Who initiated force in the Highland Clearances?

[Demogorgon]

Yes another attack on Libertarians here, but bare with me.

First a bit of background. The highland clearances were a particularly brutal time in Scottish history. Many thousands of people were thrown from their homes in the late eighteenth century by their landlords to make room for more profitable sheep farming and also, to put it frankly, in order to commit cultural genocide in an effort to prevent there being any more Highland uprisings.

ANyway many thousands of people were thrown from their homes and left destitute. Anyone who tried to stay had their homes burnt or dogs set on them for "trespass". The North of Scotland was reduced to a shell population (which apart from the cities never recovered incidentally) and those left without homes were forced to go and work in the factories in Glasgow (or at least their children were, the factories disliked adult labour as child labour was cheaper) or else emigrate to Canada.

In short, it was a pretty brutal time. However it occurs to me that Libertarians are committed to defending the clearances as completely just and indeed saying that any farming family who attempted to stay in their home was initiating force by trespassing on the land owners property.

The clearances were after all a huge scale removal of a population and the destruction of a culture orchestrated entirely by the private sector. The Government was not involved. To be sure, it was involved in its own bad behaviour in the highlands, using excessive force to put down rebellions and so forth but it didn't force anybody out of their homes. It was solely the land owners wanting to profit on the wool trade who did that?

So Libertarians, was this event, often considered one of the most brutal in Scottish history, completely justified. After all, at its route it involved property owners simply wishing to change to something more profitable than renting to farmers?

But then again, can you really defend genocide?

[Schrödinger's Cat]

I don't know. I registered on Mises.org to understand the opposition better, and there existed an awkward consensus that a landlord can't own unspoiled land, but they can force rent and land speculation onto land neither they nor anyone else touch by just utilizing a defense agency (or state). What the hell? At least with the natural rights argument there is some sense.

I'm also amused whenever someone tries to defend the original pioneers for utilizing money made from state charters and reprehensible practices like indentured servitude just to "cultivate the New World." Vulgar indeed.

[pusher robot]

Yes another attack on Libertarians here, but bare with me.

First a bit of background. The highland clearances were a particularly brutal time in Scottish history. Many thousands of people were thrown from their homes in the late eighteenth century by their landlords to make room for more profitable sheep farming and also, to put it frankly, in order to commit cultural genocide in an effort to prevent there being any more Highland uprisings.

ANyway many thousands of people were thrown from their homes and left destitute. Anyone who tried to stay had their homes burnt or dogs set on them for "trespass". The North of Scotland was reduced to a shell population (which apart from the cities never recovered incidentally) and those left without homes were forced to go and work in the factories in Glasgow (or at least their children were, the factories disliked adult labour as child labour was cheaper) or else emigrate to Canada.

In short, it was a pretty brutal time. However it occurs to me that Libertarians are committed to defending the clearances as completely just and indeed saying that any farming family who attempted to stay in their home was initiating force by trespassing on the land owners property.

The clearances were after all a huge scale removal of a population and the destruction of a culture orchestrated entirely by the private sector. The Government was not involved. To be sure, it was involved in its own bad behaviour in the highlands, using excessive force to put down rebellions and so forth but it didn't force anybody out of their homes. It was solely the land owners wanting to profit on the wool trade who did that?

So Libertarians, was this event, often considered one of the most brutal in Scottish history, completely justified. After all, at its route it involved property owners simply wishing to change to something more profitable than renting to farmers?

But then again, can you really defend genocide?

It's not really possible to answer this question without some information as to the legitimacy of the landowners' claims to the land. How did they come to own it? Did they homestead it? Work it? Buy it from someone who did? Or was it granted by fiat from an unaccountable political patron?

[Dean]

It's not really possible to answer this question without some information as to the legitimacy of the landowners' claims to the land. How did they come to own it? Did they homestead it? Work it? Buy it from someone who did? Or was it granted by fiat from an unaccountable political patron?

This exemplifies how bankrupt capitalist philosophy really is. Who cares about the property claim? It is peoples' lives. Nevertheless, property win in this sick game.

[Kwisatz Haderach]

It's not really possible to answer this question without some information as to the legitimacy of the landowners' claims to the land. How did they come to own it? Did they homestead it? Work it? Buy it from someone who did? Or was it granted by fiat from an unaccountable political patron?
Are you suggesting that there exists some property over land which was not originally granted by fiat from an unaccountable political patron? I'm not aware of any. Certainly not in Europe, at least.

Theories of property based on some kind of "homesteading" that never happened are as idiotic as theories of government based on some kind of "state of nature" that never existed.

[pusher robot]

This exemplifies how bankrupt capitalist philosophy really is. Who cares about the property claim? It is peoples' lives. Nevertheless, property win in this sick game.

Look, the OP asked a specific claim: who initiated force? That's orthagonal to any question of overall utility or efficiency given real-world conditions. Please stop putting words in my mouth.



Are you suggesting that there exists some property over land which was not originally granted by fiat from an unaccountable political patron? I'm not aware of any. Certainly not in Europe, at least.


No, I never suggested any such thing. My question was not about what happened to the property originally, it was with respect to the current owners.



Theories of property based on some kind of "homesteading" that never happened are as idiotic as theories of government based on some kind of "state of nature" that never existed.


Well excuse me for not knowing the intricate details of Scottish history and having the temerity to ask the question from someone who might. Since you're so smart, you probably ought already know that in fact a good portion of the American west was actually homesteaded, and that the "state of nature" was, since Hobbes came up with the terminology, posited as a thought experiment and not actual existence.



But though there had never been any time wherein particular men were in a condition of war one against another, yet in all times kings and persons of sovereign authority, because of their independency, are in continual jealousies, and in the state and posture of gladiators, having their weapons pointing, and their eyes fixed on one another; that is, their forts, garrisons, and guns upon the frontiers of their kingdoms, and continual spies upon their neighbours, which is a posture of war. But because they uphold thereby the industry of their subjects, there does not follow from it that misery which accompanies the liberty of particular men.


At least, though, I'm willing to admit that I do not know what I do not know.

[Demogorgon]

It's not really possible to answer this question without some information as to the legitimacy of the landowners' claims to the land. How did they come to own it? Did they homestead it? Work it? Buy it from someone who did? Or was it granted by fiat from an unaccountable political patron?

They inherited it mostly or else bought it. Go back for enough and it will have been taken by force or else granted by Royal Charter, but that was a long time previously and you lot love to say that what happened in the distant past does not bare on present legitimacy of property. Of course some of the land was confiscated land bought from the Government who had taken it from landowners who had engaged in rebellion and attempted to overthrow the Government, so whether or not you will accept that property as justifiable I don't know, but rest assured, most of it had been obtained through legal transaction with the initial force involved in taking it in many cases going back at least to the early 1300s.

So, given tat the land was (by your definition) at least as legitimately owned as land now is, was this particular genocide justified because it was carried out by the private sector as opposed to the Government?

[pusher robot]

They inherited it mostly or else bought it. Go back for enough and it will have been taken by force or else granted by Royal Charter, but that was a long time previously and you lot love to say that what happened in the distant past does not bare on present legitimacy of property. Of course some of the land was confiscated land bought from the Government who had taken it from landowners who had engaged in rebellion and attempted to overthrow the Government, so whether or not you will accept that property as justifiable I don't know, but rest assured, most of it had been obtained through legal transaction with the initial force involved in taking it in many cases going back at least to the early 1300s.

So, given tat the land was (by your definition) at least as legitimately owned as land now is, was this particular genocide justified because it was carried out by the private sector as opposed to the Government?

First of all, it wasn't a "genocide" by any reasonable definition. Second of all, I still don't feel like I have enough information to really pass judgment on what happened. I will argue, in the abstract, that we should be clear to distinguish legal justification from moral justification.

It is, I think, important to keep in mind that there have been since antiquity two thresholds for justification of an act. First, justification for or against its being prohibited, and second, justification for or against its being mandatory. We work within these distinctions every day, and we tend to take the position in liberal societies that the lower threshold is defined by law and the upper as defined by morality. Of course, there is a large zone in between that consists of behavior that, while falling short of being virtuous, is not so bad as to be criminal. And while various societies have, from time to time, tried to eliminate that threshold by either by declining to prohibit crime or by criminalizing lack of virtue, these efforts have all failed in a myriad of spectacular ways.

So, when we talk about "justification," I might very rightly think that you are asking whether the situation cannot justifiably be legal, and you might think you are asking whether the situation cannot justifiably be moral. So we could both come up with opposite answers without holding dramatically differing opinions. In the specific example you cite, assuming arguendo that all parties involved had full information available about the agreements they made with each other, and that the agreements were substantially voluntary, then I would say it is not morally justifiable but it is legally justifiable. In other words, it was a dick move but you can't take away peoples' rights to be dicks.

[Demogorgon]

Landowners from the lowlands of Scotland and England engaged in a concerted effort to disposes almost the entire body of Celtic people in the Scottish Highlands. They let them starve from the removal of their livelihoods or else send their children to work in appalling factories where they had a good chance of dying anyway. Those who escaped this had to flee across the Atlantic (and this was the eighteenth century remember). The culture was gutted, much of it permanently lost, the language almost destroyed, families we torn apart and so forth. What other name is there for this apart from genocide?

To say that you think it was immoral but that it should still have been legal is an utter cop out. What conceivable justification is there for allowing an atrocity on this scale? Do property rights trump everything including basic human decency in opposing genocide? You appeal to the values of Liberal Societies to say that it couldn't be banned, but the truth is that here in the twentieth century there is not a Liberal Society on earth that would entertain allowing the clearances to happen. I can just about see it happening in China or some places in Africa or similar corrupt regimes, but a Liberal society? No way. Liberalism today recognises that things like this cannot happen and to their credit, the Liberals of the time were ferociously opposed to the clearances. It was they and not their Conservative opponents in parliament who attempted to have the practices leading to the clearances banned, even at the expense of reduced property rights.

To be honest, your answer surprises me. I honestly thought you would say the practice should have been illegal, accepting that some limits must be imposed, recognising that freedom is something a bit more than abstract values and when these abstract values justify genocide, it is time to seriously rethink them. I was wrong. I still don't think necessarily that you think the practice should really have been legal, but you are arguing from what I think is a completely untenable position now.

[pusher robot]

What other name is there for this apart from genocide?



Displacement? Dispersment? Relocation? Depatriation? I can think of a lot of terms that are a far better fit than "genocide," which is typically reserved for cases of systematic murder.

In any case, such a situation exists - at least for those of us in liberal societies - entirely in the past. I see little point to going back in time and passing judgment on acts based on the sensibilities of our more sensitive age that were undertaken in light of material conditions wholly unfamiliar to us. Furthermore, I sense that you are trying to entrap me by only revealing details you think would dispose me to judge a certain way, then springing other details on me that make that judgment untenable. The tepid conclusion I reached was, as I clearly stated, based on some assumptions that may be wholly unwarranted and it is unfair to hold me to it if those assumptions do not hold. I am not really in a position to argue based on the factual record, so I make no claim whatsoever as to the accuracy of those assumptions.

[Nusocialist]

Like the enclosures this was mostly the landlord's fault. The land was originally fuedal tenure where the peasants had as much right to it as the lord(more if you remember he just got his position from conquest.). Suddenly by act of parliament they become capitalist tenants at will and then shoved on the land by force.

[Demogorgon]

Displacement? Dispersment? Relocation? Depatriation? I can think of a lot of terms that are a far better fit than "genocide," which is typically reserved for cases of systematic murder.

In any case, such a situation exists - at least for those of us in liberal societies - entirely in the past. I see little point to going back in time and passing judgment on acts based on the sensibilities of our more sensitive age that were undertaken in light of material conditions wholly unfamiliar to us. Furthermore, I sense that you are trying to entrap me by only revealing details you think would dispose me to judge a certain way, then springing other details on me that make that judgment untenable. The tepid conclusion I reached was, as I clearly stated, based on some assumptions that may be wholly unwarranted and it is unfair to hold me to it if those assumptions do not hold. I am not really in a position to argue based on the factual record, so I make no claim whatsoever as to the accuracy of those assumptions.
The legal definition of genocide is: "any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [and] forcibly transferring children of the group to another group."Everything except preventing births within Highland Celts was present to one extent or another, though admitably the direct killing element was not that prominent either, mostly being reserved for so called "necessary measures" to evict those who did not want to be evicted. It is clearly genocide. It was not in the same league as the Holocaust of course, but what is?

Anyway, claiming that you cannot apply modern standards to it is again a cop out, particularly as you claim an intellectual lineage from the liberals of the time whom, as I say, almost universally opposed the clearances. Of course that could bring us into another territory, my belief that Libertarianism cannot claim legitimate descent from liberalism, because eighteenth century liberals were basing their views on a progressive desire for societal betterment and did not see their rules as rigid (hence they were happy to see property rights limited to prevent genocide for instance). Modern Libertarians take the rules of classical Liberals, which are themselves an anachronism these days, and apply them as near inflexible dogma. Hence you are finding it difficult to come up with an answer here that both says the clearances were wrong and should have been stopped and leaves all your moral axioms intact.

Leaving that aside though, you suggest that I might be playing a game with the facts, well I certainly am not doing such a thing intentionally, not least as it would be a really stupid thing to do with an event like the clearances. I appreciate that it is not something that you will have any great interest or knowledge in as it had little or no impact on American history so naturally it is not a subject you are likely to have come across in any great detail, but on the other hand, there are parts of Canada where this history is very well known, better known even than in Scotland, due to the fact that so many Scots went to Canada (as an interesting aside, the graves of those most responsible for the clearances are to this day spat on almost daily by Canadian visitors), there are a fair few Canadians on this board, chances are that at least some of them are from a background where they will have heard a lot about the clearances. If I were trying to trick you, I would be soon caught out.

The only thing I can think of that you might complain you didn't know (though i did mention it in my first post) was that the Government of Britain was already at loggerheads with the Highland communities because there had been several attempted coups from that direction and some years prior to the clearances, much of the highlanders ability to defend themselves had been removed due to disarming to stop more rebellion. This came before the clearances and was separate though. You could certainly legitimately argue of course that the Government was not in the least bit bothered when this took place as it was quite happy to see its biggest source of trouble being removed for it and that its failure to act to stop it was more than mere respect for property rights, but again whatever the motivations the fact is that it was the private sector that did this.

The reason for this thread is to point to an atrocity for which the Government was not actively responsible for and merely failed to stop (a failure justified according to Libertarian ideology as to have intervened would have been to violate property rights). It is an attempt to force you to choose whether your opposition to genocide trumps your support for property or not. Clearly you oppose genocide when a Government (or equivalent) does it, but when faced with the private sector having done it by itself, simply using private property rights to carry it out, and only unleashing direct violence once the eviction notices had been issued and they could claim they were dealing with trespassers, what is your choice?

[Demogorgon]

Like the enclosures this was mostly the landlord's fault. The land was originally fuedal tenure where the peasants had as much right to it as the lord(more if you remember he just got his position from conquest.). Suddenly by act of parliament they become capitalist tenants at will and then shoved on the land by force.

That was before the clearances though. The abolition of feudal land tenure had come long before. Of course a sort of system had formed in the Highlands in some places due to the clan chiefs being able to act as lords in certain ways and after the 1745 uprising and their loss of power a new set of Southern Capitalists had bought the land and brought north the system used in England and Lowland Scotland.

You have to remember that we are not talking about the enclosures here. That was an English thing that never happened in Scotland in that way. The clearances had similar effects but happened in a different way without any legal change to the way the land ownership worked.

[Nusocialist]

I'm sure that the landlords in the middle ages did not have capitalist style ownership of the land. There must have been a change somewhere.

In many places the chief owned the land as guardian of the clan but later he did treat it like his own private land and when Southern capitalists came in, btw you shouldn't discount the large capitalist inpulse among the Highland chiefs in the 18th century, they took this land and of course cared nothing about its old clan statusand treated the peasants just as tenants at will.

[Dean]

Look, the OP asked a specific claim: who initiated force? That's orthagonal to any question of overall utility or efficiency given real-world conditions. Please stop putting words in my mouth.

Quite clearly, the landownres initiated force. The diplaced population simply built homes and farmed. I don't see what justifies their expulsion?

[Green Dragon]

OK. Let us apply modern standards to the events described.

It has been stated that the efforts were made (triggered perhaps) because the land was more profitable as pasture land for sheep (their wool) than for whatever was produced prior to. This means that the wool was more valuable to the community than what was previously produced on the land.
The problem which the community faces is how to best to use that land to benefit the community.

That is a problem of life. Its not a problem created by a capitalist system. A socialist system will have to deal with the problem as well.

The capitalist solution would involve somebody purchasing the land, and then utilising it in such a way which maximes profit (ie benefit to the community). The problem as described in the Highland Clearances was probably due to the fact that the farmers did not own the land from which they were being evicted. They were simply tenants.

What becomes interesting is how a socialist system might deal with the same problem (land being more valuable for a different than it is currently being used). Since the workers cannot own the land, they too are at the mercy of the landlords (ie the majority of the population who will democratically dicate how the land is to be used). The minority would have no recourse to any sort of change in the use of the land that is so democratically decided. In other words, there is nothing particularly "unsocialist" with the result of the Highland Clearances, only in its means.

[Green Dragon]

And as an aside, what exactly is the socialist objection to the Highland Clearances? It resulted in labor flocking to the cities to take part in the beginings of the industrial revolution. It helped create a labor pool to develop capitalism, which in turn destroyed feudalism. It helped created the proleteriat, and thus was part of the entire basis, and justification, for socialism. One can certainly decry what happened on that individual basis. But to single it out as an event that ought never have happened seems to run counter with the whole idea of human progress toward socialism.

[Nusocialist]

OK. Let us apply modern standards to the events described.

It has been stated that the efforts were made (triggered perhaps) because the land was more profitable as pasture land for sheep (their wool) than for whatever was produced prior to. This means that the wool was more valuable to the community than what was previously produced on the land.
The problem which the community faces is how to best to use that land to benefit the community.

That is a problem of life. Its not a problem created by a capitalist system. A socialist system will have to deal with the problem as well.

The capitalist solution would involve somebody purchasing the land, and then utilising it in such a way which maximes profit (ie benefit to the community). The problem as described in the Highland Clearances was probably due to the fact that the farmers did not own the land from which they were being evicted. They were simply tenants.
They were tenants however because of conquest and legal control by the landowning class. They would have lived there since time immemorial. What happened was that old fuedal tenure was turned into capitalist tenure and the peasants who under the old system had as much right to the land as the lord became simply tenants at will.

If one is talking about community benefits one has to ask who benefits and why. Like the enclosures I'm sure even if this was good for the community at large, it needn't have happened the way it did nor with the ruin of peasantry.

I suggest you read works like the Hammonds, they are on English enclosures mostly but it was the same sort of process run mostly by the landlords and mostly profiting them. There is this extremely moving chapter all students of the social history of the period should read.

http://socserv.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/hammond/village.html

The immediate consequences of this policy were only partially visible to the governing or the cultivated classes. The rulers of England took it for granted that the losses of individuals were the gains of the State, and that the distresses of the poor were the condition of permanent advance. Modern apologists have adopted the same view; and the popular resistance to enclosure is often compared to the wild and passionate fury that broke against the spinning and weaving machines, the symbols and engines of the Industrial Revolution. History has drawn a curtain over those days of exile and suffering, when cottages were pulled down as if by an invader's hand, and families that had lived for centuries in their dales or on their small farms and commons were driven before the torrent, losing

<poem>
'Estate and house and all their sheep,
A pretty flock, and which for aught I know
Had clothed the Ewbanks for a thousand years.'
</poem>

Ancient possessions and ancient families disappeared. But the first consequence was not the worst consequence: so far from compensating for this misery, the ultimate result was still more disastrous. The governing class killed by this policy the spirit of a race. The petitions that are buried with their brief and unavailing pathos in the Journals of the House of Commons are the last voice of village independence, and the unnamed commoners who braved the dangers of resistance to send their doomed protests to the House of Commons that obeyed their lords, were the last of the English peasants. These were the men, it is not unreasonable to believe, whom Gray had in mind when he wrote: --

<poem>
'Some village Hampden that with dauntless breast
The little tyrant of his fields withstood,'
</poem>

As we read the descriptions of the state of France before the Revolution, there is one fact that comforts the imagination and braces the heart. We read of the intolerable services of the peasant, of his forced labour, his confiscated harvests, his crushing burdens, his painful and humiliating tasks, including in some cases even the duty of protecting the sleep of the seigneur from the croaking of the neighboring marshes. The mind of Arthur Young was filled with this impression of unsupportable servitude. But a more discerning eye might have perceived a truth that escaped the English traveller. It is contained in an entry that often greets us in the official reports on the state of the provinces: ce seigneur litige avec ses vaissaux. Those few words flash like a gleam of the dawn across this sombre and melancholy page. The peasant may be overwhelmed by the dîme, the taille, the corvée, the hundred and one services that knit his tenure to the caprice of a lord: he may be wretched, brutal, ignorant, ill-clothed, ill-fed, and ill-housed: but he has not lost his status: he is not a casual figure in a drifting proletariat: he belongs to a community that can withstand the seigneur, dispute his claims at law, resume its rights, recover its possessions, and establish, one day, its independence.

In England the aristocracy destroyed the promise of such a development when it broke the back of the peasant community. The enclosures created a new organisation of classes. The peasant with rights and a status, with a share in the fortunes and government of his village, standing in rags, but standing on his feet, makes way for the labourer with no corporate rights to defend, no corporate power to invoke, no property to cherish, no ambition to pursue, bent beneath the fear of his masters, and the weight of a future without hope. No class in the world has so beaten and crouching a history, and if the blazing ricks in 1830 once threatened his rulers with the anguish of his despair, in no chapter of that history could it have been written, 'This parish is at law with its squire.' For the parish was no longer the community that offered the labourer friendship and sheltered his freedom: it was merely the shadow of his poverty, his helplessness, and his shame. 'Go to an ale-house kitchen of an old enclosed country, and there you will see the origin of poverty and Poor-rates. For whom are they to be sober? For whom are they to save? For the parish? If I am diligent, shall I have leave to build a cottage? If I am sober, shall I have land for a cow? If I am frugal, shall I have half an acre of potatoes? You offer no motives; you have nothing but a parish officer and a workhouse! -- Bring me another pot --.'(16*)




What becomes interesting is how a socialist system might deal with the same problem (land being more valuable for a different than it is currently being used). Since the workers cannot own the land, they too are at the mercy of the landlords (ie the majority of the population who will democratically dicate how the land is to be used). The minority would have no recourse to any sort of change in the use of the land that is so democratically decided. In other words, there is nothing particularly "unsocialist" with the result of the Highland Clearances, only in its means.Except that private landlords decided all of this and run it for their own profit.

[Nusocialist]

And as an aside, what exactly is the socialist objection to the Highland Clearances? It resulted in labor flocking to the cities to take part in the beginings of the industrial revolution. It helped create a labor pool to develop capitalism, which in turn destroyed feudalism.It ruined a whole class of people in the highlands and forced them kicking and screaming into the nightmares of the factory or to become dependent farm labourers or perhaps, as happened with enclosures, to the grave itself. It drove them onto the poor rates and the workhouse, to be shunted around by the laws of settlement which created little more than serfdom to serve industrial interests. As the Hammonds note:



It helped created the proleteriat, and thus was part of the entire basis, and justification, for socialism. One can certainly decry what happened on that individual basis. But to single it out as an event that ought never have happened seems to run counter with the whole idea of human progress toward socialism.
Well I'm not a Marxist, such theories of history don't mean much to me. It need not have happened and it could have happened differently.

[pusher robot]

Well I'm not a Marxist, such theories of history don't mean much to me. It need not have happened and it could have happened differently.

Again, I'm very skeptical this constitutes any sort of insight. History is filled to overflowing with example of things that, with the benefit of hindsight, certainly could have turned out better. This alone proves nothing. I find it ridiculously unfair to hold the actors of the time to such an impossible standard: "I condemn you, you made mistakes!"

[EvigLidelse]

I pretty much call myself a Libertarian, but I try not to believe in taking ownership of things in that way. How do you actually decide who's the owner of something?

I don't feel like I have to defend this at all. This is rather an act of Feudalistic owners than Capitalistic ones. Remember that this happened like 400 years ago. Greed still existed back then though.

And yes, no one can justify genocide. How could someone do that?

[Demogorgon]

I'm sure that the landlords in the middle ages did not have capitalist style ownership of the land. There must have been a change somewhere.


Feudalism was long gone by the late eighteenth century though. This was a capitalist society (an early one mind you), working according to capitalist rules.

Incidentally, for the most part, land in the highlands never was divided into smaller allotments. After all you can't keep vast amounts of sheep on small farms.


This means that the wool was more valuable to the community than what was previously produced on the land.
The problem which the community faces is how to best to use that land to benefit the community.

There wasn't any Community left after the clearances! We are talking about an act of genocide here as I say, not merely a change to more profitable farming techniques. This is really not meant to be a debate about whether it was justified or not. nobody thinks it was justified. The capitalists at the time who were not directly involved in it didn't think it was justified either incidentally. so we aren't even applying modern standards, simply pointing out that genocide can be carried out by the private sector and asking Libertarians if they think that makes it all right. It isn't addressed to capitalists as a whole, because most are perfectly aware that exterminating an entire culture is wrong, but at Libertarians, who apply such strict rules that they have no way of consistently opposing this.
And as an aside, what exactly is the socialist objection to the Highland Clearances? It resulted in labor flocking to the cities to take part in the beginings of the industrial revolution. It helped create a labor pool to develop capitalism, which in turn destroyed feudalism. It helped created the proleteriat, and thus was part of the entire basis, and justification, for socialism. One can certainly decry what happened on that individual basis. But to single it out as an event that ought never have happened seems to run counter with the whole idea of human progress toward socialism.We oppose it for the same reason everybody else opposes it, nobody likes genocide. Obviously there had to be industrialisation, and there was heavy industrialisation going on in Britain as a whole and Scotland in particular. This was after all, the most industrialised country in the world. Rather the condemnation is of this particular event of genocide.

Like I say, once again, the purpose of this thread is not to try and argue the clearances were wrong. That is a settled issue. Nobody in their right mind argues otherwise. Rather, I say again. the point is to challenge Libertarians with a clear example of history where Genocide was carried out by the private sector.
Again, I'm very skeptical this constitutes any sort of insight. History is filled to overflowing with example of things that, with the benefit of hindsight, certainly could have turned out better. This alone proves nothing. I find it ridiculously unfair to hold the actors of the time to such an impossible standard: "I condemn you, you made mistakes!"
What impossible standards? Do you think many people in the eighteenth century thought this was right either?

[Green Dragon]

If one is talking about community benefits one has to ask who benefits and why.

One would think all people who like to wear clothes would benefit by the increase a wool supply.



Like the enclosures I'm sure even if this was good for the community at large, it needn't have happened the way it did nor with the ruin of peasantry.


But is not an aim of socialism to "ruin" the peasantry? Since when do socialists support its continued existence?





Except that private landlords decided all of this and run it for their own profit.
[/QUOTE]

So the objection to the clearances is not that they occurred, or even that it was "genocide" (if we accept Demogorgon characterisation), but rather the manner by which it occurred. Had the majority of the population voted democratically to clear the land, there would be no grounds for objection.

[Green Dragon]

Like I say, once again, the purpose of this thread is not to try and argue the clearances were wrong. That is a settled issue. Nobody in their right mind argues otherwise. Rather, I say again. the point is to challenge Libertarians with a clear example of history where Genocide was carried out by the private sector.


Its a straw man argument. The problem is what I said earlier: The land was more valuable supporting sheep than for what is was actually being used. The issue is how to go about making the neccessary adjustments.

Capitalist- Buyer would seek to purchase the land from the owner at a price mutually agreed upon.
Landlord system (as described)- simply force the people off the land.
Socialist- Since land is owned by everyone, the decision would be by majority vote, with the minority having to conform to the use of the land as dictated by the majority. The majority would have the right to force the recalcitrant minority to conform-or to leave.

The historical solution to the problem would be far more expected to reoccur in a socialist system, than in a capitalist one.

[Demogorgon]

Its a straw man argument. The problem is what I said earlier: The land was more valuable supporting sheep than for what is was actually being used. The issue is how to go about making the neccessary adjustments.

Capitalist- Buyer would seek to purchase the land from the owner at a price mutually agreed upon.
Landlord system (as described)- simply force the people off the land.
Socialist- Since land is owned by everyone, the decision would be by majority vote, with the minority having to conform to the use of the land as dictated by the majority. The majority would have the right to force the recalcitrant minority to conform-or to leave.

The historical solution to the problem would be far more expected to reoccur in a socialist system, than in a capitalist one.
No it wouldn't, because a socialist society would likely not go about a concerted attempt to destroy an entire culture.

A socialist society might very well have mechanisms to reform the land, just as a modern capitalist society would. The objection again isn't that the economy was moving on, but that the capitalists committed genocide in order to make the change at the absolute minimum cost to themselves. Do you think a modern capitalist society where the Government restrains the private sector would allow this to happen? I certainly don't. Ad nor would a socialist society. There are other ways to modernise an economy after all.

So the question is, was the genocide justified because the private sector rather than the Government did it? And to stop further dancing around answer this question, would you accept the same actions if carried out by a Government?

[Bud Struggle]

No it wouldn't, because a socialist society would likely not go about a concerted attempt to destroy an entire culture.

Excuse me, but Socialist societies are all about destroying entire cultures. There is nothing hetrodox about Socialism. Socialism is about the homogenization of culture--actually it's that, not the economic aspects of Communism are my greatest problem with Marxism.

[Demogorgon]

Excuse me, but Socialist societies are all about destroying entire cultures. There is nothing hetrodox about Socialism. Socialism is about the homogenization of culture--actually it's that, not the economic aspects of Communism are my greatest problem with Marxism.
Let's pretend I have given the stock reply about it not being real socialism that does that to save me writing it and you dismissing it, okay?

In actual fact the Governments you would call "socialist" never did go about destroying culture, apart from the very worst ones. Go around Eastern Europe and the culture is still there. Indeed the Governments like to preserve it to a large extent because it was good for the tourists. Similarly across the Soviet Union and across modern Russia and the former Soviet Republics as well for that matter the cultures were and are varied across the vast landscape and were not forced together.

I don't think Communism or socialism is abut cultural homogenisation at all because it is an issue not terribly relevant. Culture is really about the activities and background people identify with, any decent society does not interfere with that. Obviously a socialist society would feature much great cultural crossover, simply because free movement of people leads tot hat, but it also happens under capitalism, indeed you can experience the same things just about anywhere now, so where is the reason to believe socialism has any tendency outwith what happens anyway to push people to adopt a
single cultural identity?

[apathy maybe]

What becomes interesting is how a socialist system might deal with the same problem (land being more valuable for a different than it is currently being used). Since the workers cannot own the land, they too are at the mercy of the landlords (ie the majority of the population who will democratically dicate how the land is to be used). The minority would have no recourse to any sort of change in the use of the land that is so democratically decided. In other words, there is nothing particularly "unsocialist" with the result of the Highland Clearances, only in its means.
Depends on who you talk to buddy. In my opinion, in most cases (including this sort of situation), in a socialist society usage trumps the "democratic will of the majority". In other words, fuck off with oppressive majorities as much as oppressive minorities.



Excuse me, but Socialist societies are all about destroying entire cultures. There is nothing hetrodox about Socialism. Socialism is about the homogenization of culture--actually it's that, not the economic aspects of Communism are my greatest problem with Marxism.
D explained a lot about how this post is crap.

But here's some more. The belief that Communism will lead to homogenisation of culture, of everyone being the same, of everyone wearing grey etc., is one of the oldest, and most bullshit beliefs regarding communism. (Sorry, let me be clear here, regarding any sane type of communism. Libertarian or anarchist communism qualifies as sane by my standards.)

HG Wells (if my memory serves me correctly), wrote a story around the idea before the 20th century for fucks sake! That's how old this bullshit is.

Communism (or rather, from my perspective, anarchism) is about liberating people, and allowing them to express themselves freely. Allowing people to reach their full potential as human beings is one of the great promises of a libertarian system of society.

If nothing else, without a central government or similar (which wouldn't exist in a class-less state-less system of any kind), there would be no way to enforce a homogenised culture.

Oh, and finally, have you heard of the term, Coca-colonization (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocacolonization)? It refers the the invasion and destruction of cultures by the USA. Of course, there is nothing wrong with this from a capitalist perspective, let the free market rule and the strongest culture win!

[Bud Struggle]

Communism (or rather, from my perspective, anarchism) is about liberating people, and allowing them to express themselves freely. Allowing people to reach their full potential as human beings is one of the great promises of a libertarian system of society.

I see it as quite the opposite. I see Capitalism as liberating and setting people free.

I guess you say tomato and I say tomato. :lol:

[Nusocialist]

One would think all people who like to wear clothes would benefit by the increase a wool supply.
That is there choice I would think, not some private landlord who wants to ruin them.



But is not an aim of socialism to "ruin" the peasantry? Since when do socialists support its continued existence?You're thinking of Marxists, I'm not a Marxist. I'm a Kropotkinesque Libertarian socialist who wants more integration of rural and urban.




[/quote]

So the objection to the clearances is not that they occurred, or even that it was "genocide" (if we accept Demogorgon characterisation), but rather the manner by which it occurred. Had the majority of the population voted democratically to clear the land, there would be no grounds for objection.[/quote]I don't know I'd put it like that but in a way yes.

[Nusocialist]

Feudalism was long gone by the late eighteenth century though. This was a capitalist society (an early one mind you), working according to capitalist rules.Indeed however it had to change sometime and actually I think the fuedal/clan system only changed quite late in many places, not still after the failure of the 45'.



Incidentally, for the most part, land in the highlands never was divided into smaller allotments. After all you can't keep vast amounts of sheep on small farms.
I'm not sure. The highland was very densely populated for a long time, something like a third more than the population could take.

[Green Dragon]

A socialist society might very well have mechanisms to reform the land, just as a modern capitalist society would. The objection again isn't that the economy was moving on, but that the capitalists committed genocide in order to make the change at the absolute minimum cost to themselves.

One would think that a socialist system would have mechanisms to make change at the absolute minimum cost to themselves. It is ridiculous to suppose people would want to pay more than is needed for the change.



Do you think a modern capitalist society where the Government restrains the private sector would allow this to happen?

In a modern capitalist society the land would be bought, because the tenants would own the land, and mot merely being dependent upon the will of someone else.
In the socialist community...? That person is reduced to right back where he was in feudal days.



So the question is, was the genocide justified because the private sector rather than the Government did it?

No.


And to stop further dancing around answer this question, would you accept the same actions if carried out by a Government?[/QUOTE]

No.

[Green Dragon]

[
quote=Nusocialist;1247400]That is there choice I would think, not some private landlord who wants to ruin them.

They did make the choice. That is why the land became more valuable for the pasture for sheep.

[Demogorgon]

One would think that a socialist system would have mechanisms to make change at the absolute minimum cost to themselves. It is ridiculous to suppose people would want to pay more than is needed for the change.

In a socialist society, everybody factors into the equation, not just the capitalists. Hence genocide can not happen in order to benefit one group.


In a modern capitalist society the land would be bought, because the tenants would own the land, and mot merely being dependent upon the will of someone else. What makes you think that? I mean in the Highlands currently vast amounts of land is still owned by private land owners and rented by tenants and it is the same in many other places. The reason something like the clearances cannot happen now is that there are a vast amount of laws limiting what the land owners can do. Of course you might very well call that unjust to the land owners

In the socialist community...? That person is reduced to right back where he was in feudal days.
Leaving aside the fact that they wouldn't and that this is a ridiculous characterisation of socialism. In this instance, would feudal rights have been worse than capitalist rights? After all feudalism contained reciprocal rights that the landowners had to respect. They were not allowed to dispossess those on the land they owned.

The clearances were an atrocity very particular to capitalism.


No.


So atrocities can indeed happen in the free market without Government intervention?

[pusher robot]

The reason something like the clearances cannot happen now is that there are a vast amount of laws limiting what the land owners can do. Of course you might very well call that unjust to the land owners

Could you elaborate on this please? I'm not asking rhetorically, but out of honest lack of knowledge: what laws exist now prevent a similar occurrence? Is it against the law for a lessor to stop renting a property to a tenant once the lease is up?

[Demogorgon]

Could you elaborate on this please? I'm not asking rhetorically, but out of honest lack of knowledge: what laws exist now prevent a similar occurrence? Is it against the law for a lessor to stop renting a property to a tenant once the lease is up?

Well the most recent law is that land owners have to sell the land tot he tenants if they do not want to keep up whatever the current arrangement is (unless the tenants also want the change of course). Also there are the older laws forbidding leases to be cancelled without considerable warning, forbidding people being thrown out of their homes without compensation (unless it was due to them misbehaving) or at the very least re-homing them and so forth.

The laws are very strict with the rural land owners now, because people, most capitalists included, are utterly sick of so much of so much of rural Scotland belonging to so few landowners.

On a different but related note, landowners are also now forbidden to stop people passing through their property and must respect right of way. There was considerable reform in 2003. Though the basic laws forbidding another clearance are over a hundred years old.

[Bud Struggle]

Slightly off topic--but here is an interesting article from Wiki on the "Right to Roam."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_to_roam

It really doesn't exist for private land in the US--but it does in GB and other places.

[Demogorgon]

Slightly off topic--but here is an interesting article from Wiki on the "Right to Roam."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_to_roam

It really doesn't exist for private land in the US--but it does in GB and other places.

That was big stuff in Scotland five years ago when it was passed. Scotland is often considered one of the most beautiful countries in the world and people like to walk in the Highlands a lot. Some landowners preferred to prevent this but they can no longer do so. A very good thing in my opinion.

What right to they have to own or direct it really?

[Bud Struggle]

What right to they have to own or direct it really?

As a land owner myself--I don't really like people trespassing on my property and I wouldn't really like to ever trespass on someone elses property--yet I can see the point, dimly, but I can see the point of the legislation.

[Lynx]

Slightly off topic--but here is an interesting article from Wiki on the "Right to Roam."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_to_roam

It really doesn't exist for private land in the US--but it does in GB and other places.
Wow, that's discriminatory. If you're a squirrel, or a bear, you get a free pass?

[Demogorgon]

As a land owner myself--I don't really like people trespassing on my property and I wouldn't really like to ever trespass on someone elses property--yet I can see the point, dimly, but I can see the point of the legislation.Suppose you owned vast swathes of Scotland though-while living in Germany and making no contribution to the area or land at all. Would you think you had any right to stop trespassing then?

[Nusocialist]

Again, I'm very skeptical this constitutes any sort of insight. History is filled to overflowing with example of things that, with the benefit of hindsight, certainly could have turned out better. This alone proves nothing. I find it ridiculously unfair to hold the actors of the time to such an impossible standard: "I condemn you, you made mistakes!"

That could be extended to anyone in the past including Stalin or Hitler. It was done deliberately for greed and the poor were forgotten and trodden under foot when they didn't have to be. it wasn't as if thre weren't pleas from the poor and from others to help them and ideas of how to do it easily. The British state was controlled by the landowning classes and it deliberately ignroed the rights of the poor to satisfy its own greed.

[Nusocialist]

[

They did make the choice. That is why the land became more valuable for the pasture for sheep.Do you have proof of this? How do you know the wool wasn't mostly exported and used to supply the rich? The poor at could barely afford food and shelter let alone any decent clothes.

There is power in market relationships often you know.

[Green Dragon]

Do you have proof of this? How do you know the wool wasn't mostly exported and used to supply the rich? The poor at could barely afford food and shelter let alone any decent clothes.

There is power in market relationships often you know.

Well, we know from demogorgon that the enclosures were in the 1700s. This coincides with the start of industrial revolution in the UK. It is unlikely wool was shipped to France for refinement. It went to the factories in the cities of the UK.

As far as supplying the rich, there is simply not enough "rich" to support such a massive change. No doubt many became "rich" as a result of the increase demand for wool. Which makes sense considering Scotland as a whole became richer as a result of the industrial revolution.

[Green Dragon]

[QUOTE]
[quote=Demogorgon;1247724]In a socialist society, everybody factors into the equation, not just the capitalists. Hence genocide can not happen in order to benefit one group.

In the equation you presented, the land being was being used less inefficiently and less beneficially for the people than it was/would have been as used for the sheep. At this point, the equation of the original uses of the land ought take precedence, and efforts to change the equation illegitimate.

[Demogorgon]

Well, we know from demogorgon that the enclosures were in the 1700s. This coincides with the start of industrial revolution in the UK. It is unlikely wool was shipped to France for refinement. It went to the factories in the cities of the UK.

As far as supplying the rich, there is simply not enough "rich" to support such a massive change. No doubt many became "rich" as a result of the increase demand for wool. Which makes sense considering Scotland as a whole became richer as a result of the industrial revolution.
As it happens Scotland's main textile industry ended up being cotton rather than wool. Cotton was imported in vast quantities from America to be refined in Scotland. So much so than when Scottish cotton workers went on strike during the American civil war due to refusal to work with Confederate produced goods (there was a massive anti-slavery feeling in Scotland by this time). It caused major problems for the wider economy.

However the biggest source of Scotland's industrial power was heavy industry, especially iron and steel.
[QUOTE]
In the equation you presented, the land being was being used less inefficiently and less beneficially for the people than it was/would have been as used for the sheep. At this point, the equation of the original uses of the land ought take precedence, and efforts to change the equation illegitimate.
Has it occurred to you that the farmland could have been effectively used for sheep farming by the crofters themselves switching from Arable farming to sheep farming? Why did genocide have to be committed in order to change to sheep farming? It was committed to ensure that the land owners got full benefit from the sheep farming rather than only collecting rents while the farmers themselves profited.

It might come as a surprise to learnt hat changes in farming are actually possible without atrocities like the clearances.

[Nusocialist]

Well, we know from demogorgon that the enclosures were in the 1700s. This coincides with the start of industrial revolution in the UK. It is unlikely wool was shipped to France for refinement. It went to the factories in the cities of the UK.

As far as supplying the rich, there is simply not enough "rich" to support such a massive change. No doubt many became "rich" as a result of the increase demand for wool. Which makes sense considering Scotland as a whole became richer as a result of the industrial revolution.I'm not sure you really deal with the question here. Exchange value has many social causes, just because something is profitable doesn't mean that everyone would want it and its production if they had a complete choice.

[Nusocialist]

In the equation you presented, the land being was being used less inefficiently and less beneficially for the people than it was/would have been as used for the sheep. At this point, the equation of the original uses of the land ought take precedence, and efforts to change the equation illegitimate.
Your conclusion only follows if you have a silly misoid kind of view of the market and ignore all power and social relationships within it.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

And reality. Let's not forget reality. :laugh:

[Green Dragon]

However the biggest source of Scotland's industrial power was heavy industry, especially iron and steel.



The UK includes England. Somebody, somewhere wanted that wool more than what the land had previously supported.


Has it occurred to you that the farmland could have been effectively used for sheep farming by the crofters themselves switching from Arable farming to sheep farming?

Perhaps so, perhaps so.




It might come as a surprise to learnt hat changes in farming are actually possible without atrocities like the clearances.


No doubt.

[Green Dragon]

[
quote=Nusocialist;1249819]I'm not sure you really deal with the question here. Exchange value has many social causes, just because something is profitable doesn't mean that everyone would want it and its production if they had a complete choice.[/QUOTE]


I am not aware that the socialist community demands unanimity for all production decisions.