Without government courts, how would consumers find redress against businesses that rip them off? That's the question I answer, in part, in my article, "Free-Market Justice is in the Cards," published in the April 2005 issue of The Freeman. Free-market justice is merely business as usual for the credit card companies who settle disputes every day between buyers and sellers. Moreover, this is justice without borders, because it is provided equally for everyone around the world as well as in the United States. Most importantly, this privately provided justice is also significantly more effective, efficient, and consumer-friendly, and far less expensive (meaning no filing fees, court costs or lawyers), than what the state serves up.
This article is an outgrowth of my research as a 2003-2004 John M. Olin Student Fellow in Law and Economics at the University of Chicago Law School. I presented some of these details as a scheduled speaker at the 2004 Austrian Scholars Conference. In any event, this Freeman article should provide some food for thought and, I hope, provoke a bit of scholarly feedback as well.
