Dĩ nhiên, ngay như chúng ta đã biết, Phi quyền chính, không phải là một chủ thuyết hệ thống theo như định nghĩa, nó chỉ là một NGUYÊN LÝ của tự nguyện và tự do.
Bài viết dưới đây, tái thẩm định học thuyết chính trị của John Lock theo cách nhìn của một nhánh Phi Quyền Chính tân lập "Tư Bản Phi Quyền Chính" (anarcho-capitalism)- khác với các nhánh như Anarcho-syndicalism- socialism, communism v.v .
Tuy vậy, tất cả vẫn dựa trên một NGUYÊN LÝ CHUNG là không chấp nhận một quyền lực tập chung dưới định chế Nhà nước chính phủ. Vấn đề còn lại vẫn luôn là một Ý NIỆM về CÔNG CỘNG và TÀI SẢN ĐẤT ĐAI, hai khúc xương lớn khó nuốt của tất cả các nhánh Phi Quyền Chính.
* Gợi ý và nhắc nhở: - Một điều cần khẳng định là QUẢ ĐỊA CẦU không ai TẠO RA NÓ, đất đai sông ngòi núi rừng v.v là sản phẩm của thiên nhiên, và nó không thể là tài sản sở hữu của bất cứ ai, làm di sản thừa kế- khi tài sản sở hữu chỉ là những gì thuộc về THÂN XÁC của một người và tất cả những gì DO NGƯỜI ĐÓ SÁNG TẠO RA mà thôi. Nói cách khác, một con người có QUYỀN SỬ DỤNG sản vật thiên nhiên trong một thời gian để sản xuất tương tác với đồng loại, TRONG ĐIỀU KIỆN nguyên lý DỒNG THUẬN nhưng không thể SỞ HỮU TUYỆT ĐỐI NHƯ SẢN PHẨM TÁC TẠO HAY CHÍNH BẢN THÂN CỦA HỌ.
Khúc xương này quả thật khó nuốt!
Mời độc giả tham khảo và tự quyết định,
Nhân Chủ
13-3-2015
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John Locke
Revisiting John Locke
March 13, 2015
The perennial question – that likely racks the brains of recovering conservatives, who are leaning toward an adoption of anarcho-capitalism – is the following: Is it morally justifiable to physically force someone to join an association for that person’s own good? Obviously an anarcho-capitalist must say no, while conservatives and liberals alike must answer this in the affirmative. Surprisingly, it is relatively difficult to find articles and books (outside libertarian circles) that treat this question directly. So after having read up pretty thoroughly on Austrian economics and regularly studying the various authors who are published by www.lewrockwell.com, I figured I would revisit John Locke himself and his “Second Treatise of Government.” I wanted to see exactly how he treated the question that I posed above and whether or not his answer was as satisfying as I originally found it to be when I first read Mr. Locke 15 years ago as a college junior.
So what makes government legitimate according to Locke? “…Political Society, (is one) where every one of the members hath quitted his natural power, (and) resigned it up into the hands of the community.” (Italicized emphasis is mine) Similarly Locke states: “Where-ever therefore any number of men are so united into one society, as to quit every one (of) his executive power of the law of nature, and to resign it to the public, there and there only is a political, or civil society.” And finally Locke, says again: “Men being…by nature, all free, equal, and independent, no one can be put out of this estate, and subject to the political power of another, without his own consent. The only way whereby anyone divests himself of his natural liberty, and puts on the bonds of civil society, is by agreeing with other men to join and unite into a community for their comfortable, safe and peaceable living one amongst another, in a secure enjoyment of their properties, and a greater security against any, that are not of it. This any number of men may do, because it injures not the freedom of the rest; they are left as they were in the liberty of the state of nature.” (Italicized emphasis mine)
The running theme then seems to be that the explicit consent of every member is required in order to establish and maintain valid governmental authority. So far so good, right? The above doesn’t sound much like a modern government to me at all, but rather more like the Rotary Club or any other voluntary association. But alas, Mr. Locke is not finished and you did not actually think he was on your side, did you?
Expanding upon the idea that explicit consent is required, Locke then introduces the far more fluid and hence dangerous idea of tacit consent. Here we go guys and gals: “Every man, that hath any possessions, or enjoyment, of any part of the dominions of any government, doth thereby give his tacit consent…” Wow, really? Something tells me Locke is not just talking about buying into a condominium association. Just like that, I went from being a member of the Rotary club to the obedient tax slave of Governor Christie and Senator Menendez. At least we can take solace in the fact that “…(we are) at liberty to go and incorporate (ourselves) into any other commonwealth; or to agree with others to begin a new one, in vacuis locis, in any part of the world they can find free and unpossessed”
I feel a lot better now, don’t you? I mean maybe if me, my family and some compatriots head to the pine barrens of South Jersey, Mr. Christie and Mr. Menendez will allow us the “….liberty to agree with others to begin a new (commonwealth), in vacuis locis!” Oh wait the illustrious former Governor, Brendan Byrne, already claimed that land under the dominion of the state of New Jersey. In the end folks, is there a single acre of land that does not fall within the boundaries of one sovereign or another? I know I would love to mix my blood, sweat and tears in vacuis locis such that said property becomes my private property by virtue of that admixture, wouldn’t you? Locke doesn’t treat the fact that there is no free and unpossessed land that one would not have to fight for; nor does he treat whether or not one may morally fight for that seemingly free and unpossessed land that is now unjustifiably claimed by some unproductive sovereign. All in all, Locke’s treatment of explicit consent seems sound. It gets foggy and more ambiguous when he introduces tacit consent and it falls to pieces when you try to apply the theory to real circumstances.
All of this is not even considering Locke’s dubious assumption that entry into civil society somehow baptizes those who make the plunge or are forced into the Jordan. Are men really more likely to be just if they live together in a political order versus living in proximity to one another in a state of nature? I find it hard to believe that entry into civil society somehow removes the stain of original sin. Locke himself seems to acknowledges that it does not when he says that “…absolute monarchs are but men”, yet he is still a proponent of limited government. What justifies the rule of those who are “but men” over those of us who are also “but men”? What sense does it make to say that no government would be necessary if men were angels, when men (who are not angels) constitute government? Admittedly I am reluctant to conclude that government is a massive conspiratorial canard, but the longer you live and the more you dig, it is hard not to see it as just that.
WILLIAM. True; that’s right enough. The land and al the things that nobody has made ought to belong to all. But there are things that have not come of themselves.
ReplyDeleteJACK. Certainly, there are things that are made by man’s work and the land itself would be worth very little if it were not cleared by the hand of man. But in common fairness these things should belong to those who produce them. By what miracle doe sit happen that they are in the possession of exactly those people who are doing another and have never done anything?
WILLIAM. But the gentlefolks state that their fathers have worked and made savings.
JACK. And they ought to say, on the contrary, that their fathers have made other work without paying them, just as is done to-day. History teaches us that the lot of the worker has continually been wretched and that he who has honestly laboured without taking advantage of his neighbor has never been able to lay by any considerable savings. Generally he has not been able to get enough to keep him from need. Look at what is going on before you eyes. Does not all that the workers produce go into the hands of the masters? A man spends a few pounds on an uncultivated bit of marshy ground, puts some men there to work and gives them scarcely enough to live on, whilst he stays quietly in town and does nothing. A few years after, this bit of waste land is a garden, with a hundred times its original value. The sons of the proprietor will inherit this fortune and say they are enjoying the fruits of their father’s labour; whilst the sons of the men who really toiled and suffered there will continue to toil and suffer. That to you think of that?
WILLIAM. But if, as you say, the world really has always been thus, there is nothing to be done and the employers cannot help it.
ReplyDeleteJACK. Well, I am ready to admit everything in favour of the gentry. Let us suppose that the holders of property are all sons of people who have worked and made savings and he the workers are all sons of idle spendthrifts. This is obviously ridiculous, you understand; but even if things actually were so, would there be any justice at all in the present social organization? If you work and I am a lazy dog, it is right enough I should be punished for my laziness; but this is no reason that my sons, who may be honest working men, should be worked to death and famished to keep your sons in idleness and plenty.
WILLIAM. All that is very fine, and I don’t say to the contrary, but then the gentlefolks have got the property, and, when all’s said and done, we must be grateful to them, because if it weren’t for them people could not get a living.
JACK. If they have the wealth it is because they have taken it by force and have increased it by pocketing the fruit of other people’s labour. But they may chance to lose it the same way as it was gained. Until now men have been fighting with one another; they have been trying to snatch the bread out of one another’s mouths, and each has esteemed himself happy if he could subjugate his fellow and use him for a beast of burden. But it is time this state of things was put an end to. We gain nothing by fighting with one another; the only harvest we have reaped is poverty, slavery, crime, prostitution, and now and again, those blood-lettings called wars and revolutions. If instead we could come to a mutual agreement, love and aid each other, we should see no more of these evils; there would no longer be some people with a great deal and other with nothing at all, and we should all be trying to make every one as well off as possible. Of course I know that the rich, who are accustomed to rule and to live without working, will not hear of a change of system. We shall act accordingly. If they come to understand that there ought no longer to be hate and inequality between men, and that all ought to work, so much the better; if, on the contrary, they claim a right to continue to enjoy the fruits of their own and their fathers’ violence and robbery, so much the worse for them: they have taken what they possess by force, and by force we shall take it from them. If the poor know how to come to an understanding, they are stringer than the rich.
WILLIAM. But when there are no more gentlefolks how shall we manage to live? Who will give us work?
ReplyDeleteJACK. What a question! Why you see what happens every day; that it is you who dig, plough, sow, reap, you who thresh the corn, who feed the beasts, who make the better ad cheese, and yet you ask me how we shall live without the gentlefollks? Ask me rather how the gentry would manage to live without us, poor fools of working men in town and country, who slave to clothe and feed them. A moment ago you wanted us to be grateful to the employers because they enable us to live. Don’t you understand that it is they who are living on your work and that every bit of bread they eat is taken from your children, every fine present they make their wives means the poverty, hunger, cold, even perhaps the prostitution of yours? What so these gentlefolks produce? Nothing. Therefore what they consume is taken from the workers. Suppose all agricultural labourers disappeared to-morrow; there would be no one to till the ground and every one would be starved. If the shoemakers disappeared, there would be no more shoes; if the masons vanished, there would be no one to build houses, and so forth. If each class of workers failed, one after anther, with each a branch of production would disappear and men have to do without some useful or necessary things. But what harm would it do us to be rid of the gentry! It would be like the disappearance of the locusts.
WILLIAM. Yes, it really is we who produce everything; but how could I, for instance, grow corn if I had neither land nor beasts nor seed? I am sure there is nothing for us but to be dependent upon the employers.
JACK. Come now, William, do we understand one another or not? I have told you already what we must take from the masters what is needful to enable us to work and live, land, tools, seed and all. I know very well that as long as the land and instruments of labour belong to the masters, the workers must always be in subjection and will reap naught but slavery and poverty. This is just why the very first thing to do is to take away property from the middle-class; without that the world will never mend.
WILLIAM. You are right, you did say so. But all this is so new that I get quite lost. Now explain a bit how you would do. What would be done with this property taken from the rich? It would be divided, I suppose?
JACK. No, no, nothing of the sort. If you hear any one say that we want to divide up property and take the place of those who have it now, you may rely upon it that he does not know what he is talking about or is a scoundrel.
But any way, things of the first necessity, like bread, dwellings, water and suchlike, must be secured to every one, regardless of the amount of work he may do. Whatever organization is adopted, inheritance should exist no longer, for it is not just that one should be born to wealth and another to hunger an toil. Even if we admit that each is absolute master of what he produces and may make savings on his own account, those savings ought to return to the community at his death. Children ought to be brought up and educated at the cost of all and in such a fashion as to procure them the greatest development and best attainable teaching. Without that, there can be neither justice nor equality, the principle of the right of each to the instruments of labour will be violated, for it does not suffice to give men land and machinery if they are not also put in a condition to make the best possible use of them. I do not say anything specially about women, because we think women should be the equals of men and when we speak of “men” we mean human beings without distinction of sex.
ReplyDeleteWILLIAM. There is jus tone thing: to take the fortune of rich men who have robbed and starved the poor is all very well; but if a man by hard work and saving has put by something to buy a little field, or open a little shop, what right have you to take from him what is really the fruit of his labour?
JACK. That is not an over common case in these days when capitalists and governments make a clean sweep of so much of the produce; but any way, I have told you that each person has a right to ray material and the instruments of labour and, for that reason, if a man has a bit of ground which he cultivates with his own hands, he might just as well keep it and he would be given besides all the best tools and manures and everything else he required to make it produce as much as possible. Certainly it would be the best plan to put everything in common; but there will be no need to force people to do so because a like interest will urge all to adopt a communist system. Things will go better with common property and work, and very likely there may be more, which it is more convenient to use in common.