Does It Matter Where You Start?
Further Contemplations on Race, Equality, and Freedom
by Wilton D. Alston
by
Wilton D. Alston
DIGG THIS
"There
are two types of people: those that talk the talk and those that
walk the walk. People who walk the walk sometimes talk the talk
but most times they don't talk at all, 'cause they walkin'. Now,
people who talk the talk, when it comes time for them to walk
the walk, you know what they do? They talk people like me into
walkin' for them."
~
"Key" (Anthony Anderson), Hustle
& Flow
A respondent
in South Africa made some fascinating comments after reading my
"Where Have
All the Black Libertarians Gone?" article, the first modest
musing I submitted to LewRockwell.com back in 2006. His
questions and comments, from which I quote below, are among those
that I’ve often asked myself or considered. In fact, they reflect
concerns that plagued me for years as I struggled to reconcile how
the (what I thought was) unassailable logic of libertarianism fit
in with my own experience as a black person. Frankly, he raised
outstanding points.
Given all the
debate, gnashing of teeth, and outright idiocy surrounding the political
process currently, it seems to me that looking at these questions
regarding race, class, equality, and interaction of the State with
each, is germane once again. My respondent’s most basic question
all those days ago (and mine) was specifically about reparations,
but that is simply a starting point for such discussions. It resonates
throughout the logic of liberty and applies to those from whom a
portion of wealth has been stolen. Allow me to quote him directly.
The part
[of what you say] that I am struggling to reconcile is this: We
know the state has caused many distortions in the economy through
misallocation of resources. We know the state mechanism is very
poor at deciding how best to use scarce resources. The free market
is best able to make such decisions because of the feedback that
is inherent, [i.e.,] good businesses make money and bad ones go
bust.
This is classic
free market economic theory. He went on:
What I am
asking relates to getting us to a free society. Let's take the
question of "property rights" and "the rule of law" to start.
Historically, how was the ownership obtained? Usually there was
great use of force backed by the state machinery. How could [we]
not redress that issue, before we say, "OK, from now on what's
yours is yours and the state leaves everyone alone." This
is especially important for black people with the history of suppression.
State intervention benefited one class and disadvantaged the other,
mostly along racial lines.
This is a scenario
that, I dare say, most black people who embrace libertarian law
have examined. In fact, Walter Block and I discuss this issue in
our joint paper1 on reparations. My
respondent actually mentions reparations directly in his next paragraph,
when he says:
I guess I
am struggling a bit with the issue of reparations which you brought
up in your article. I understand that there cannot be a wholesale
redistribution of resources, but there has to be some kind of
starting point where opportunities are equalised. Land ownership
is the key issue here in South Africa. Most of the land is owned
by the white population. If you look at how black people were
forcefully removed from the land which was then given to whites,
is it right to say, the son does not have to repay what his father
stole if the son still has in his possession?"
Answers,
Suppositions, and Contemplations
Without stealing
too much of the thunder from my paper with Doc Block, we’ve already
addressed the basic question directly. Yes, if the "son"
– the descendent of the person from whom the land or the labor on
that land was ostensibly stolen – can prove that the current owner
of the land is illegitimate then he can simply take ownership, or
be otherwise compensated, via civil (and private) means. The
land should return to its rightful owner, payment should be made
for services rendered, and we do not need the state to help us with
that per se. This is the Blockian notion of reparations presented
in several papers. The point is, the State cannot "equalize"
anything. It can only make things more unequal. This is true
whether one is talking about reparations, health care, education,
or access to low-interest loans.
Of course,
there is a deeper insight in his specific question, which might
be stated as: "How can we just say, 'let's start the race now' when
we know that the race would begin with some participants
having an advantage based upon what their ancestors stole from others?
We can say "let’s just start now," because the old saw
is correct. It doesn’t matter where you start, it matters where
you finish.
A hypothetical
can be constructed around this question thusly. Consider life as
if it were a distance race being run on a track or on the roads.
One competitor is at the starting line for the race, ready
to go. Another competitor is at an entirely different starting line,
some distance, maybe even over half the full race distance, behind
that first runner. Looking at this scenario, there are several
valid questions one could ask, which might include, although not
be limited to:
- Could this
be considered a fair race?
- How can
the competitor with the deficit be expected to compete?
- Does not
the fact of the initial race set-up virtually guarantee the outcome?
I admit to
having no idea what "fairness" means in this case. (Again,
it appears that one’s
view of sports would affect how one views fairness!) As I’ve
said before, people seem to think that fairness – as provided by
the central planning of sports – can be applied to the "game"
of life. This is, in my view, a naïve and somewhat dangerous
over-simplification of the situation. To pose the question more
directly, would it not make sense to assure that the participants
in this race are equally positioned along the track, given our understanding
of fairness and what we can predict about the outcome? I say
no. We can’t make any predictions! But why is this true?
Problems
with the Road Race Analogy Abound
The problems
with our assessment of the situation in our hypothetical are numerous.
Most certainly, we have not accurately judged all the factors involved.
Further, each of the facts we have assumed carries with it
certain underlying assumptions, which may or may not be true. For
example:
- The race
– of life, particularly success in life – is very long.
(The longer the race, the less important a few meters ostensible
head-start becomes.)
- We are basing
our assessment of the competitors, and the likelihood of them
winning, on faulty and aggregated information. (In my own
case, one could argue that I was either person. My
father is the son of a sharecropper who is descended directly
from a slave. My mother is the daughter of a landowner who has
no slaves in his ancestry. Where would that place me, relative
to the other competitors? In fact, there are not only two,
but many, positions spaced between our two hypothetical starting
points. Even more interestingly, some competitors who have
supposedly been denied a head start might actually have other
advantages that would mitigate any such positioning. Of course
all of this assumes that we know exactly what is required
for success, but we don’t!)
- Because
of the complexity of the competition, we cannot legitimately predict
the outcome based upon the starting position. (Even in the
simplest case of just a running competition on a track, if I was
given a two-mile lead on a marathoner from Kenya or any
other world-class runner, I would still lose by a large margin!)
- The race
of life, unlike a race on a track, does not include only, nor
end simply, with just two people. (People drop out unexpectedly,
enter at random points, help other "racers," learn from
the mistakes of others, and ignore the lessons of others, etc.,
all the time. The linear paradigm of racing, and the fairness
of starting at the same point, does not fit.)
- It is impossible
to look at a person individually, or by extension a group in aggregate
and accurately determine, with any certainty, how he (or they)
will perform in something as complex as life. (It is, in
fact, the height of hubris and insulting to presume otherwise.
Can you look at Allen Iverson and determine how well he
should perform in the NBA? How about Manu Ginobili? Can
you look at Floyd Landis and determine his chances for winning
the Tour de France? (Insert obligatory steroid reference
here.) What about Lance Armstrong or Greg LeMond? Basically
we often have an overdependence on groups and what membership
in them might mean, but I’ve mentioned
that before.)
Almost any
way one looks at it, the hypothetical fails.
Conclusion
This hypothetical
– modeling success in life as winning a road race – reflects the
misuse of the argument from effect, and the flawed application
of the argument from morality, both in an attempt to assure
a fair race. To attempt this, the hypothetical focuses not only
upon the beginning of the contest, but also upon some overarching
authority’s ability to set up a fair contest. As the simplest examination
of this hypothetical illustrates, outside the obviously appropriate
recovery of stolen property via civil means, no one is adequately
equipped to do that. Imagine the difficulty we would encounter were
we to attempt to assure a fair ending to the race as well!
 I’ll
close with a quote from the final note I got from my respondent,
slightly paraphrased:
So, yes,
let each of us bite the bullet, we were robbed, but we are not
asking for [any] favours. From now each of us can set the record
straight and reclaim our place under the sun through our own hard
work.
I couldn’t
have said it better myself. Certainly, compensation for theft can
be sought from the individuals who have committed crimes, but looking
to an overarching body like the State to "right the past wrongs"
can only result in more wrongs and few, if any corrections of the
previous errors, at a price too high with no guarantee to boot.
Note
- Alston,
Wilton D. and Walter Block. 2007. "Reparations,
Once Again." Human Rights Review December 4
March
31, 2008
Wilt
Alston [send him
mail] lives in Rochester, NY, with his wife and three
children. When he’s not training for a marathon or furthering his
part-time study of libertarian philosophy, he works as a principal
research scientist in transportation safety, focusing primarily
on the safety of subway and freight train control systems.
Copyright
© 2008 LewRockwell.com
Wilton
D. Alston Archives
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