Market Theocracy

OK, I’ve had quite a few people ask me why I call this blog ‘Market Theocracy’. The truth is that there are several reasons. I shall summarize:

1) A couple years back I had a group blog with some friends of mine that went by the name Market Theocracy. It had no real theme and the name came from the fact that all the bloggers were market anarchist types and one of them (my friend Aaron who I never freakin’ see any more) was a devout Christian and quite used to taking our many jokes about him being a theocrat. While that blog didn’t last and was read by almost no-one, I have many wonderful memories of it and have always been proud of my posts and those of my pals. Unlike most blogs, MT was actually funny. It had passion and did things no one expected. I was quite sad to see it fade.

2) I am, for the most part, a market anarchist - -a term I prefer to the awful ‘anarcho-capitalist’. AC does nothing but piss off anti-capitalist anarchists and cause misconceptions. I am not pro-corporate. I know that corporations are fully state dependant creation intended to shield businesses from market forces. In short, ‘capitalism’ is not a word I’m willing to go to the wall for or even bother defending.

Among market anarchists there is a tendancy to see ‘the market’ as a sort of God, and the laziest answer a market anarchist can give is ‘The market will handle it.’ This (although true in certain situations) is basically the non-religious version of ‘The Lord shall provide.’

Market Theocracy, then, is a sort of exaggerated tounge in cheek version of my own philosophical mindset.

3) I think it’s both funny and interesting as a name. It’s memorable. It brings to (my) mind a collection of Misean monks in some post-apocalyptic future, hoarding gold and computational equipment, attempting to preserve free-market thought against the onslaught of survivalist communitarian altruism! They say things like ‘By Hayeks beard!’ and ‘For the love of Friedman!’ when troubled. They trade the products of their gardens and their accounting services to the mutated bands of collectivist scavengers that pass beyond their walls.

So now you know.