If everyone consents to the laws, then Ruritania is an anarcho-capitalist utopia and there's no reason for intervention in the first place. If not everyone consents (as would always be the case in reality, of course), then the new regime wouldn't be doing anything new in forcing itself on the people.
You said "They chose to submit to the old government, [whereas] you would have forced the new one on them with violence."Originally Posted by Swordsmyth
So, you're criticizing the new regime for forcing the people to obey, contra the old one which (allegedly) didn't force them to obey, no?
I still don't know what you mean.The best case scenario to justify your invasion.
It's inappropriate to treat sovereignty as property in the libertarian sense of the word.That argument only applies to the first person to seize power for himself, if we ignore the possibility of sovereign power being granted by GOD it still can be inherited, whether by a monarch or a member of the citizen partners, if nobody has a better claim then inheritance is a legitimate method of acquiring property.
Sovereignty is a thing of value held by one or more persons therefore it is property...
All ethics concern property. Any time one is making ethical statements about what someone should or should not do, one is speaking of property rights. Communism or shariah is a theory of property rights as much as libertarianism is. Ethical systems differ only in the specific property rules they endorse. For example, libertarianism endorses the rule of freedom of contract, while Shariah does not. One can speak of sovereignty as property only in the general sense in which all ethical concepts concern property. That is the extent of it. It is inappropriate to treat sovereignty as property in the uniquely libertarian sense of the word, because the reasons for which we as libertarians want property to be respected do not apply in the case of sovereignty.
The deontological justification for property doesn't apply in the case of sovereignty (it was not acquired legitimately, by homesteading, contract, or restitution, and so the "owner" has no fundamental right to it). As for the consequentialist justification, one would have to show that treating sovereignty as you are results in some material advantage resulted; whereas, in fact, by treating sovereignty as property in the libertarian sense, and declaring that the overthrow of a tyrannical state is equivalent to theft, you are creating worse practical results than would obtain otherwise.
A monarch can be treated as if he owned the country for the purpose of economic analysis. This is very different from the ethical claim that he owns the sovereign power, which, on my view, he most certainly does not. The legitimacy of his power is contingent on how he employs it. If he abuses it, and it is possible to remove him and replace him with something better, that is entirely just: not a theft of "his property."your theories of monarchy are predicated on the monarch owning this property.
Yes, I understand that you believe that sovereignty is the property (in the libertarian sense) of the people; that the legitimacy of a government of the people does not depend on what that government does; that removing such a government, no matter that it is very bad and its replacement very good, is unjust, and equivalent to a theft.I believe that the citizens of our society should hold it collectively and delegate it to someone who will minimize aggression, but I am a member of our society and one of the "partners" who hold title to it's sovereignty therefore I have a say, elsewhere others hold sovereignty wholly or collectively and it is theft to seize it from them and redistribute it to whomever you or I choose.
Suffice it to say, I disagree, for the reason that my goal is aggression-minimization, which the above contradicts.
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