Protect the market or the people
First I would like to apologize there is no link for my source. I got it out of "The Constitution of Liberty" by Friedrich Hayek. In chapter two(pg.22-51) he talked about the market determining various rights as they pertain to trade. He felt that the government should stay the heck out trade all together, to prevent any loss of information that would be exchanged. He felt that information exchanged thru trade brings about progressive change in human civilization. Any institution that makes guidelines or seeks to control markets restricts progress and makes society constrained and thus un-free.
After I read this for my Political Organizations class, I began thinking about the different information that came to the Americas as a result of no government intervention on trade. Slavery came to mind, and we all know what ideologies came what it, and the notion that Native Americans were savages who had no souls, which contributed greatly to the extermination of thousands tribes. Several social problems occurred as a result of "Free-trade".
I say all this just to say that if we don't have government policies targeted at protecting markets but also protecting the rights of the people who make up those markets, then we leave the door open to allow a person or a group of people to exploit the masses and take away basic human rights in the process, just because it's profitable for business. If we determine rights based on who values air, water or trees more, whoever has more of the commodity by which value is measured (i.e. land, money, people, heredity,etc.) will receive supreme rights over all the other parties involved, which is unjust unless a all parties agree upon their rights and claims to the resource in question. The government should therefore protect and enforce the argreement by the various parties to avoid violence and any other ill-mannered feelings which could bring social tension.
posted by Anonymous @ 3:46 PM
2 Comments:
The problem is see with complete free trade, free of government is that rights and/or freedoms extend into trade. Everyone should be allowed to trade freely, but when does someone else ideas of their free trade impose itself on another’s freedom. I do somewhat agree that a true free market can and has lead to the restrictions of ones perceived rights. So if one wants to trade freely and that trade or product is someone else’s freedom, in a true free trade society that can be difficult to control if on a large scale where one person can hide among millions.
I do agree that there can be no true "free" market without exploitation. We live in a world defined by rules, the thou shalt not's if you will. With rules come consequences and thus accountability. The problem comes when you try to define the rules because who truely is right in the end. But in every market there are rules. The choice is whether you want to government to define those rules or if you trust others to make it. One would hope that since we elect our own officials, they would work for our interests, but that doesn't always happen. But truth is that the government has checks and balances whereas other institutions or people may not, which allows change to occur as values change.
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