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This article makes the case that we can have police forces that are less militaristic and that are more in tune with the needs of society by privatizing the police. Read the article and give your opinion on the issue.
It would have been interesting to see how Sheriff Taylor would have handled a schizophrenic person or a drug dealer protecting his turf, or a rapist and murderer on the Andy Griffith Show. Those stories were never written, though.
From the link:
Quote:
We know that state monopolies invariably provide worse and worse services for more and more money. Police services are no exception. When it comes to your local police, there is no shopping around, there is no customer service, and there is no choice. Without market competition, market price signals, and market discipline, government has no ability or incentive to provide what people really want, which is peaceful and effective security for themselves, their families, their homes, and their property.
I believe we would end up with the same type of police force even if it were profit driven. The market isn't some magic elixir meant to cure corrupt blood. The market can be corrupted as well, especially when there is little to no competition in the market (also when the market is "settled"). I look at my electric and waste disposal companies as examples. Pseudo-governmental, no competition companies that raise (by advocating to the state's PSC), never lower, my rates, and provide average service.
I can see it coming down to a "peace or profit" issue for the company. I wonder which will prevail?
This article makes the case that we can have police forces that are less militaristic and that are more in tune with the needs of society by privatizing the police. Read the article and give your opinion on the issue.
But who would do the accrediting?
The State which will deny a license for a private organization to enforce public law.
Do you really believe private police forces would not establish a local monopoly and protect only the people that had the money to pay for their protection? History is replete with private police forces that only protected the people that paid the, the rest were left to live in a lawless society.
The police in may small to mid size Midwestern American town are effectively owned by the white citizens of the town and serve as a repressive occupying force suppressing the rest of the citizens that live outside the protection but not the persecution of the law.
Including human rights abuses, reduction in quality resulting in deaths from illness/abuse, increases of charges to keep prisoners in prison to increase profits...
Private police forces make sure that if someone crosses jurisdictions they will only be followed if those people are firendly. Plus what happens when a person violates the laws of one jurisdiction and lives in another (especially if it is not a crime in the home jurisdiction)?
It could get absurd if one house is covered by one type and the person flees across the yard of someone else's police coverage. Nothing like an officer saying to a home owner "Sorry that guy set the fire, but he fled across the street to Smith's and their phone lines are busy to get permission, or get an officer of theirs down here."
Only wackjobs seem to think if something is having problems...destroy it and put in something worse. They make vague statements like it would be better because "free markets" make them feel better without addressing pretty obvious and important details that could make it work. Also without addressing current issues in free market alternatives or history where it was tried (the gilded age Pinkertons) and failed miserably.
Lew Rockwell also never disappoints with the crazy.
It would have been interesting to see how Sheriff Taylor would have handled a schizophrenic person or a drug dealer protecting his turf, or a rapist and murderer on the Andy Griffith Show. Those stories were never written, though.
From the link:
I believe we would end up with the same type of police force even if it were profit driven. The market isn't some magic elixir meant to cure corrupt blood. The market can be corrupted as well, especially when there is little to no competition in the market (also when the market is "settled"). I look at my electric and waste disposal companies as examples. Pseudo-governmental, no competition companies that raise (by advocating to the state's PSC), never lower, my rates, and provide average service.
I can see it coming down to a "peace or profit" issue for the company. I wonder which will prevail?
Why would there be no competition in the market? Have you seen the budgets of police and sheriffs departments? They are huge! There would be plenty of competition for those budgets and plenty of pressure to keep them. Like the public school system, the public police forces have no accountability to the public whereas a private force who could stand to loose a contract and be replaced by a competitor would have every incentive to both keep the peace and to serve the people instead of abusing them. Personally, I would be thrilled to have the same level of competency and accountability in law enforcement that we have in utility or trash companies... it would be a big improvement from where we are.
This article makes the case that we can have police forces that are less militaristic and that are more in tune with the needs of society by privatizing the police. Read the article and give your opinion on the issue.
Why not start with a private military? And eventually, we can move back to privatized governance. Instead of "government", may be we can then call it "East India Company" because "government" has become a pejorative term anyway while anything that sounds like a business is perceived as being good for the society.
There are already neighborhoods that are cordoned off and have their own security, but THEY ARE WAY OUT THE PRICE RANGE FOR MOST PEOPLE.
But those areas also have public police forces as well. Just building a gate and cordening off the public doesnt limit the jurisdiction of the police.
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