Competitive Law and Order

I like law and order. I dislike the police. Practically everyone sees these as contradictory. But no—the police have failed us, it’s pretty clear, both in how they let criminals run rampant and in how they abuse people in ways that would be beyond the pale coming from anyone else. No wonder I dislike the police—it’s in large part because I like law and order, and dislike how the police have failed to provide it to us.

To say that we need more police or better funding for police is absurd. It’s the kind of latitude only extended to government, like when public schools do terribly and then people whine that the schools need more money to fix it. No, if some institution is terrible, it isn’t going to be made magically better just by giving it more "resources". In the private sphere this is well-understood. Yet for some reason, when it’s the government, throwing more money at the same incompetent buffoons is supposed to somehow turn them into benevolent and wise technocrats.

What’s the alternative? Well, what's the alternative with schools? As always, products from providers who have to perform up to snuff or lose their customer base turn out better than those from the government. Some of the more reasonable leftists even think that competitive pressure from private schools could cause public schools to shape up and actually serve their students reasonably well. I have to admit, if that really happens and public schools become competitive enough to attract students by choice, that wouldn’t be too terrible. Failing that? I sincerely hope that public schooling becomes a relic of the past.

The assumption that security has to come from government providers will, I hope, one day be viewed in the same light as the outdated notion that education can only be provided by public schools. Like education, security is a service. Thankfully, at least the more well-off among us have the option to bypass publicly funded rubbish; they send their children to private schools and hire security guards for their gated communities. But just as it is difficult for anyone of modest means to shoulder both the cost of private school tuition and also the taxes that pay for public schools, at present private security is unfortunately out of the budget of most.

While a not insignificant number of people choose to homeschool, many don’t feel it’s within their ability. The same holds true for self-defense: while it’s indeed extremely valuable to be able to protect yourself and your family, it’s entirely reasonable to gain the benefits of division of labor by outsourcing this task to a specialized provider.

Where forwards with this on the policy front? An incremental shift in the right direction would be ideal, rather than attempt a radical change overnight. Perhaps a security-voucher program, akin to school vouchers, could be a good first step. Would that work, or are the coordination problems too difficult? After all, one security guard or policeman stationed in a public place provides protection for eveyrone, regardless of if they’ve paid. This isn’t an insurmountable problem—recent advancements in coordination technology, like dominant assurance contracts, offer novel approaches to try to tackle this sort of public-goods dilemma. But maybe not. Maybe at present the policemen who stands watch over a public area needs to remain in the employ of the government—but don’t start from the notion that all security must be provided by the government, any more than you would for any other field of human endeavor. Rather, as in general, we should use government only as a fallback for if there is no better solution for a given case.

The cops that come when you dial 911 certainly don’t have that coordination problem, nor do the detectives who painstakingly track down criminals after the fact. Even if we can only improve these aspects of policing, a significant improvement in law and order is within our grasp.

Remember too that the government police often actively act against law and order, by preventing those able and willing to provide their own from doing so. Spare a thought for those heroes like Bernie Goetz and Daniel Penny, who—at risk to themselves and without thought of recompense—fought back against ne’er-do-wells on the New York subway, despite the threat of punishment from the so-called law.

But though these men are heroes, they are exceptions—I do not expect most people to rise to that selfless standard. For the majority of services we engage with, we don’t rely on the generosity of noble heroes who offer their work free of charge, but rather we pay the market rate for the services of professionals. As Adam Smith wrote, it is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, and while we are fortunate to have a handful of heroically benevolent defenders of law and order among us, the practical way to ensure more than mere scraps of it is to purchase it from professionals.

Let’s strive for a future filled with genuine law and order—not one in which we are forced to rely on an ineffective and corrupt government monopoly that, adding insult to injury, perversely persecutes those noble few who dare to selflessly stand up for themselves and the public good.