seus sucessores, mas não era muito melhor antes…enfim…), consegue me salvar.

Bem público produzido pelo setor privado com motivos “egoístas” (se ganhar dinheiro para pagar as contas é egoísmo, então Luis F. Verissimo e eu somos os mais egoístas do mundo…junto com você, leitor). Exemplo que poderia estar em qualquer livro-texto de Economia. Gostei tanto que fiz todo um malabarismo para comer na bandeja sem sujar o sanduíche e as fritas (e, sim, eu consegui fazer isto!) para guardar esta excelente peça de propaganda.

Aliás, gostei tanto que a empresa ganhou o direito a uma propaganda gratuita aqui.

E agora, para algo mais técnico…

O que é um bem público? Antes que você pense no senso comum, esta é uma definição técnica, um conceito teórico. Um bem público é um bem não-excludente e não-rival. O melhor exemplo disto está no livro-texto do Mankiw. Uma estrada com pedágio é excludente (sem pedágio, portanto, não-excludente). Uma estrada congestionada é rival (porque o espaço entre carros diminui. O consumo do mesmo pedaço de chão é rivalizado com outro motorista e seu pequeno SUV…). Sacou?

Bom, então fica meio óbvio – ou então você dá uma pesquisada na internet, ok? – que alguém que busque lucrar não tem muito motivo para produzir um bem público…em princípio. Por que? Porque não dá para lucrar tanto quanto se você produz um bem privado (rival e excludente). Claro que esta classificação do bem ou serviço em “privado” e “público” é uma questão de grau (além do fato de existirem bens rivais, não-excludentes e não-rivais, excludentes). Mais ainda, o grau pode ser alterado conforme a tecnologia mude. Pense no caso da TV. Há algumas décadas, era impossível vender um pacote de canais como um bem privado (o que se fazia era vender um bem público (o pacote de canais) com um financiamento via propaganda).

O que isto tudo tem a ver com o McDonald’s? Simples. A informação turística é um bem público. Supostamente, o governo poderia criar uma secretaria de turismo (esqueçam a ironia da coisa…ou melhor, dêem uma boa risada e prossigam) para prover os turistas de informações como esta. Bem, a coisa mais difícil do mundo é achar um guia turístico desta cidade de fácil acesso e na hora que você precisa. Aí entra a campanha da cadeia de fast-food, em busca de lucros com a praça específica de Belo Horizonte. De forma inteligente, percebe-se que homenagear a cidade torna o consumo do sanduíche mais agradável. A experiência de se comer dois pães e carne não se distingue, em princípio, por conta do lugar onde você o compra. Contudo, diferenciar o produto é uma prática mais antiga do que a prostituição (se é que não nasceu com a mesma…).

Portanto, ao vender um sanduíche (bem privado) com uma folha de papel destas, com uma propaganda da cidade, agrega-se à experiência de consumo um certo valor que, imaginam os donos do boteco, aumentará suas vendas. Bem, não estou eu aqui falando bem da propaganda?

Voltando ao hambúrguer…

Pois é. Eu pensei até em voltar hoje para comer um outro hambúrguer deles, mas não sou tão fã assim do consumo diário de McDonald’s. Mas fica aqui o exemplo, a evidência (talvez a milésima, neste blog) de que bens públicos podem ser produzidos de forma eficiente pelo setor privado. Eu diria, neste caso, até mais eficientemente do que o setor público municipal sequer poderiaimaginar alcançar um dia.

Antes de me despedir, eu me pergunto: burocratas, sempre tão invejosos dos sucesso alheio (dentro ou fora de seu mundinho, a repartição), adoram sabotar a concorrência com um papo furado muito bonito de “proteção às crianças, índios, animais domésticos, mulheres, etc”. Papinho bem ruim mesmo. Mas, às vezes, há até uma boa justificativa para tal, embora raramente me pareça ser a regra seguida por eles. Eu me pergunto quando vão proibir a cadeia de fast-food de produzir informações turísticas porque “apenas o fazem pelo lucro”.Como se os burocratas não maximizassem nem mesmo seu orçamento…

Vovô não quer BigMac. E agora, Ricardo?

Claudio Shikida Current Events, Economics , , , , , , ,

Eis aí algo que é verdade aqui ou no Japão. O texto do casal de blogueiros é recheado de elementos que você pode usar para discutir com seus amigos, professores ou, claro, com seu avô. Eu ainda destacaria um ponto específico, além do demográfico: a questão ricardiana. Cito com negrito por minha conta:

If the central point of Abenomics is to boost prices and thus wages and consumption — the old “raise all boats” metaphor — then to a certain extent the plan has succeeded over the last year. Consumers don’t seem to be fixated on cheap goods and services any more, though, to be honest, it’s difficult to tell if this willingness to spend more is a function of anticipation for April’s consumption tax hike.

Pois é. A administração do Primeiro-Ministro Abe sabe que a política fiscal não é um saco sem fundo (até o do Papai Noel não tem buracos, vale lembrar…). Portanto, mesmo com o estímulo fiscal, a antiga promessa de aumentar o imposto sobre o consumo foi aprovada pelo parlamento.

E agora, para algo completamente diferente…ou pelo menos mais técnico.

A aprovação legal nos traz uma redução na incerteza jurídica, já que todos sabem que a lei, em um país desenvolvido (= civilizado) será cumprida sem maiores problemas. Mais ainda, o aumento tem data e foi anunciado. Então estamos diante de um clássico problema de Macroeconomia de se saber qual é o impacto de uma política anunciada em um mundo em que as expectativas racionais opera.

A proposição Barro-Ricardiana de livro-texto nos diz algo bem simples: se eu sei que vou ter que pagar impostos amanhã, eu poupo hoje. Já num mundo não-Ricardiano (ou não-Barro-Ricardiano), o reduzido imposto de hoje, sob a expectativa de aumento do mesmo amanhã, provavelmente me induzirá a consumir mais. Tudo isto, claro, ceteris paribus.

Mas quando se fala do Japão, é bom ter em mente um ponto muito importante que não tem nada a ver com aquela lenda de “cultura oriental”, mas sim com a demografia (o tal bônus demográfico que meus amigos Salvato, Ari e Bernardo explicam aqui, para o caso brasileiro). Os autores do post falam do desejo dos mais velhos em consumir produtos de qualidade maior (embora exagerem na ênfase). Não apenas isto, mas “mais velhos” no Japão significa que estamos falando de pessoas cujo padrão de consumo alimentar é bem distinto do moderno fast-food norte-americano que os jovens tanto parecem gostar.

Barro, na própria discussão de sua proposição, já havia discutido a questão demográfica ao falar do argumento do altruísmo (herança) que justificaria o efeito da equivalência no, digamos, longo prazo. No caso do post dos autores, a demografia não está tanto no longo prazo, mas no curto prazo (acho que se fala “coorte” lá em demografia). Estamos falando de um modelo de overlapping generations destes simples. Ou seja, no mesmo período de tempo convivem duas gerações distintas: a mais velha e a mais nova (estou supondo, por simplicidade, apenas duas gerações). Só que, ao contrário do modelo de livro-texto, estamos dizendo que o padrão de consumo das gerações é distinto: uma prefere consumir mais fast-food e outra prefere alimentos de maior tempo adicionado (é, eu pensei em algo comohousehold production models que o Tyler Cowen, implicitamente, usa aqui).

A pergunta, portanto, neste caso, é a seguinte: em um modelo simples, com dois períodos, o que acontece quando tornamos o bem “consumo” (que é, lembre-se, estudante de graduação, sempre sinônimo de consumo de bens não-duráveis) heterogêneo? Primeiro, à la ciclos reais, temos duas gerações e, adicionalmente, agora, colocamos a heterogeneidade do consumo. Suponha que o restante do modelo funciona tal como antes. Ah sim, é importante fazer o destaque didático-científico: mantenha as expectativas racionais. Afinal, pode ser que algo mude (ou não) no modelo, mesmo que não haja nenhuma mudança no tipo de racionalidade dos agentes (esta é uma observação para os eternos apressados que desejam, loucamente, jogar fora a racionalidade sem antes relaxar outras hipóteses do modelo. Interessados vejamisto).

Será que a equivalência barro-ricardiana se mantém? Poderia ser uma questão de prova, mas fica para o espaço de comentários. Preferencialmente, gostaria de ver citações de papers que trataram do assunto com hipóteses semelhantes.

Consumerism and Christmas

Tibor Machan Current Events, History, Religion , , , , , ,

You all may recall that after 9/11 Osama bin Laden explained his orchestration of the terrorist deed that murdered some 3000 innocent human beings as payback for America’s materialism. (His anti-materialist rant is routine – a good discussion of his views may be found here.)

Yet as the writer of the above piece notes, anti-materialism is a common theme among most religions. Sure, the idea that human life is about preparation for an after-life — a spiritual life superior to the mundane one we can lead here on Earth — is central to religions.

In the West, however, many religions have made peace with the mundane elements of human existence so there tends to be a less avid denunciation of materialism, which is how the idea of being seriously concerned with living prosperously here on Earth is usually designated. After all, the Christian God is both human and divine (in the person of Jesus).

Destruction of life is generally deemed to be a sin for Christians, whereas, as bin Laden has noted, the love of death is central in his version of Islam. As one account has it, “This originated at the Battle of Qadisiyya in the year 636, when the commander of the Muslim forces, Khalid ibn Al-Walid, sent an emissary with a message from Caliph Abu Bakr to the Persian commander, Khosru. The message stated: ‘You [Khosru and his people] should convert to Islam, and then you will be safe, for if you don’t, you should know that I have come to you with an army of men that love death, as you love life’.” This account is widely recited in contemporary Muslim literature.

Yet despite the Western theological tradition’s more friendly attitude toward the mundane, nearly every Christmas leaders of Christian denominations tend to revert to the original, anti-life doctrines by condemning commercialism. The latest Pope followed the previous one by lamenting the “materialist” approach to celebrating Christmas. They referred to “the dead-end streets of consumerism,” according to newspaper reports, chiding people everywhere for what the report calls “being caught up with consumerist pursuits.”

Ironically, the Pope issued his proclamations from St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican. If you have ever visited the Vatican, as I and millions of others have, you would know it to be one of the West’s, if not the world’s, most opulent places. And as to consumerism, the gift shop dominates the entrance to the Vatican, where one is invited to spend great sums of money on various small or sizable trinkets. Commerce flourishes there, believe me, as the Vatican cashes in on the desire of many of the visitors to take away some reminder of their having been to that historically and theologically significant place.

Of course, even apart from the Vatican, the Roman Catholic Church, as well as others within Christianity, often excel in ostentatious display of riches – one need but go to high mass on Christmas Eve to witness this.

And why not? That is how human beings tend to celebrate what they value highly, by honoring the occasion with gift-giving. And gift-giving necessarily involves commerce – most of us aren’t skilled at the crafts that it takes to create the various gifts we wish to bestow upon those we love and cherish. I personally bought airline tickets for some of my family members and a computer for another, in part because I have no airplane in which to fly them where they would like to go and no factory and expertise to make a modern, up-to-date computer. To obtain these gifts, I rely, as do billions of others, on commerce.

So why then would Popes besmirch consumerism and commerce? Beats me. (And remember, also, that “materialism” is ultimately a nonsense term – nothing we purchase is simply material but embodies the creative intelligence – indeed the creative spirit – of many human beings!)

So, I urge all Popes to change their message and to have a more generous understanding of all who make use of commerce in our celebration of Christmas!

Kalashnikov, hero and inventor, is dead, but how did he do it?

Brandon Christensen Current Events, Economics, History , , , , , , ,

Mikhail Kalashnikov is dead. From the LA Times:

Weapons designer Mikhail Kalashnikov, […] The creator of the legendary AK-47, which became widely known as the Kalashnikov, […] died Monday […]

Over six decades, Kalashnikov’s cheap, simple and rugged creation became the weapon of choice for more than 50 standing armies as well as drug lords, street gangs, revolutionaries, terrorists, pirates and thugs the world over.

Here is a great piece by CJ Maloney celebrating the AK-47. What I really want to know is this: How was such an invention able to be created in the Soviet Union?

The only option I can think of is that the military-industrial complex of the USSR was so powerful and influential that incentives actually drove innovation in that sector of the economy.

But even this doesn’t fully explain how Kalashnikov was able to invent the gun, patent it, put his name on it, and reap the benefits from creating it in the first place. How could any of this be possible in a command-and-control economy?

Around the Web

Brandon Christensen Links , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

This is the 69th installment of ‘Around the Web’. Giggity!

  1. guaranteed income vs. open borders; Economist Kevin Grier weighs the options
  2. How poverty taxes the brain; A sexy-sounding female gives us the low-down
  3. The origins of Northwest European ‘guilt culture’; Evolutionary anthropologists are so, soooo cute
  4. The ‘thoughtful libertarian’ subreddit; Finally!
  5. Is Christmas efficient? Only an economist (Tyler Cowen) could ask such a thing
  6. God, Hayek and the Conceit of Reason; Concise essay by Jonathan Neumann in Standpoint
  7. Milton Friedman’s 1997 musings on a common currency in the European Union: The Euro: From monetary policy to political disunity

Right-wing Marxists and the libertarian’s lament

Brandon Christensen Politics , , , , , , , ,

Daniel McCarthy, the editor of The American Conservative, has a post up on the current “liberal” (Leftist) misreadings of how politics actually works:

Politics is just magic to [Leftists]. (Some of this comes of drawing the wrong lessons from Alinsky and Gramsci—wrong lessons the activist right is now busy committing to memory.)

The “lessons from Alinksy and Gramsci” that the Right is currently incorporating into its political program are none other than the tactics Leftists used during the heyday of communism to gain political power in the West.

Unfortunately, I think the Right is making a big mistake by copying a program that has failed the Left. Has it failed the Left? Or is communism an inevitable failure and tactics had nothing to do with it?

Governance is affected by movements. Does the Right want to be the new authoritarians? They’ve always been less authoritarian than the Left, but I see this changing especially if the Right continues to borrow tactics and ideas from the communist Left.

What is interesting is to watch how this all plays out. The Left’s playbook consists of delegitimizing people rather ideas or institutions. This leads to misdirected anger and makes it easier for opposition movements to seize the levers of power. It worked in the Anglo-American world, to a large extent (look at our educational systems, for example; they’re run by Marxists), but never more than superficially. Everybody knows, for example, which institutions have been captured by the Left. They know which institutions are Left-wing and which ones are not.

Why Rightists would want to copy this failed tactic is beyond me. The strength of classical liberalism has always been the resounding truth within its creed. It is truth that we march into battle with, not cheap tricks or ploys from the gutter.

It seems to me that the Right’s embrace of communist tactics comes mostly from one influential group of people in the US: conservative intellectuals with cultural ties to the Catholic or Mormon churches. To me I find this very weird, and while weirdness is definitely something I appreciate in my personal life I truly hope these tactics don’t trickle into the intellectual wing of the libertarian quadrant.

The spectacle of conservative intellectuals mimicking their Cold War adversaries two decades after winning – outright – the war of ideas is pathetic. You know where the ‘comments’ section is!

Pope Francis: Does An Anti-Capitalist = A Socialist?

Samuel Allen Current Events, Liberty, Religion , , , , ,

The Pope has made his opposition to capitalism clear and his words were scathing…

“Just as the commandment ‘Thou shalt not kill’ sets a clear limit in order to safeguard the value of human life, today we also have to say ‘thou shalt not’ to an economy of exclusion and inequality. Such an economy kills… A new tyranny is thus born, invisible and often virtual, which unilaterally and relentlessly imposes its own laws and rules. To all this we can add widespread corruption and self-serving tax evasion, which has taken on worldwide dimensions. The thirst for power and possessions knows no limits.”

This has led to praise and criticism from the right and the left. People have naturally views this within the right vs left dichotomy. I think it worth pointing out that libertarians of all varieties do not fit anywhere, comfortably, in this one dimensional paradigm, nor aught the Pope be expected to. He has been called a Marxist and had the economic failing of state socialism in Latin America and around the world flagged up, the assumption seems to be that if he is against the present model of capitalism he must be a socialist. The problem is the Pope may have made clear that he is in opposition to our present economic model he has not made clear what else he is against, (socialism) or what he supports.

What he has said on the matter and the clues to what he supports are as follows “I repeat: I did not talk as a specialist but according to the social doctrine of the church. And this does not mean being a Marxist.” The Pope indicates here that his stance on economics is only that which the Church has long-held. That he is simply re-iterating it’s doctrine, the only economic ideology based upon catholic social doctrine is Distributism… It is based on the teachings of Pope Leo XIII in his encyclical Rerum Novarum and Pope Pius XI in Quadragesimo Anno, and it is emphatically opposed to socialism. In the words one who inspired it:

“No one can be at the same time a sincere Catholic and a true Socialist” and “it is gravely wrong to take from individuals what they can accomplish by their own initiative and industry and give it to the community” – Pius XI.

The Popes Francis’s words on capitalism were no less scathing than his predecessor’s in Rerum Novarum. Pope Leo XIII spoke of “misery and wretchedness pressing so unjustly on the majority of the working class” and how “a small number of very rich men” had been able to “lay upon the teeming masses of the labouring poor a yoke little better than that of slavery itself.” And Pope Francis’s use of the term “exclusion” I’d argue meaning exclusion from personal access to property, and the means to produce are a further clue to his distributist leanings.

So what do these distributists profess if they oppose both socialism and capitalism?

According to distributists, property ownership is a fundamental right and the means of production should be spread as widely as possible rather than being centralized under the control of the state (state socialism) or of accomplished individuals (laissez-faire capitalism). Distributism therefore advocates a society marked by widespread property ownership and, according to co-operative economist Race Mathews, maintains that such a system is key to bringing about a just social order. – Wikipedia

In truth we cannot know where the Pope stands on socialism other than what he has said. Until he say’s otherwise I think it’s safe to say there is no reason to suspect he is a socialist, or that his position is anything other than that which the church has long-held.

– Samuel Allen

Weekend Question: What to do about the violence in South Sudan?

Brandon Christensen Current Events , , , , , , , , , ,

As many of you may know, the recently-minted country of South Sudan has descended into civil war. I’m going to show you how this violence was actually predictable, but first I want to point out a couple of things.

  1. Why did South Sudan get international recognition and not Somaliland, which has been a functioning democracy for about twenty years now? I’ve got two theories: One of them has to do with Islam. The peoples in what is now South Sudan are Christians and animists and the Arabs they were fighting in Khartoum were Muslims. Theory 2 has to do with Western pseudo-guilt associated with its past, state-sponsored racism. The peoples of South Sudan are black and the people running Khartoum are not.  Neither of these theories makes sense, mind you, but I think this actually bolsters my thoughts on ‘why?‘.
  2. Where did the violence between South Sudan and Sudan go? These guys were duking it out over an oil-rich region just a few months ago and now I can’t find much about the conflict. I’ll bet Khartoum’s disappearance has to do with both Western threats and the realization that it could accomplish more behind the scenes, so to speak, by playing its former enemies (various black ethnic groups) off on each other.
  3. The violence between former allies in war against Khartoum is also worth musing about, if only for a moment. A bunch of different ethnic groups were former allies in the war against Arab Khartoum and now they are at each other’s throats. I don’t think ideology, specifically ethno-nationalism, is an issue here…yet. It won’t be for a long time. Ethno-nationalism seems to be something that shows up within a society after years and years of botched efforts by elites to mold a nation out of a post-colonial state.

Ok, back to the issue at hand. I’ve blogged a little bit about secession before, and one thing I like to remind readers of is that there is an underlying concept that is much more important than case studies. For instance, you can probably get a much better understanding of what is going on in South Sudan by reading this old piece by yours truly:

In fact, the West could help to turn this disaster into something quite worthwhile: Build an international consensus and recognize the independence of the fiefdoms.  If the West does this now, there is a good chance that local players will be more agreeable in their claims on territory.  To secure independence from a Leviathan like Libya would guarantee a period of time for the local fiefdoms to regroup and rebuild what Ghaddafi had destroyed.

A parallel can be drawn to the velvet divorce of the Czech Republic and Slovakia just after the collapse of the USSR.  What made the divorce “velvet” was international cooperation.  When the international community doesn’t play the game smart, however, divorces look more like Algeria, Indonesia, the Congo basin, the Balkans, and, of course, Somalia.

If the West is to “do something”, and I think it should in most cases, then pursuing diplomatic relations that focus on decentralized governance and international trade are a good way to start.

Can you see how this works? Just replace ‘Libya’ with ‘South Sudan’ and ‘Ghaddafi’ with ‘Khartoum’ and you have the right parameters in place for what needs to be done in regards to making secession in failed states work (I blogged a little bit more about these parameters in South Sudan here as well).

Here is the relevant map for our weekend question:

This is a map of South Sudan’s ethnic groups. It looks like Switzerland, to be honest, but unlike Switzerland South Sudan does not have the same institutional structures in place. Nor does this new country have the full support of the international community. There are plenty of condescending Leftists “monitoring” the country inside and out, but that’s about it.

If the West wants to play a role in helping to avert a violent downward spiral, then it would do well to quickly recognize the futility of South Sudan’s existence and start acknowledging the legitimacy of the fiefdoms. You know where the ‘comments’ section is!