Private Provider of Law

From the Quicksilver Metaweb.

Definition

In the anarcho-capitalist theory of David Friedman, a Private Provider of Law, or PPL, is essentially a legal insurance company: you the customer contract for certain rights the PPL will protect and enforce, compensate you for their violation, and collect damages from violators, just as if your rights were an automobile.

A PPL may be your Burbclave, FOQNE, Phyle or other voluntary dynamic security collective. In a highly balkanized world, citizens of different PPL's get along because many, most, or all PPLs have some form of re-insurance policy/contract agreement with other PPLs, such as the Common Economic Protocol, an agreement whose PPA is known as Protocol Enforcement. Such arrangements are needed to ensure that in disputes between individuals from different PPLs, there is some form of pre-agreed final arbiter, or a pre-agreed way of deciding upon one.

Individuals who do not retain a PPL may be said to have "gone Armadillo" in the words of David Brin's characters in "The Ungoverned". In the Stephensonian world, Armadillo's may be directly contracted with PPAs to some limited extent or may be personally signatory to the CEP as Sovereigns.

See also: Private Protection Agency, Protocol Enforcement, and Common Economic Protocol

External Links * David Friedman's Website * "The Machinery of Freedom" by David Friedman (at amazon.com)