Robin Hanson - WHO VOUCHES FOR YOU?: A RADICAL CRIME LAW PROPOSAL | #hcpp19

Most ancient societies used simple A-sues-B-for-cash legal systems to deal with most harms. But in the last few centuries, states added “crime law”, wherein the state investigates, sues, and imprisons “criminals.” These centrally-run one-size-fits-all bureaucratic systems don’t innovate well nor adapt well to individual conditions. And even though most of your “constitutional rights” are regarding such systems, they still seem badly broken.

In the ancient world, a stranger who came to town was trusted more if a local “vouched” for them. We still use vouching today in bonded contractors, in organized crime, and in requiring most everyone to get an insurer who pays on their behalf if they cause a car accident. I propose requiring everyone to get an insurer to vouch for them regarding any crimes they might commit. If you are found guilty of a crime, your “voucher” pays the state a fine, and then pays to punish you according to your contract with them. This fine in part pays the private bounty-hunter who convinced the court of your guilt. Competing bounty-hunters obey law because they can’t maintain a blue-wall-of-silence.

To lower your voucher premiums, you might agree to (1) prison, torture, or exile, if caught, (2) prior limits on your freedom like curfews, ankle bracelets, and their reading your emails, and (3) co-liability wherein you and your buddies are all punished if any one of you is found guilty. In this system, the state still decides what behaviors are crimes and if any one accusation is true, and it sets fine and bounty levels regarding how hard to discourage and detect each kind of crime. But each person chooses their own “constitutional rights”, and vouchers acquire incentives and opportunity to innovate and adapt, by searching in a large space of ways to discourage crime.

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