[SolarCross]

I have just been intensely reading a cluster of writing that expounds an analysis remarkably close to the view I now hold after falling off the an-cap wagon and becoming a minarchist / monarchist libertarian. It is sufficiently different from libertarianism, although the proponents all seem to be former libertarians, that it probably deserves to be considered something of its own beast rather than a quirky off-shoot.

The writing is lengthy, erudite and a bit convoluted but very interesting and thought provoking all the same.

Neo-reactionary reading list

Mencius Moldbug

- A formalist manifesto

- Open letter to open-minded progressives

Nick Land

- Dark Enlightenment

Any thoughts on this?

[Technology]

Formalism.

It's what happens when hard right libertarians drop the libertarianism and legitimately embrace the leftist caricature of libertarianism as being pro-oligarchy. Formalism seems to tell us that what right-libertarians call "crony capitalism" is actually just great, and that hey, states are just big corps, so they're cool too... providing the people who control them get to own them (and these are regular corporations yay!).

"But if there is one thing all libertarians do believe, it's that the Americans should get America back. In other words, libertarians (at least, real libertarians) believe the US is basically an illegitimate and usurping authority, that taxation is theft, that they are essentially being treated as fur-bearing animals by this weird, officious armed mafia, which has somehow convinced everyone else in the country to worship it like it was the Church of God or something, not just a bunch of guys with fancy badges and big guns.

A good formalist will have none of this.

Because to a formalist, the fact that the US can determine what happens on the North American continent between the 49th parallel and the Rio Grande, AK and HI, etc, means that it is the entity which owns that territory. And the fact that the US extracts regular payments from the aforementioned fur-bearing critters means no more than that it owns that right. The various maneuvers and pseudo-legalities by which it acquired these properties are all just history. What matters is that it has them now and it doesn't want to give them over, any more than you want to give me your wallet.

So if the responsibility to fork over some cut of your paycheck makes you a serf (a reasonable reuse of the word, surely, for our less agricultural age), that's what Americans are - serfs.

Corporate serfs, to be exact, because the US is nothing but a corporation. That is, it is a formal structure by which a group of individuals agree to act collectively to achieve some result.

So what? So I'm a corporate serf. Is this so horrible? I seem to be pretty used to it. Two days out of the week I work for Lord Snooty-Snoot. Or Faceless Global Products. Or whoever. Does it matter who the check is written to?"


If you can control a thing, it's morally yours, according to this reasoning (or lack thereof). The fact that this philosophy still manages to be anti-socialist is baffling, because if socialists had the might to start a revolution and control the US, then what is the moral basis for opposing them taking over? He also says that governments are just corporations writ large. If true, then a socialist government is just a more egalitarian corporation. Why oppose it?


"So this is the formalist manifesto: that the US is just a corporation. It is not a mystic trust consigned to us by the generations. It is not the repository of our hopes and fears, the voice of conscience and the avenging sword of justice. It is just an big old company that holds a huge pile of assets, has no clear idea of what it's trying to do with them, and is thrashing around like a ten-gallon shark in a five-gallon bucket, red ink spouting from each of its bazillion gills.

To a formalist, the way to fix the US is to dispense with the ancient mystical horseradish, the corporate prayers and war chants, figure out who owns this monstrosity, and let them decide what in the heck they are going to do with it. I don't think it's too crazy to say that all options - including restructuring and liquidation - should be on the table.

Whether we're talking about the US, Baltimore, or your wallet, a formalist is only happy when ownership and control are one and the same. To reformalize, therefore, we need to figure out who has actual power in the US, and assign shares in such a way as to reproduce this distribution as closely as possible."

Figuring out who owns what by what means? Any specific way will be biased to some sort of goal, and then you are back to having a moral basis again. There's no objective sense in which anybody owns anything. We assign ownership rights based on moral theories; all philosophies including communism do this.

If you want to go off "control", then it's still subjective. Who exerts the most control over the USA? Is it the voters? Is it some particular conglomerate more than an other conglomerate? The one who donates the most money to political campaigns? Who pays the most taxes? The ones the system itself says are in control - the voters? How do you properly answer that question without any particular applicant trying to bias the argument towards themselves through the control they already have? And if they already have that control, then what's the point? This just devolves into "might makes right", which is an incoherent basis for an actionable philosophy. If they already have control, then so what? What is the point of formalism?

It doesn't seem to have anything beyond some vague idea that if we did "formalize" (somehow!), the guys in charge would be more "efficient". Who are we fixing the US for? It jumps straight to this goal of states and their people owned by corporate families, because it's obvious that this is what the guy wants.

Formalism is just post-libertarian feudal reconstructionism.

[Paul Sanderson]

Those articles were very long so someone who's read the majority of them might be able to fill in a few gaps or point me in the right direction. But the first article says "The fundamental idea is that the Cathedral regulates our discussions enforces a set of norms as to what sorts of ideas are acceptable and how we view history — it controls the Overton window, in other words." and then "the media-academic-civil service complex punishes “heretical” views." which I think is a pretty standard viewpoint of most people and hardly unique to this ideology.

I am in agreement with those who claim that democracy is actually a hindrance to progression, but putting a monarchy in its place? How would this monarchy work? If its hereditary and my understanding of libertarianism is right, how can these two ideas be as related and compatible as some people are claiming?

[SolarCross]

I am in agreement with those who claim that democracy is actually a hindrance to progression, but putting a monarchy in its place? How would this monarchy work? If its hereditary and my understanding of libertarianism is right, how can these two ideas be as related and compatible as some people are claiming?

For all the length Mencius Moldbug and others barely touch on those questions, mostly they are debunking progressivism, demotism and the "cathedral". Although Mencius Moldbug does outline a "neo-cameralist" vision of a state which is structurally a public traded corporation, which I find distasteful and unlikely (not because it is undemocratic but because it is unspiritual.).
However I have some answers to your questions but they are broadly my own answers and not the neo-reactionary's answers though they may approve or agree somewhat with some of it.
The monarchy works by doing very little actually. It is the focal point, the leader, of a military security enterprise and not much else. In that sense it is profoundly libertarian, an-cap even.. It does not fussily tell people what to wear, eat, how they can trade or work, what they can own, or believe; it just organises the crushing of those that invade, kill and destroy within its realm of operations. On the hereditary principle.. I don't think it is a requirement of monarchy, but it does tend to work quite well that way and it is quite in keeping with the libertarian idea of inheritance and property rights. The monarchy is, one might crassly say, a family business. If you were a carpenter shouldn't you decide who gets to takeover ownership of that carpentry business when you die? Wouldn't you most likely choose to will it to someone in your own family and wouldn't that person most likely be a child of yours and a boy child at that? For monarchy it is the same.

[Paul Sanderson]

Although Mencius Moldbug does outline a "neo-cameralist" vision of a state which is structurally a public traded corportation, which I find distasteful and unlikely (not because it is undemocratic but because it is unspiritural.).

Damn, treating a country like a public traded corporation. I agree, this is unlikely to ever be able to be implemented successfully and a big part of my problem would be the lack of ideology and unity that would arise from it.

The monarchy works by doing very little actually. It is the focal point, the leader, of a military security enterprise and not much else.In that sense it is profoundly libertarian, an-cap even.. It does not fussily tell people what to wear, eat, how they can trade or work, what they can own, or believe; it just organises the crushing of those that invade, kill and destroy within its realm of operations.

Under a system of anarchy without strict legislation, this role isn’t going to easy to fulfil. I guess this is just my own general problem with anarchy, democracy, liberalism, libertarianism etc really. It seems to go against anarchy as well as a lot of power would be placed in the hands of this king if it was his duty to militarily put down invaders. Other groups would become resentful of this privileged position and there wouldn’t be many barriers to entry into the military business under anarchism, this would create instability surely.

On the hereditary principle.. I don't think it is a requirement of monarchy, but it does tend to work quite well that way and it is quite in keeping with the libertarian idea of inheritance and property rights.

I’m not so averse to the idea of a monarchy of some sort, but hereditary monarchies aren’t acceptable to me because of the potential for having a terrible leader and being able to do nothing about it. Also, under any system, a real monarchy will turn out to be intrinsically powerful, I don’t know whether you could really call it a monarchy otherwise.

The monarchy is, one might crassly say, a family business. If you were a carpenter shouldn't you decide who gets to takeover ownership of that carpentry business when you die?

Being the king or a carpenter are quite different businesses. My own personal belief is that companies over a certain size should be state owned anyway, so in a sense I would agree with the idea of passing your business to your son and in another sense not.

[Cromwell]

I have a pounding headache and, so, may have missed something. But, isn't this just libertarianism for die-hard homophobes, misogynists, racists and religious zealots?

Or is it something else? You see, I don't know how you can go from "the freer the market the freer the people" to "capitalism was the biggest mistake ever made"...

Capitalism demands absolute equality and, despite claims to the contrary by pseudo-Marxist New Left Frankfurt School arse-wipes, abhors all forms of social prejudice; the £20 offered by a disabled black lesbian Muslim is better than the £19 offered by a white straight Christian man.

Either you demand your monarch fight tooth and nail against the invisible hand in order to impose reactionary cultural values or you pretend that big businesses will just be fine with not being allowed to drive through all possible avenues of profit (which they won't).

[SolarCross]

I’m not so averse to the idea of a monarchy of some sort, but hereditary monarchies aren’t acceptable to me because of the potential for having a terrible leader and being able to do nothing about it. Also, under any system, a real monarchy will turn out to be intrinsically powerful, I don’t know whether you could really call it a monarchy otherwise.

The terrible leader possibility is mitigated by the fact that the heir is trained almost from birth to do the job usually by none other than the very person who is currently doing it. Its an apprenticeship of sorts. Lack of innate talent and bad character is still a risk of course but if the monarch is selected by someone other than "fate", the biological lottery so to speak, that risk is still there its just moved to whoever is doing the selecting... What if the council, commitee or whoever that selects or vetoes the successor monarch have a lack of talent and bad character, won't they select a terrible leader too? Also whoever it is that is doing the selecting practically becomes covertly the de facto monarch with the notional monarch being a mere proxy. There is the potential for a great loss of accountability in that. The "power behind the throne" is generally regarded as tending to malevolence, because they can wield power without being responsible for it. Which is one of the reasons why democracies tend to be so corrupt.

Being the king or a carpenter are quite different businesses. My own personal belief is that companies over a certain size should be state owned anyway, so in a sense I would agree with the idea of passing your business to your son and in another sense not.

Is there any particular reason why you prefer large businesses to be owned by the state? Or is this just demotism?

I have a pounding headache and, so, may have missed something. But, isn't this just libertarianism for die-hard homophobes, misogynists, racists and religious zealots?

So the cathedral speaks through you. Are these your words or the Cathedral's? They look like the latter. Do you realise that practically makes you a mere host to a virus? Is there even a you anymore, perhaps you have been entirely taken over by the cathedral.

Or is it something else? You see, I don't know how you can go from "the freer the market the freer the people" to "capitalism was the biggest mistake ever made"...

Capitalism in the sense of rational economics is just fine. Yes a free people is a free market. The only exception is the business of war. The business of war, unlike the business of cake making and carpentry, needs to be a territorial monopoly or else peace and prosperity is impossible.

Capitalism demands absolute equality and, despite claims to the contrary by pseudo-Marxist New Left Frankfurt School arse-wipes, abhors all forms of social prejudice; the £20 offered by a disabled black lesbian Muslim is better than the £19 offered by a white straight Christian man.

Capitalism demands nothing. Capitalists tend not to care very much who they do business with as long as they can pay. So much so prudent and rational. What's the problem?

Either you demand your monarch fight tooth and nail against the invisible hand in order to impose reactionary cultural values or you pretend that big businesses will just be fine with not being allowed to drive through all possible avenues of profit (which they won't).

Hardly. The monarch only has to provide plausible security at a reasonable cost in taxes (which they almost invariably do because despite the fancy clothes monarchies are super cheap compared with demotic regimes) and business will be happy. Monacco? Leichtenstein? The emirates? Business may not do anything to cultivate the cultural values the monarchy may prefer to foster but that isn't something the monarchy would necessarily want them to do anyway.

[Cromwell]

So the cathedral speaks through you. Are these your words or the Cathedral's? They look like the latter. Do you realise that practically makes you a mere host to a virus? Is there even a you anymore, perhaps you have been entirely taken over by the cathedral.

What preposterous nonsense. I'm asking totally reasonable questions. Why have you abandoned right-libertarianism in favour of this particular brand of anti-socialist ideology? What does it have to offer the regular stuff does not?

Capitalism in the sense of rational economics is just fine. Yes a free people is a free market. The only exception is the business of war. The business of war, unlike the business of cake making and carpentry, needs to be a territorial monopoly or else peace and prosperity is impossible.

You aren't making any sense. Reactionaries hate the free market. That's the whole point; you want to go back to a time before capitalism.

Capitalism demands nothing. Capitalists tend not to care very much who they do business with as long as they can pay.

Capitalists, then, if we are going to play the semantic game, are interested in the maximisation of profit; they'll not take too kindly to unnecessary cultural restrictions (discrimination against particular social groups, for example).

So much so prudent and rational. What's the problem?

Why are you now on the side of reactionaries? If you're goal is freedom (which you've linked inexorably to a free market), why don't you just stick to right-libertarianism?

Hardly. The monarch only has to provide plausible security at a reasonable cost in taxes (which they almost invariably do because despite the fancy clothes monarchies are super cheap compared with demotic regimes) and business will be happy. Monacco? Leichtenstein? The emirates? Business may not do anything to cultivate the cultural values the monarchy may prefer to foster but that isn't something the monarchy would necessarily want them to do anyway.

I fail to see, if you have no interest in the cultural values of right-wing reaction nor the economic values of right-wing reaction, why you don't just support a presidential republic like most libertarians; you'd just like the Head Of State to be a fiscal conservative, at the end of the day.

I find monarchies, personally, repugnant but, as I've said before, they're rendered meaningless by the greater economic situation.

[SolarCross]

What preposterous nonsense. I'm asking totally reasonable questions. Why have you abandoned right-libertarianism in favour of this particular brand of anti-socialist ideology? What does it have to offer the regular stuff does not?

Right-libertarianism is not too bad, it is quite on the money on most things but the an-caps fall badly short on the matter of war and peace, and the minarchists fall badly short on political defences against creeping demotism. Good but not good enough.

You aren't making any sense. Reactionaries hate the free market. That's the whole point; you want to go back to a time before capitalism.

Hardly. I am not sure but I think you are mixing up fake reactionaries such as fascists with real reactionaries who are mostly monarchists. Fake reactionaries are infected with demotism and thus seek to plunder others, thus they create a bogey man in the market so that they can disguise their looting in pseudo-sanctimony. Real reactionaries concern themselves with the optimal conditions for peace and prosperity which in the final analysis leads one to absolute monarchism. Real reactionaries want to go back to before demotism not get rid of trade and investment. Merchants are fine as long as they are not demotic.

Capitalists, then, if we are going to play the semantic game, are interested in the maximisation of profit; they'll not take too kindly to unnecessary cultural restrictions (discrimination against particular social groups, for example).

By unnecessary cultural restrictions, do you mean racially motivated persecution? Monarchists are NOT fascists. They naturally do not believe in demotic cult of equality, but neither are they prone to mindless bigotry. Cosmopolitanism is the general tendancy with monarchists. The racist / anti-racist dichotomy is entirely a demotic meme set.

Why are you now on the side of reactionaries? If you're goal is freedom (which you've linked inexorably to a free market), why don't you just stick to right-libertarianism?

I am a monarchist. My goal is peace, prosperity, justice and truth. Freedom is desirable where it enhances these things and undesirable where it does not.

I fail to see, if you have no interest in the cultural values of right-wing reaction nor the economic values of right-wing reaction, why you don't just support a presidential republic like most libertarians; you'd just like the Head Of State to be a fiscal conservative, at the end of the day.

I find monarchies, personally, repugnant but, as I've said before, they're rendered meaningless by the greater economic situation.

If you are demotist you are not a reactionary, not a real one anyway. Libertarians are still somewhat infected with demotism although of all the strains of progressive they are the nearest to recovering from the virus. Good but not good enough.

[Paul Sanderson]

The terrible leader possibility is mitigated by the fact that the heir is trained almost from birth to do the job usually by none other than the very person who is currently doing it.

This is no guarantee of success, in fact it could be a guarantee of the opposite.

What if the council, commitee or whoever that selects or vetoes the successor monarch have a lack of talent and bad character, won't they select a terrible leader too?

If you had 1000 people on the committee, this would go some way to dealing with the problem. You could have one maniac king that would train his son to destroy the country, but the likelihood of 1000 people doing this same thing is much less. Especially if they’ve not lived their whole lives with this character-altering power and have (at least more than the king) seen the effects of his rule.

Also whoever it is that is doing the selecting practically becomes covertly the de facto monarch with the notional monarch being a mere proxy.

This is preferable to me. Although we haven’t decided exactly what powers this king will have, if the council is responsible only for selecting the king once every so often with little other influence over his decisions, this makes him more than a proxy.

There is the potential for a great loss of accountability in that. The "power behind the throne" is generally regarded as tending to malevolence, because they can wield power without being responsible for it. Which is one of the reasons why democracies tend to be so corrupt.

There’s no reason that people shouldn’t know who decides who will be king. My own belief would be to not give too much power to someone or a group that are appointed for life anyway. I also believe that the council who would be responsible for appointing the king would also have to be put to election every 5 years or so. I am against democracy generally though so I wouldn’t be in favour of universal suffrage based solely on being over a certain age.

Is there any particular reason why you prefer large businesses to be owned by the state? Or is this just demotism?

In a sense it is, but as stated before I’m not in favour of democracy in its current form in the west so maybe not so much. But the reason behind it would be so that firstly not so much power can be concentrated in the hands of people solely because of their wealth. But more to the point, if you want to increase social mobility, certain people are going to have to fall, not least because space needs to be made for those on the rise. This could only be done if the government had the power over the appointment of higher managerial positions.

[SolarCross]

This is no guarantee of success, in fact it could be a guarantee of the opposite.

There are no guarantees of anything. The old defence of the hereditary principle for monarchs, relied on a lot on appeals to the divine, bloodlines and such which will struggle for credibility these days. There are a few rational / economic arguments for it that work better. One is the issue of time preferences and incentives. If we think of the governance as a kind of business and the governor as the business owner / manager we can see best management will come from the owner taking a far sighted approach to consumption and investment. The more far sighted the better. Humans are self-interested always, or at least most reliably, if the owner can expect his interest in the business to be over a short time, a few years say like a president, then he has no incentive to take the long view and instead has every incentive to emphasise in his policy capital consumption over investment. If the owner can expect his stewardship to last a lifetime then he will have the incentive to emphasise investment over consumption. If he has reasonable certainty that the business will pass to his close kin after his death then he even has an incentive to invest for benefits that will come to fruition even beyond his own lifespan... which is as about as farsighted as a human can do. The certainty of succession also does much to keep potential rivals from chancing a take over and causing conflict in doing so.

If you had 1000 people on the committee, this would go some way to dealing with the problem. You could have one maniac king that would train his son to destroy the country, but the likelihood of 1000 people doing this same thing is much less. Especially if they’ve not lived their whole lives with this character-altering power and have (at least more than the king) seen the effects of his rule.

The more people on the committee the less likely the agreement made will be rational. It might not produce results quite as bad as universal suffrage does but still you are looking at divisive factionalism and compromise candidates resulting.

For a real example of what this succession by committee might look like consider the papacy. The pope is something quite like a monarch and is elected by a council of cardinals. So the model is there but it isn't widely found; pretty much only the papacy does it that way. The obvious reason is the popes as catholic priests are supposed to be celibate and therefore without legitimate heirs.. To me this suggests that electing monarchs is not a better solution than inheritance but merely something to fall back on if inheritance is unavailable.

Perhaps the perfect solution to mitigating the risk of a dud inheriting the throne whilst still benefiting from the hereditary principle was developed by the House of Osman which is the dynasty that founded the magnificent and long lasting Ottoman Empire. The Osman monarchs ensured they would have a very large pool of heirs through keeping a harem rather than a single wife. Better still all the heirs went to a monarch school where they would be trained and tested for the job of being monarch. The monarch would select from this pool of candidates who would succeed based on their performance. An elegant blending of merit, choice and heredity.

This is preferable to me. Although we haven’t decided exactly what powers this king will have, if the council is responsible only for selecting the king once every so often with little other influence over his decisions, this makes him more than a proxy.

True.. but it is still a weakening of the monarch and creates the potential for divisive factionalism.

The powers of a king are wholly military, he is commander-in-chief of the largest alliance of arms within the realm. After this he makes a credible lawgiver, for anyone who has command of the dominant military is someone miscreants can't afford to ignore. That is all government should be really.

In a sense it is, but as stated before I’m not in favour of democracy in its current form in the west so maybe not so much. But the reason behind it would be so that firstly not so much power can be concentrated in the hands of people solely because of their wealth. But more to the point, if you want to increase social mobility, certain people are going to have to fall, not least because space needs to be made for those on the rise. This could only be done if the government had the power over the appointment of higher managerial positions.

If you are worried about concentration of power then the last thing you should want is the government taking over businesses just because they are big.

[Paul Sanderson]

If we think of the governance as a kind of business and the governor as the business owner / manager we can see best management will come from the owner taking a far sighted approach to consumption and investment. The more far sighted the better.

As you can probably guess from what I’ve been writing, I’m not totally against the idea of someone being appointed for life to a fairly powerful position. I understand and agree with your reasoning for the most part as well. In the case you’re stating though, there would need to be a way of removing this king when necessary. A king with almost total power over the military (with a long and well-connected family tree to back them up) with additional powers of a “credible lawgiver” is not like a figurehead. What do you would think would stop them from trying to take over government?

The more people on the committee the less likely the agreement made will be rational. It might not produce results quite as bad as universal suffrage does but still you are looking at divisive factionalism and compromise candidates resulting.

Factionalism isn’t a bad thing, the first clear reason being that it prevents one person or group from dominating the whole political scene and it makes your opponents concerned with their performance compared to yours. Added to this, if the council’s job was to appoint a king once in every 30 or 40 years roughly, no one would see it as worthwhile to develop parties and groups dedicated to the achievement of their aims. Not for much more than 2 weeks anyway.

The pope is something quite like a monarch and is elected by a council of cardinals. So the model is there but it isn't widely found; pretty much only the papacy does it that way. The obvious reason is the popes as catholic priests are supposed to be celibate and therefore without legitimate heirs.. To me this suggests that electing monarchs is not a better solution than inheritance but merely something to fall back on if inheritance is unavailable.

Are you saying that the reason you don’t think it’s as good as inheritance is because it’s less used?

If you are worried about concentration of power then the last thing you should want is the government taking over businesses just because they are big.

I’m concerned about the concentration of power being with one person and potentially for a lifetime.

[Technology]

In a response to Moldbug's the truth about left and right - part 11 of his "open minded progressives" series above, someone in the comments makes the point I'm making more succinctly:

It seems to me that the only principle of nomianism is that might makes right -- agreements are to be kept only because either one party to them has the power to unilaterally coerce compliance, or a third party has the power to do so and is interested in doing so. If the antinomians manage to seize power by assembling a coalition of weaker people whose collective power is greater than that of the formal authorities (or "unauthorities"), what grounds are there -- from a nomianist perspective -- for doing so? As far as I can tell, there are none. The antinomians are acting in a perfectly legitimate nomian manner, even if they claim to be doing otherwise.

Let me say that I am not, in MM's terms, a Progressive, and I'm not defending the impulse to "seize power in order to do good," by which he defines Progressivism. But I don't see any grounds by which a pronomian can consistently, on his own terms, criticize Progressives. To look at it from another perspective: in what way were the Bolsheviks different from any other self-interested urauthority, and how, other than in rhetoric, which I hope we can agree to dismiss as meaningless, was the Russian Revolution different from a sovereign bankruptcy using the Wand of Fnargl? In what way is Lenin a worse Receiver than Charles Edward Stuart, and by what consistent criterion is this determined?

My notes: Moldbug's "Reciever" is a sort of extreme executive selected to "formalize" a sovereign corporation (nation) so as to restructure debt into equity.

Moldbug characterizes himself as a pronomian; a supporter of having formal ownership match actual control. The problem with this in having a moral theory that bases ownership off de facto control is that if the Bolshevik Party, say, were to control a sovcorp, there would be no justification for opposing them. Moldbug's theory suggests that you can only defend the status quo, and if it is overturned, then you must defend the new order once it has been established and so on. The problem is that this gives us no reason to support or oppose specific schemes of control, yet he irrationally jumps straight to his particular CEO based scheme, and at no point (up to part 11 at least) gives us any justification for this that follows from his initial theory. The problem lies between the ethereal distinction between pronomianism and antinomianism; today's antinomian is tomorrow's pronomian.

TL;DR: if you follow his logic you should end up opportunistically supporting whatever happens to have been established, not particularly favoring a capitalist order over a socialist order (which is only an inegalitarian sovcorp versus an egalitarian sovcorp - sovcoop - in his theory).

[SolarCross]

As you can probably guess from what I’ve been writing, I’m not totally against the idea of someone being appointed for life to a fairly powerful position. I understand and agree with your reasoning for the most part as well. In the case you’re stating though, there would need to be a way of removing this king when necessary. A king with almost total power over the military (with a long and well-connected family tree to back them up) with additional powers of a “credible lawgiver” is not like a figurehead. What do you would think would stop them from trying to take over government?

I appreciate your open mindedness. An absolute monarch like Louis the XIV, Charlemagne, Sulieman the Magnificent, Qin Shi Huang, Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, can't take over the government because they are the government.

The more people on the committee the less likely the agreement made will be rational. It might not produce results quite as bad as universal suffrage does but still you are looking at divisive factionalism and compromise candidates resulting.

Factionalism isn’t a bad thing, the first clear reason being that it prevents one person or group from dominating the whole political scene and it makes your opponents concerned with their performance compared to yours. Added to this, if the council’s job was to appoint a king once in every 30 or 40 years roughly, no one would see it as worthwhile to develop parties and groups dedicated to the achievement of their aims. Not for much more than 2 weeks anyway.

In theory that's how it supposed to work but in practice it doesn't ever work like that. When there is one clear single individual in charge of a project or organisation, no matter if we are talking about a local corner shop or an empire billions of souls strong, then you have an administrator that can only succeed through the success of the project, there is no one else to blame. Divided command introduces another way to succeed: the failure of the rival. All successful organisations have unity of command, none have divided command. No one in business or in religion or charitable organisations or military organisations has any doubt of that, only in government does anyone ever think divided command is desirable or feasible and nevermind the appalling results. Even if we are talking about a council appointing the administrator every 30 or 40 years there will certainly be far sighted organisations scheming to get their man into the job, churches, business corporations, even big charities like greenpeace not to mention rival governments of other countries. And whoever wins out and gets their man in the job has a king in their pocket. It would still be miles better than the orgy of criminality that is democratic politics but still less than ideal.

Are you saying that the reason you don’t think it’s as good as inheritance is because it’s less used?

It is an indicator that it isn't ideal, if we believe successful stable solutions tend to outcompete less successful solutions. The Catholic Church is not just nearly the only example of this method of choosing a monarch it also shows over its long history some of the reasons why it doesn't always work out so well. Factionalism over which prospective pope would get the job quite frequently resulted in more than one pope at a time. google "antipopes".

I’m concerned about the concentration of power being with one person and potentially for a lifetime.

Concentration of power is the same thing as unity of command. The latter label few would claim was a bad thing but somehow under the ideological sway of the progressives the former label is considered bad, very bad, and nevermind that concentration of power and unity of command are exactly the same thing. Funny eh?

[Rejn]

Without telling me your life story or offering anecdotes of any kind, could someone please outline the main points of this ideology?

[SolarCross]

Without telling me your life story or offering anecdotes of any kind, could someone please outline the main points of this ideology?

Neo-reactionaries say that:
- democracy is bad.
- less democracy is better than more democracy
- no democracy at all is best.

- The ideal society is like Karl Popper's Open Society but the progressive democracies are not that society. Popper's alternative society is the Loyal Society where thought is managed to some extent by a central information coordinator (heresy, sedition) but progressive democracies are not that either. Progressive societies are a new type of society which has all the thought distortion (and more) of the Loyal Society but without the central coordinator. They call this the self organising consensus society.

- Government should be small, sharp and strong not big, confused and weak. Historically absolute monarchies are the former and democracies are the latter. There may be a way to have small, sharp and strong government without using the traditional absolute monarchy model through using something like the joint stock company model, this is neo-cameralism.

[Paul Sanderson]

I appreciate your open mindedness. An absolute monarch like Louis the XIV, Charlemagne, Sulieman the Magnificent, Qin Shi Huang, Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, can't take over the government because they are the government.

No problem. I mean someone who is in complete control of the military and is a credible law giver as you say. In this example it doesn’t sound as though the king is the government, how would you stop him overthrowing it?

When there is one clear single individual in charge of a project or organisation, no matter if we are talking about a local corner shop or an empire billions of souls strong, then you have an administrator that can only succeed through the success of the project, there is no one else to blame.

There is often someone else to blame, not least when it isn’t actually your fault. In the Premier League though, I understand managers tend to be treated as if they ruined everything for the team when things go wrong. If the monarch actually is to blame however, what do you suggest to do with them then?

Divided command introduces another way to succeed: the failure of the rival. All successful organisations have unity of command, none have divided command. No one in business or in religion or charitable organisations or military organisations has any doubt of that, only in government does anyone ever think divided command is desirable or feasible and nevermind the appalling results.

Politics has to be treated differently to everything else. Besides, if the military takes its orders from the government, and the government doesn’t have a unity of command, does the military have a unity of command? Even within politics though there is someone at the top who represents the most powerful person. In what ways would you describe the British government as having a divided command?

Even if we are talking about a council appointing the administrator every 30 or 40 years there will certainly be far sighted organisations scheming to get their man into the job, churches, business corporations, even big charities like greenpeace not to mention rival governments of other countries. And whoever wins out and gets their man in the job has a king in their pocket. It would still be miles better than the orgy of criminality that is democratic politics but still less than ideal.

Why would people not try to persuade this king how to behave while he was in office? If he’s going to be there for life it would be a worthwhile investment or energy and money to do so. And this is one of the problems with having so much power in one man’s hands, if he’s particularly feeble he will be easily influenced by his advisors, friends or anyone else who has a lot of influence.

It is an indicator that it isn't ideal, if we believe successful stable solutions tend to outcompete less successful solutions.

Then that could be an argument as to why democracy is better than monarchy.

The Catholic Church is not just nearly the only example of this method of choosing a monarch it also shows over its long history some of the reasons why it doesn't always work out so well. Factionalism over which prospective pope would get the job quite frequently resulted in more than one pope at a time. google "antipopes".

This would be a problem of any system that involves appointment/election by some kind of popular consent. With hereditary kings though, it wouldn’t go smoothly for very long. Even if you have a system of rigid rules in place that set out who will become king next. Someone will in the end overthrow the king, they always do. Then something else that always happens, one of the former kings’ descendants claim they are the rightful heir to the throne and this breeds a more dangerous type of factionalism.

Concentration of power is the same thing as unity of command. The latter label few would claim was a bad thing but somehow under the ideological sway of the progressives the former label is considered bad, very bad, and nevermind that concentration of power and unity of command are exactly the same thing. Funny eh?

True that people tend to reword inconvenient truths. But my point was that concentration of power shouldn’t be in one person’s hands for a lifetime. I suppose we haven’t discussed whether there actually can be a concentration of power if it’s not in one person’s hands. So I’ll wait to hear what you say about that one.

[quetzalcoatl]

Delete, pls.

[quetzalcoatl]

I object to the adjective "demotic" being randomly tossed around. Demotic derived from hieratic Egyptian writing used by the priestly caste. Demotic was one of the three languages on the Rosetta Stone. If you want to use it as an adjective, a more reasonable synonym would be "sacerdotal."

Neo-reactionaries say that:
- democracy is bad.
- less democracy is better than more democracy
- no democracy at all is best.

- The ideal society is like Karl Popper's Open Society but the progressive democracies are not that society. Popper's alternative society is the Loyal Society where thought is managed to some extent by a central information coordinator (heresy, sedition) but progressive democracies are not that either. Progressive societies are a new type of society which has all the thought distortion (and more) of the Loyal Society but without the central coordinator. They call this the self organising consensus society.

- Government should be small, sharp and strong not big, confused and weak. Historically absolute monarchies are the former and democracies are the latter. There may be a way to have small, sharp and strong government without using the traditional absolute monarchy model through using something like the joint stock company model, this is neo-cameralism.

No society can long survive without a balance of two tendencies. Tendency (1) is the hierarchical organization of the tribe, and by extension, the government. Tendency (2) is the formation of CAS (complex adaptive systems) which you have described as a self-organizing consensus society. Note that CAS is an inevitable development in large complex societies - unfortunately they tend to become inflexible, which is where tendency (1) needs to intervene.

Your three points of neo-reactionaryism illustrate another tendency: taking a formal ideological stance to a point where it self-destructs. There is no ideal amount of democracy, just as there is no ideal size of government; these calculations are entirely dependent on context.