Efficiency in policing is inherently unethical as long as the laws they're supposedly enforcing aren't ethical. There's also the issue of corruption which isn't overcome by efficiency.
I appreciate your engagement, but I worry that you're misunderstanding the overall perspective of my blog. I'm trying to envision how society should ideally be set up (given ~current tech). Would that ideal society have laws? If so, would that society have police? If so, how do those police operate? My claim is that in Utopia, police are more efficient as a result of greater specialization. It seems like your claims are mostly non-sequiturs to that. If you have thoughts on how to make laws more ethical, that seems on-topic for this blog, but not on topic for policing per se. If you know of a way to set up policing that's predictably less corrupt than the Utopia I'm depicting, by all means I'd love to hear it. That'd be extremely on topic. But simply noting that efficiency per se doesn't solve corruption doesn't feel constructive.
I didn't say that efficiency isn't desirable but that until the law is reasonable it's inherently bad. It's infinitely more important to get the basics right than to speculate about how current systems could be made better. Any version of policing that will be ethical Cannot be based on any version that exists now.
It seems like we're both on the same page about idealism being important. I'm not really trying to argue how to improve the current system. I'm trying to figure out how to do policing in a better world. Want to tell me more about how to "get the basics right"?
The baseline is ethical universals: ethical priorities in a necessary sequence: survival, truth, sustainability, reciprocity. The system that sits atop them can be quibbled over. I think i've shown necessities.
With regard to current policing, they don't even vet whether a law is ethical before enforcing it. In fact they're not allowed to. That's an existential problem, abdication of morality, deontology. Duty ethics is inherently flawed and nothing based on it is ethical but by accident. That includes all currently existing versions of policing, as far as i can see.
My problem with the article has nothing to do with it's content, but the lack of a precursor - “within the scope of current policing….”
But then i wouldn't have read it because that scope admits of no solution.
I like to think that I can see beyond which words are used and respond to the substance. Thanks for sharing that post. We clearly agree on some things and disagree on others, but have a shared love of utopian dreaming. 🙂
In your ideal world, suppose there's someone living in the libertarian zone, and they kill a hiker in the woods (perhaps for fun because they're a sociopath). What happens? Presumably there is a law against murder (a "necessary" law?) that is enforced by a group of police? And because they're in your ideal world, presumably those police are ethical? If so, consider my essays as a proposal for how those police should operate. In other words, I don't think my essay lacks "within the scope of current policing..." and could just as well have "within the scope of Kaiser Basileus' notion of ideal policing..." Nothing in your mandate seems contradictory to the notion of police I'm laying out.
But maybe I don't understand you. Communication is hard.
Perhaps you're trying to say something like "I like the content of this essay, but I think you're missing a key to how policing should be set up: it should be legal for officers to only enforce laws that they personally believe are right. That would bring personal responsibility back into policing." If you said that, I could respond to the idea. But I don't want to put words in your mouth.
>Suppose there's someone living in the libertarian zone, and they kill a hiker in the woods (perhaps for fun because they're a sociopath). What happens?
Indigenous tribes are in charge of the ecosystem in the free zone. Anyone had the right to pursue justice, but the State may not get directly on involved unless it's requested to our knows of a human rights violation. But in that case there's probably already a tribal body or some group of ethical citizens who will step up and do whatever needs to be done.
For the state to have legitimacy there must be a way for people to opt out, so there must be a free zone that it's not typically involved with. People will make their own structures there, for better or worse.
But neither can a legitimate state refuse a legitimate request for assistance, so if asked to intervene, it must, using least intrusive means to accomplish the objective. In the case of mental illness that means taking control of the person in-so-far as they don't themselves, to prevent harm to others.
The key is, the State has no right to do more or less than any ethical person would have the right to do in the same circumstances, only more training and resources. Hopefully the UBI and rational, ethical rules will produce maximum compliance with human rights without much force.
The ethical guidelines of the state must be clear and obvious, the law minimal, straightforward, simple, and necessary so that even basic people get the idea and have good reason to comply. And police must be trusted to do the right thing on their own, with or without state funding and training.
Rules, including laws, are only for the ignorant. Personal responsibility trumps rules from above. I’m going to check out P3 now…
Efficiency in policing is inherently unethical as long as the laws they're supposedly enforcing aren't ethical. There's also the issue of corruption which isn't overcome by efficiency.
I appreciate your engagement, but I worry that you're misunderstanding the overall perspective of my blog. I'm trying to envision how society should ideally be set up (given ~current tech). Would that ideal society have laws? If so, would that society have police? If so, how do those police operate? My claim is that in Utopia, police are more efficient as a result of greater specialization. It seems like your claims are mostly non-sequiturs to that. If you have thoughts on how to make laws more ethical, that seems on-topic for this blog, but not on topic for policing per se. If you know of a way to set up policing that's predictably less corrupt than the Utopia I'm depicting, by all means I'd love to hear it. That'd be extremely on topic. But simply noting that efficiency per se doesn't solve corruption doesn't feel constructive.
I didn't say that efficiency isn't desirable but that until the law is reasonable it's inherently bad. It's infinitely more important to get the basics right than to speculate about how current systems could be made better. Any version of policing that will be ethical Cannot be based on any version that exists now.
It seems like we're both on the same page about idealism being important. I'm not really trying to argue how to improve the current system. I'm trying to figure out how to do policing in a better world. Want to tell me more about how to "get the basics right"?
You're not gonna like it bc i use a word that has historical implications:
https://kaiserbasileus.substack.com/p/the-mandate-of-libertarian-fascist
The baseline is ethical universals: ethical priorities in a necessary sequence: survival, truth, sustainability, reciprocity. The system that sits atop them can be quibbled over. I think i've shown necessities.
With regard to current policing, they don't even vet whether a law is ethical before enforcing it. In fact they're not allowed to. That's an existential problem, abdication of morality, deontology. Duty ethics is inherently flawed and nothing based on it is ethical but by accident. That includes all currently existing versions of policing, as far as i can see.
My problem with the article has nothing to do with it's content, but the lack of a precursor - “within the scope of current policing….”
But then i wouldn't have read it because that scope admits of no solution.
I like to think that I can see beyond which words are used and respond to the substance. Thanks for sharing that post. We clearly agree on some things and disagree on others, but have a shared love of utopian dreaming. 🙂
In your ideal world, suppose there's someone living in the libertarian zone, and they kill a hiker in the woods (perhaps for fun because they're a sociopath). What happens? Presumably there is a law against murder (a "necessary" law?) that is enforced by a group of police? And because they're in your ideal world, presumably those police are ethical? If so, consider my essays as a proposal for how those police should operate. In other words, I don't think my essay lacks "within the scope of current policing..." and could just as well have "within the scope of Kaiser Basileus' notion of ideal policing..." Nothing in your mandate seems contradictory to the notion of police I'm laying out.
But maybe I don't understand you. Communication is hard.
Perhaps you're trying to say something like "I like the content of this essay, but I think you're missing a key to how policing should be set up: it should be legal for officers to only enforce laws that they personally believe are right. That would bring personal responsibility back into policing." If you said that, I could respond to the idea. But I don't want to put words in your mouth.
>Suppose there's someone living in the libertarian zone, and they kill a hiker in the woods (perhaps for fun because they're a sociopath). What happens?
Indigenous tribes are in charge of the ecosystem in the free zone. Anyone had the right to pursue justice, but the State may not get directly on involved unless it's requested to our knows of a human rights violation. But in that case there's probably already a tribal body or some group of ethical citizens who will step up and do whatever needs to be done.
For the state to have legitimacy there must be a way for people to opt out, so there must be a free zone that it's not typically involved with. People will make their own structures there, for better or worse.
But neither can a legitimate state refuse a legitimate request for assistance, so if asked to intervene, it must, using least intrusive means to accomplish the objective. In the case of mental illness that means taking control of the person in-so-far as they don't themselves, to prevent harm to others.
The key is, the State has no right to do more or less than any ethical person would have the right to do in the same circumstances, only more training and resources. Hopefully the UBI and rational, ethical rules will produce maximum compliance with human rights without much force.
The ethical guidelines of the state must be clear and obvious, the law minimal, straightforward, simple, and necessary so that even basic people get the idea and have good reason to comply. And police must be trusted to do the right thing on their own, with or without state funding and training.
Rules, including laws, are only for the ignorant. Personal responsibility trumps rules from above. I’m going to check out P3 now…
I don't have time to respond atm, so in the meantime:
https://substack.com/profile/214294422-kaiser-basileus/note/c-106818740