To date, libertarian ideas have had no material impact upon the body politic.
True or false?
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True.
And certainly this blog makes no attempt to influence the policy makers and the mainstream political parasite class in general (in fact we are trying to get people to regard exactly those people with contempt). We try to move what other people think by refusing to always talk about things from within the accepted frames of reference.
It may be a long process. Or things may suddenly break somewhere a year from now. Who knows?
Just to expand on that: capitalist ideas have clearly had a huge impact… we are clearly freer economically than were were 30 years ago… but that is not the same thing at all.
True.
Communism has fallen under its own weight. Collectivism in general has demonstrated itself to be inherently flawed, and yet no one rushes to the libertarian side of things. Rather, even the most traditional parties can be seen dumping conservative thought over the side while embracing the new collectivist fads. I know conservatives aren’t completely libertarian, but they should at least be cutting taxes.
I think its because we are usually arguing for the absence of things, while collectivists get to talk about their pretty utopia. As stories, they sell to a larger crowd. I can’t think of a good analogy, but I know the human mind can grasp their pretty picture, but they don’t understand us. Oh, wait, it’s literally true- people can add easier than they can subtract! Just try it with large random numbers or something.
That’s why we always lose out in the end. Less government is the sticking point. More freedom sounds great, but to achieve it you actually need less government; otherwise you end up with the Democrats over here, or Labour over there handing you the freedom to behave badly but nothing else- until of course, they use your self-destructive behavior as an excuse to set up a nanny-state.
Wikipedia defines “body politic”:
When you use it, do you mean the government of a geographic area or the typical citizens of it?
A lot of people are totally disillusioned with government as a solution to much of anything. I think we are influencing those people quite a bit and more all the time. Are they part of the body politic as you meant it?
False.
Libertarian ideas from professed libertarians might yield a True.
What incentive is there for a vocational or attitudinal libertarian to prevail?
True.
True.
Two memes work against it. Most people are just too inculcated with statism to get over the shock value of any other approach.
Also, cogent agreement from libertarians is a lot like herding cats, they (we) are just too individualistic.
What is a collective noun for libertarians? A loose cannon?
I’m curious what is meant by “libertarian ideas”. Is that “ideas that libertarians have” or “ideas that only libertarians have”? Or is something like “ideas that libertarians have and have pressed for in a concerted effort”? Going under something like the third definition, I must say:
False.
Milton Friedman headed the commission on the draft in America, and he was successful in persuading almost everyone that the draft is a terrible idea.
I can’t think of any other really pertinent examples. But we should also measure not by the policy proposals enacted, but by the policy proposals which were voted down, or have never even been seriously considered, due to libertarian objections. If we hadn’t been a small, but very loud, voice over the past 35-40 years, how much worse would the state be? In that regard, I think we can take some pride.
– Josh
false
I am not quite sure to be honest.
False
err
True
err
I am not really sure. I think Wild Pegasus has a point that if the universally accepted goal is less government while we haven’t managed to roll back the state basically anywhere I think we have managed to stem the tide in our own little ways (of course, you can go with the whole Atlas shrugged notion that we’re just prolonging things by keeping them from getting hellishly bad but who knows?)
False
err
True
err
I am not really sure. I think Wild Pegasus has a point that if the universally accepted goal is less government while we haven’t managed to roll back the state basically anywhere I think we have managed to stem the tide in our own little ways (of course, you can go with the whole Atlas shrugged notion that we’re just prolonging things by keeping them from getting hellishly bad but who knows?)
False.
The Declaration of Independence
U.S. Constitution
New Hampshire State Constitution
Admittedly, liberty has been fighting a rearguard action for some time.
Thaddeus,
That really is the question. That is about the most to the point post I’ve seen on Samizdata for a while. Touche!
No, libertarian ideas have as of yet not made a jot of difference.
I think this is because very few people have really got Perry’s meta-context. When I first pitched up here I thought that sounded like a load of pretentious wank.
I stuck around because many of the folks round here seemed to (generally) share my “odd” mix of “left” and “right” views and I liked that. It was only later, following a particular post from Perry that I really got it.
I’d love to say more. I might do tomorrow but I’m really tired.
Of course the “not” shouldn’t have been in para 2.
And the rest of the post was disorganised.
Sorry.
“What is a collective noun for libertarians? A loose cannon?”
Plural – Loose Cannons. Using the singular could imply that this “herd of cats” is capable of selecting a common target. In such a target-rich environment, that is impossible.
Still, there were some encouraging, if inadequate, changes brought about during the Reagan / Thatcher years of which Libertarians could approve. It at least slowed the tide for a brief moment.
I think I’ll be an optimist and vote “False”.
I think they have had some small material impact, mostly in freer trade, but little intellectual and no emotional impact. Rationality is the core libertarian value, and we are living in times when the anti-rational philosophies are becoming more dominant.
While I understand why you use the term “libertarian”, I think it pushes the possible answers strongly towards “true”, simply because of its narrowness and recent invention.
If you asked, instead, have the ideas of the classical liberal school of Enlightenment political and social theory had any significant effect, then the answer is very clearly “yes”, or “false” in the context of your debate topic.
Let’s remember that even the total collectivists of the marxist/maoist persuasion, as well as the fascists in Europe, all had to pretend that their brand of politics was legitimate because it derived from the people, and offered progress towards the betterment of the common man.
Only the Japanese, and the current islamic theofascists, dared to reject the concept that political legitimacy was found in the people.
The former had a three+ millenia old system based on a deified emperor who, like the Pharaohs of old, embodied and legimitmized everything the state did in his name, and the islamicists, of course, get their claimed legitimacy from the Koran.
It is no coincidence that even totalitarians write elaborate constitutions, hold regular elections, and talk constantly about the “the people”, even as they slaughter them in carload lots.
In academia, the grotesque, impenetrable nonsense of Marx and his acolytes is studied endlessly, even now, while any suggestion that the philosophy of classical liberalism should be more deeply investigated is met with the PC rejection that “it’s just the writings of dead, white men, and therefore without value”.
But this collection of ideas and principles has provided the framework, and energized, the most significant sea change in the fortunes of humanity since the mastery of agriculture or animal husbandry.
Here is a thought experiment.
Go back to any time, or several, since the beginnings of national societies in the middle east or asia. Grab up a few peasants and transport them to the year 1700.
What will they find that is fundamentally different than what they were used to in their own time? Would a farmer on the Indian subcontinent circa 1700 BCE, for example, feel out of place on a farm in the same place 3400 years later?
Now imagine taking a farmer from 1707 AD and dropping him on a farm in 2007. The same goes for an artisan, a clerk, a physician, or any other form of human activity.
Something happened in a few centuries that has literally changed the common parameters of life on this planet, and is continuing to percolate through even the most distant and isolated cultures, bringing about fundamental changes, and, consequently, ferocious resistence.
Ideas have consequences. The idea that the minds of ordinary people should not be controlled, that their property should be protected, and their lives were their own, not the “property” of the lord, or some commissar, has had a profoundly revolutionary effect on the very nature of who we are, not to mention how we live.
In fact, it is that very revolutionary effect which has caused the enormously violent response from those who cannot accept the existence of the independent mind, the independent man, the woman who will not “do as she is told”.
What, then, do these opponents worship?
Walk through the world and count, if anyone possibly could, the corpses of the victims of the collective, of the state, the volk, the “dictatorship of the proletariat”.
The anti-mind is the anti-life.
Kind of true, but for the wrong reasons. I know plenty of people who wouldn’t look at you in horror if you told them that schools should be privatised ( for example ), whereas if I’d said this ten years ago, I’d have been given the usual “You’re a fascist” treatment. This is even the case with leftoids, who seem much more amenable than they used to be.
But the argument only carries any weight from a practical perspective: the market improves quality, via competition. etc. That is, people tend to accept the argument because it improves the overall quality of education, for everyone.
The moral argument, however, that it is my business how I educate children, and I don’t see it as a state practice, carries, in my estimation, absolutely no weight at all. That convinces no one other than other libertarians.
You could say that libertarianism only succeeds when it’s wrapped up in communitarian blather.
A loose canon, surely.
Bishop Hill beat me to it…
Do libertarians really want to be involved with any sort of COLLECTIVE, even nouns?
If you must, then it has to be one word only and singular. So a Cannon of libertarians would be OK. I personally think Cannon is not a good choice, as it gives a cheap debating point to opponents, as in ”Yes, a right bunch of loose cannons”.
How about a freedom of libertarians.
Samizdata is a collective. It is forced collectives that are the problem.
True.
Thatcher said she was influenced by Hayek, and boldly abolished price, wage, and foreign exchange controls, thereby erasing major restrictions on economic freedoms.
It is notable that, despite all the anti-libertarian acts of the Blair government, those parts of the Thatcher legacy has endured
More freedom sounds great, but to achieve it you actually need less government…
Most people are just too inculcated with statism…
…how much worse would the state be?
…if the universally accepted goal is less government…
Libertarianism has, due to the anarchocapitalists, come to equal a knee-jerk opposition to government where it should be concentrated on the extension of freedom. Something to be called government has always been there and will always be there. No hominid is an island.
I use ‘collective’ as something that is collected. I ‘collect’ books. The books are part of my ‘collection’. I use the word to in the context of imposed. The books don’t have any choice in the matter. They are a collective body of work of various authors.
I use ‘cooperative’ as participative not hierarchical. We are operating to common purpose. Since none of us can compell the contributions that each other is making, I consider cooperatives (like Samizdata) to be a group with common cause that meets on private owned property by the owner’s consent and under the owner’s rules.
It’s not exactly the way the dictionary defines it, but I follow this usage in my debates and once understood, I seldom have to explain myself more than once. It helps to make easily a distinction that, in our typical conversations, needs to be made frequently.
An interesting comment was from Guy Herbert who said that the anti-rational philosophies are becoming more dominant, and that doesn’t bode well for libertarianism whose premise relies on rationality. I would tend to agree, and that helps to explain the difficulty libertarians encounter when they try to persuade friends on the issues.
Has anyone ever tried to marry postmodernism (the non-rational)and libertarianism (the rational)? It seems to me that, in such a world, if it is possible, it would be pertinent to find a means of appealing to postmodern thought with a libertarian message.
Oh I had this conversation the other night, albeit after one too many tequilas… I don’t recall exactly how it started but it was basically a Canadian girl (predictably socialist), banging on about how the state should ‘invest’ in education. After questioning her as to how long the state has been ‘investing’ in education and what happened before that, I got branded a ‘right-wing conservative’ and she lost interest.
I don’t know – I try to challenge preconceptions from time to time, but usually it just seems to wear down the other person’s patience. Maybe I’m doing something wrong…
False. We have a libertarian political party, after all…
DK
How about an “individualism” of Libertarians. That might also go some way to addressing John Wright’s point 🙂 JW’s point is, I think, a good one. I actually have some rather disturbingly post-modern, Borgesian views.
veryretired’s thought experiment was interesting, but we don’t need to rely on our imagination. I grew up in Orkney, and as late as the second half of the nineteenth century agricultural practices were almost unbelievably primitive.
This man has borrowed his neighbour’s ox, and together with his own ox is using the pair to drag a flagstone across the recently broken ground so as to break clods.
This man is harrowing a field by hand
The caption for the next photo reads: “The threshing of corn with flails was part of the routine of barn work. Usually this was done indoors in the draught between the two doors (seen on left). The building is a typical nineteenth century farm with dwelling, barn, stable and byre in a single low building. Note the remains of a turf cover on the flagstone roof.” That’s right – these people lived in that building behind them.
The woman in the next photo is called Margaret Brown and she is standing in front of her house.
contrast this with the equipment my brother now uses on the family farm:
Its hard to believe that only a little more than 100 years separates the last and second last photo which were taken only a few miles apart – and in the United Kingdom! My brother’s tractor – which has air conditioning, a CD/radio and an extremely comfortable seat – offers more comfort than Margaret Brown’s house.
But what is even more shocking is that what the old photos above show is how crofters farmed. Crofting was only introduced in the mid nineteenth century and was a huge improvement on the previous cottar (villein) system. This was really little better than serfdom in that the cottar was given some land to farm in exchange for being permanently on call to do work for the landowner – this was called “on-ca’-work”.
One of the people who was most responsible for ending the cottar system in Orkney was my great-great-great-great-grandfather (also called Robert Scarth), he wrote the following comment on the cottar system in 1842:
The motivation for ending the system of cottarage was that “Progressive Victorians like Scarth deplored enforced services, and they saw the money relationship as bringing dignity to the labourer and profit to his master.” (p. 380 of A New History of Orkney). Here we can see very clearly and graphically how liberal ideas have changed things radically and for the better.
Robert Scarth—thank you for those fascinating photos, and my respects to your ancestor.
Robert Scarth:
I just want to reiterate veryretired’s gratitude – thank you for taking the time and effort to compile your comment. As he said, truly fascinating stuff. It belongs on the main page. The plight of those 19th century crofters is enough to turn your bones to glass.
I have nothing of particular interest to contribute to drive the discussion forward, however I will observe that this sort of high quality comment (along with many others on this thread) makes me feel very proud, and quite humble, to be a member of the Samizdata collective.
False. I agree with Josh (which has to be a first), that Milton Friedman’s work in helping to scrap the draft and push the case for sound money were examples. Some of the work of the IEA writers like the late Arthur Seldon have had an impact.
The main problem lies in the cultural/social sphere. Nannyism, hatred of British history and the traditional constraints on power are very strong in the political establishment. Libertarians are still seen as odd/nasty/ by many people. The drugs issue remains very difficult, ditto things like the right to defend one’s home and life with deadly force, etc.
True – No doubt about it.
Within my lifetime, conservatives have become more libertarian with regard to education policy.
False.
Elements which now might be regarded as cogent to modern libertarianism seem to bob in and out of focus over history, and leave their mark in one way or another – the collection of statutes known as magna carta remain an important element of modern constitutional affairs, even if they now form a talking point precisely because there are those who would actively seek to dismantle them, given the chance.
Similarly, it would be a brave person who argued that Jeremy Bentham had little influence on political and economic theory. But what is an immediate cause for concern – at least in the UK – is the apathetic response to the gradual encroachment on everyday civil liberties and the notion of privacy. That one can confidently expect to be photographed 200 times a day just by going about one’s daily business, have one’s personal correspondance read in transit, that the police can record personal details on file, including DNA, without any criminal conviction, I’m sure would have excited a much more robust response 30 years ago than the listless acceptance demonstrated by the populace now.
False.
At least in the US.
The pace at which pages are added to the federal register is troubling. We have an accrual basis $47 Trillion debt. The republicans no longer make any attempt at limiting government (a la George Will writing Ron Paul off as and anachronism). Personal behaviors such as eating and smoking are now legislated. We have the Patriot Act still bubbling along. Prisons are filled with people who did not threaten anyone else or their property. The list goes on and on.
Ask me ten years ago when the Republicans still cared what about their libertarian faction, then I might have said yes. But the mainstream Republicans have severed ties with libertarians, not the other way around.
And I doubt whether the Dems give two hoots in hell for libertarians. There is some commonality, but it more coincidental than anything else.
False
In a few small ways. Milton Friedman and the draft for instance.
I perceive a small shifting amongst my contemporaries (mid to late 20s, highly educated) where libertarian ideas are more palatable.
Libertarian drug policies are seen as more reasonable, even sometimes gun control (we have many debates at work…)
There’s still many who think ‘but there must be a good reason for all the regulation’ and some ‘you must be protected from yourself’ and people are far from consistent, but there’s more libertarian feeling than there would have been 20 years ago.
There’s very little support for the far end of the spectrum, but that’s to be expected, more moderate libertarianism and the basic premise that the state should keep out of our lives is getting easier to find, especially when statist received wisdom is challenged.
I’m positive in the long term, I don’t expect to see much in the near future though.
The two key flaws in libertarian philosophy, or at least in how it has been expounded, is (a) that it pays no attention to the role of a community as a framing device for actions of the individual.; and (b) that it imagines individuals as idealized, autonomous actors seeking to maximize utility. (Even if you define utility, as did Mises and Friedman, as whatever it is that makes you feel good, still there are many people who cannot muster the energy to pursue their avowed goals no matter what they are.)
People examining libertarianism soon perceive that it has no “soul,” being (as many mentioned upthread) built around logic and reason exclusively. In this way, it has fallen into the trap of flawed Greek thinking, which imagines that reason and emotion are distinct from each other, and in opposition to each other–while at the same time neglecting the Greek focus on community as the guardian of civilization.
The truth is that emotion cannot be stripped out of the human experience. Neither can the role of the community in educating the young. Unless libertarianism comes to grips with these flaws in its thinking, it will continue to be marginalized.
I’ve been watching this thread for a while and wondering. Some things seem clear to me that may be relevant.
~30 years ago my contemporaries and I had a much more libertarian attitude and lifestyle as young people now, but virtually no understanding of what we had. That is why and how we lost it. The local high school just had one of its regular fine tooth comb drug and gun surprise searches. ~15 cops and ~5 sniffer dogs. Apparently they shake out the entire school searching for guns, drugs and drug apparatus. They made very clear that there was no reason for the search, no tips, no suspicions, and nothing was found. Something like that would have been utterly inconceivable in ‘my day’.
‘Kids’ the age now that I was then are very different. As a general pattern the thoughtful ones are very aware that things have changed and they don’t have near the belief in government that my generation does. These new kids know that social security is a chain letter and they are the end of the chain. They know many other things that we never gave a second thought to. Sure they have a lot of idealists, its part of youth. But they are much more cynical about the ‘benefits’ of government.
I don’t know if the credit for that enlightenment goes to libertarians or to the people who have so thoroughly screwed things up.
But you do not actually mean ‘community’ do you? Surely you mean ‘state’. The state is only a ‘community’ in the sense a street gang can be described as a community (which I suppose it can).
I am very informed by community values (I am a member of said community) actually, it is force backed regulations that I want less of. My actions are already framed by community values and I have no problem with that: I really do tend to do most of the things the ‘community’ expects of me, such as wear contemporary clothes, eat with a knife and fork, not thump people (all too often), allow other drivers to alternate merge, shake hands when meeting someone, generally try to be agreeable, etc. etc.. I do not need the force of law to make me do these things. I do them because I do indeed subscribe to a great many ‘community values’ so clearly violence backed politics is not the issue here.
Well no, I do not think that at all. In fact the reason I value liberty is because I view a large number of the people I walk past every day as half-witted venal dolts who like to take things that do not belong to them. And for that reason, I dislike the idea of a selection of the most psychologically domineering members of said community of half-witted venal dolts being given all too much force backed power over other people (such as me, for example). It is because I do not think most people are particularly rational that I do not want a powerful state (which is, you may note, run by… people).
Is disliking imposing actions by violence against people who are not doing particularly wicked things indicative of a lack of soul? I wonder why?
Again, that is why I want to limit the ability these emotional people to be provided with the means to impose the product of their emotions on me.
Sure. And that happens by socialising with people, not by being conscripted against your will and sent to politically directed educational detention camp (i.e. state school) or by having much of your life directed under threat of force by the members of the community most psychologically driven to control other people.
Libertarianism is an incomplete philosophy. Notwithstanding the success of liberalism and the natural tendency for humans to want to better their own lot in life, liberalism/libertarianism cannot sustain long-term success without a broader philosophical base.
The movement should look to its philosophical foundations as laid out by Ayn Rand. This is the only way to counter the broader underlying philosophies that support collectivist forms of government.
Given that libertarianism offers little more than a blueprint for government, Guy Herbert’s conclusion that libertarians have had little intellectual and emotional impact is not surprising. It needs to be much more than this, and certainly more than mere “rationality”, which is what Guy would have it confined to.
That dry-balls attitude is part of the problem. We are right about what we say, so we should be outspoken and passionate about the way we say it.
Although I do not want this thread to degenerate into arid debates about Objectivism, I cannot resist answering this.
I was once a Randoid myself ( I am an apostate 🙂 ) but the trouble is it just does not stand up to continuous enquiry because whilst the nature of reality maybe objective (i.e. “existence exists”), our understanding of it can never be more than conjectural to a lesser or greater degree, and that is something that seriously breaks the epistemological core of Objectivism (at least version 1.0 as according to the Blessed Ayn and Pope Leonard).
At its core, Objectivism is incredibly dogmatic and that makes it fundamentally irrational. The Peikoffian flavour at least is little more than a secular religion in which no deviation from the holy writ of St. Ayn will be suffered.
No thanks.
That said, I see Rand and her acolytes (to give them their correct description) as fellow travellers (we want many of the same things) but I feel no urge to count myself amongst their number.
Oh yes, Dr. Chris Tame, the recently deceased head of the Libertarian Alliance in the UK was… an Objectivist. In truth Objectivists are indeed a form of libertarian regardless of the fact they claim otherwise. ‘Libertarian’ itself is a fairly amorphous term and really just means (as a practicle matter) someone who wants less government and more liberty… all the various forms are just hyphenated versions from anarchists (no government) to minarchists (less government). Objectivists are a form of minarchist which is in turn a form of libertarian.
Why should libertarianism offer more?
Speaking as, well, one with libertarian leanings, I just want to be left alone. I could almost give a damn about the state’s philosophical foundation. Almost. I just want them to deliver the mail and fix the potholes.
Government is merely a way to accomplish cooperative aims that are beyond the reach of individuals: national defense and roads and I’m not even sure that mail needs to be a government activity now that UPS, FedEx, etc. are around. Government is a tool. This business of assuming it to be something more, or assuming that it must have some underlying philosophy, is where we get into trouble.
And Ayn Rand can go stick herself. “Anthem’s” sole virtue is that it’s short. “The Fountainhead” doesn’t even offer that one virtue. And anybody who tries to build a career on preaching logic and reason and dogma, all in the same breath, doesn’t offer a coherent philosophy.
And now, Libertarianism As I See It, by Sunfish:
All communities will have some sort of cooperative aims: this is what differentiates them from mere random assemblages of people. The aims will be different for different communities. When communities try achieve these aims, they will likely have a few people tasked specifically towards these aims. These people may be granted certain powers to act on behalf of the community, and may be given certain access to the community’s resources, or might be allowed to accumulate resources on behalf of, or in the name of, the community in order to achieve these goals.
Those people are the government. Their purpose is to do certain things that the community wants done. And I don’t care whether they see their raison d’etre as coming from Ayn Rand, J.S. Mill, Robert Heinlein, or Bugs Bunny. As long as a big red fire truck shows up when I call 911 and tell them that my neighbor’s house is fully involved, it really doesn’t matter.
To ascribe a greater status to “government” than this is to deify it. If you’re religious, then your response will probably be “I already have a god, and I don’t need another one.” If you’re an atheist, then you’d probably be thinking “I already don’t have a god, and I don’t need another one!”
If you remember the discussion about Vladimir Putin a few weeks ago, we had words about this then.
Now, as I see it, the community may have common aims and goals and values, but it’s still a collection of individuals. That means that its rights and powers are those of the individual members. They may be acting in concert for the greater good, but they still don’t have any right, acting as a group, that they didn’t have as individuals.
A bunch of libertarians could be an alliance, or a menagery
Kinda false.
There has been some blowback here in the states around the rather overenthusiastic use of eminent domain, and there may be a reaction developing against paramilitary police squads kicking down people’s doors.
These are such exceptions that they point out the utter pervasiveness of the Total State, though.