First Week of classes

Last night the discussion in public choice class ran along the lines of contrasting Hobbes and Locke as two fairly contemporary and different ways of viewing the world. To this day they seem to remain the paradigm which captures the minds of political thinkers. Hobbes is represented by a spectrum of anarchy and order, while Locke is more focused on the presence of individual liberty. 

 

I am trying to think of these principles as co-existing. Order seems to be conceptually open to both oppressive regimes and those that preserve liberty. The market is one way to preserve order without the presence of oppression. If this is true, then I come closer to understanding the distaste for anarchy which I held before learning more about folks who assert anarcho-capitalism. However, I know I am abusing what they mean. They tend to see order as a top down command. I rather see order as something which is predictable. In rational expectation terms, order should be that environment where people’s models for behavior have the lowest cost for updating. This would mean an environment where feedback transmits the clearest of information.

 

Oppression is not likely to do this. Surrendering rights to a supreme power seems likely to distort feedback. For example, take airport security. Because the airlines all have centrally provided airport security, the necessary precautions which need to be taken, can not be divorced from the fear managing tactics which are meant to reassure people, and finally the frivolous things we do because the bureaucracy is path dependant. If different airlines were allowed to try different schemes, a market outcome would be more trustworthy at least. Maybe there are people who will take higher levels of risk, to not be searched.

 

 Fear of Anarchy leads to loss of liberty. This was given. Is there a love of anarchy which will then lead to more liberty? It seems possible within the given framework. The problem here is that I have changed the definition of anarchy again. Chaos, is to be accepted as a part of life, not to be embraced. Anarchy must then be something attractive in order to embrace it. Could chaos / Anarchy be tolerated? This might be the point which comes out in the wash. Since Anarchy is no worse than oppression we tolerate Anarchy because its threat is temporary, folks have a propensity to organize and then eliminate the chaos.

 

This brings me to where I leave Hobbes (with my current level of understanding). In a Hobbesian world people seem not to band together in tribes. The social contract has very little reason to disintegrate with the abuse of power. In the order is stable, then I cannot explain history. In light of counter examples, it seems that the order is a temporary fix to adverse circumstances. I take the point of the consequences of order – leviathan, but don’t dismiss the very real presence of chaos even in the most structured of worlds. Liberty then becomes a measure which propels what I then to think of as good society. It should explain the difference between well integrated and fallen societies regardless of the Hobbesian spectrum.