                F.1 Are "anarcho"-capitalists really anarchists?

   In a word, no. While "anarcho"-capitalists obviously try to associate
   themselves with the anarchist tradition by using the word "anarcho" or
   by calling themselves "anarchists" their ideas are distinctly at odds
   with those associated with anarchism. As a result, any claims that
   their ideas are anarchist or that they are part of the anarchist
   tradition or movement are false.

   "Anarcho"-capitalists claim to be anarchists because they say that they
   oppose government. As noted in the [1]last section, they use a
   dictionary definition of anarchism. However, this fails to appreciate
   that anarchism is a political theory. As dictionaries are rarely
   politically sophisticated things, this means that they fail to
   recognise that anarchism is more than just opposition to government, it
   is also marked a opposition to capitalism (i.e. exploitation and
   private property). Thus, opposition to government is a necessary but
   not sufficient condition for being an anarchist -- you also need to be
   opposed to exploitation and capitalist private property. As
   "anarcho"-capitalists do not consider interest, rent and profits (i.e.
   capitalism) to be exploitative nor oppose capitalist property rights,
   they are not anarchists.

   Part of the problem is that Marxists, like many academics, also tend to
   assert that anarchists are simply against the state. It is significant
   that both Marxists and "anarcho"-capitalists tend to define anarchism
   as purely opposition to government. This is no co-incidence, as both
   seek to exclude anarchism from its place in the wider socialist
   movement. This makes perfect sense from the Marxist perspective as it
   allows them to present their ideology as the only serious
   anti-capitalist one around (not to mention associating anarchism with
   "anarcho"-capitalism is an excellent way of discrediting our ideas in
   the wider radical movement). It should go without saying that this is
   an obvious and serious misrepresentation of the anarchist position as
   even a superficial glance at anarchist theory and history shows that no
   anarchist limited their critique of society simply at the state. So
   while academics and Marxists seem aware of the anarchist opposition to
   the state, they usually fail to grasp the anarchist critique applies to
   all other authoritarian social institutions and how it fits into the
   overall anarchist analysis and struggle. They seem to think the
   anarchist condemnation of capitalist private property, patriarchy and
   so forth are somehow superfluous additions rather than a logical
   position which reflects the core of anarchism:

     "Critics have sometimes contended that anarchist thought, and
     classical anarchist theory in particular, has emphasised opposition
     to the state to the point of neglecting the real hegemony of
     economic power. This interpretation arises, perhaps, from a
     simplistic and overdrawn distinction between the anarchist focus on
     political domination and the Marxist focus on economic exploitation
     . . . there is abundant evidence against such a thesis throughout
     the history of anarchist thought." [John P. Clark and Camille
     Martin, Anarchy, Geography, Modernity, p. 95]

   So Reclus simply stated the obvious when he wrote that "the
   anti-authoritarian critique to which the state is subjected applies
   equally to all social institutions." [quoted by Clark and Martin, Op.
   Cit., p. 140] Proudhon, Bakunin, Kropotkin, Goldman and so on would all
   agree with that. While they all stressed that anarchism was against the
   state they quickly moved on to present a critique of private property
   and other forms of hierarchical authority. So while anarchism obviously
   opposes the state, "sophisticated and developed anarchist theory
   proceeds further. It does not stop with a criticism of political
   organisation, but goes on to investigate the authoritarian nature of
   economic inequality and private property, hierarchical economic
   structures, traditional education, the patriarchal family, class and
   racial discrimination, and rigid sex- and age-roles, to mention just a
   few of the more important topics." For the "essence of anarchism is,
   after all, not the theoretical opposition to the state, but the
   practical and theoretical struggle against domination." [John Clark,
   The Anarchist Moment, p. 128 and p. 70]

   This is also the case with individualist anarchists whose defence of
   certain forms of property did stop them criticising key aspects of
   capitalist property rights. As Jeremy Jennings notes, the "point to
   stress is that all anarchists, and not only those wedded to the
   predominant twentieth-century strain of anarchist communism have been
   critical of private property to the extent that it was a source of
   hierarchy and privilege." He goes on to state that anarchists like
   Tucker and Spooner "agreed with the proposition that property was
   legitimate only insofar as it embraced no more than the total product
   of individual labour." ["Anarchism", Contemporary Political Ideologies,
   Roger Eatwell and Anthony Wright (eds.), p. 132] This is acknowledged
   by the likes of Rothbard who had to explicitly point how that his
   position on such subjects was fundamentally different (i.e., at odds)
   with individualist anarchism.

   As such, it would be fair to say that most "anarcho"-capitalists are
   capitalists first and foremost. If aspects of anarchism do not fit with
   some element of capitalism, they will reject that element of anarchism
   rather than question capitalism (Rothbard's selective appropriation of
   the individualist anarchist tradition is the most obvious example of
   this). This means that right-"libertarians" attach the "anarcho" prefix
   to their ideology because they believe that being against government
   intervention is equivalent to being an anarchist (which flows into
   their use of the dictionary definition of anarchism). That they ignore
   the bulk of the anarchist tradition should prove that there is hardly
   anything anarchistic about them at all. They are not against authority,
   hierarchy or the state -- they simply want to privatise them.

   Ironically, this limited definition of "anarchism" ensures that
   "anarcho"-capitalism is inherently self-refuting. This can be seen from
   leading "anarcho"-capitalist Murray Rothbard. He thundered against the
   evil of the state, arguing that it "arrogates to itself a monopoly of
   force, of ultimate decision-making power, over a given territorial
   area." In and of itself, this definition is unremarkable. That a few
   people (an elite of rulers) claim the right to rule others must be part
   of any sensible definition of the state or government. However, the
   problems begin for Rothbard when he notes that "[o]bviously, in a free
   society, Smith has the ultimate decision-making power over his own just
   property, Jones over his, etc." [The Ethics of Liberty, p. 170 and p.
   173] The logical contradiction in this position should be obvious, but
   not to Rothbard. It shows the power of ideology, the ability of mere
   words (the expression "private property") to turn the bad ("ultimate
   decision-making power over a given area") into the good ("ultimate
   decision-making power over a given area").

   Now, this contradiction can be solved in only one way -- the users of
   the "given area" are also its owners. In other words, a system of
   possession (or "occupancy and use") as favoured by anarchists. However,
   Rothbard is a capitalist and supports private property, non-labour
   income, wage labour, capitalists and landlords. This means that he
   supports a divergence between ownership and use and this means that
   this "ultimate decision-making power" extends to those who use, but do
   not own, such property (i.e. tenants and workers). The statist nature
   of private property is clearly indicated by Rothbard's words -- the
   property owner in an "anarcho"-capitalist society possesses the
   "ultimate decision-making power" over a given area, which is also what
   the state has currently. Rothbard has, ironically, proved by his own
   definition that "anarcho"-capitalism is not anarchist.

   Of course, it would be churlish to point out that the usual name for a
   political system in which the owner of a territory is also its ruler
   is, in fact, monarchy. Which suggests that while "anarcho"-capitalism
   may be called "anarcho-statism" a far better term could be
   "anarcho-monarchism." In fact, some "anarcho"-capitalists have made
   explicit this obvious implication of Rothbard's argument. Hans-Hermann
   Hoppe is one.

   Hoppe prefers monarchy to democracy, considering it the superior
   system. He argues that the monarch is the private owner of the
   government -- all the land and other resources are owned by him. Basing
   himself on Austrian economics (what else?) and its notion of time
   preference, he concludes that the monarch will, therefore, work to
   maximise both current income and the total capital value of his estate.
   Assuming self-interest, his planning horizon will be farsighted and
   exploitation be far more limited. Democracy, in contrast, is a
   publicly-owned government and the elected rulers have use of resources
   for a short period only and not their capital value. In other words,
   they do not own the country and so will seek to maximise their
   short-term interests (and the interests of those they think will elect
   them into office). In contrast, Bakunin stressed that if anarchism
   rejects democracy it was "hardly in order to reverse it but rather to
   advance it," in particular to extend it via "the great economic
   revolution without which every right is but an empty phrase and a
   trick." He rejected wholeheartedly "the camp of aristocratic . . .
   reaction." [The Basic Bakunin, p. 87]

   However, Hoppe is not a traditional monarchist. His ideal system is one
   of competing monarchies, a society which is led by a "voluntarily
   acknowledged 'natural' elite -- a nobilitas naturalis" comprised of
   "families with long-established records of superior achievement,
   farsightedness, and exemplary personal conduct." This is because "a few
   individuals quickly acquire the status of an elite" and their inherent
   qualities will "more likely than not [be] passed on within a few --
   noble -- families." The sole "problem" with traditional monarchies was
   "with monopoly, not with elites or nobility," in other words the King
   monopolised the role of judge and their subjects could not turn to
   other members of the noble class for services. ["The Political Economy
   of Monarchy and Democracy and the Idea of a Natural Order," pp. 94-121,
   Journal of Libertarian Studies, vol. 11, no. 2, p. 118 and p. 119]

   Which simply confirms the anarchist critique of "anarcho"-capitalism,
   namely that it is not anarchist. This becomes even more obvious when
   Hoppe helpfully expands on the reality of "anarcho"-capitalism:

     "In a covenant concluded among proprietor and community tenants for
     the purpose of protecting their private property, no such thing as a
     right to free (unlimited) speech exists, not even to unlimited
     speech on one's own tenant-property. One may say innumerable things
     and promote almost any idea under the sun, but naturally no one is
     permitted to advocate ideas contrary to the very purpose of the
     covenant of preserving private property, such as democracy and
     communism. There can be no tolerance towards democrats and
     communists in a libertarian social order. They will have to be
     physically separated and expelled from society. Likewise in a
     covenant founded for the purpose of protecting family and kin, there
     can be no tolerance toward those habitually promoting lifestyles
     incompatible with this goal. They -- the advocates of alternative,
     non-family and kin-centred lifestyles such as, for instance,
     individual hedonism, parasitism, nature-environment worship,
     homosexuality, or communism -- will have to be physically removed
     from society, too, if one is to maintain a libertarian order."
     [Democracy: the God that Failed, p. 218]

   Thus the proprietor has power/authority over his tenants and can decree
   what they can and cannot do, excluding anyone whom they consider as
   being subversive (in the tenants' own interests, of course). In other
   words, the autocratic powers of the boss are extended into all aspects
   of society -- all under the mask of advocating liberty. Sadly, the
   preservation of property rights destroys liberty for the many (Hoppe
   states clearly that for the "anarcho"-capitalist the "natural outcome
   of the voluntary transactions between various private property owners
   is decidedly non-egalitarian, hierarchical and elitist." ["The
   Political Economy of Monarchy and Democracy and the Idea of a Natural
   Order," Op. Cit., p. 118]). Unsurprisingly, Chomsky argued that
   right-wing "libertarianism" has "no objection to tyranny as long as it
   is private tyranny." In fact it (like other contemporary ideologies)
   "reduce[s] to advocacy of one or another form of illegitimate
   authority, quite often real tyranny." [Chomsky on Anarchism, p. 235 and
   p. 181] As such, it is hard not to conclude that "anarcho"-capitalism
   is little more than a play with words. It is not anarchism but a
   cleverly designed and worded surrogate for elitist, autocratic
   conservatism. Nor is too difficult to conclude that genuine anarchists
   and libertarians (of all types) would not be tolerated in this
   so-called "libertarian social order."

   Some "anarcho"-capitalists do seem dimly aware of this glaringly
   obvious contradiction. Rothbard, for example, does present an argument
   which could be used to solve it, but he utterly fails. He simply
   ignores the crux of the matter, that capitalism is based on hierarchy
   and, therefore, cannot be anarchist. He does this by arguing that the
   hierarchy associated with capitalism is fine as long as the private
   property that produced it was acquired in a "just" manner. Yet in so
   doing he yet again draws attention to the identical authority
   structures and social relationships of the state and property. As he
   puts it:

     "If the State may be said to properly own its territory, then it is
     proper for it to make rules for everyone who presumes to live in
     that area. It can legitimately seize or control private property
     because there is no private property in its area, because it really
     owns the entire land surface. So long as the State permits its
     subjects to leave its territory, then, it can be said to act as does
     any other owner who sets down rules for people living on his
     property." [Op. Cit., p. 170]

   Obviously Rothbard argues that the state does not "justly" own its
   territory. He asserts that "our homesteading theory" of the creation of
   private property "suffices to demolish any such pretensions by the
   State apparatus" and so the problem with the state is that it "claims
   and exercises a compulsory monopoly of defence and ultimate
   decision-making over an area larger than an individual's
   justly-acquired property." [Op. Cit., p. 171 and p. 173] There are four
   fundamental problems with his argument.

   First, it assumes his "homesteading theory" is a robust and libertarian
   theory, but neither is the case (see [2]section F.4.1). Second, it
   ignores the history of capitalism. Given that the current distribution
   of property is just as much the result of violence and coercion as the
   state, his argument is seriously flawed. It amounts to little more than
   an "immaculate conception of property" unrelated to reality. Third,
   even if we ignore these issues and assume that private property could
   be and was legitimately produced by the means Rothbard assumes, it does
   not justify the hierarchy associated with it as current and future
   generations of humanity have, effectively, been excommunicated from
   liberty by previous ones. If, as Rothbard argues, property is a natural
   right and the basis of liberty then why should the many be excluded
   from their birthright by a minority? In other words, Rothbard denies
   that liberty should be universal. He chooses property over liberty
   while anarchists choose liberty over property. Fourthly, it implies
   that the fundamental problem with the state is not, as anarchists have
   continually stressed, its hierarchical and authoritarian nature but
   rather the fact that it does not justly own the territory it claims to
   rule.

   Even worse, the possibility that private property can result in more
   violations of individual freedom (at least for non-proprietors ) than
   the state of its citizens was implicitly acknowledged by Rothbard. He
   uses as a hypothetical example a country whose King is threatened by a
   rising "libertarian" movement. The King responses by "employ[ing] a
   cunning stratagem," namely he "proclaims his government to be
   dissolved, but just before doing so he arbitrarily parcels out the
   entire land area of his kingdom to the 'ownership' of himself and his
   relatives." Rather than taxes, his subjects now pay rent and he can
   "regulate the lives of all the people who presume to live on" his
   property as he sees fit. Rothbard then asks:

     "Now what should be the reply of the libertarian rebels to this pert
     challenge? If they are consistent utilitarians, they must bow to
     this subterfuge, and resign themselves to living under a regime no
     less despotic than the one they had been battling for so long.
     Perhaps, indeed, more despotic, for now the king and his relatives
     can claim for themselves the libertarians' very principle of the
     absolute right of private property, an absoluteness which they might
     not have dared to claim before." [Op. Cit., p. 54]

   It should go without saying that Rothbard argues that we should reject
   this "cunning stratagem" as a con as the new distribution of property
   would not be the result of "just" means. However, he failed to note how
   his argument undermines his own claims that capitalism can be
   libertarian. As he himself argues, not only does the property owner
   have the same monopoly of power over a given area as the state, it is
   more despotic as it is based on the "absolute right of private
   property"! And remember, Rothbard is arguing in favour of
   "anarcho"-capitalism ("if you have unbridled capitalism, you will have
   all kinds of authority: you will have extreme authority." [Chomsky,
   Understanding Power, p. 200]). The fundamental problem is that
   Rothbard's ideology blinds him to the obvious, namely that the state
   and private property produce identical social relationships
   (ironically, he opines the theory that the state owns its territory
   "makes the State, as well as the King in the Middle Ages, a feudal
   overlord, who at least theoretically owned all the land in his domain"
   without noticing that this makes the capitalist or landlord a King and
   a feudal overlord within "anarcho"-capitalism. [Op. Cit., p. 171]).

   One group of Chinese anarchists pointed out the obvious in 1914. As
   anarchism "takes opposition to authority as its essential principle,"
   anarchists aim to "sweep away all the evil systems of present society
   which have an authoritarian nature" and so "our ideal society" would be
   "without landlords, capitalists, leaders, officials, representatives or
   heads of families." [quoted by Arif Dirlik, Anarchism in the Chinese
   Revolution, p. 131] Only this, the elimination of all forms of
   hierarchy (political, economic and social) would achieve genuine
   anarchism, a society without authority (an-archy). In practice, private
   property is a major source of oppression and authoritarianism within
   society -- there is little or no freedom subject to a landlord or
   within capitalist production (as Bakunin noted, "the worker sells his
   person and his liberty for a given time"). In stark contrast to
   anarchists, "anarcho"-capitalists have no problem with landlords and
   factory fascism (i.e. wage labour), a position which seems highly
   illogical for a theory calling itself libertarian. If it were truly
   libertarian, it would oppose all forms of domination, not just statism
   ("Those who reject authoritarianism will require nobody' permission to
   breathe. The libertarian . . . is not grateful to get permission to
   reside anywhere on his own planet and denies the right of any one to
   screen off bits of it for their own use or rule." [Stuart Christie and
   Albert Meltzer, Floodgates of Anarchy, p. 31]). This illogical and
   self-contradictory position flows from the "anarcho"-capitalist
   definition of freedom as the absence of coercion and will be discussed
   in [3]section F.2 in more detail. The ironic thing is that
   "anarcho"-capitalists implicitly prove the anarchist critique of their
   own ideology.

   Of course, the "anarcho"-capitalist has another means to avoid the
   obvious, namely the assertion that the market will limit the abuses of
   the property owners. If workers do not like their ruler then they can
   seek another. Thus capitalist hierarchy is fine as workers and tenants
   "consent" to it. While the logic is obviously the same, it is doubtful
   that an "anarcho"-capitalist would support the state just because its
   subjects can leave and join another one. As such, this does not address
   the core issue -- the authoritarian nature of capitalist property (see
   [4]section A.2.14). Moreover, this argument completely ignores the
   reality of economic and social power. Thus the "consent" argument fails
   because it ignores the social circumstances of capitalism which limit
   the choice of the many.

   Anarchists have long argued that, as a class, workers have little
   choice but to "consent" to capitalist hierarchy. The alternative is
   either dire poverty or starvation. "Anarcho"-capitalists dismiss such
   claims by denying that there is such a thing as economic power. Rather,
   it is simply freedom of contract. Anarchists consider such claims as a
   joke. To show why, we need only quote (yet again) Rothbard on the
   abolition of slavery and serfdom in the 19th century. He argued,
   correctly, that the "bodies of the oppressed were freed, but the
   property which they had worked and eminently deserved to own, remained
   in the hands of their former oppressors. With economic power thus
   remaining in their hands, the former lords soon found themselves
   virtual masters once more of what were now free tenants or farm
   labourers. The serfs and slaves had tasted freedom, but had been
   cruelly derived of its fruits." [Op. Cit., p. 74]

   To say the least, anarchists fail to see the logic in this position.
   Contrast this with the standard "anarcho"-capitalist claim that if
   market forces ("voluntary exchanges") result in the creation of
   "tenants or farm labourers" then they are free. Yet labourers
   dispossessed by market forces are in exactly the same social and
   economic situation as the ex-serfs and ex-slaves. If the latter do not
   have the fruits of freedom, neither do the former. Rothbard sees the
   obvious "economic power" in the latter case, but denies it in the
   former (ironically, Rothbard dismissed economic power under capitalism
   in the same work. [Op. Cit., pp. 221-2]). It is only Rothbard's
   ideology that stops him from drawing the obvious conclusion --
   identical economic conditions produce identical social relationships
   and so capitalism is marked by "economic power" and "virtual masters."
   The only solution is for "anarcho"-capitalist to simply say that the
   ex-serfs and ex-slaves were actually free to choose and, consequently,
   Rothbard was wrong. It might be inhuman, but at least it would be
   consistent!

   Rothbard's perspective is alien to anarchism. For example, as
   individualist anarchist William Bailie noted, under capitalism there is
   a class system marked by "a dependent industrial class of wage-workers"
   and "a privileged class of wealth-monopolisers, each becoming more and
   more distinct from the other as capitalism advances." This has turned
   property into "a social power, an economic force destructive of rights,
   a fertile source of injustice, a means of enslaving the dispossessed."
   He concluded: "Under this system equal liberty cannot obtain." Bailie
   notes that the modern "industrial world under capitalistic conditions"
   have "arisen under the regime of status" (and so "law-made privileges")
   however, it seems unlikely that he would have concluded that such a
   class system would be fine if it had developed naturally or the current
   state was abolished while leaving that class structure intact. [The
   Individualist Anarchists, p. 121] As we discuss in [5]section G.4,
   Individualist Anarchists like Tucker and Yarrows ended up recognising
   that even the freest competition had become powerless against the
   enormous concentrations of wealth associated with corporate capitalism.

   Therefore anarchists recognise that "free exchange" or "consent" in
   unequal circumstances will reduce freedom as well as increasing
   inequality between individuals and classes. As we discuss in [6]section
   F.3, inequality will produce social relationships which are based on
   hierarchy and domination, not freedom. As Noam Chomsky put it:

     "Anarcho-capitalism, in my opinion, is a doctrinal system which, if
     ever implemented, would lead to forms of tyranny and oppression that
     have few counterparts in human history. There isn't the slightest
     possibility that its (in my view, horrendous) ideas would be
     implemented, because they would quickly destroy any society that
     made this colossal error. The idea of 'free contract' between the
     potentate and his starving subject is a sick joke, perhaps worth
     some moments in an academic seminar exploring the consequences of
     (in my view, absurd) ideas, but nowhere else." [Noam Chomsky on
     Anarchism, interview with Tom Lane, December 23, 1996]

   Clearly, then, by its own arguments "anarcho"-capitalism is not
   anarchist. This should come as no surprise to anarchists. Anarchism, as
   a political theory, was born when Proudhon wrote What is Property?
   specifically to refute the notion that workers are free when capitalist
   property forces them to seek employment by landlords and capitalists.
   He was well aware that in such circumstances property "violates
   equality by the rights of exclusion and increase, and freedom by
   despotism . . . [and has] perfect identity with robbery." He,
   unsurprisingly, talks of the "proprietor, to whom [the worker] has sold
   and surrendered his liberty." For Proudhon, anarchy was "the absence of
   a master, of a sovereign" while "proprietor" was "synonymous" with
   "sovereign" for he "imposes his will as law, and suffers neither
   contradiction nor control." This meant that "property engenders
   despotism," as "each proprietor is sovereign lord within the sphere of
   his property." [What is Property, p. 251, p. 130, p. 264 and pp. 266-7]
   It must also be stressed that Proudhon's classic work is a lengthy
   critique of the kind of apologetics for private property Rothbard
   espouses to salvage his ideology from its obvious contradictions.

   So, ironically, Rothbard repeats the same analysis as Proudhon but
   draws the opposite conclusions and expects to be considered an
   anarchist! Moreover, it seems equally ironic that "anarcho"-capitalism
   calls itself "anarchist" while basing itself on the arguments that
   anarchism was created in opposition to. As shown, "anarcho"-capitalism
   makes as much sense as "anarcho-statism" -- an oxymoron, a
   contradiction in terms. The idea that "anarcho"-capitalism warrants the
   name "anarchist" is simply false. Only someone ignorant of anarchism
   could maintain such a thing. While you expect anarchist theory to show
   this to be the case, the wonderful thing is that "anarcho"-capitalism
   itself does the same.

   Little wonder Bob Black argues that "[t]o demonise state
   authoritarianism while ignoring identical albeit contract-consecrated
   subservient arrangements in the large-scale corporations which control
   the world economy is fetishism at its worst." ["The Libertarian As
   Conservative", The Abolition of Work and Other Essays, pp. 142]
   Left-liberal Stephen L. Newman makes the same point:

     "The emphasis [right-wing] libertarians place on the opposition of
     liberty and political power tends to obscure the role of authority
     in their worldview . . . the authority exercised in private
     relationships, however -- in the relationship between employer and
     employee, for instance -- meets with no objection. . . . [This]
     reveals a curious insensitivity to the use of private authority as a
     means of social control. Comparing public and private authority, we
     might well ask of the [right-wing] libertarians: When the price of
     exercising one's freedom is terribly high, what practical difference
     is there between the commands of the state and those issued by one's
     employer? . . . Though admittedly the circumstances are not
     identical, telling disgruntled empowers that they are always free to
     leave their jobs seems no different in principle from telling
     political dissidents that they are free to emigrate." [Liberalism at
     Wit's End, pp. 45-46]

   As Bob Black pointed out, right libertarians argue that "'one can at
   least change jobs.' But you can't avoid having a job -- just as under
   statism one can at least change nationalities but you can't avoid
   subjection to one nation-state or another. But freedom means more than
   the right to change masters." [Op. Cit., p. 147] The similarities
   between capitalism and statism are clear -- and so why
   "anarcho"-capitalism cannot be anarchist. To reject the authority (the
   "ultimate decision-making power") of the state and embrace that of the
   property owner indicates not only a highly illogical stance but one at
   odds with the basic principles of anarchism. This whole-hearted support
   for wage labour and capitalist property rights indicates that
   "anarcho"-capitalists are not anarchists because they do not reject all
   forms of archy. They obviously support the hierarchy between boss and
   worker (wage labour) and landlord and tenant. Anarchism, by definition,
   is against all forms of archy, including the hierarchy generated by
   capitalist property. To ignore the obvious archy associated with
   capitalist property is highly illogical and trying to dismiss one form
   of domination as flowing from "just" property while attacking the other
   because it flows from "unjust" property is not seeing the wood for the
   trees.

   In addition, we must note that such inequalities in power and wealth
   will need "defending" from those subject to them ("anarcho"-capitalists
   recognise the need for private police and courts to defend property
   from theft -- and, anarchists add, to defend the theft and despotism
   associated with property!). Due to its support of private property (and
   thus authority), "anarcho"-capitalism ends up retaining a state in its
   "anarchy": namely a private state whose existence its proponents
   attempt to deny simply by refusing to call it a state, like an ostrich
   hiding its head in the sand. As one anarchist so rightly put it,
   "anarcho"-capitalists "simply replaced the state with private security
   firms, and can hardly be described as anarchists as the term is
   normally understood." [Brian Morris, "Global Anti-Capitalism", pp.
   170-6, Anarchist Studies, vol. 14, no. 2, p. 175] As we discuss more
   fully in [7]section F.6 this is why "anarcho"-capitalism is better
   described as "private state" capitalism as there would be a functional
   equivalent of the state and it would be just as skewed in favour of the
   propertied elite as the existing one (if not more so). As Albert
   Meltzer put it:

     "Commonsense shows that any capitalist society might dispense with a
     'State' . . . but it could not dispense with organised government,
     or a privatised form of it, if there were people amassing money and
     others working to amass it for them. The philosophy of
     'anarcho-capitalism' dreamed up by the 'libertarian' New Right, has
     nothing to do with Anarchism as known by the Anarchist movement
     proper. It is a lie . . . Patently unbridled capitalism . . . needs
     some force at its disposal to maintain class privileges, either from
     the State itself or from private armies. What they believe in is in
     fact a limited State -- that is, one in which the State has one
     function, to protect the ruling class, does not interfere with
     exploitation, and comes as cheap as possible for the ruling class.
     The idea also serves another purpose . . . a moral justification for
     bourgeois consciences in avoiding taxes without feeling guilty about
     it." [Anarchism: Arguments For and Against, p. 50]

   For anarchists, this need of capitalism for some kind of state is
   unsurprising. For "Anarchy without socialism seems equally as
   impossible to us [as socialism without anarchy], for in such a case it
   could not be other than the domination of the strongest, and would
   therefore set in motion right away the organisation and consolidation
   of this domination; that is to the constitution of government." [Errico
   Malatesta, Errico Malatesta: His Life and Ideas, p. 148] Because of
   this, the "anarcho"-capitalist rejection of the anarchist critique of
   capitalism and our arguments on the need for equality, they cannot be
   considered anarchists or part of the anarchist tradition. To anarchists
   it seems bizarre that "anarcho"-capitalists want to get rid of the
   state but maintain the system it helped create and its function as a
   defender of the capitalist class's property and property rights. In
   other words, to reduce the state purely to its function as (to use
   Malatesta's apt word) the gendarme of the capitalist class is not an
   anarchist goal.

   Thus anarchism is far more than the common dictionary definition of "no
   government" -- it also entails being against all forms of archy,
   including those generated by capitalist property. This is clear from
   the roots of the word "anarchy." As we noted in [8]section A.1, the
   word anarchy means "no rulers" or "contrary to authority." As Rothbard
   himself acknowledges, the property owner is the ruler of their property
   and, therefore, those who use it. For this reason "anarcho"-capitalism
   cannot be considered as a form of anarchism -- a real anarchist must
   logically oppose the authority of the property owner along with that of
   the state. As "anarcho"-capitalism does not explicitly (or implicitly,
   for that matter) call for economic arrangements that will end wage
   labour and usury it cannot be considered anarchist or part of the
   anarchist tradition. While anarchists have always opposed capitalism,
   "anarcho"-capitalists have embraced it and due to this embrace their
   "anarchy" will be marked by relationships based upon subordination and
   hierarchy (such as wage labour), not freedom (little wonder that
   Proudhon argued that "property is despotism" -- it creates
   authoritarian and hierarchical relationships between people in a
   similar way to statism). Their support for "free market" capitalism
   ignores the impact of wealth and power on the nature and outcome of
   individual decisions within the market (see sections [9]F.2 and [10]F.3
   for further discussion). Furthermore, any such system of (economic and
   social) power will require extensive force to maintain it and the
   "anarcho"-capitalist system of competing "defence firms" will simply be
   a new state, enforcing capitalist power, property rights and law.

   Thus the "anarcho"-capitalist and the anarchist have different starting
   positions and opposite ends in mind. Their claims to being anarchists
   are bogus simply because they reject so much of the anarchist tradition
   as to make what little they do pay lip-service to non-anarchist in
   theory and practice. Little wonder Peter Marshall said that "few
   anarchists would accept the 'anarcho-capitalists' into the anarchist
   camp since they do not share a concern for economic equality and social
   justice." As such, "anarcho"-capitalists, "even if they do reject the
   State, might therefore best be called right-wing libertarians rather
   than anarchists." [Demanding the Impossible, p. 565]

References

   1. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secFint.html
   2. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secF4.html#secf41
   3. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secF2.html
   4. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secA2.html#seca214
   5. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secG4.html
   6. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secF3.html
   7. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secF6.html
   8. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secA1.html
   9. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secF2.html
  10. file://localhost/home/mauro/baku/debianize/maint/anarchy/secF3.html
