instead of moving the people across the borders, we should move the borders across the people. What people are really voting for, when they vote with their feet, is imperialism. They want to be ruled by foreigners.
This is an oversimplification, of course. But there is a core truth (not at all imperialistic), which is that it would be better to allow people to choose a government rather than be forced to accept a government based on where they happen to have been born, or even where they currently reside. I have suggested the idea of “virtual federalism:” someone residing in Maryland could choose to live under the government of Texas. My progressive friends could have their preferred government, and I could have mine.
Your progressive friends prefer not to let you have the freedom to live under the government you prefer. The hallmark of extremists on both sides is that they prefer to impose their version of government on you.
Only some Republicans prefer individual freedom as libertarians do. Progressives, on the other hand, believe only in mass movements, hive minds, and everyone suffers equally. Bad outcomes are not a problem as long as everyone is subjected to them.
So, I take it you are a fan of flags of convenience and Delaware corporations?
Honest question. I think you can make arguments for and against, and my instinct is to tend toward for as well. But I think most people see these as kinda shady dodges, and we need to either address that better or argue that more comprehensive competitive government would be different from those similar looking examples.
Most people don’t realize that perhaps even a large majority of their lives are already this way to at least some extent. Are we not to some extent endorsing some portion of Chinese governance, for perhaps a very inflammatory example, when we buy so many Chinese goods?
Thanks Arnold.
I don’t think your version is very practical though. Countries are first clubs for mutual defence, and it’s hard to defend people if they are scattered all over the world. Which is why we have borders.
Plus, for a lot of club goods, like roads. It wouldn’t be very practical to provide roads for citizens who were living everywhere.
But governments do lots of things. For instance, setting up commercial regulatory regimes. And US companies are often allowed to choose which foreign regime suits them best, even when it is as odds with local rules.
There is the example of corporations chartering in Delaware, or banks getting national charters. And it is entirely common for companies to put ‘choice of law’ provisions in their contracts, and specify which state’s laws will govern, and which state’s courts will adjudicate, in the event of any dispute between parties, with provisions extremely generous in granting jurisdiction even if the nexus to the chosen state is very tenuous, and the bulk of the important aspects of the case were all located in another state.
This is completely typical in international law as well, where, for example, terms insisting that disputes be resolved in Geneva or London under public international commercial law as deemed legal by those arbitration bodies even if the host countries of the counterparites would take a different view were they to preside over the dispute. As for domestic affairs, contractual parties may specify that their disputes must be resolved by binding arbitration outside the government judicial system, a regime which Congress has long supported and which the Supreme Court has recently issued yet another holding in a long line of rulings affirming the practice.
Furthermore, until relatively recently, there was much more tolerance in Anglo-American law for pre-nuptual or contractual provisions in family law and wills, trusts, and estates to make certain religious laws operative, and grant designated religious tribunals jurisdiction, in the event of any critical life event. To the extent that civilian courts refuse to honor such provisions today, it is mostly because they are reluctant to get involved in anything religious and to make any religious determinations on their own, especially if they go against typical public policy. But even today many people still abide by these religious rules and tribunals and judgments with a tacit agreement and social norm that it is not appropriate to appeal to the civilian courts even when one is unhappy with the ruling in their case.
The principle is that when parties can voluntarily agree between themselves which regime shall govern, they should be permitted to do so.
When that is not feasible, such as with the rules regulating local community norms, conditions, and non-contractual interactions between strangers, and in matters of collective defense, then obviously local default rules should apply, from which it would nevertheless be relatively easy for any individual to escape, if not to their liking and willing to abandon the benefits of living within the community, by simply moving out and finding some other place that suits them better, and which is reciprocally willing to accept their entrance.
Countries are not clubs for mutual defense. Countries are places controlled by a single authority that taxes the residents and prevents others from challenging its taxing authority, by force if necessary. The residents get taxed, but get a symbiotic benefit from the fact that they are protected, by the authorities, from the chaos and destruction that would result from multiple taxing agencies fighting over the territory.
The taxing authority will also build infrastructure and in other ways add value to the territory and population it owns. Thus, a country can be thought of as having roughly the economics of a farm (as Orwell famously noted).
Your scenario is too sweet. The AngloSaxon did not decide one day to be taxed by the Norman overlords. The Sioux did not choose to be ruled by the American government. They lost and had no choice.
As a rule, people do not prefer to be ruled by foreigners. Who Did you hear about wars of independence?
Arnold’s virtual federalism is very practical. In fact on its basic premise ot is the most practical. Because it is really just federalism when you place the appropriate government functions at the correct level/scales of government. Defense is one of the only things that needs a national level (and not even all defense which is embarrassingly non-obvious to some). Etcetera.
Is there a,national interested in interstates? Maybe a little. But they don’t have to annex the property and finance and build them. They want a coherent system so extortion and bribery are in order. And lo and behold that is more or less how it is done with highway dollars. I am often amused at how we approach (2nd best) methods libertarians would advocate but are stubborn enough to put different ideological patinas over them. In the US we usually do the right thing after trying everything else first, but we never ever admit to it.
Texas is still open, as is Maryland. Isn’t this a case of revealed choice?