Most political theories include as absolutes theories of economics. For example, Objectivism asserts the ethical necessity of capitalism. Communism asserts the ethical necessity of public ownership of all property (in fact, according to Marx, this is "scientifically" valid). Most political theories make such assertions based upon a description of human nature. The human nature that they assume is asserted to be universal.
Rational Anarchism separates what it is to be a rational agent from what it is to exist. To be rational is to employ reason. A machine can employ reason. An animal can employ reason. However, what it is to be a machine differs drastically from what it is to be an animal. Economics, in its most fundamental form, is the process of obtaining the elements and conditions necessary to exist. The elements and conditions necessary for existence differ from one form of existence to another. Thus, it seems evident that the process by which these elements are obtained will differ in their adequacy according to the mode of being.
Imagine a rational machine that is self aware. The machine may be embodied as a box containing electronic parts. It may be connected to a network. If the nature of this rational machine is the acquisition of knowledge, it may be content with only a steady stream of electricity and a good network connection. It would not benefit from having more electricity than it needs. It would not benefit from having fuzzy toys placed around it. If such a machine were to propose a system of economics, it would consider any system that provides these basic needs to be just.
Now let us consider the rational animal. The rational animal needs to consume food and water, breath air, maintain warmth, sleep, reproduce, and amuse itself. If the rational animal is social as well, then it needs contact with other social animals. If the process of reproducing within the society of these animals includes the need to impress upon potential mates certain qualities, it may need to possess more than it needs to simply exist. With each additional dimension of nature we add, we find that the process of obtaining needs differs. Thus, depending upon the various needs of the rational animal, different processes are needed to maintain existence.
While each species of rational entity includes a set of conditions necessary for existence, the differences do not stop there. The psychological makeup of one rational animal differs from the psychological makeup of another rational animal even when both are of the same species. These differences are derived from brain chemistry, hormonal differences, reproductive roles, age differences, experiential differences, and education differences, just to name a few. Thus, it should be clear that needs differ from one individual to another within the same species.
Observation of our own society brings evidence to bear on this point. Men vote Republican more frequently than do women. Single women vote Democratic more frequently than married women. The elderly are more likely to support Democrats than they were when they were younger. One could cynically hypothesize that they are voting purely in their own personal interest, but I believe that there is more to these trends than that. Most elderly individuals have younger relatives. Most women have male family members. It is difficult to believe that they do not take the interests of those whom they love into account when they vote. Thus, it is probably the case that their beliefs are affected by their embodiment. Why is this so?
Let us consider the single woman. Not all single women are the same, so let me be clear that I am not implying that what follows is true for all single women. It has been many years since the successful movement for women's liberation changed the political landscape of our society. Before this change took place, most women had as their goal marriage to a successful man and the production of children. Income taxes were much lower then. The federal government was very small. The forerunner of the FBI had little to do as there were few crimes defined under federal law. Social programs were not the prerogative of government. Most assistance to people in need was provided by private concerns such as charities and churches.
When women won the right to vote, all of this changed. Women advocated the prohibition of alcohol on the grounds that it drained the income of their families (their husbands spent their salaries drinking rather than providing for the family). They won this cause. Alcohol was outlawed. In response, organized crime came into existence to fill the need for alcohol. Federal laws were passed on the basis of governance of interstate commerce in an effort to fight organized crime. The federal government began using this same legal argument to extend its control. In time, it was illegal to bring underage women across state lines. In effect, the liberation of women began the process of changing the practice of law from a minimalist enterprise into a maximalist enterprise.
As women progressed in their rightful desire for liberation, the goals of woman changed as well. Women, sexually repressed for centuries, began to seek relations of pleasure instead of relations of commitment. This increased the number of single mothers. Likewise, it increased the number of irresponsible fathers who chose not to support their children. More and more, women demanded the intervention of the state to solve this problem, ignoring the fact that their own choices were part of the process that led to the undesirable state of affairs. Simultaneously, the demand for legal abortion increased. American politics shifted from a primarily libertarian base to an increasingly socialist base. Taxes increased. The production of laws increased. The number of criminals (probably as a function of the number of laws) increased. The number of prisons increased. The number of police increased.
In our current period, American society has become nothing less than a police state. While women of the past relied upon their husbands for income and protection, the modern women relies on her self and the government for income and protection. Thus, it would appear, that the husband has been substituted with the government. Only there is a twist. All men now pay for all women and all children. They do this without receiving the benefit of having the women they support as mates nor the affection of the children.
Considering the above, it is clear that single women, generally, vote Democratic because the Democratic Party seeks to replace the husband with the state. With the state as one's source of protection and emergency (or complete) support, one is free to pursue one's sexual interests without the need for commitment. Just as strongly we can see why men vote Republican in higher numbers. Men see the state as their enemy. The state appropriates their income, outlaws their natural behavior, and imprisons them if they step out of line. Men are more frequently imprisoned for their crimes, sentenced to longer stays in prison, and executed more often than women. Thus, it is only natural that they would support the downsizing of the state.
The source of these differences, of course, is embodiment. Women are more often than men left with the burden of caring for children. This fact is reflected in their physiology. Women can provide milk to children and women alone can know with certainty (without the need of a test) that they are the biological mothers of their children. Men, on the other hand, must generally take the word of a woman when choosing to be responsible. Thus, women have a greater need for security of income. If the man that impregnated a woman will not take responsibility, she will call on the state to force him to do so. If he still will not (or cannot), or she does not know which man is responsible, she will call on the state to forcibly appropriate the income of all producers to support herself and her children. If she does not have or want to have a man to protect her, she will demand that the state send a man (in this case, a police man) to protect here. She will demand of politicians the passage of laws that will protect her. The embodiment and embeddedness of the single female, then, demands a socialist model of economics.
The married female, on the other hand, is embedded in a different situation. While she shares the embodiment of the single female, she derives her support from herself (if she works) and her husband (if he works (and he probably does)). The demands of the state for the support of single females has negative consequences on the married female. Her income and the income of her husband are appropriated by the state to support the single female and her children. This process decreases the security of the married female and her children. The married female, therefore, is more like the married male. Each are driven protect their income from the hands of the state. Unlike the married man, however, the married female continues to view male behavior as a threat to her security. Consequently, she calls for less taxation but more law. This accounts for the greater number of married women who vote Republican. It accounts, as well, for the gender gap between married females and males. Married males vote Republican more often than married females.
When individuals become older and their children leave the home, the situation continues to change. Their embodiment changes as they become older. No longer as strong and more frequently ill, older individuals seek greater protection by the state. Additionally, once they retire, they need support for healthcare and income. They begin to see the suffering of others through the eyes of one who suffers. No longer able to produce children, the older female becomes less concerned about reproductive issues. The differences between the elderly man and woman decrease. They move leftward, economically, because of the change in their embodiment and embeddedness.
These distinctions of sex and age are very blunt. Finer distinctions play a role as well. Within groups of individuals within the same age and sex, there are additional differences. Some of these differences stem from differences in ability, differences in brain chemistry, differences in physical ability, and differences in level of education. Some people are fortunate to find pleasure in activities that are in high demand. Their skills coincide with society's needs and they are rewarded greatly. Other individuals are less fortunate and find their talents and interests valued little. They are compensated less. For those who are in demand, life is good and the desire to be free of the fetters of the state and socialist economics is large. For those who are not in demand, life is difficult. They either choose to do something they do not like or they feel oppressed by a system that does not value their qualities.
Even among those who share the same interests, differences in mental abilities and education as well as brain chemistry can have a great affect on their ability to perform at the tasks they enjoy. The perky, always energetic genius will often have little pity for the genius who experiences periods of depression and hyper-productivity. Each individual, with their varying needs will conceive of a system of economics differently than others.
With all of these individual differences, how do we resolve this issue? What system of economics is most just? The answer may be surprising: they are all unjust when applied to everyone equally.
Each system is unjust when applied to everyone equally because each system violates the principle of non-exploitation for some individuals. The principle of non-exploitation is based on the premise that it is unethical to use an individual as a means to another's end without the individual's consent. Socialism, by using productive individuals as an means (the end being the welfare of the non-productive) is unethical. Individualism (or actions motivated by the assumption of atomicity within human interest), by using females as incubators for the production of children without concern for the female as an end in herself, is unjust because it supports the use of woman as a means by men to produce children (assuming that a man consciously uses a woman to produce children, which is not always the case). When the weak use the powerful as a means for their protection, they violate this principle as well. Thus, when force is applied, there is no just solution to the problem of a universal economic system. The only just alternative is to remove force (and governance) from economics.
In an ethical world, the productive would express their ethical nature by giving freely to those who cannot produce adequately. The strong would express their ethical nature by protecting, of their own free will, those who cannot protect themselves. Thus the act of giving has as one of its ends, the giver (in the sense that the giver benefits by achieving his or her nature qua ethical agent). The recipients of this good will would express their ethical nature by not taking more than they need and by giving freely of their talents to those who give to them. Sounds like Utopia, one may protest. Humanity is not perfect and there will be individuals who do not act ethically! This is true. There will always be unethical individuals. However, with the power to give freely within the hands of the giver, the giver would be free to not give to those who take more than they need. The ethical strong would assist the ethical weak. For such a system to work, the only criteria for success is that the number of ethical individuals is sufficiently greater than the number of unethical individuals to maintain the balance in the favor of ethics. Humankind is sufficiently rational and human impulses are sufficiently good that a society where reason became a cultural norm would have little trouble maintaining the required balance. Yes, injustices would occur, upon occasion, but this is a far better situation than the institution of a procedure that systematically employs injustice to accomplish its ends.
The only economic system that supports the minimal flexibility necessary to implement a gift economy is anarcho-capitalism. As the basis of interchange, extended with the ethics of rational anarchism, such a system would enable the operation of a gift economy. The gift economy derived from this system would then provide the means of ethically supporting the variations of economic interchange needed for all individuals. This gift economy can be thought of as a kind of private-socialist-anarchism. It is private in that individuals maintain their private property and are not used against their will as means to end outside of themselves. They are free to accumulate wealth and dispose of it as they see fit. It is a form of socialism in that the ethics underlying the system encourage productive individuals to give some of their surplus, as a personal expression of ethical principle, to those who need it. Any other form of socialism would constitute exploitation of the productive. Any other kind of capitalism would constitute neglect of one's fellow human beings. Thus, we conclude that a gift economy, or a private-socialist-anarchism, is the only just economic model for human society.
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