The Territorial Assumption: Rationale for Conquest

"The classic definition of the State involves two elements: a coercive monopolization of defense services over a given geographic area, and the imposition of coercive revenue collection from all of the area’s inhabitants. As Murray Rothbard has pointed out, even if taxes were voluntary, the libertarian must still oppose state control over protective services. By what right does the State prohibit competition in the production of security? By what right does the State force the pacifist or libertarian to subscribe to its service? The competition among states to provide protection services is certainly anarchic (and chaotic), by anyone’s standard. To be consistent, shouldn’t statists be opposed to world anarchy, just as they oppose domestic anarchy? How far should state boundaries extend and what should determine the extent of a state’s jurisdiction? How do statists answer these questions? (A consistent libertarian, of course, would reply that there should be no state, and therefore the question of state boundaries and state jurisdiction would not arise)."