Anarkokapitalismista

Tässä on tiivistetty lyhyesti ja ytimekkäästi juuri se, mitä olen vuosikaudet yrittänyt turhaan pukea sanoiksi: "Competition in goods and services is a market. Competition in force is war." - "Kilpailu tavaroiden ja palvelujen osalta on markkinat. Kilpailu voimankäytön osalta on sota." Anarkokapitalistit näkevät aivan oikein, miten markkinat pystyvät tuottamaan jonkin hyödykkeen tehokkaammin kuin julkinen valta. Mitä he eivät näe, on että jos myös se väkivalta, joka on tällä hetkellä julkisen vallan monopolina, asetetaan avoimesti kilpailtavaksi, tuo kilpailu ei tapahdu niinkään siitä, kuka tuottaa suojelupalveluja tehokkaimmin, vaan siitä, kuka tuota väkivaltaa käyttäen pystyy ensimmäisenä nitistämään kilpailijansa - ja siis muodostamaan valtion. Robert J. Bidinotto, (joka tosin on objektivisti) on tiivistänyt useimmat muista tärkeistä anarkokapitalismin vastaisista argumenteista tekstissään "The Contradiction in Anarchism", joten en katso tarpeelliseksi kerrata niitä tässä.

Iloista kulutusjuhlaa!

Tänään on kulutusta vastustavien sosialistien julistama "Älä osta mitään" päivä, joten nyt kaikki shoppailemaan! Illan kuluessa ehtii vielä vaikka tehdä jouluostoksia ennakkoon. Itse kävin ostamassa Terry Pratchettin uusimman kirjan Going Postal, Chanelin deodoranttia, lasinpaloista ja peileistä tehdyn joulukoristeen sekä kouvolan lakritsia. Ei oikeastaan olisi ollut varaa, mutta olin pihistellyt varta vasten tätä päivää varten, ja kerrankos sitä nyt hyvän asia puolesta. Kaupoissa oli aika ruuhkaista, joten kävin vielä rentoutumassa Cafe Esplanadessa kupillisella kaakaota ja mustikkapiirakalla. Taustalla jammailivat saksofoni ja basso livenä.

Elections in Ukraine

I'm excited to see, whether Ukraine will become a president-led pseudo-democracy like its neighbours Belarus and Russia, or will it choose the path of Serbia and Georgia and rise against the fraud.

The Netherlands: Some light in the dark

The murder of the film director Theo van Gogh by a religious fundamentalist might produce at least one positive outcome. It is suggested, that the blasphemy laws of the Netherlands would finally be abolished. (news) This would be a beautiful mark of respect to Theo van Gogh, or anybody killed or threatened for his or her religious opinions.

Obligatory voting in Belgium

The main stream parties in Belgium have done their utmost to stop the advance of the extreme right wing Vlaams Blok. Last week Belgium's highest court ruled that Vlaams Blok is a racist party, which means that the party will lose access to state funding and to television, which, in a country where the rest of the main parties are publicly funded and have secured their share of the broadcasting time in the state-owned television, effectively means shuting down the party. This seems to only have increased the support of Vlaams Blok, as we can see from this poll. However, this news shows, that all the exertion of the establishment to suppress Vlaam Blok by using government coercion is as unnecessary as it is ineffective. They should just abolish the the law obliging Belgians to vote, and the support of the Vlaams Blok would fall to the half of the current.

Johan Norberg in Helsinki

I met yesterday evening for the first time the world-famous Swedish liberal thinker Johan Norberg at a public meeting in the restaurant Memphis, Helsinki. He seemed to be as pleasant and intelligent as I had predicted. Unfortunately I had to work late, so when I came there, the meeting was almost over. The discussion had likely been about the free trade and globalisation, as the Finnish translation of Norberg's book In Defence of Global Capitalism has just recently been published.

Since I have read news that the traditionally pro-market Swedish conservative party, Moderaterna, has shifted to the Left, I used the opportunity to ask Norberg how he predicts that the other Swedish non-socialist parties, particularly the liberal Folkpartiet will react. Will they fill the space that Moderaterna left empty, or will they try to compete for the same leftist voters with Moderaterna. Norberg, who have close relations with both the youth organisations of Moderaterna and Folkpartiet, told me that there are many in Folkpartiet who would like to turn their party into a great market liberal party, but the party's headstrong old social liberals would rather die than change.

I'm afraid that if Moderaterna will permanently shift to the Left and Folkpartiet will fail to reform itself into a market liberal party, there will be no hope for Sweden to become a real market economy anytime in the foreseeable future. So I wish all the best for the market liberals of Folkpartiet.

Tervetuloa / Welcome

Päätinpä sitten minäkin aloittaa weblogin. Kirjoittelen tänne suomeksi ja/tai englanniksi, kumpi milloinkin sattuu miellyttämään minua. Kutsun itseäni mieluiten liberaaliksi, mutta tarkemmin ottaen minua voisi kuvata termeillä klassinen liberaali, markkinaliberaali tai libertaari. Kirjoitukseni on kirjoitettu lähinnä tästä näkökulmasta.

So I decided to start a weblog, as well. I will write here in Finnish and/or in English, whichever happens to please me the most at the moment. I prefer to call myself liberal, but I could be described more precisely as a classical liberal, market liberal or libertarian. My writings are written mostly from this point of view.