Estado: Instituição que intervém no livre mercado através do exercício direto da coerção ou da concessão de privilégios (sustentados pela coerção).

Impostos: Forma de coerção ou interferência no livre mercado em que o estado coleta tributos (os impostos) que permitem que ele contrate forças armadas para agir de forma coercitiva na defesa de privilégios, além de se envolver em guerras, aventuras, experimentos, “reformas” e outras atividades custeadas não por seus próprios recursos, mas às custas de “seus” súditos.

Privilégio: Do latim privi, privado, e lege, lei. Uma vantagem concedida pelo estado e protegida por seus poderes de coerção. Uma lei em benefício privado.

Usura: Forma de privilégio ou interferência no livre mercado em que um grupo, apoiado pelo estado, monopoliza a emissão de moeda e, com isso, cobra tributos (juros), diretos ou indiretos, sobre todas as transações econômicas.

Latifundismo: Forma de privilégio ou interferência no livre mercado em que um grupo, apoiado pelo estado, passa a ser “dono” da terra e, assim, extrai tributos (rendas, aluguéis) daqueles que vivem, trabalham ou produzem nela.

Tarifas: Forma de privilégio ou interferência no livre mercado em que as mercadorias produzidas fora do estado não podem competir em igualdade com aquelas produzidas dentro do âmbito do estado.

Capitalismo: Organização social que incorpora elementos como impostos, usura, latifúndios e tarifas e, portanto, é contrária ao livre mercado, embora alegue representá-lo.

Conservadorismo: Escola filosófica capitalista que afirma apoiar o livre mercado, mas que, na verdade, defende a usura, os direitos artificiais à terra, as tarifas e, às vezes, impostos.

Social-democracia: Escola filosófica capitalista que pretende corrigir as injustiças do capitalismo acrescentando novas leis às já existentes. Toda vez que os conservadores passam novas leis que criam privilégios, os social-democratas criam outras leis modificando esses privilégios, o que impele os conservadores a fazerem leis mais sutis que recriam os antigos privilégios e assim por diante, até que “tudo que não seja proibido é obrigatório” e “tudo que não seja obrigatório é proibido”.

Socialismo: Tentativa de abolição de todos os privilégios através da concentração de todo poder no agente coercitivo por trás dos privilégios, o estado, transformando a oligarquia capitalista em monopólios estatais. É o mesmo que tentar branquear uma parede pintando-a de preto.

Anarquismo: Organização social na qual o mercado opera de modo livre, sem impostos, usura, concentrações de terras, tarifas ou outras formas de coerção ou privilégio. Os anarquistas de “direita” preveem que, num livre mercado, as pessoas escolheriam voluntariamente competir mais do que cooperar; anarquistas de “esquerda” preveem que, num livre mercado, as pessoas escolheriam voluntariamente cooperar mais do que competir.

Traduzido do inglês para o português por Erick Vasconcelos.

DE STAAT: De instelling die de Vrije Markt belemmerd via de directe uitoefening ban dwang of het toekennen van privileges (gesteund door dwang).

BELASTING: Een vorm van dwang en belemmering van de Vrije Markt waarin de staat tribuut verzamelt (de belastingen), waardoor het strijdkrachten kan huren om dwang uit te oefenen en privileges te verdedigen, en ook om deel te nemen aan oorlogen, experimenten, ‘hervormingen”, enzovoort. De staat doet dit niet op eigen kosten maar ten kosten van haar burgers.

PRIVILEGE: Van het Latijnse privi, privé, en lege, wet. Een voordeel toegekend door de staat en beschermd doormiddel van dwang. Een wet voor persoonlijke bevoorrechting.

WOEKER: Een vorm van privilege die de Vrije Markt belemmert waarin een groep, gesteund door de overheid, het muntstelsel monopoliseert en daardoor tribuut (in de vorm van rente), direct of indirect, uit alle economische transacties weet te halen.

GROOTGRONDBEZIT: Die vorm van privilege of belemmering van de Vrije markt waarin een groep, gesteund door de overheid, eigenaar wordt van grote stukken land en daardoor tribuut (huur) kan afdwingen van degenen die op het land wonen, werken of produceren.

DOUANERECHTEN: Een vorm van privilege of belemmering van de Vrije Markt waardoor goederen die buiten de Staat geproduceerd worden niet vrij zijn om op gelijke voet te concurreren met goederen die binnen de staat geproduceerd zijn.

KAPITALISME: De inrichting van de samenleving waarin belasting, woekeraars, grootgrondbezit en douanerechten de dienst uit maken. Deze toestand belemmert de Vrije Markt terwijl het juist de Vrije Markt probeert te illustreren.

CONSERVATISME: De school van de kapitalistische filosofie die trouw beweert aan de Vrije Markt terwijl het in feite woekering, grootgrondbezit, douanerechten en soms belasting ondersteunt.

LIBERALISME: De school van de kapitalistische filosofie die probeert de onrechtvaardigheden van het kapitalisme te corrigeren door nieuwe wetten toe te voegen aan bestaande wetten. Elke keer dat conservatieven een nieuw privilege toekenennen maken de liberalen een wet om dit voorrecht te wijzigen, waarna conservatieven een meer subtielere wet maken die het privilege in stand houdt, etc., tot dat “alles dat niet verboden is verplicht word” en “alles dat niet verplicht word verboden is”.

(STAATS) SOCIALISME: De poging tot afschaffing van alle privileges door de volledige macht te geven aan de vertegenwoordig van alle privileges, de Staat, waardoor de kapitalistische oligarchie omgezet word in een etatistische monopolie.

ANARCHISME: Die inrichting van de samenleving waarin de vrije markt vrij functioneert zonder belasting, woeker, grootgrondbezit, douanerechten of andere vormen van dwang of voorrecht. “Rechts-“ anarchisten voorspellen dat in de Vrije Markt mensen vrijwillig zullen kiezen om vaker te concurreren dan om samen te werken; “links-“ anarchisten voorspellen dat in de Vrije Markt mensen vaker vrijwillig zullen kiezen voor samenwerking dan concurrentie.

Robert Shea en Robert Anton Wilson, The Illuminatus! Trilogy (New York: Dell, 1975) pp. 622-23

Vertalingen voor dit artikel:

• Deutsch, Begriffserklärungen und Unterschiede.
• English, Definitions and Distinctions

FREIER MARKT: Der Zustand der Gesellschaft in dem alle ökonomischen Handlungen (Geschäfte) auf Freiwilligkeit basieren, nicht auf Zwang.

DER STAAT: Die Institution die den freien Markt behindert durch die direkte Anwendung von Zwang oder die Gewährung von Privilegien (unterstützt durch Zwang).

STEUER: Die Form des Zwangs bzw. Behinderung des freien Marktes durch den der Staat Abgaben kassiert (die Steuer), die die Anheuerung von bewaffneten Truppen ermöglichen welche den Zwang ausüben und Privilegien verteidigen, auch die Beteiligung an Kriegen, riskanten Unternehmen, Experimenten, Reformen, etc. wie es ihm beliebt, nicht auf eigene Kosten, sondern auf die Kosten seiner Propanden.

PRIVILEG: Von Latein: privi – privat und lege – recht. Eine Bevorteiligung, die durch den Staat garantiert wird und von seinen Kräften mit Zwang geschützt wird. Ein privates Vorteilsrecht.

ZINSWUCHER: Die Form von Privileg bzw. Einmischung in den freien Markt bei dem staatlich- unterstützte Gruppen das Geldsystem monopolisieren und dadurch Abgaben (Zinsen) einnehmen, direkt oder indirekt, von allen bzw. den meisten ökonomischen Transaktionen.

GROẞGRUNDBESITZ: Die Form von Privileg bzw. Einmischung in den freien Markt bei dem eine staatlich unterstütze Gruppe Land „besitzt“ und dadurch Abgaben (Pacht) von denen einnimmt die dort leben, arbeiten oder produzieren.

ZOLL: Die Form von Privileg bzw. Einmischung in den freien Markt bei Waren die ausserhalb des Staates produziert wurden nicht in gleicher Weise mit den Waren konkurrieren die im Staat produziert wurden.

KAPITALISMUS: Die Gesellschaftsordnung bei der Elemente der Steuer, des Zinswucher, des Großgrundbesitzes und des Zolls eingebettet sind, welche den freien Markt verweigert während sie so tut als würde sie ein Beispiel für diesen sein.

KONSERVATIVISMUS: Die Schule der kapitalistischen Philosophie die behauptet loyal zum freien Markt zu stehen, während sie eigentlich Zinswucher, Großgrundbesitz, Zoll und manchmal Besteuerung unterstützt.

LIBERALISMUS: Die Schule der kapitalistischen Philosophie welche versucht die Ungerechtigkeit des Kapitalismus durch neue Gesetze zu beseitigen. Jederzeit wenn Konservative ein Gesetz erlassen das ein Privileg erschafft, erlassen Liberale ein anderes Gesetz um das Privileg zu modifizieren, dies veranlasst Konservative mehr raffinierte Gesetze zu verabschieden die das Privileg wiederherstellen, usw. solange bis „alles was nicht verboten ist Zwang ist“ und „alles was nicht Zwang ist verboten ist“.

SOZIALISMUS: Die versuchte Abschaffung aller Privilegien durch die Wiederherstellung der vollständigen Zwangsgewalt hinter allen Privilegien, dem Staat, wodurch die kapitalistische Oligarchie in einen staatlichen Monopolismus umgewandelt wird. Eine Wand kalken, indem man sie schwarz streicht.

ANARCHISMUS: Die Ordnung der Gesellschaft in der der freie Markt ungehindert agiert, ohne Steuern, Zinswucher, Großgrundbesitz, Zoll und anderen Formen von Zwang oder Privilegien. „Rechte“ Anarchisten prophezeien das die Menschen in einem freien Markt freiwillig mehr miteinander konkurrieren statt kooperieren würden, „Linke“ Anarchisten prophezeien das es mehr Kooperation als Konkurrenz geben wird.

Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson, The Illuminatus! Trilogy (New York: Dell, 1975) pp. 622-23

Die ursprüngliche Version dieses Artikels wurde von Robert Shea und Robert Anton Wilson veröffentlicht.

Übersetzung aus dem Englischen: Sascha Bose

What are the ways by which men gain possession of property? Not many. Let us name them: work, gift, discovery, gaming, the various forms of illegal robbery by force or fraud, usury. Can men obtain wealth by any other than one or more of these methods? Clearly, no. Whoever the Somebody may be, then, he must accumulate his riches in one of these ways. We will find him by the process of elimination.

Is the Somebody the laborer? No; at least not as laborer; otherwise the question were absurd. Its premises exclude him. He gains a bare subsistence by his work; no more. We are searching for his surplus product. He has it not.

Is the Somebody the beggar, the invalid, the cripple, the discoverer, the gambler, the highway robber, the burglar, the defaulter, the pickpocket, or the common swindler? None of these, to any extent worth mentioning. The aggregate of wealth absorbed by these classes of our population compared with the vast mass produced is a mere drop in the ocean, unworthy of consideration in studying a fundamental problem of political economy. These people get some wealth, it is true; enough, probably for their own purposes: but labor can spare them the whole of it, and never know the difference.

Then we have found him. Only the usurer remaining, he must be the Somebody whom we are looking for; he, and none other. But who is the usurer, and whence comes his power? There are three forms of usury: interest on money, rent of land and houses, and profit in exchange. Whoever is in receipt of any of these is a usurer. And who is not? Scarcely any one. The banker is a usurer; the manufacturer is a usurer; the merchant is a usurer; the landlord is a usurer; and the workingman who puts his savings, if he has any, out at interest, or takes rent for his house or lot, if he owns one, or exchanges his labor for more than an equivalent, – he too is a usurer. The sin of usury is one under which all are concluded, and for which all are responsible. But all do not benefit by it. The vast majority suffer. Only the chief usurers accumulate: in agricultural and thickly-settled countries, the landlords; in industrial and commercial countries, the bankers. Those are the Somebodies who swallow up the surplus wealth.

And where do the Somebodies get their power? From monopoly. Here, as usual, the State is the chief of sinners. Usury rests on two great monopolies, – the monopoly of land and the monopoly of credit. Were it not for these, it would disappear. Ground-rent exists only because the State stands by to collect it and to protect land-titles rooted in force or fraud. Otherwise the land would be free to all, and no one could control more than he used. Interest and house-rent exist only because the State grants to a certain class of individuals and corporations the exclusive privilege of using its credit and theirs as a basis for the issuance of circulating currency. Otherwise credit would be free to all, and money, brought under the law of competition, would be issued at cost. Interest and rent gone, competition would leave little or no chance for profit in exchange except in business protected by tariff or patent laws. And there again the State has but to step aside to cause the last vestige of usury to disappear.

The usurer is the Somebody, and the State is his protector. Usury is the serpent gnawing at labor’s vitals, and only liberty can detach and kill it. Give laborers their liberty, and they will keep their wealth. As for the Somebody, he, stripped of his power to steal, must either join their ranks or starve.

Ready to print Zine.

THE STATE: That institution which interferes with the Free Market through the direct exercise of coercion or the granting of privileges (backed by coercion).

TAX: That form of coercion or interference with the Free Market in which the State collects tribute (the tax), allowing it to hire armed forces to practice coercion in defense of privilege, and also to engage in such wars, adventures, experiments, “reforms”, etc., as it pleases, not at its own cost, but at the cost of “its” subjects.

PRIVILEGE: From the Latin privi, private, and lege, law. An advantage granted by the State and protected by its powers of coercion. A law for private benefit.

USURY: That form of privilege or interference with the Free Market in which one State-supported group monopolizes the coinage and thereby takes tribute (interest), direct or indirect, on all or most economic transactions.

LANDLORDISM: That form of privilege or interference with the Free Market in which one State-supported group “owns” the land and thereby takes tribute (rent) from those who live, work, or produce on the land.

TARRIFF: That form of privilege or interference with the Free Market in which commodities produced outside the State are not allowed to compete equally with those produced inside the State.

CAPITALISM: That organization of society, incorporating elements of tax, usury, landlordism, and tariff, which thus denies the Free Market while pretending to exemplify it.

CONSERVATISM: That school of capitalist philosophy which claims allegiance to the Free Market while actually supporting usury, landlordism, tariff, and sometimes taxation.

LIBERALISM: That school of capitalist philosophy which attempts to correct the injustices of capitalism by adding new laws to the existing laws. Each time conservatives pass a law creating privilege, liberals pass another law modifying privilege, leading conservatives to pass a more subtle law recreating privilege, etc., until “everything not forbidden is compulsory” and “everything not compulsory is forbidden”.

SOCIALISM: The attempted abolition of all privilege by restoring power entirely to the coercive agent behind privilege, the State, thereby converting capitalist oligarchy into Statist monopoly. Whitewashing a wall by painting it black.

ANARCHISM: That organization of society in which the Free Market operates freely, without taxes, usury, landlordism, tariffs, or other forms of coercion or privilege. “Right” anarchists predict that in the Free Market people would voluntarily choose to compete more often than to cooperate; “left” anarchists predict that in the Free Market people would voluntarily choose to cooperate more often than to compete.

Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson, The Illuminatus! Trilogy (New York: Dell, 1975) pp. 622-23

Translations for this article:

• Deutsch, Begriffserklärungen und Unterscheidungen.
• Dutch, Definities en onderscheid.
• Portuguese, Definições e distinções.

Obama opined, predictably, that the 2008 banking crisis was the result of under-regulation. And he was right — as far as it goes. The repeal of Glass-Steagall, for example, no doubt exacerbated the growth of the bubble economy over the past thirty years.

The problem is that for Obama — and for Romney as well — “regulation” refers only to secondary state interventions that stabilize or ameliorate the existing model of corporate capitalism, and prevent corporate power from becoming so great it destroys itself and takes everything down with it.

“Regulation” decidedly does not include the primary state interventions that created the power of big business, finance capital and the FIRE Economy in the first place. So the regulations Obama champions are really just a state restriction or qualification on the exercise of powers granted by the state in the first place.

If the bloated FIRE Economy and bubble-fueled demand didn’t exist, corporate capitalism would have to invent them in order to survive. It was the state itself, in the mid-19th century, which created a centralized, capital-intensive, overbuilt corporate economy prone to chronic overaccumulation of capital, stagnation and idle capacity. The tendency toward stagnation was exacerbated by the “maldistribution of purchasing power” resulting from state enforcement of rents on artificial scarcity and artificial property rights, which shifted income from those classes with a high propensity to consume to those with a high propensity to save and invest.

State capitalism’s chronic crisis tendencies almost destroyed it in the Great Depression — and would have, had not the state intervened to save it with a little stimulus package called World War II. WWII not only stimulated domestic war production — nearly half of all American plant and equipment in 1945 had been built in the previous three years — but it destroyed most industrial production in the world outside the United States. Between having bombed most of its competition flat and having greatly expanded aggregate demand from the permanent war economy, the U.S. had good economic times for a generation after WWII.

But by around 1970, Europe and Japan had more than rebuilt their industrial capacity, and America’s chronic tendencies toward overaccumulation and excess capacity resumed. Since then there’s been an increasing tendency toward declining profits and jobless recoveries, with profit in boom times increasingly fueled by speculative bubbles, the creation of new industries by the state and deficit spending far beyond the naughtiest of Keynes’ dreams.

When Obama and Romney debate “regulation,” they’re not talking about the primary regulations that define the structure of capitalism as we know it. They’re both entirely in favor of them. Their entire disagreement is over the amount of secondary regulation — of restraint on the rentier classes’ exercise of their state-created power — necessary to maximize long-term profit on a sustainable basis. Those two clowns, in other words, just represent the two major factions in the economic ruling class.

To the extent that the primary interventions were even hinted at, Romney let out a vigorous dog-whistle that he’s all fur ‘em. “Regulation is essential. You can’t have a free-market work if you don’t have regulation, You couldn’t have people opening up banks in their garage and making loans. At the same time, regulation can become excessive.”

So Romney’s totally OK with regulation that protects the banksters from competition with garage loans. It’s just regulations that prevent them from becoming too big to fail, or restrict their participation in the casino economy, that he has a problem with.

It’s worth considering just how much of the alternative economy we free market anticapitalists promote centers on things like the “garage banks” to which Romney is so justifiably opposed. The real reason he (and the economic parasites both he and Obama represent) are so vehemently against such operations is that they represent the one thing above all of which the economic ruling class is opposed: Competition.

Legal tender laws and requirements that taxes be paid in legal tender hinder the operation of alternative currency systems, which provide much-needed liquidity for local exchange in conditions of economic downturn when there is “no money” in circulation. They’re growing rapidly right now in places like Greece and Spain thanks to Europe’s currency meltdown, for example. And bank licensing laws that mandate minimum capitalization levels for lending institutions further hinder the development of alternative money and credit systems.

Tom Greco‘s credit-clearing network, my favorite alternative currency, serves as a rough model for most of the digital, encrypted local currency systems around the world. The beauty of Greco’s system is that it serves as a denominator for exchanging existing values, rather than a store of past value. So members of the system can trade present against present, or present against future services, even when nobody has any money accumulated from past transactions. Greco’s system functions much like a checking account: When you sell a good or service within the “barter” network, your balance goes up. When you buy, it goes down. But most such systems let members run standing negative balances up to an amount equivalent to some selected period of average activity on their account. Which means that, even with everyone starting from zero, members of a community with “no money” have liquidity for trading their goods and services. Obviously, such advances of purchasing power by a barter network — which amount to free overdraft protection — risk falling afoul of government banking regulations.

Mutual banks, likewise — banking cooperatives which issue zero-interest secured loans against their members’ own collateral — are in clear violation of the state-enforced banking monopoly when they issue even secured credit without any capital reserves.

Obviously the economic ruling classes — which have lived off the rents on artificial scarcity since the rise of the state — cannot tolerate competition from such arrangements. The state is the instrument of armed force by which an economic ruling class extracts rents from the producing majority of a society. Since the beginning of history, rentier classes have interposed themselves between producers and consumers, setting up tollgates to collect tribute in return for not forcibly obstructing production, or allowing producers to trade their goods and services with others in return for a cut of the take.

The usurer, the landlord, the licensed monopolist, the holder of copyrights, patents and trademarks — are all comparable to the owner of a toll-gate erected on a bridge. On one side of the river is (say) a farmer who needs shoes, and on the other side a shoemaker who needs corn. The shoemaker and farmer can cross the bridge — so long as the owner of the toll-gate gets a share of the corn and shoes for allowing it.

The function of the state is to back up, with its guns, the right of these toll-gate owners to exact tribute from the rest of us for the privilege of feeding ourselves. And regardless of Obama’s talk about “working families” and “kitchen tables,” and Romney’s talk about “free enterprise” and “individualism,” both of them are good and faithful servants of the classes that own the Earth and everything in it, and live off our sweat and blood.

Two things to remember, though. First, it’s “garage banks” — credit clearing networks, LETS systems, and mutual banks — in conjunction with local micromanufacturers, permaculture, open-source information technology, and other horizontal and decentralized forms of production — that will keep us alive long after the state and corporations are smoldering in the garbage heaps of Gehenna. And second, thanks to such expedients as encryption and darknets, the state is losing its ability to stamp out such competition to the rentier classes at the very time it’s becoming most essential to our survival.

We will bury them.