[grandalf]

Well, to be fair, governments also do things like create internment camps for Japanese Americans, Gitmo, horrible prisons, genocides, etc.

The worst atrocities of history are generally Government power run amok, where governments use propaganda mechanisms to rally the public into a frenzy and then do horrible things (like the Iraq war, Holocaust, etc.)

There is a big difference between the constructive activities of governments (solving coordination problems, building roads and other infrastructure, basic criminal justice) and the perverse social engineering that corrupt governmental organizations seem to universally gravitate toward.

[krapp]

I don't think that is entirely fair, as it seems to presume the scale of atrocity for any government necessarily outweighs the scale of its benefit. It isn't the case that events like you describe (genocide, internment camps, the Holocaust) are inevitable or constant. Governments do these things, when they do, because governments are the only power structures capable of it -- one would have to prove that corporations given the same opportunity or power would somehow not engage in anything similar. Other governments also fight against them. The only difference between a company hiring Pinkertons to shoot striking miners and an army killing civilians is in scale, I don't believe it says much about the implicit evil of government versus the implicit good of a free market.

Most of these events had some measure of popular support. Many people wanted to put the Japanese in camps. Many people wanted to rid Europe of Jews. A lot of Americans wanted the Iraq war, and a lot of Americans want prisons to be horrible, believing we're a Christian nation and that a Christian nation should punish the wicked and smite the infidels. It is, I think, a mistake to presume that government even in the act of tyranny necessarily separates people from the better angels of their nature through deception or coercion.

[grandalf]

I don't disagree with any of your points (and they are well put).

However government is viewed by many as a legitimate purveyor of lethal force, both locally (everything from cops w/ guns to the death penalty) and remotely (intercontinental missile strikes, rendition, and foreign occupation).

Since governments typically have significant control over the media (by being able to classify information or more direct measures) there exists a significant self-perpetuating propaganda regime, which I think calls into question the basic legitimacy government is thought to enjoy, and along with it the mandate to use lethal force.

Most of the things we consider atrocities are the abuse of lethal force. When a militia member in Africa forces a child to murder his parents, we consider that unequivocally wrong, yet when a government murders his parents we consider that a legitimate projection of lethal force, perhaps only b/c we don't know the details.

So while governments do have some legitimacy and do a lot of good, the basic structures (consent, monopoly on coercion, and propaganda) are ripe for abuse and (I'd argue) transition into covert/improper use of force as they stabilize and their purpose becomes widely viewed as oriented toward peacetime activities.

[krapp]

>So while governments do have some legitimacy and do a lot of good, the basic structures (consent, monopoly on coercion, and propaganda) are ripe for abuse and (I'd argue) transition into covert/improper use of force as they stabilize and their purpose becomes widely viewed as oriented toward peacetime activities.

I agree with you. But I also feel that cynicism, while justifiable and oftentimes necessary, can itself be a blinder to the degree to which the faults of government can tend to take root in any power structure of any significance. Government can fall prey to abuse, and often does, but this doesn't necessarily mean that a lack of government in and of itself will limit abuse where any one group of people has any power over another. If government isn't a legitimate purveyor of lethal force or significant social planning then who or what is?

[grandalf]

>the faults of government can tend to take root in any power structure of any significance

Absolutely.

>cynicism, while justifiable and oftentimes necessary, can itself be a blinder

I agree with this as well, and think that the proper course of action for the individual citizen is to uphold his civic duty and actively dissent, rather than merely resorting to cynicism.

Dissent can take many forms, but generally ought to provide a check to the tendency of government (or any kind of institution) to abuse its' power.