Between State and Anarchy:

A Model of Governance

by Fred E. Foldvary

School of Management

John F. Kennedy University

Anarchy & Liberty Seminar

Université du Québec à Hull

1. The moral basis for just governance

2. Communitarian democracy

3. Secession

4. Public finance

5. Geo-archism between anarchism and minarchism

1. The moral basis for just governance

The relationship between anarchy, liberty, and governance first requires an ethical basis from which to draw political and economic policy conclusions. John Locke provided the basic framework for an objective universal ethic. However, Locke did not provide a derivation. I will first provide a derivation for the universal ethic, based on my book The Soul of Liberty (1980), and then apply it to the question of proper governance.

In his Second Treatise (1947, p. 123), Locke stated:

"The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it which obliges every one; and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind who will but consult it that, being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions...."

This pithy statement summarizes the premises and contents of the Locke's natural law, which is the universal ethic that will be derived here. I define "morality" as "the assignment of moral values by an ethic." This concept can be expressed as:

V 7 e(A)

where A is an act performed by a person, e is some ethic, and V is one of the four moral values good, evil, neutral, and undetermined. The value V is assigned by the ethic e applied to act A. The issue at hand is whether there exists some universal ethic "u" which is independent of cultural and personal values despite the premise of subjective values, that all values only originate in individual interests and the culture of individuals.

Locke states, "and reason, which is that law". The universal ethic is derived using reason, and reason implies that it is a non-arbitrary, hence rational, ethic. But in order to derive such an ethic, we must be able to recognize it once we have concluded its rules. How will we know that we have achieved a rational, universal ethic? We need criteria.

Locke, in the statement quoted above, stated that "reason ... teaches all mankind" and that persons are "all equal and independent". The key word here is "all". The domain of the universal ethic (the "A" in the argument) must include all persons; it is universal in applying to all persons in all cultures and all times and places. This is the first criterion.

The universal ethic must also be "comprehensive," which means that all the acts of a person are included in its domain. Clearly, it would lose universality if any acts were excluded. Hence, all acts are included, and this forms the second criterion regarding the domain of the ethic.

There are also two criteria regarding the ethic itself. As Locke wrote, it is reason which teaches it to mankind; hence the ethic must be logically derived, its conclusion consistent with its premises.

Reason also requires that the premises themselves be non-arbitrary, not based on any personal or cultural views or values, or any authorities. This is the second criterion for the ethic itself, making four criteria in total: 1) universality regarding persons, 2) comprehensiveness regarding acts, 3) logical consistency, 4) non-arbitrary premises.

The ontological basis for the universal ethic, the basis for its existence, is that it uniquely fits the criteria. The acceptance of the criteria imply that if one can present an ethic that uniquely fits them, then that ethic is indeed the universal ethic. These criteria imply that, if it exists, the universal ethic must be unique. A second universal ethic must either have different and conflicting premises, or else its rules would be compatible with the first, enabling the two to be merged into one ethic. Hence, there can only be one set of consistent and universal moral rules.

The Premises of the Universal Ethic

Where, then, shall we obtain our premises for the derivation? I turn once again to Locke: "The state of nature has a law of nature". The "law of nature" is the "universal ethic". It is an "ethic of nature" existing in "the state of nature". What is this "nature"? Clearly, it is not the nature of the stars or the atoms, but the nature of what the ethic applies to: persons. The nature of human beings (and whichever other species may be "persons") is such that it contains or implies an ethic. The premises from which the universal ethic can be derived therefore regard human nature (