Actually, my point re: language is not that normative moments in language  
necessarily distort our ability to explain.  It was that when we pretend  
to use language that is formed from a normative point of view in a  
non-normative way that that is what can lead to distortion.   
 
I also think that another aspect of this debate concerns the relationship  
between theory and practice and how the meaning of concepts is  
determined.  Does the meaning of term consist only of what *I* want it to  
mean (humpty-dumpty in Alice and Wonderland).  This can reduce to the  
absurd conclusion that if *I* want to define coercion as the right of  
people to do what they want when they want, that is as legitimate or  
acceptable as more conventional definitions.  Or is it the case that  
terms, concepts, etc. derive their meaning from the language within which  
they develop.  If the latter is the case, how likely is it in the social  
sciences that one would be able to extract a body of concepts from common  
usage, define them in a purely nominalist fashion, and still claim to   
have a non-normative discourse (as per physics) in relation to social  
practice?   
 
 
On Wed, 17 May 1995, Steven G Medema wrote: 
 
>  
> > I think that Steven's position is a perfect example of a contestable  
> > account of the "essence" of government (or the state) that is assumed to  
> > be universal or "the way things simply are" but one that is in fact  
> > peculiar to a very specific period of time (as a description of  
> > legitimate government authority, it would not, for example,  
> > sit well with the communitarian elements of Anti-Federalism) and even at  
> > that point more common to some people than others.  The claim that the  
> > essence  
> > of government is law and that law is coercive simply wouldn't be  
> > accepted by a number of accounts of the origin/basis/justification for  
> > legitimate authority (many consent theorists, for example).  Steven's  
> > statement also suggests that those  
> > responding to Mary's comments who have suggested she is misconstruing  
> > what economists think need to qualify their denial.   
>  
> I would point out that I am not trying to account for the use of an idea,  
> but simply to describe how coercion is inevitably operative within the  
> economic system, since law (and thus rights) have an essential coercive  
> element (in allowing certain things and disallowing others).  I will  
> continue this thought with the comment below. 
>  
> > I would also dispute the claim that coercion is simply a value neutral  
> > term.  I would suggest that it is a term that is developed, in part, from  
> > a normative point of view, that there are a number of terms in our  
> > discourse shaped from the normative point of view, and that to try to  
> > deny that or to purge that normative dimension is to do violence to tha  
> > lnaguage in such a way that it hampers our ability to explain the world  
> > rather than helps. 
>  
> You see, this gets to the heart of the matter about which Mary is  
> concerned, particularly when combined with my statement above and in the  
> previous message.  The term coercion is sometimes (perhaps even often)  
> USED in a pejorative, non-neutral way.  This lends rhetorical force to  
> certain arguments, not unlike "more v. less government" (another  
> irrelevant distinction, generally, since the question is usually rights  
> for A v. rights for B, government being "present" in either case).  I  
> would bet that an in-depth study of the use of the term "coercion" in  
> economic analysis would reveal a multiplicity of uses, right, left, and  
> neutral. 
>  
> I might also add that the converse of Mike's last sentence is also true:   
> the tendency to attach normative connotations to certain elements of our  
> language hampers our ability to explain the world.  But enough for now. 
>  
>  
>