Here is chapter 18 of the voluntarist handbook, section titled, the utilitarian case for voluntourism by Danny Duchamp, no position. But volunteerism is defensible from a utilitarian perspective. Even if I convince you of this you might respond that. You are not a utilitarian. So this does not convince you of voluntourism. However you needn't be a utilitarian to be persuaded by utilitarian. Givens utilitarianism is the proposition that you should do whatever maximizes utility or
the Fulfillment of human values. You may not think that maximally fulfilling human values is always the right thing to do. But you probably do care about human values, at least a little. So it's still worth taking utilitarian analysis into account, or perhaps. You are a utilitarian that works too. Volunteerism is the proposition that interactions in which both parties consent, trade Games. Etc. Are universally preferable to interactions in which one party coerces.
The other violence theft Etc. I could plausibly. Establish the utilitarian justification for voluntourism simply by referring to the billions lifted out of poverty. Through voluntary trade, over the past couple of centuries since 1820 GDP per Capital worldwide has increased 15 fold the percentage of people living in extreme poverty less than a
dollar and ninety cents a day. Inflation-adjusted has fallen from over 90 percent to under 10 percent and the average person has access to a variety of food entertainment and technology. That even Kings under previous economic systems, couldn't dream of the utilitarian benefits of voluntary, trade are. So gargantuan that no honest utilitarian could enter. Pain, any alternative. However, this argument doesn't make clear. Why we can attribute the triumphs of capitalism to voluntourism.
More importantly it misses the deeper philosophical connection between voluntarism and utilitarianism to resolve those issues. Let us begin from the perspective of a utilitarian. The problem with utilitarian analysis is that some values are mutually exclusive. If I eat an apple, you can't eat it too. My value for Apple eating is fulfilled. And yours is not, we therefore must determine who values it more. Sometimes this may be intuitively obvious. We probably agree that if I'm
dying of hunger. Well, you aren't even sure if you'll finish the Apple, then I value it more than you in other situations. It isn't so obvious. If neither of us is starving in both of us like apples, then who values it more. It's hard to say. Why is it so obvious in? In the extreme case perhaps because we know I would be willing to sacrifice more.
If the Apple were on a high Branch, I'd be willing to climb up to get it. If the Apple were for sale, I'd be willing to pay more, this understanding drawn from the extreme case gives us a way of estimating who value something more when it isn't. So obvious namely, if I would be willing to pay more for something in effort money or anything else, then I value it more. Fortunately this system is largely self arranging.
If one of us currently possesses the apple and the other values at more, the latter can buy it from the former. Not only does this mean, the buyer is better off, the seller must be too. If the buyer did not value the Apple more than the money, he would not have bought if the seller did not value the money more than the apple.
He would not have sold. It is only largely self arranging because while people are generally incentivize To act in accordance with it. There is one exception coercion. I might not want to buy the Apple from you, if I can simply take it by force. My values are still fulfilled. I must have valued the Apple more than the effort of taking
it from you, but yours are not. You must have valued the Apple more than the nothing you got in return, or you would have just given it to me. We are back to the problem of determining whose values are more important. In fact, it's worse than that. That if I try to take something from you, you will resist imposing costs on both of us in the form of property damage and bodily harm. In addition to the cost of security, you may incur to
prevent future acts of coercion. It's not just that voluntary acts potential raise total utility and coercive acts have no, such tendency coercive acts actually tend to decrease total utility. Thus, voluntourism gives us a method of determining who gets what, in a way that maximizes total utility. If someone appropriates some unknown piece of property from nature, leave him be. He has just increased his utility, if he trades that property with One else, leave them be.
They have both just increased their utility. If however, he steals her damages, the property of someone else stop him. He has just reduced total utility. If we apply these principles of private ownership and voluntary exchange, consistently, we must apply them to capital goods which are Goods used to produce other Goods, tools, machines companies, Etc. If these Goods could be seized at any moment, then you would
have little reason to produce. M. Conversely, if you can reliably maintain ownership of capital goods, you have a profit incentive to produce them, and sell their output to the world. This is how capitalism the private ownership of capital goods. Achieve the unprecedented living standards, we discussed at the beginning. This isn't to say that the world we live in now operates entirely on a voluntary basis theft fraud murder and assault still happen regularly.
In war victimless crime laws and an endless list of other government. Actions all violate people's consent every day. Our reasoning tells us that each of these actions should be expected to reduce. The total fulfillment of human values. At least to the extent that you care about human values. You should attempt to prevent these coercive actions. In other words, at least to the extent that you are a utilitarian, you should be a volunteer. First.