alt Hacker NewsIt seems to me that the crypto absolutists have it backwards. You can’t solve the problem of failed states by changing the technology of currency, because the state is there to solve for the counterparty risk at the point of exchange.
The alternative to governments monopoly on violence for enforcement, no matter if you exchange in monero or giant stone discs, is broad use of vigilante violence.
So while crypto seems like an interesting technology for moving money around, it seems like it doesn’t solve for the point of exchange problem and thus crypto that focuses on making that difficult for government mediation are bound to be only useful for illegal activities.
There is no counterparty risk for the seller in the traditional sense with bitcoin or monero, they're bearer assets, once the transaction is confirmed in your wallet there's no risk for you. You don't need to use violence to make sure you get paid?
What you actually have is the opposite problem (in a sense) - the transaction is irreversible, the seller will receive payment and keep it even if they shouldn't (i.e fraud). So there is more risk for the buyer than in a fiat system where transactions can be reversed by legal processes