Boundaries of Order: Private Property as a Social System

by Butler D Shaffer

Every once in a while, a treatise on libertarian philosophy appears that presages a new way of thinking about politics and economics. Boundaries of Order by Butler Shaffer is in that tradition — scholarly yet passionate, providing a completely fresh look at a marvelous intellectual apparatus by a mature intellectual who has been writing on law, economics, and history for four decades. It is the treatise on liberty and property for the digital age, one written in the Rothbardian and Hayekian tradition with a consistently antistate message and a unique perspective on how the great struggle between state and society is playing itself out in our times.Its added value is a vision of the completely free society that is idealistic, practical, and thoroughly optimistic. In a thoroughly composed work that builds up from foundations all the way through to an inspiring conclusion, Shaffer presents a vivid portrait of how human cooperation within a framework of liberty and private property yields results that produce human betterment in every conceivable way. Just as powerfully, however, he shows that right now, even in the midst of an epoch of despotic state control, we owe all that we love in the course of our daily lives to the institution of liberty.What's striking is how this is not a book that merely bemoans the loss of a bygone era. In fact, Shaffer's view is that the state itself represents a bygone era, ruling with dated ideas over a world that no longer exists. Reality is at once hyperlocalized and hyperinternationalized, with the two ends of the spectrum connected through digital communication and infinitely complex forms of ownership that never stop yielding unpredictable change.The nation-state as we know it is constructed to deal with static institutions that are largely mythical, that are not part of our daily lives — and to that extent the state has become an artificial structure governing an artificial reality but with very tangible costs.What Shaffer argues is that we are living in a world of glorious upheaval, managed in an orderly way by virtue of individual volition and property ownership. The state is not part of this path of progress and only works to impede it temporarily and at terrible cost. Meanwhile, the political is ever less relevant for people in the course of their daily lives. It does not help us accomplish the ends we seek to achieve. In this way, he strengthens the case against the state, and intensifies it in our the sheer complexity of the social order stands to utterly defy any attempts to control it.The life of a society is found in the relations between its individuals and their property-based associations. But property always has a social end, he argues. Our lives are bound up with each other within the division of labor, while our individual interests are unavoidably intertwined. If we are to live as free individuals, we must cooperate with others in voluntary association.He further discusses the albatross of collectivism and its grave consequences, yet he understands the collective in a different way. He views it as a pyramidal model that is forced to fit on a diffuse and changing social order; it relies most fundamentally on violence but cannot achieve any socially useful end. The analysis applies not only to socialism but to all models of top-down management, even that which relies on the myth of limited government.The book is at once deeply radical and penetratingly optimistic about the future. Shaffer helps us to imagine that the withering away of the state will not bring cataclysm but simply more of what we love and what we find useful and less of what we do not love and what we do not find useful. One comes away from this work with an intense awareness of the great dividing line — too often made invisible by disinformation — that separates power relations from social rela

Genres: Economics

352 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Jason Williams · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has had some mixed reviews, and I can relate to some of the criticisms, but I still highly recommend it. This book opened a new area of my mind when I thought I couldn't be surprised anymore. When I first read Rothbard's Man Economy and the State, I was transformed. This book caused me to transform some more. What I took most from this book is the power and control that symbols have on one's mind. That your mind and the emotions you go through can be seen as property that the state is actively trying to control.

[Logan Albright · Rating 5 out of 5]

Magnificent. Deserves to stand alongside The Road to Serfdom and For a New Liberty as required reading for libertarians.

[Zachary Moore]

I enjoyed this book although I didn't quite live up to my expectations as I was expecting some more thorough analysis on some points and though the author rested his case much too heavily on sociobiology (a theory whose merits I am doubtful of). What I believe will stick with me most is the basic observation that when an individual desires to change the behavior of his fellow men he can either persuade them (in which case he does not need to use force) or fail to persuade them (in which case any force he employs is likely to be counter-productive).

[Geir · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very mind-expanding and eye-opening book. Private property as a concept is discussed in all its implications. I would not recommend it as a first read for those who want to get to know libertarinism, but for those who are missing the final step: Of getting rid of the State and politics from their mind as a "necessary evil".

Some chapters were a bit long and there is a tendency for repetition, but the entire book was not too long. In fact, I wanted more. The author has so much to tell and I am beginning to read more and more of what he has written on various subjects.

[Giovanni Parra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Muitas idéias interessantes, formuladas somente ao nível de idéias, sem aprofundamento algum (isto pode ser bom, e, no caso, é um elogio, porque funciona e cumpre o propósito de inundar o leitor de pensamento pró-propriedade por todos os lados), mas esses muitos bons momentos estão mergulhados num oceano de obviedades e repetições exaustivas que são de dar azia em bicarbonato. De tanto pular páginas tentando escapar da enrolação, devo ter perdido pelo menos metade dos bons insights.

[Geoffrey Hazelton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow, this is a must read if you have a concern for where this country is headed. The author defines private property in ways that will change your thinking, His description of private property and it's relation to liberty is an eye opener and perhaps is the ideal we need to replace the all pervasive state.

[Tommy Powell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some solid reasoning... -but a bit too long in the tooth.

[Peter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent!

[Michael Kaz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rambles a bit at times but overall a worthwhile discussion on the nature of private property.

[Keir Martland · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'll have to read it again some time, didn't enjoy it at all, though.

[Neelesh Marik · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book is an attempted answer to a single question: Who has the ultimate authority (claim) to exercise decision making (control) over any given item of property (boundary)?

This quote sums up the quandary human civilization finds itself in:

As individuals, we may experience some insight into a fundamentally different sense of our relationship with other people and the rest of the world. This new vision begins to inform our consciousness in a significant way. But instead of allowing this experience to play itself out within our mind, many of us become anxious to confirm its validity by projecting onto others the behavior that we believe are its consequences. We become driven to control the behavior of others so that their
conduct will reflect our new vision. In such ways do we try to bolster our own newly-discovered resolve by imagining that the coerced obedience of others is a reflection of shared values. As with so many other aspects of our lives, we have learned to regard our inner experiences as unimportant.
Rather than permitting such insights to develop themselves into a radically altered personal consciousness, we settle for the ersatz transformation of our outer world, which we deceive ourselves into believing can be produced through coercive, political means.
- Chapter 8 pp 246