Why Obey?

Who went to war with Iraq?

Rothbard quotes Parker Thomas Moon, a historian writing in the 30s, on the way that collective nouns like “nation” or “society” mislead us into thinking that these are actual entities who think and choose and act.

When one uses the simple monosyllable “France” one thinks of France as a unit, an entity. When… we say “France sent her troops to conquer Tunis”– we impute not only unit but personality to the country. The very words conceal the facts and make international relations a glamorous drama in which personalized nations are the actors, and all too easily we forget the flesh-and-blood men and women who are the true actors…” (FNL 45-46)

Glamorous drama indeed. Look how many roles our “nation” plays: America the world police, everybody’s friend America, America the misunderstood, America the bully. Meanwhile, it’s estimated that over one million Iraqis have died as a result of the US invasion.

Moon continues:

If we had no such word as “France”… then we should more accurately describe the Tunis expedition in some such way as this: “A few of these thirty-eight million persons sent thirty-thousand others to conquer Tunis.” This way of putting the fact immediately suggests a question, or rather a series of questions. Who were the “few”? Why did they send the thirty thousand to Tunis? And why did these obey? Empire-building is done not by “nations,” but by men (FNL 46).

Rothbard goes on to address Moon’s questions, and I may try to comment on his answers. But I’m specifically interested in the last one, which Rothbard later calls “the mystery of civil obedience.” Why did these obey? Why obey? “Why do people obey the edicts and depredations of the ruling elite?” (66).