I am really tired of the fact that people confuse certain political positions, maybe due to ignorance, or maybe due to the heavy propaganda against it. Certainly the propaganda against more liberty oriented positions is enormous, constantly pushed in the media, so I can’t blame people for misinterpreting certain positions.

I want to introduce an accurate political compass so that we can settle once and for all all kinds of political misconceptions about different political positions. The compass is based on my understanding of politics, which I am pretty well knowledged about, plus I have discovered a lot of propaganda elements aimed against both the leftists and the right-wingers, so it’s time to clear the confusion.

Basically there are 2 dimensions:

• One for the level of coercion, in one side no coercion in the other side full coercion
• The other dimension measures the level of collectivism, either pure individualism or pure collectivism

First of all I don’t use the word Authoritarian, I think it’s a propaganda word, which has been changed it’s meaning. Authoritarian=/=Coercive, it certainly doesn’t, in most cases it does, but it doesn’t necessarily have to:

• For example the Roman Republic was very authoritarian, in the sense that the public officials were revered. Yet it had the smallest amount of taxes and the most amount of public liberty that you could get. Taxes were around 2% of your wealth, no income tax, poor and working people didn’t pay taxes, only land owners. And everyone had access to public trials, corruption was low (initially) and it was a very decent society. Despite the fact that politicians were revered, and discipline was enforced, it was one of the freest societies, if not the freest society that humanity has ever lived in. So it was authoritarian but it was not very coercive, probably the closest example of Anarcho-Capitalism.

Then secondly, Collectivism=/=Coercion, it certainly doesn’t. It might just mean cooperation, or a sense of community, it doesn’t necessarily imply the use of force. It might, but it doesn’t have to.

So these are 2 misconceptions, that once you understand, you will see through the propaganda and see the true compass, which is like this:

Now you can see the clear picture. I used to be a full Anarcho-Capitalist/Individualist, but I have realized that pure individualism, would be good, but there are 7,500,000,000 people on the planet, so it’s kind of hard to imagine individualism on such a large scale. So some kind of cooperation is unfortunately necessary. If galactic travel would be possible, then people could settle on a different planet, but for now, pure individualism is unfortunately improbable. So now I am a centrist, a centrist voluntarist. Of course I despise coercion, that’s not even up to discussion.

So I personally believe that the left and right can sort of work together, and both public and private property can coexist in a voluntary manner. Things like blockchains, based on voluntary cooperation, but they also include pure private property in the forms of private keys.

So it’s certainly possible. I am not sure how direct-democracy would work out though, so that is why I insist the sovereignty of private property, but that doesn’t mean that cooperatives can’t exist in their own domain.

So a mixture of left and right ideas in the voluntary spectrum is very much possible.

Now let’s take each sector and explain it in more detail:

Coercive-Collectivism

This is the “Stalin model”. It’s basically enforced equality for the entire population, from top down, by a ruling class or party, while the ruling class is above the law obviously. So basically equal slavery and tyranny for the citizenry, while the party leaders live in luxorious conditions.

It’s also the 1984 Ingsoc model, although that is a little bit different, since there is a hierarchy, so except that, but it’s not a monarchic model, the Ingsoc model is closely resembling this one.

Basically nobody has any property, all property is collective, bureaucratically managed by State-appointed officials. Tyranny, labor camps, political persecution is the norm. Possibly genocide and torture is also used by the secret police.

The economy is State-Capitalism, as the state manages everything, and masquarades itself as if it were “collective or public property”, when infact it’s state property directly controlled by the Party.

The Party is the oligarchic class ruling, usually a 1 party system, possibly other parties serving as controlled opposition, or perhaps underground parties or resistances like Emannuel Goldstein, but of course either controlled oppositions or fabrications.

Absolute-Monarchy

The absolute monarchy is not as bad as the CC model. Although tyranny and totalitarianism is the norm there. Also labor camps for political dissidents, secret police, surveillance, propaganda and so on are also the norm.

The difference is that here there is no enforced equality. People can rise up the ladder of power, but only if they got good connections and behave well.

So obedience is rewarded with positive “perks” and disobedience is heavily punished. So for example mind-control schemes like you see now in China, where they reward credit breaks for party loyalty is a good example.

So there is private property here, but only conditional. If you get out of line, your property gets confiscated and you get thrown into a labor camp.

Every economic action is heavily regulated and permit based, so you only have the freedom to do most economic actions if you buy a permit. Of course not all of them, certain industries are only licensed towards the oligarchs like: natural resources, gold mining, electricity services, infrastructure services.

Of course heavy taxes are levied from any economic activity, and permits are required for almost anything. So freedom is not free here.

It’s kind of like a fascist model but it’s worse than that, probably if Hitler and Mussolini had won the war in a few decades their country would have transformed into this model, but it wasn’t like this initially.

There is also a stock market in this system, but the stock market is only for the oligarchs, and permit is required to join it. So any kind of investments or white collar professions are only for the oligarch class.

While most people are forced into manual labor, sustenance farming, and other awful jobs, of course heavily taxed and regulated.

Anarcho-Capitalism

Its is well known. This model is free of coercion. So both rich and poor people live peacefully next to eachother. There will not be an ultra-rich class, since with the absence of coercion (which is what most of these billionaire’s wealths are based on), the wealth will be more equally distributed. Not through violence but through equality of opportunity.

Certainly without taxes, regulations and coercive IP laws, I would guarantee you that poverty would be eliminated and people would be so much wealthier on average.

The problem is that I am not sure the Elite would let this happen. As Chomsky said it, the wealthy class would never approve Anarcho-Capitalism, since most of their wealth comes from big taxpayer subsidies (banksters) and State-enforced monopolies.

So even though Ancap is a noble goal, it’s very hard to achieve, and what is to stop the Elite from forming a State? Nothing.

So I think more public participation is needed to keep the Elite in check.

Anarcho-Communism

Of course pure Ancom is not good either, since democracy can easily be subverted. I have been in many committees in high-school and college, and the sort of utopian model that communists believe in that everyone will just cooperate is utterly false.

What you see in these “voluntary committees” are nothing less that influence peddling, backstabbing, cynicism, conflicts between influential members, and strive for personal power. Period.

So it’s kind of hard to imagine a direct democracy where everyone will cooperate, instead of chasing their own greedy goals.

So people must be very careful if they surrender their individual liberty to a “democratic committee”, it can easily become a bureaucracy that will rule over them.

So there must always be private property, as an insurance, against if or when collectivism turns coervice.

For example a blockchain is direct democracy, close to the Ancom model. But what is to stop some lunatics of implementing a 50% tax there as a patch? Nothing. So you must always have the option to bail out, take your money out and run, if things get crazy.

So private property must be an insurance against coercion if things go south.

Conclusion

So this is why I am a centrist now. You need public participation to keep the Elites in check. But you also need private property as an insurance if things go south, so that you can bail and run.

There is too much optimism and faith in the Elites, and there is too much optimism and faith in the altruism of the collective.

I want the realist position, so I am a centrist. And whatever happens, coercion is never an option.

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Sources:

• Julius Caesar portrait by Gautier Poupeau from Paris, France (César) CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
• Adolf Hitler portrait by Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-H1216-0500-002 CC BY-SA 3.0 de, via Wikimedia Commons
• Mao Tse-tung portrait by Georg Denda CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
• Murray Rothbard portrait by Ludwig von Mises Institute, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
• Ludwig von Mises portrait by Ludwig von Mises Institute, GFDL or CC-BY-SA-3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

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