I clearly recall that first time I attended a meeting of the Libertarian Alliance here in London. The guest speaker, a very earnest but rather monochromatic fellow (whose name, I must confess, I cannot now recall) was issuing forth on the subject of the purpose of the Libertarian Alliance and what its goals should be.
His conclusion was that those goals should, at the very least, include ‘the spreading of good ideas’. That sounded like a worthwhile project and, indeed, it is one in which I am engaged to this day.
But, how to do it? That’s the real trick. Marketing is dead simple when you’re peddling, say, luxury motor cars. But if you’re peddling the kind of ideas that make luxury motor cars both possible and widely available then you tend to find that you’re butting your head against a brick wall of indifference.
Perhaps we should take a leaf out of the book of those people who spread bad ideas because they seem to be enjoying no end of success, especially in Southern Africa:
“South Africa’s ruling African National Congress yesterday effectively gave its backing to President Robert Mugabe’s regime in Zimbabwe, cheering a speech by a Zanu-PF loyalist attacking “western imperialists”.
Now one would think that the experience of a lunatic marxist regime transforming a neighbouring country from a relatively prosperous bread-basket into a ‘Year Zero’-type hellhole would provide a pretty stark lesson in ‘How Not To Do Things’. But, such is the seductive power of those bad ideas, that they can trump even the most graphic and immediate realities.
And so British libertarians are left wrestling with the puzzle of how we capture that magic driver for impelling bad ideas and turn it to good use.
It is a thorny and will-sapping problem but one of far less magnitude than the one facing those South Africans of European or Asian descent. As far as they are concerned, all I can say is that I sincerely hope that they have an exit strategy because the day that they’re going to sorely need one appears to be getting closer.
You mean you actually believed that the ANC were democrats – there’s one born every minute.
A Non
I sympathize with your dilemma, this a hard nut to crack. But regarding the ANC. It has always been a communist organization, eventually you will see many Soviet style “reforms” in South Africa.
Are there any libertarian crossbenchers in the House of Lords? (or anywhere, for that matter)
You obviously haven’t seen the loony things cheered at Labour conferences in the UK – yet how many of those ever get translated into policy?
Dare I say, not a particularly enlightened piece of commentary. Take some time out to understand the nature of African politics, the structures of the ANC and the geopolitical sensitivities of the region before delivering such glib prognostications.
James,
You may indeed ‘dare’, sir.
Is this, then, merely some political showboating by the ANC? Does it lack substance? Do you find my dark forebodings about the future of that country to be overwrought?
If so, then I hope you are right and I am wrong.
The goings-on in sub-Saharan Africa are clutching defeat from the jaws of victory. Is that the normal result of liberation on the African continent?
Zimbabwean authorities have rapidly managed to destroy a viable economy. It could have fed itself and neighboring states. Now it’s veered into regional starvation.
When the talented people flee, who’s going to pick up the pieces?
I refer you to this piece by Kim do Toit
Let Africa Sink
When it comes to any analysis of the problems facing Africa, Western society, and particularly people from the United States, encounter a logical disconnect that makes clear analysis impossible. That disconnect is the way life is regarded in the West (it’s precious, must be protected at all costs etc.), compared to the way life, and death, are regarded in Africa.
It is, of course, a sad indictment of South Africa that they support Mugabe’s regime.
The short-term political reason is to outflank the Landless Movement and the Pan-Africanist Congress.
The medium-term consequences are economic support for a regime that appears to be moving towards genocide.
the facts are different. Whatever the African nationlists in the ANC might say — and you should realise it is itself deeply split between the minority liberal left and the nationnalist right — the technocrats are running the show.
Mbeki’s first remarks at the ANC congress were that the time had come (well, yes, it came a long time ago really) that something had to be done about Zim, where the fuel has dried up and so has Libyan largesse. He seems to be proposing some sort of all-party conference a la Burundi, mediated by Big Brother down south.
It is a mistake to think that South Africa’s problems will worsen in the same way as Zimbabwe’s.
Mugabe has, I think most people realise, gone mad in the literal sense. Yes, rank and file delegates in the ANC may well cheer the likes of Zanu-PF, for sentimental reasons (comrades in struggle etc). But it doesn’t amount to a hill of beans in government policy.
I am not an ANC supporter (although my daughter is indeed an ANC city councillor . But anyone who thinks there will be some sort of white exodus (apart from the economic brain drain) is simply overdramatising the issues.
We still have an extremely liberal constitution, with safeguards for individual liberty and freedom of expression, backed up by a constitutional court of last resort. This is a lot better than the UK’s situation, which I know all too well. Nobody’s nannying me or telling me what I may see in films or any of the other Establishment or Euronut control freakery Britons endure (and I too am one).
I’ll take my chances in a country that’s still arguing its future, ta.
Talking about technocrats running the show: here’s an article mostly ignored by the viciously destructive UK press (too ashamed of the rest of former British Africa?):
New SARB deputy praises SA economy