Capitalism Misrepresented

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What ever happened to no coercion?

ViennaSausage:

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What ever happened to no coercion?

Because 'capitalism' as it is commonly perceived is not laissez-faire.  Though I acknowledge Mises' desire to stick with it (the importance of capital formation) one may as well just stick to 'free markets' or 'individual liberty' since they mean the same thing and are not so nearly as likely to be misinterpreted.

How would a free market depiction look like?  Perhaps a consumer and a bunch of options for exchange?

Ante Simtapalic wrote about this here.

Niccolò:

Ante Simtapalic wrote about this here.

Talking about yourself in the 3rd person? 

Also, do you still have that leather jacket?  I'd like to bid on it.

 

ViennaSausage:

How would a free market depiction look like?  Perhaps a consumer and a bunch of options for exchange?

Praxeologically speaking, we can not predict a free market's structure at any time in the future.  This will have to be determined by people's actions, which is to say, "By the market".  Describing institutions in a free market is, strictly speaking, not an endevour of economics (though economics may inform our ideas).  What a free market might be like, empirically speaking, depends on your estimation of empirical information and expectations about future states.  Since we currently live in a market where coercion is widespread our difficulties are compounded.

I do not say this to discourage such investigations, indeed developing ideas about organization is one requisite for entrapeneurial endevour.  But it seems to me that many libertarians compound economic and empirical predictions too much.

Kevin Carson  believes, and I agree, that the structure of western intervention in the economy has systematically created and protected certain businesses and industries which rely on high capital concentration and economies of scale.  This has fostered certain business models and specific businesses which would be less competitive on a free market.  Basically: too much capital concentration, too much expensive technical stuff, too many technicians and bureacrats, inferior wages and flexibility for workers (including technicians).

Now his predictions of a free market are somewhat praxeologically sound, ceterus paribus, which is to say we would simply see less of this sort of organization and more of other types.  Of course this whole argument is really a specific example of misallocation of resources due to interference with market forces.  But he is not justified, as he has if not outright stated at least implied, that firm-structures, labor contracts and other typical features of the present economy would be absolutely uncompetitive or secondary.  He has made a compelling case that it exists excessively at present due to intervention, but just how excessively can only be shown by the market.  Perhaps high-capital concentration firms would still dominate or be extremely competitive if the artificial strictures were to disappear, for these firms are just as distorted by internal incentive and relationships to the state as they are a product of that distortion.  Also his notions that things like nuclear power and computers are products of government intervention and artificial capital concentration-automation-technicality from this structure confuses proximate causes with ultimate causes.  The proximate cause of computer technology and computerization may have been government action, but the ultimate cause is that capital was available for their development.  Small difference you say?  Yet a free market will promote much more real growth and thus more capital creation.  Even if Carson were correct that the relative capital concentration is artificial, in a free market absolute capital would be likely to increase.  It is possible to imagine in a free market, for example, that everyone has just about the same exchangeable-wealth as everyone else but where the capital concentration of any individual exceeds all of Wal-Mart at present.  One need only point to a present day machine shop whose cost would be virtually infinite 60 years ago.

I dedicate so much space to a discussion of Carson's ideas and erroneous or misleading ideas because many on here will likely agree with me.  Yet I believe that many market-anarchists make the exact same error or misleading statements when imagining Libertopia.  Hans Hoppe and the Tannehills, for example, have a distinctively conservative and firm-based image of the stateless market which, while not a priori wrong, are also not a priori accurate - even in tendency.  Markets tend to promote individual power, which means that individual choices - left or right, wrong or right - tend to have more sustainability and effect.  Hoppe might predict that homosexual anarcho-socialists will have less materially and intellectually rich communities and even individuals.  Homosexuals are very willing to withstand not only social and economic but also violence.  An increase in capital makes every individual more productive and more immune to social approbrium.  Presuming a generally libertarian society, unless masses of strangers arbitrarily forgo the ever increasing contributions of a homosexual he will likely feel little sting.

Being kept out of a place one has no desire to go to rarely bothers people, and some people don't care what the 'elites' say, natural or otherwise.  The iconoclastic Hoppe has ably demonstrated this by disagreeing openly and broadly with State and anti-state elites.  Natural elites have a great deal of influence but it is bought with their intellectual and material capital.  A lot of people who are natural elites actually encourage 'deviant' behaviour because they can afford it.  Their very existence upsets 'conservatism', they will be willing to disagree on the most important points if they believe they are right and will be best able to persuade others even if they are wrong about the things they advocate.

Need I point out that developments like AI, genetic manipulation and transhumanism possess the appeal and potential productivity to transform the world away from either ideal?  Where ideas like 'sex' and 'authority' lose their relevance (at least to some people)?  I do not posit this as a prediction, it may not even come to pass, I simply say that most ideas take existing economic and social conditions, somewhat purified, as embodying models of the future.  I think that a free market is something nobody can predict, and the longer its free the faster your predictions go out the window.

I have my own predictions, based on certain philosophical as well as scientific ideas I have.  I am a libertarian transhumanist, as well as being a radical egoist (value-individualism if you prefer).  I tend toward a mix of Hoppe's and Konkin's views of a future because it is my belief that such a structure will naturally evolve out of not only existing differences but different preferences people have.  I think transhumanism is likely (though I am not a professional) and I think that throws much of traditional social mores and norms out the window.  My ideal society is a transhuman variant of Stirner's union of egoist, where everyone acts for his own purposes and views all values as subsidiary to himself.  "The Stone Canal" novel shows a somewhat caricature version of this.
  But I certainly do not posit this for the immediate future, and I certainly may be wrong in some points.  I think it's important for theorists of a free market, especially a radically free market, realise that however good their reasons are predictions of economcs and society are predictions of human action.  You really, really don't know.

We've had this "definition of capitalism" argument here recently.

I don't really give a crap what Niccolo or Kevin Carson think. I'm not really interested in left anarchist propaganda, and based on our last discussion on this topic, many other people weren't either (this is not directed at the poster I replied to, just a general statement).

If capitalism is the opposite of socialism, then it is the private ownership of the means of production.  Leftists like to befuddle and obfuscate any terminology that presents a clear alternative to socialism, anything that casts socialism into a bright light, naked and shivering.

All of these elaborate explanations, when we have a perfectly good one, and the very people who would tear it down admit to being mutualists or anarcho-syndicalists and offer us nothing in return to clearly contrast socialism.

Mises knew what capitalism was, and he used the term correctly.  He also knew that socialism was not only not viable, like fascism, it was a form of statism.

Let's dot our Is and cross our Ts.  This redefinition nonsense is bunk.

 

liberty student:

We've had this "definition of capitalism" argument here recently.

I don't really give a crap what Niccolo or Kevin Carson think. I'm not really interested in left anarchist propaganda, and based on our last discussion on this topic, many other people weren't either (this is not directed at the poster I replied to, just a general statement).

If capitalism is the opposite of socialism, then it is the private ownership of the means of production.  Leftists like to befuddle and obfuscate any terminology that presents a clear alternative to socialism, anything that casts socialism into a bright light, naked and shivering.

All of these elaborate explanations, when we have a perfectly good one, and the very people who would tear it down admit to being mutualists or anarcho-syndicalists and offer us nothing in return to clearly contrast socialism.

Mises knew what capitalism was, and he used the term correctly.  He also knew that socialism was not only not viable, like fascism, it was a form of statism.

Let's dot our Is and cross our Ts.  This redefinition nonsense is bunk.

 

What a nice serious of disingenous strawmen. It's not "left-anarchist propaganda" to point to the role of the state in concentrating capital and artificially boosting and privileging big industry at the expense of consumers and workers.

As I've pointed out before, "private ownership of the means of production" in and of itself is vague and does not necessarily describe a pure free market. It can theoretically describe monarchy. It says nothing about justice or aquisition or ethics or anything of that sort.

I don't favor socialism or communism or syndicalism. You're viewing things through a silly red-baiting/pink-baiting lense. I don't favor "capitalism" in any traditional sense either.

Kevin Carson's position is practically the same as Benjamin Tucker's, only he actually synthesizes elements of austrian economics into his view. He quite clearly is working within the tradition of individualist anarchism.

Mises isn't an authority in the realm of anarchism, only economics. Even the "capitalism" that Mises himself supported was a form of statism. The usage of the term "capitalism" to describe a form of anarchism didn't exist until Murray Rothbard, and it easily can be argued that it was Rothbard who was changing definitions by coining "anarcho-capitalism".

Historically, even the most radical of laissez-faire economists still clung to the idea of the need for a state to define and protect property rights, and of course in reality the state always ends up misdefining them and violating them. 99.99% of everyone who has ever spoken favorably of capitalism or defined themselves as a capitalist have been statists of some sort.

It makes no sense whatsoever for anarchists to view right-wing statists and/or minarchists more favorably than other actual anarchists. I would much rather be associated with someone like Kevin Carson or Roderick Long than someone like Pat Buchannan or Bob Barr.

There is no redefinition going on, only a revaluation of where one stands on the political spectrum. In fact many of the people in question are insisting on using the words in their original meanings or contexts, or they are rejecting cliche false dichotomies in contemporary political discourse.

What you're fighting for is a word and a particular political spectrum, not a principle.

You repeatedly fail to grasp the concept of someone who is both a radical free marketer and a "leftist" in some sense at the same time. It seems inconcievable to you that someone can be "left" and "libertarian" or "left" and "free market" at the same time. I think that this is because you are still applying an erroneous political spectrum that proclaims "less government" to be "rightist" and "more government" to be "leftist".

It looks like the link has exceeded its bandwidth.  The picture was very similar to someone on the Mises Forum where a blue man with a cash bag was being held up by a red man with a gun which was entitled socialism.  A picture right next to was the same thing accept the bag of money was with the red man, and he still had the gun pointed at the blue man.  It was funny, but just misrepresented Free Market Capitalism.  Perhaps it was an accurate depiction of Corpratism or Mixed Market Capitalism.

liberty student:

If capitalism is the opposite of socialism, then it is the private ownership of the means of production.

Strictly speaking yes.  Socialism is Centralization & Collective/Public Ownership if the means of production, and Capitalism is Decentralization & Private Ownership.

liberty student:

Mises knew what capitalism was, and he used the term correctly.

While Mises may have appropriated the term Capitalism in reference for Laissez-Faire/Free Market, the term was pejoratively created and used by Marx.  Marxist skew the definition of Capitalism to their favor utilizing a different one that the Free Market.

 

I'm not really interested in left anarchist propaganda

I am not going to deny the existence of left-anarchist propaganda which exaggerates or makes mistakes.  But I think that left-anarchism and right-anarchism both have some valid points which need more critical interpretation and qualification than they usually give.  This is, however, more a problem of the people promoting the ideas online than the originators of these ideas.  I would say that Carson is a serious scholar who has raised very interesting questions, although I disagree with him on practically every point of economic reasoning the ideas he and several Austrians have developed have, I think, raised our understanding of the present economic conditions.  Everyone know that mercantalism/fascism is not the free market, but few pro-market scholars will examine just what the exact economic effects institutions of this nature have.  If Carson were correct that abnormal concentration of economic control and the promotion of certain forms of economic organization which allow the state to effect abnormal power on people's lives this would be an important 'utilitarian' argument; indeed it seems a natural outgrowth of hard-core libertarian and Austrian claims that Corporatism sucks; why do we put so much emphasis on how the government rules screws over consumers and businessmen for power but ignore the way it screws people over as employees and limits their options.  Indeed, work by Stromberg and others along the same lines indicate that this is perhaps the natural direction of private-property 'capitalism' under a State regime.  It fascinates me in that, although complicity of some interests in business is obvious, the business community might actually be 'roped in' to this sort of organization even if they would prefer others and even if they personally and politically object to the measures which promote it.

If capitalism is the opposite of socialism, then it is the private ownership of the means of production

I agree with this, and I don't agree with Carson's views on land.  But remember that 'private' simply means owned and disposed of by somebody in particular, libertarians promote a certain type of private property.  Thus even the view of capitalism by your defintion is open to statist misinterpretation.

All of these elaborate explanations, when we have a perfectly good one,

As I expressed, I do not agree with Carson's economic theorems but find some of his ideas interesting - epsecially when further developed by Austrians.  It is important to realise that Carson's theory of the firm in the present is very Austrian and thus fits with our 'perfectly good' explanation.
If you refer to what an anarchist society might be like, we have a lot of interesting and plausible ones but I think it is incumbent upon us to realise that we don't really know what a free market society would look like.  But, from an economic standpoint, potential merits or flaws in our imaginary organizations have no bearing on the fact that the market does work, and it's really the only organization we can say objective 'works' in the sense of mutual gain.  So while it is important to recognize holes or guesses within our 'Future-World' for intellectual clarity and precision I am not saying that 'an-caps' or others need to abandon their ideas of what society would be like, or what they'd like it to be like.  Because the market works to solve these problems, even if - especially if - a handful of guys with immense amounts of knowledge and free time can still find things to argue over.  All these things that depend on our subjective evaluation and preferences will get worked out by people's actual choices, and these will work as well as anything we can expect.

Anarcho-syndicalism in its classic formulation is not anarchistic in our sense.  It is decentralized fascism.  And though errors are present on the left, the more 'vulgar' the more common, dismissing such a broad grouping really doesn't seem justified considering that Proudhoun and Josiah Warren could easily consider themselves in the same tradition.  Thus many individualist anarchists and right anarchists came at certain observations and conclusions through the development of what would be called 'leftist' ideas.  Indeed, it is important never to forget that what is generally recognized as a culturally left radicalism did grow out of classical liberalism, just like egoism and 'natural' elitism.  I prefer an argument with a good radical statist to an argument with a welfare statist, who doesn't even understand what he's for much less opposed to.  Radicalism in intellect may be intellectually converted communists tend to have more in common with libertarians than with modern liberals.

Mises knew what capitalism was, and he used the term correctly.

I agree Mises was fairly justified in using 'capitalism' for the free market on several grounds, but I think it is historically and strategically problematic.  Capital is important, yes, but capital doesn't control, make up or define the market economy.  The market does.  Taking on a term of approbation because others spite you with it is certainly something I appreciate.  But Marx did confuse State-mercantalism with laissez-faire, or at least thought there was no difference.  What he describes as 'capitalism' is not laissez-faire, and just as Marxist criticism certainly don't apply to the free market I can not see why we would call the free market 'capitalism' except that Rand and a handful of others tended to do so.  I do think it is stupid that people get so hung up on labels without even exploring core ideas, but even ignoring this 'capitalism' is a misleading label.

He also knew that socialism was not only not viable, like fascism, it was a form of statism.

No disagreement here.  But don't forget that socialists, past and present, aren't always statists.  Some of them really do believe in a libertarian society of individual freedom and simply think it would take a different form.  And, like all free-market transactions, a voluntary commune is productive and can make economic calculation just like a firm or individual agent.

Let's dot our Is and cross our Ts.  This redefinition nonsense is bunk.

But you don't need to argue this fact with me.  Almost everyone in favor of something they call 'capitalism' mean a free or more-free market.  But because of the negative press of the word, mostly directed against mercantalism, why not simply stick with the word 'market' or 'free market'?  I am not trying to waste time in semantics, I presume you do mean a laissez-faire economy and if anything I think Mises' defense of it wasn't thorough going enough.  But the language we're using depends at least partially on the rest of the human race who sees the as 'capitalist' the present system and resents the very real defects.  To tell him this isn't 'really' capitalism, and that the capitalism you envision will have none of this is simply confusing and implausible.  Imagine if we called market defense agencies 'Government', but went around talking to anarchists telling them that our 'government' won't involve any of the problems of the old one.  You run a serious risk of justified disinterest, just as I am unlikely to spend my time listening to people talk about 'communism'.  They might very well mean 'individual liberty and freedom with social interaction predominated by voluntary pooling of assets'.  This communist-corporation idea might be very fascinating and appealing to me, but I might never hear it because I hear 'communism' and my brain scoffs.  Recognizing this reaction to 'capitalism' should at least give us pause before tossing the world around willy-nilly without qualification.

To Brainpolice: I agree with the views you presented, have probably duplicated some of them here.  But, as I am sure you know, many who consider themselves right-anarchists or who behave as vulgar-libertarians are philosophically libertarian and simply have not been exposed to rational and libertarian critiques of their views as regards existing-business.

R.J. Moore II:

Because 'capitalism' as it is commonly perceived is not laissez-faire.  Though I acknowledge Mises' desire to stick with it (the importance of capital formation) one may as well just stick to 'free markets' or 'individual liberty' since they mean the same thing and are not so nearly as likely to be misinterpreted.

The word is not simply cosmetic.

We are anarcho-capitalists because of how we deal with capital.

Capitalists are those who privately own, or advocate the private owernship of, capital. (Though I presume Marx would have been quick to apply the term to anyone who merely tolerated its existance) It can be state capitalism, or it can be market capitalism.

To call yourself an anarcho-capitalist is to make an important distinction. A distinction that terms like "individual", "voluntary", "right/left", or even "market" dont clearly make.

Ask an anarcho socialist if we are capitalist.

 

Capitalists are those who privately own, or advocate the private owernship of, capital.

But 'capitalism' already has a meaning which, if vague and inconsistent, is held by a mass of the human race.  I am not saying that you can not make some definitional or etymilogical case for using capitalism.  I already acknowledged that Mises' argument was fine in itself.  But a 'free market' means (in Mises' mouth) precisely the same way of doing things as what he means by 'Capitalism'.  A free market has the clear implication of being both free and a market in name.  Indeed, the 'means of production in private hands' (from a libertarian standpoint) merely says that capital is sold on the market, that it is free to be bought, sold, saved etc.  To have a free market implies private capital, indeed it is precisely the lack of a capital-goods market which dooms socialism.  NOT capital itself - nor capitalists - are the core of the market, but the fact that capital and all other services may be bought and sold, make a market what it is.  Market anarchism or free market do not put any emphasis upon capital or the capitalist, which 'capitalism' might easily be miscontrued as.  Likewise, mercantalism and the western 'ruling class' have a long association with conspicuous capitalists.  Wilsonian corporate-liberals, with their systematic belief and support of vertically integrated capital heavy industries (and the limited clique which owned a lot of it), have far more historical and etymological claim to the word than radical individualists.  Unlike our claims to the word 'anarchism', which can be justified on purely historical and etymological grounds, 'capitalism' can more easily be used to name a system of systematic government privlidge for capital-heavy businesses than for libertarian anarchism or free exchange.

Likewise, as Brainpolice as pointed out, Feudal lords were 'private' owners of the means of production, but they were certainly not libertarian.  Thus private ownership itself does not distinguish austro-libertarianism from fascism, feudalism or monarchy.

The abandonment of 'capitalism' to signify a market economy is strategically and definitionally sound.

Ask an anarcho socialist if we are capitalist.

Yeah, ask most anarcho-socialists what capitalism is and they will tell you government privilidge for the rich and capital holders.  This is precisely why we might not want to be known as 'capitalists'.

R.J. Moore II:

But 'capitalism' already has a meaning which, if vague and inconsistent, is held by a mass of the human race.

And I just gave it!

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/capitalism

R.J. Moore II:

The abandonment of 'capitalism' to signify a market economy is strategically and definitionally sound.

You are advocating a specific kind of "free market" a "capitalist free market". Syndicalists advocate a "socialist free market."

 

R.J. Moore II:

This is precisely why we might not want to be known as 'capitalists'.

Thats all great and fine. Only problem is its still accurate. What happens when a socialists accuses you of being a capitalist? Deny it?

JonBostwick:

What happens when a socialists accuses you of being a capitalist? Deny it?

Ask for his definition, and then accept or deny the defined term?

Brainpolice:

What a nice serious of disingenous strawmen. It's not "left-anarchist propaganda" to point to the role of the state in concentrating capital and artificially boosting and privileging big industry at the expense of consumers and workers.

That's an issue with statism, not the private ownership of the means of production.  If that is what you are doing, then you are making the case for capitalism as far as I am concerned.  State intervention in private markets is socialism.

Brainpolice:

As I've pointed out before, "private ownership of the means of production" in and of itself is vague and does not necessarily describe a pure free market. It can theoretically describe monarchy. It says nothing about justice or aquisition or ethics or anything of that sort.

I'm not trying to define everything with one word.  I understand that capitalism is not synonymous with free markets.  That's not my argument and you know it.

Brainpolice:

I don't favor socialism or communism or syndicalism. You're viewing things through a silly red-baiting/pink-baiting lense. I don't favor "capitalism" in any traditional sense either.

Every once in awhile, you leak a little leftism on the forum.  You ally closest with leftists.  IIRC, you spend time debating with leftists on other forums.

It's not red-baiting.  I think you're purple through and through.

Brainpolice:

Mises isn't an authority in the realm of anarchism, only economics. Even the "capitalism" that Mises himself supported was a form of statism. The usage of the term "capitalism" to describe a form of anarchism didn't exist until Murray Rothbard, and it easily can be argued that it was Rothbard who was changing definitions by coining "anarcho-capitalism".

Capitalism is first and foremost an economic word, not an anarchist one.  Which is why I resent the left-anarchists redefining it, then literally making up a bunch of silliness about how it has original meanings or more broad populist meanings than what the word actually means.

Brainpolice:

Historically, even the most radical of laissez-faire economists still clung to the idea of the need for a state to define and protect property rights, and of course in reality the state always ends up misdefining them and violating them. 99.99% of everyone who has ever spoken favorably of capitalism or defined themselves as a capitalist have been statists of some sort.

We don't need to pad our posts with made up statistics and false claims.

Brainpolice:

It makes no sense whatsoever for anarchists to view right-wing statists and/or minarchists more favorably than other actual anarchists. I would much rather be associated with someone like Kevin Carson or Roderick Long than someone like Pat Buchannan or Bob Barr.

The great thing about the left, is that they like to talk and write a lot more than they like to act.  I'd rather not be associated with philosophers in times of turmoil and opportunity.

Brainpolice:

There is no redefinition going on, only a revaluation of where one stands on the political spectrum.

When it comes to the political spectrum, I see you work extra hard to avoid being cornered as a leftist, but you always have a smart comment for the right, for "conservatives", for "capitalists" etc.  In the words of the great libertarian and President, Ronald Reagan ;),

You and I are told increasingly that we have to choose between a left or right, but I would like to suggest that there is no such thing as a left or right. There is only an up or down--up to a man's age-old dream, the ultimate in individual freedom consistent with law and order--or down to the ant heap totalitarianism, and regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would trade our freedom for security have embarked on this downward course.

Brainpolice:

What you're fighting for is a word and a particular political spectrum, not a principle.

I'm fighting for honesty and truth.  I'm fighting people I see trying to twist and turn the language to suit their own agenda, one which I am concerned is not genuinely concerned with liberty, but using libertarianism and anarchism to achieve a form of communism, where it's only 1 or two short steps to coercive centralized control.

Brainpolice:

You repeatedly fail to grasp the concept of someone who is both a radical free marketer and a "leftist" in some sense at the same time. It seems inconcievable to you that someone can be "left" and "libertarian" or "left" and "free market" at the same time. I think that this is because you are still applying an erroneous political spectrum that proclaims "less government" to be "rightist" and "more government" to be "leftist".

You thought wrong.  Call the Brain Police.

I probably wouldn't be so bothered that you are a leftist, but that you continually take pot shots at the right, as though your particular positioning is holier than thou.  It isn't.  You just favor another form of statism than someone on the right may.

I don't see the right as "less government".  I see the right as "more action" and the left as "more philosophy".  There is nothing wrong with writing or having a philosophical bent, but that seems to be the sole area of expertise of many of these so-called "left libertarian" thinkers.

The passivity of the left annoys me, when it is constantly criticizing the actions of the right, and condemning everything they do.  It's like a big whiny crybaby.

And while I draw inspiration from both sides and natures, I do come at this from the right originally.  As my evolution rapidly continues, I move farther from the left and the right.  And it seems to me that someone like yourself, who has a lot more knowledge, and a much greater understanding than I do, should be a lot less concerned with conservative/liberal, Barr/Buchanan, left/right and more with purely defining liberty as being better than and differentiated from both perspectives.  Because it is very conservative of you to constantly be paying homage to the historical legacy and traditions of the left.  So much so, that many posts seem more like museum artifact placards, than any sort of genuine roadmap or battle plan for future advancement.

I happen to think that the whole thing breaks down into a collection of false dichotomies and vague maxims. I reject the idea that there is necessarily a strict dichotomy between owner and worker, capitalist and laboror. Everyone, in theory, can be both at once. "Private ownership of the means of production" can refer to anything from a worker who uses their own tools to a king. "Public ownership of the means of production" can refer to anything from an individual who decides to be inclusive with their property and state ownership of property, although taken literally ("public" /= state) it is actually irreconcilable with state ownership. "Capitalism" can refer to anything from a free market to fascism and "socialism" can refer to anything from a family to a welfare state. The term "socialist" can describe anything from an individualist anarchist to a raving communist.

I would not be accurately describing myself by using such terms because they have possible implications that totally clash with what I support, they have multiple connotations that contradict eachother. If I'm going to use those terms at all, I immediately have to get into specifics to clarify what I mean, and this usually only creates confusion and forces me to make distinctions or dichotomies within the overall category (thus destroying any singular meaning for the term). This leads me to even be weary about the term "libertarianism", which particularly in America has been nearly reduced to meaninglessness already. I realize that many libertarians are not comfortable with this analysis because it reduces to a massive deconstruction of contemporary worldviews and political rhetoric. I'm certainly not a linguistic anti-realist or an obscurantist, but I believe that some serious deconstruction is necessary for the purposes of clarity (not to obfuscate, and I think it's actually the current language that obfuscates).

Perhaps instead of concerning oneself with what labels people use, what's important is to figure out what the content of the individual's ideas actually are. Breaking everything down to "capitalism good, socialism bad" or vice versa does no justice to individualism or clarity. And to a certain extent this really does seem to reduce to an absurd emotivism in which everyone is yelling "boo socialism!" or "workers of the world unite!" without doing much to articulate a position or argument. People are much more complex than that. I happen to be a bit of a fan of deconstruction and synthesis. Contemporary political discourse must be deconstructed for the empty vitrol that it largely is and when one clears up the categorical chaos one finds that it makes sense to synthesize various individual elements that make sense together but are typically detached from eachother in discourse.

That's an issue with statism, not the private ownership of the means of production.  If that is what you are doing, then you are making the case for capitalism as far as I am concerned.  State intervention in private markets is socialism.

How certain are you, because I often see libertarians conveniently switch between both connotations. On one hand they'll (correctly) say that such issues are a negative effect of state intervention, and on the other hand they will then go on to argue for the legitimacy of such effects in the name of "the free market". Which is it?

As for state intervention in private markets, if that is the be all and end all definition of what socialism is than most self-identified libertarians (I.E. minarchists or partyarchs or classical liberals) must qualify as socialists, including Ludwig Von Mises, the very person being so heavily relied on here for a defense of "capitalism".

I'm not trying to define everything with one word.  I understand that capitalism is not synonymous with free markets.  That's not my argument and you know it.

Then if you were intellectually honest, you would gladly admit that you don't 100% support "capitalism" in all contexts.

Capitalism is first and foremost an economic word, not an anarchist one.

Exactly, so why use the term as being synanomous with a broad political philosophy? Why use the term as being descriptive of liberty in a political sense if it is an economic word?

Which is why I resent the left-anarchists redefining it, then literally making up a bunch of silliness about how it has original meanings or more broad populist meanings than what the word actually means.

Again, noone is redefining it. People are insisting on using the original meanings, and it is you who wishes to cling to a redefinition descriptive of political liberty. Or, alternatively, moreso to describe my own case, I largely reject the utility of using such terms and find them obfuscatory.

We don't need to pad our posts with made up statistics and false claims.

It isn't a false claim, it should be obvious upon minimal reflection, and I never claimed an exact statistic, I was speaking in a generality. It simply a fact. The vast majority of people who identify as "capitalist" today are not anarchists, not even close to being anarchists. Likewise, this is true historically as well. Even the 19th century champions of "capitalism" were minarchists at best. I don't see how I'm making anything up here, I'm merely pointing out the obvious. Before Murray Rothbard, no anarchist ever refered to themselves as "capitalist", and even after Rothbard, this usage of the term is highly marginal. I don't see the logic in trying to construe a new and marginal use as the definitive meaning of something.

The great thing about the left, is that they like to talk and write a lot more than they like to act.  I'd rather not be associated with philosophers in times of turmoil and opportunity.

What is this "the left" anyhow? The way you speak of it, to me it translates to "anything I don't like". And that's the way that most people who identify as "rightist" and buy into the contemporary political spectrum tend to operate.

I probably wouldn't be so bothered that you are a leftist, but that you continually take pot shots at the right, as though your particular positioning is holier than thou.  It isn't.  You just favor another form of statism than someone on the right may.

Are you actually accusing me of being a statist? Ha! That's amusing. I'm a market anarchist. I fail to see how someone who believes in the right to individual secession and repeatedly denies state legitimacy is a "statist". My criticism of the right is from an anti-statist perspective, as in my understanding the right has always been statist. I critisize the right for it's statism, which it conveniently disguises rhetorically.

I find this all rather amusing because I get attacked this way from both sides. People like you red-bait me and are somehow under the illusion that I'm a statist, while most of the anarcho-syndicalists and anarcho-communists attack me as a "petty burgeosie individualist" (since in a voluntaristic context I defend "private property", money, wage labor, rent, interest, etc.) and see me as just another anarcho-capitalist. Interesting, isn't it? It says more about the confusion in political discourse than it does about me or my position.

I don't see the right as "less government".  I see the right as "more action" and the left as "more philosophy".  There is nothing wrong with writing or having a philosophical bent, but that seems to be the sole area of expertise of many of these so-called "left libertarian" thinkers.

I find this criticism vain and silly. Being philosophical is bad? And I don't see how this is specific to "the left" at all. Every political group are at least loosely based on political philosophies and philosophy in general. Your "criticism" applies to libertarianism as a whole, which is FULL of philosophers. The "criticism" could just as easily be thrown at "right-libertarians" such as Hans Herman Hoppe, who likewise spend lots of their time philosophizing and lecturing. Welcome to the world of a serious consideration or exploration of ideas! If you want to deny the importance of ideas, that's your problem, not mine. If you don't like it, if philosophy turns you off, I have to wonder why you're on this libertarianism (a political philosophy) bandwagon to begin with.

The passivity of the left annoys me, when it is constantly criticizing the actions of the right, and condemning everything they do.  It's like a big whiny crybaby.

What passivity, and since when are "the right" known to be enthusiastic activists who take direct action? I'm not aware of any mass-protests or any acts of mass civil disobedience going on within "the right". Anyhow, as usual you don't seem to have a concept of direct action, which is what us "evil leftists" advocate and practise. You seem to view anything that's NOT democratic politics as "passivity" or "doing nothing", as if there is a total vacuum of action in the absence of democratic politics. The failure here is your own, not mine. Apparently you don't have enough of an imagination to concieve of anything other than electoral politics as "action".

And it seems to me that someone like yourself, who has a lot more knowledge, and a much greater understanding than I do, should be a lot less concerned with conservative/liberal, Barr/Buchanan, left/right and more with purely defining liberty as being better than and differentiated from both perspectives.

I deconstruct them. I'm not "concerned" with them in any normal sense.

Arguing definitions is pointless.  In situations like this, you should play the "Taboo Your Words" game.  Replace "capitalism" with what you think it actually means.  I've seen many different definitions of capitalism:

1. Capitalism is the economic and political system in place right now.  (This is the definition I prefer.)
2. Capitalism is a system of State subsidies and welfare for current capital holders.  These subsidies take the form of outright grants or negative real interest rates.  Regulations restricting competition are a form of corporate welfare.
3. Capitalism is a system of unfair discrimination against non-capital holders.  Sexism unfairly discriminates by gender.  Racism unfairly discriminates by race.  Capitalism unfairly discriminates based on whether or not you own capital.  By restricting the ability of individuals to start businesses, capitalism discriminates against workers who don't already own capital.
4. Capitalism is a *TRUE* free market.  This is what most people believe, but it isn't actually true.  I consider a true free market to be a stateless society.  Once a group of people have the abililty to tax you and impose regulations, that destroys the free market.  If you're forced to "purchase" government against your will, then how can you claim that's a free market?
   
5. Capitalism is communism.  If you analyze the US ecomomy and the Communist Manifesto, then the USA actually is a communist country.  A corporate bureaucracy functions the same was as a government bureaucracy.  (This goes back to the Mises "economic calculation problem".)
   

If a debate essentially boils down to a disagreement over definitions, that's pointless.

I don't think it's even one of word use, though.  'Capitalism' for the purpose of describing a market is a connotation which is both oddly specific, historically awkward and generally dubious.  And I don't think it's totally inaccurate or unacceptable for the purpose libertarians use it for, except that most people don't believe it means what they mean.  And that is kind of a big problem.  Obstinance in inconsequentials is as silly as inconsistencies and essentials.  I really don't care what people call it, I'm just saying that it's worth considering.  Ultimately, though, you're on your own.