Anyone /minarchist/ here?
Yes, I'm a well-considered minarchist. My political ideal is something close to a nightwatchman state.
I had considered the market anarchy option for many years, and I was largely sympathetic to the idea, though I was never 100% convinced that it would work as advertised. Still, I would not object to market anarchists attempting their own social experiment in the Pacific Ocean somewhere, perhaps on a floating island.
I'm a minarchist because:
1) I never agreed with the anarchistic contention that the non-aggression principle means that government's "monopoly" on law is automatically an aggression on others, instead of a defensive use of force. IMV, this arguments rests on the fuzziness of the NAP when taken out of a deeper philosophical context.
2) An entrepreneurial legal system is a constant threat to libertarian legal arrangements. Centers of law in a polycentric system do not act in isolation from one another. There are going to be demands for compromises from other centers of law that won't be libertarian.
3) Government territories tend to minimize border contact with other government territories. A market anarchy could lead to an unsupportable amount of border contact (your neighbors could belong to several others legal service providers), leading to greater problems. Yes, the market might lead towards larger intentional communities to limit the problem, but then why not have governments?
4) David Friedman admits that a market anarchy won't necessarily be libertarian. He only suggests that economic incentives might work in a libertarian direction better than government. Still, given how force is involved, it is not entirely clear that it would work as he imagines.
5) While one might argue, Bruce Benson style, that private security agencies provide the "product" of safety, they rely on physical force and legal arrangements to accomplish this. One should be careful not to confuse a product produced in a free market (e.g., "widgets") with a legal service backed by force.
I personally believe that a "monopoly" on law is a valuable thing. It allows for a consistent set of procedures in investigating crimes and safeguards for victims and the accused. It places the focus on a widely known and understood Constitution that spells out a theory of individual rights. It also has historical experience and backing -- despite the Icelandic Commonwealth (which I personally wouldn't want to live in anyway), there is very little we can learn from history about the workability of a modern market anarchy.
I recommend the book
Total Freedom by Chris Sciabarra for an interesting look at Rothbard and market anarchy from a philosophical perspective. He raises many interesting questions and issues.
eudaimonia,
Mark