Can an Anarchist Society, Trade with a Totalitarian Society "Freely"?

[LifeIsBrief]

Most of this post is explained entirely in the title.  Can an anarchist society trade with a totalitarian regime "freely".  I have, at numerous times in my past suggested that capitalism can't compete with communism on price.  Is that naïve?  I think that so long as there are dictators, anyone who refuses dictation should refuse to trade with the dictators slaves, or else they are funding slavery.

 

People often respond that "by trading with them, we lead by example, and show them how wonderful our system is"... I simply disagree.  By trading with a dictatorship, you give a dictator money... Period!  There is no way to trade with the people cowering under a dictatorial regime, without empowering that regime, because they don't get to keep as much of the money, as the state.  Also, laborers who sell their labor on the free market, won't take wages low enough to compete with laborers who exist in a state of perpetual starvation.

 

So long as a dictator is capable of forcing people to work 60 hours a week, for less than is required to feed their family, in a hut... how are a free societies laborers going to compete with that?  By trading with totalitarian regimes does a free society fund its own inevitable destruction?

 

I hope I'm wrong about this, by the way, it would make me a lot more comfortable in my daily life, so feel free to disagree vehemently.

[Tony Crowe]

I think a free society would be able to compete in regards to quality and the moral high road. As far as dirt cheap prices on crappy goods I don't think a free society would be able to complete nor would they want to.

 

The example of the tech industry comes up a lot in the show where it is unregulated and constantly improving in many ways. I believe that with less regulation people in the tech industry could move into areas that are currently regulated and vastly help improve quality, efficiency, and safety. Right now there's just no incentive to.

 

Do you think you would want to buy from a place under control of a tyrant when you have a choice? Wouldn't it be risky since you'd be dealing with people having no ethical standards? Do you think a place with such shitty living arrangements could compete with a free society on quality?

[Pepin]

A similar question arose in my thoughts recently. If the products are the result of slavery, I don't you justify yourself morally in any sense, though I am unsure if it would be permissible to initiate force against someone who deals with slave owners. In a similar case, someone who makes a business off of theft and the good is certainly immoral, and there seem to be a justification to be made that if I buy a good off this man, the original owner of the property has full right to take back their stolen good through the use of force regardless of my knowledge as to if it was stolen or not. Though I am unsure if this true ethically as it isn't something I've analyzed rigorously, if it is true, then the use of force against those who knowingly enable slavery is justified.

 

My instinct tells me that it is an APA matter and that it ought to be handled purely through social ostracism. Someone who chooses to do so is certainly of vile character, yet since they are not the slave owner, force cannot be used to stop their funding. I feel as though a funding of slavery is to take ownership of the slaves through the intermediary of the actual slave owner. This is similar to the hiring of a hitman in that though the hitman pulls the trigger and is fully accountable, you are responsible just as well. But a difficulty arrives in this in relation to business as the end supported is not immoral, yet it is the method used to achieve such an end. Is the business owner using slavery as a means, or are the means only a consideration of the one who is to use them?

 

I really don't know. It is difficult to think about, partly because it confuses me as to my relation with the world. Though not slavery per se, ought I boycott Apple products for the labor practices they use? I am lead to say yes and I have no problem in saying yes, but there is a real lack of clarity in this, and it is clear to me that I don't understand enough to feel stable.

 

I don't know if this would be a problem in an anarchist society because I don't think slave based labor could compete, and it would be clear that anyone who used such labor was doing so because it was slave based, but what confuses me so much is the intermediate steps.

[LifeIsBrief]

The intermediate steps are what confuse, and frustrate me as well Pepin... It's a very dark gray area... because I do think it's immoral to buy Apple products, while being in an intermediately free society... but there are almost no "intermediately free trade" solutions, Blackberry uses Foxconn too, and it bothers me.  I don't know exactly what to do about this.

 

Tony... My principle concern is that... Are all T-shirts crappy goods?  How long can we continue to pay dictators to make our T-shirts, and as an intermediately free society, is this morally wrong?  I think once we reach, what I would call "actual freedom", no one would want to buy T-shirts from people who aren't free, but for moral reasons, not economic ones... so, what do we do before that exists?

[Emanuel]

In the case of living in a somewhat-free society and buying from a somewhat-less free society, I think that there's no ethics involved.

I can certainly see how someone would be unwilling to buy t-shirts from some dictatorial country, and how other people would not be bothered.

I don't think there is a real difference in buying from a more direct serfdom system than from a more indirect system like ours.

 

I don't think there is really a more moral way to act right now. You could even say that buying from an overseas dictator is better than funding your own state, as it will have less revenue and go bankrupt sooner, causing freedom in a shorter length of time. 

It's really up to the consumer, and how their conscience plays into it. But I don't believe that you can use UPB to justify any course of action in this situation.