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An IP Environmentalism for Culture and Knowledge?
An anonymous reader writes "An article by James Boyle in the FT argues that we are (slowly) moving towards a 'cultural environmentalism' that tries to protect the public domain in the way that the environmental movement tries to protect the natural ecology. Apparently there will be a (free) conference at Stanford on the subject soon, organized by Larry Lessig's Center there."
But I'll humor you. Since the government couldn't possibly protect any aspects of the environment (since "it" is the very same government damaging others!), I'll let you explain to me how the private sector will do a better job of protecting the environment without government regulation.
The "private sector" as in corporations will not protect the enviornment in an of themselves in the absense of government regulation (of course, big corporations as we understand them are the product of government regulation in the first place... corporations require a whole slew of special privledges and direct and indirect subsidies to exist. Corporations as they exist today are not a natural product of the free market; Big corporations couldn't exist without big government)
However, there isn't just corporations or government. Many extremly powerful institutions fall outside those categories. For example, labor unions are extremely powerful non-governmental organizations. Most of the advances in pay, benifits, working hours, etc., were fought for and won by labor unions (and then over the years governments took credit for the whole thing). Religion is an extremly powerful non-corporate, non-government institution - if you doubt the power of religion just look at what happened when someone printed a few lame Mohammed cartoons.
There is no reason why people couldn't organize a new institution to protect the enviornment. In fact, that is what would have happened if the left had not hijacked the enviornmentalist movement and turned it into a big propoganda machine for government central planning.
You don't need a police force, atomic weapons, an "elected" leader, and a flag and nationalistic anthem in order to solve problems. There are any number of diverse systems of social organization, economic exchange, and self-regulation society can use instead of government sponsered violence. There are any number of possible institutions besides "government" or "corporations" that people can establish. Unfortunatly so many people have adopted a messianic view of the state as the great savior, they cannot comprehend any solution to any problem but government. There is really a whole world of possibilities out there if we allow a little freedom and are willing to experiment.