[novas0x2a]

I apologize if this seems like I'm attacking a strawman, that's not my intent. (If I did hit the strawman, please tell me how I've misunderstood...)

The problem with this sort of ideology is it ignores deterrence as a force for stability. If the only acceptable response to an application of force is an equal, opposite force, then why shouldn't I steal someone's car for a week rather than rent a car? If the only punishment is that I am forced to pay for the "rental", then I'm afraid the logical thing to do is to steal a car from the nearest parking lot rather than go through the rigmarole of taking the shuttle to the rental car parking lot.

You could counter-argue that the equal-opposite force would take that into account, but then, how do you calculate that? Does it cost exactly the same as a rental of an equivalent car would have? (In which case, no deterrence). Is there an additional charge for the theft? The calculation of opposite force starts to take on characteristics of our current civil legal system: calculation of the cost of a wrongdoing.

[learc83]

Additional deterrent force is required, else people would always steal, and they'd be no worse off if they were caught than if they'd bought it in the first place.

However, that retaliation is usually left to the courts in a society governed by laws. For example if someone steals from you, you can't just show up to their house and punch them.

[alttag]

Deterrence is a concept that has been studied regularly by criminologists, and to my understanding has been shown to have only minimal (inverse) correlation to wrongdoing. In some studies, deterrence has been separated into formal sanctions (e.g., court system, being fired from work), informal sanctions (e.g., disapproval of peers) and personal shame. (And each of these may be broken down further into certainty and severity.) Of these three, only formal sanctions demonstrates statistical effect, but in the presence of other factors (e.g., willingness to rationalize) its effect is very weak and almost disappears.

So yes, deterrence has a place, but it's a very minor one, and researchers have understood this for decades. Politicians and the public haven't yet caught on, perhaps because we seek concrete preventative measures or conflate deterrence and justice.

[drhodes]

Reputation and eventually ostracism. The thief would suffer public records indicating offenses against society. I bet the market would entertain many such reputation schemes. here's one that tracks bad drivers (I've no affiliation): http://www.zapatag.com/

Would a bank give a loan to a thief? It's up to the bank. It's hard to say how effective a social credit system would be.

[Zak]

I think the principle includes a certain degree of deterrence as well as inconvenience to the victim. Calculating exactly the right punishment is, of course difficult. That's what courts are for.

[Retric]

That seems counter to the basic 'libertarian' idea of minimal government.

[jamesbkel]

Well, most libertarian government structures call for precisely that. A police to enforce the law, a court system to provide fair rule and a small military intended for defense.

[edit: Should add that although there are certainly disputes to how to fund said services, to the best of my knowledge it's largely agreed that some court system is required.]

[Kroem3r]

There is a mixup here of "libertarian" and anarchist.

[nirvana]

I'm sorry, I was making a different point. I didn't mean to imply that deterrent force is immoral... just that the amount is something that needs to be arbitrated, rather than decided solely by the victim of the crime. That is to say, if you stole a car and used it for a week, you'd owe equivalent to the rental of the car, and whatever else is necessary to make he owner whole -- thus that includes compensation for any consequential results (like, maybe he lost money because he'd been hired to do a job and couldn't' do that job during the week because you had his car.) There's also, from the perspective I was describing, a compensation that covers hassle, inconvenience, and the fact that your actions were morally wrong. So, yes, there should be a deterrence and yes, it is owed to the victim, but it should be adjudicated. Its possible that violating the privacy of the thief is crime that is greater than the actual theft of the laptop in the first place (if you were to reduce both to monetary damages.)

[TruthElixirX]

The "rental" would include the damage you were dealt while not having that item.