Limits of State Power
POSTED BY: SergeantX
UPDATED: Sunday, December 14, 2025 21:53
VIEWED: 37205
PAGE 23 of 36
Quote:In this case, you've got it bassakwards. Let's do a thought experiment. Let's say that the economic world is composed of just a few big players... one or two agricultural corporations, three or four clothing manufacturers, one chipmaker, an automobile maker or two etc. They all operate on the same principle: maximize profit, screw the worker. Maybe they're even in direct collusion... they set wages in consultation with with each other, they blacklist troublemakers etc. There's no law FOR it.... but there's no law against it either.
I'm simply disagreeing with your attempt to equate economic power with political power. The source of our disagreement is in your denial of what I consider obvious: economic power is dependent on political power (law).
Now, let's assume you're a worker. You're starving to death. Your child is malnourished and deathly ill. Your family lives one step away from the sidewalk. You need a better life or just a chance at life. What are your options?
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We should have strapped him into a glider, filled it nose heavy w/ explosives, and dropped his Allah lovin' ass into a large, empty field. After which, release wild boars into the area so they could make good use of his remains. Now THAT's justice.- rappy
Yeah, that's what Sheikh Issa said. Seems you both have a lot in common.- signy
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Bump for Sarge.
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We should have strapped him into a glider, filled it nose heavy w/ explosives, and dropped his Allah lovin' ass into a large, empty field. After which, release wild boars into the area so they could make good use of his remains. Now THAT's justice.- rappy
Yeah, that's what Sheikh Issa said. Seems you both have a lot in common.- signy
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Oh, fuck you Geezer.
Thanks, but I don't think you're my type. Besides, Madame Geezer is a good shot.
Quote:
I could cite nation after nation and incident after incident, but you with your background, of all people, know the stats as well as I do.
Surprisingly hard to find stats on starvation deaths by nation. I did find the Global Hunger Index, which shows most hunger in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia.
http://www.ifpri.org/pubs/cp/ghi08.pdf
From looking at the list on page 17 of the report (higher numbers = more hunger), most countries with hunger problems are those in a constant cycle of revolution or without government alltogether (DR Congo, Madagascar, Rwanda), countries using starvation as a tool to control or exterminate ethnic or religious minorities (Mynanmar, Sudan), countries using food for political control of the population (Zimbabwe, North Korea), and countries where the government is a Kleptocracy and the political leaders will starve the population to line their own pockets (Nigeria, Togo).
Of countries with the biggest capitalist economies (U.S., Canada, Western Europe, Australia, Japan, etc.), where your line of thought would indicate the capitalists are paying their workers less than starvation wages, not one is even on the list.
"Keep the Shiny side up"
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
In this case, you've got it bassakwards. Let's do a thought experiment. Let's say that the economic world is composed of just a few big players... one or two agricultural corporations, three or four clothing manufacturers, one chipmaker, an automobile maker or two etc. They all operate on the same principle: maximize profit, screw the worker. Maybe they're even in direct collusion... they set wages in consultation with with each other, they blacklist troublemakers etc. There's no law FOR it.... but there's no law against it either.
Sounds good so far, but digging a little deeper you see that without government support, they are powerless. Their money is only good if the government backs it. Their contracts are meaningless without the court system. They have no military and very little ability to defend themselves militarily.
You keep jumping to this moralistic level, all indignant as though I'm cheering for abuse of the powerless or something. All I'm doing is making the very dry, logical point that whatever power companies have is dependent on a structured government to support it. If the support goes away, the companies are powerless.
I'll break it down more. What happens to the company when the government "quits taking their phone calls"? When the police no longer look after their property. When the courts no longer enforce their contracts. When the state no long honors the value of their money? At that point they're no longer the rich and powerful elite. They're just some pushy people in suits stand in the midst of a bunch of expensive factories and offices.
SergeantX
"It's cold and it's a broken hallelujah"
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The Soviet union wasn't brought down through politics or war, it was brought down largely through economics. Apparently Economic power is as powerful as political power.
You say you're making some very dry logical point, sarge, and I grant it's dry but I'm not confident of the overall logic. You seem to be starting from one premise, then only looking at things in a way that can support that premise. So without political power supporting currency and contracts companies have no power? That rather assumes that those that control production wouldn't find some other way to make up for that loss, doesn't it? These pushy people in suits still have those factories, and if money and contracts are now worthless production will equal power. If I have a factory, and someone else doesn't, that's the basis of political power anyway.
Turn your one sided argument around, without economic power, without anyone providing the economic support for the courts, the police, the money printing presses, all those guys in Washington are, are pushy arseholes in sweaty suits. Without that economic power they can't enforce their laws, they can't enforce their currency, they can't enforce anyone's contracts. Looking at it from only one angle, as you have, makes it easy to say Economic power is much more important than political power, but it certainly isn't logical.
Ignoring the overall illogic of trying to separate out economic and political power in the way you have done of course. All different forms of power are more or less equal, just different ways of expressing the potential control of others. Trying to claim one type of power is subservient to others, is like trying to say thermo-energy is subservient to electrical, it just doesn't make the blindest bit of sense.
Political power is dependent on economic power, economic power needs political power to support it, it's irrational to claim one is subservient to the other under such circumstances. In fact I'd go one further, political power and economic power are the same thing. We just separate it out in the sort of weird pigeon holing we human beings do all the time, based on arbitrary associations that are made up on the spot, but are otherwise rather intangible. To me the only real difference between political power and economic power seems to be that the latter is how much money you can spend, and the former is how much money you have spent. The difference between Potential and Kinetic Energy.
The United States is a very powerful economic power, because it has a big economy with a lot of money in it, that can be used to buy things, things like a big technologically advanced military. It's a very powerful political power, because it has spent a lot of money on various things, like a big technologically advanced military.
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Quote:
Originally posted by citizen:
These pushy people in suits still have those factories, and if money and contracts are now worthless production will equal power. If I have a factory, and someone else doesn't, that's the basis of political power anyway.
Ownership of the factory is a legal concept. If the government doesn't recognize their property rights - well, they can say it's their factory, but honestly it's owned by whomever is strong enough to take it.
Even if you assume that the factory "owners" can maintain control of their factory without government (which is stretch), how's this "production" going to happen? It's not like production is a commodity that can be hoarded. It's an activity. If their money is no good, they can't hire people to do the production, to run the machines, etc.
SergeantX
"It's cold and it's a broken hallelujah"
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Quote:Bull. Never heard of company towns, company stores, company scrip? Study history, Sarge.
Sounds good so far, but digging a little deeper you see that without government support, they are powerless. Their money is only good if the government backs it.
Quote:It's not moralism, it's a THOUGHT experiment... to a place you apparently don't want to go, but which actually has existed and still exists today.
You keep jumping to this moralistic level
Quote:They hire private security. That was the place I was going to next. Our hapless worker, assuming he is desperate, strong, and quick enough, might try to work for the company as security... which gets better pay to ensure loyalty.
I'll break it down more. What happens to the company when the government "quits taking their phone calls"? When the police no longer look after their property. When the courts no longer enforce their contracts. When the state no long honors the value of their money? At that point they're no longer the rich and powerful elite. They're just some pushy people in suits stand in the midst of a bunch of expensive factories and offices.
You really SHOULD study history, Sarge. This HAS happened before. Company towns. Company stores. Company scrip. Company goons.
Quote:I was under the impresison that tihs was one of the few legitimate functions you conceded to government.
When the courts no longer enforce their contracts
Quote:I think I've addressed those points but I'll re-address them. I think we both agree that the value of a currency is determined by production of the economy backing it up. So the factory-owner's money IS good because they have the production capacity to back it up.... they simply will not accept other "currencies" when it comes to buying their goods. Yes, production is an activity, but the relative value of THEIR production (with automation and technology) would be much greater than the relative value of entirely manual production. As a worker, you could simply NOT compete against their production in a cost-effective way. Now, to be sure, in many developing countries people are making the choice to (literally) go back to the jungle, where they can at least exist on a subsistence level. And this was the situation in colonial America: land was free for the taking (provided you could take it away from the natives) and this "floor" created some sort economic democracy. But due to population pressures I don't see this as a viable choice for most people currently.
Ownership of the factory is a legal concept. If the government doesn't recognize their property rights - well, they can say it's their factory, but honestly it's owned by whomever is strong enough to take it. Even if you assume that the factory "owners" can maintain control of their factory without government (which is stretch), how's this "production" going to happen? It's not like production is a commodity that can be hoarded. It's an activity. If their money is no good, they can't hire people to do the production, to run the machines, etc.
Ultimately, Sarge, in YOUR system there are no rights. It all boils down to who has the most power.
You fail to realize, Sarge, that there ARE many forms of power. And IMHO economic power is the most powerful, the driving force. People accept various forms of government simply BECAUSE it provides stability in which production can take place. When that form of government costs more than it is "worth" it is replaced by another.
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We should have strapped him into a glider, filled it nose heavy w/ explosives, and dropped his Allah lovin' ass into a large, empty field. After which, release wild boars into the area so they could make good use of his remains. Now THAT's justice.- rappy
Yeah, that's what Sheikh Issa said. Seems you both have a lot in common.- signy
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Ok guys, I give up. Clearly the supremacy of "economic power" isn't something you're going to budge on. It doesn't make any sense to me, but I've got a busy weekend ahead of me. (my son's graduating from college). Maybe we can re-address the issue in a future thread.
SergeantX
"It's cold and it's a broken hallelujah"
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Give it more thought, Sarge. The economic PTB could cut governments out at any time... that IS the direction they're heading in. And then you can face them head-on, all on your own. Good luck with that.
Congrats on seeing your son thru college! Happy commencement day!
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We should have strapped him into a glider, filled it nose heavy w/ explosives, and dropped his Allah lovin' ass into a large, empty field. After which, release wild boars into the area so they could make good use of his remains. Now THAT's justice.- rappy
Yeah, that's what Sheikh Issa said. Seems you both have a lot in common.- signy
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME