The Six Myths of Libertarianism
I was recently looking through some pro-liberty/freedom message boards and I came by a reference to this great article by Murray Rothbard. It explains the philosophy of libertarianism though the prism of popular myths directed by modern conservatives in particular. If you're new to liberty, or have never heard of libertarianism before, be sure to check out this article. It is excerpted here, so please click the title link for the full text.
Six Myths About Libertarianism
by Murray N. Rothbard
This article, first published in Modern Age, 24, 1 (Winter 1980), pp. 9-15, as "Myth and Truth About Libertarianism," is based on a paper presented at the April 1979 national meeting of the Philadelphia Society in Chicago. The theme of the meeting was "Conservatism and Libertarianism."
LIBERTARIANISM is the fastest growing political creed in America today. Before judging and evaluating libertarianism, it is vitally important to find out precisely what that doctrine is, and, more particularly, what it is not. It is especially important to clear up a number of misconceptions about libertarianism that are held by most people, and particularly by conservatives. In this essay I shall enumerate and critically analyze the most common myths that are held about libertarianism. When these are cleared away, people will then be able to discuss libertarianism free of egregious, myths and misconceptions, and to deal with it as it should be – on its very own merits or demerits.
Myth #1 Libertarians believe that each individual is an isolated, hermetically sealed atom, acting in a vacuum without influencing each other.
This is a common charge, but a highly puzzling one. In a lifetime of reading libertarian and classical liberal literature, I have not come across a single theorist or writer who holds anything like this position. The only possible exception is the fanatical Max Stirner, a mid-19th century German individualist who, however, has had minimal influence upon libertarianism in his time and since. Moreover, Stirner's explicit "Might Makes Right" philosophy and his repudiation of all moral principles including individual rights as "spooks in the head," scarcely qualifies him as a libertarian in any sense. Apart from Stirner, however, there is no body of opinion even remotely resembling this common indictment.
Libertarians are methodological and political individualists, to be sure. They believe that only individuals think, value, act, and choose. They believe that each individual has the right to own his own body, free of coercive interference. But no individualist denies that people are influencing each other all the time in their goals, values, pursuits and occupations. As F.A. Hayek pointed out in his notable article, "The Non-Sequitur of the 'Dependence Effect,'" John Kenneth Galbraith's assault upon free-market economics in his best-selling The Affluent Society rested on this proposition: economics assumes that every individual arrives at his scale of values totally on his own, without being subject to influence by anyone else. On the contrary, as Hayek replied, everyone knows that most people do not originate their own values, but are influenced to adopt them by other people.1 No individualist or libertarian denies that people influence each other all the time, and surely there is nothing wrong with this inevitable process. What libertarians are opposed to is not voluntary persuasion, but the coercive imposition of values by the use of force and police power. Libertarians are in no way opposed to the voluntary cooperation and collaboration between individuals: only to the compulsory pseudo-"cooperation" imposed by the State.
4 Comments:
I think Rothbard grossly oversimplifies and mischaracterizes Stirner's position. Never once did he say, for example, that "might makes right", nor did he believe that individuals are "hermetically sealed atoms".
I do not have much experience with Stirner at all, personally, so I'll take your word for it. Nonwithstanding, however, these points are (as they were 25 years ago) important popular misconceptions to address. What do you make of the article's validity on this point?
Thanks.
~The Phoenix
I suppose the rest of what Rothbard has to say here is reasonable enough. Though is it really true that libertarianism has ever been the "fastest growing political creed"? Maybe it was at the moment Rothbard wrote the essay, but he must have measured the instantaneous differential of the function, rather than the average over any significant length of time.
Doesn't it seem like, if anything, there are fewer around today than there were even 15 years ago? I'm not sure.
I see where you are coming from, but I think there are actually many MORE libertarians out there than there were. However, the passive observer can perhaps miss this for a few significant reasons:
1. The "Old guard" of libertarianism is dying out, at least as the majority; this being those who were originally classic liberal "recovering Recovering Republicans" and the minority Rothbardian anarchocapitalist intellectual types. I think what we saw at the LP National Convention this year was a clash over these old guys feeling trapped and entagled with the factions of the new voluntaryists (those like me of college age or so and raised as moderate Democrat types), and the neo-libertarian reformer types that are in theory like the originals but less principled as it were.
2. The left is less socialist than it used to be, at least on the outside. Hardly anyone is rooting for the commies anymore, and many former socialist sympathizers seem to be realizing that such plans backfire in a BIG way.
3. The third factor, IMHO, is that the right is becoming more bankrupt and authoritarian. It's hard to stimulate agreement and dialogue with a group that is officially on the side of corruption, at least in practice.
Would you agree with this analysis, or is there something I missed? This is indeed a very complex issue that should be hashed out ASAP in my mind!
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