Could someone give me a rundown on libertarianism, and maybe recommend me some books? I want to understand the reasoning behind pic related.
Could someone give me a rundown on libertarianism, and maybe recommend me some books...
John Perez
Thomas Hall
Libertarianism is just America pre-civil war. People can't really comprehend a limited government, so they assume it can't happen and make jokes about it like in your pic.
Gabriel Brown
Libertarians believe that the free market is a natural outcome of Man's tendency to truck, barter, and exchange. They believe that this natural market is internally perfect in its efficient service of human needs and desires, and that any problem with the market is caused by interference from the government. This natural market is a result, as mentioned before, of human nature (hence natural market) and as such manifests and maintains itself without external compulsion—this tendency for the market to manifest without being "created" or guided by a central force is called "spontaneous order". Libertarians generally believe that spontaneous order doesn't apply only to the Market, but also to the organisation almost the entirety of society. The typical argument that libertarians give for for this (and against the idea of planned economies) is that there is an insurmountable epistemic problem for any directing authority to know and facilitate every individual need in society, and as such it must be left to the forces of the market to serve them. They also stick a sentiment similar to Mill's statement in On Liberty that no one can know what is for the good of an individual that that individual them self, and as such they should not be compelled to live in a way that they do not wish to; however they apply this to consumption and production. This absolute belief in the ability of the market and spontaneous order to perfectly organise society naturally leads to the question: For what purpose does the state exist? the libertarian will, depending on his ideological commitment to the market, either argue for the Smithian obligations—defense, justice,public infrastructure—,this a typical libertarians; if they are "radical", they will answer the question: the state is a parasite that only infringes on the market and free human action, and as such should not exist at all—this is a full-blown anarcho-capitalist (the greentext in the OP is more along this line of thinking). However they answer, the result is a deep skepticism of the State and a strict censure of its reach. After all, if society always organsises itself most efficiently naturally, then anything the government does will tend to tip it off balance and create problems. As such, individuals need the utmost liberty to participate in the market and the satisfaction of their wants. Typically they will pair this economic foundational argument with the traditional liberal arguments against arbitrary state interference with individual lives, formal equality in society and before the law, and a strict position against paternalism. So whenever you think libertarian, think of an economic faith in market society to fulfill social and individual needs which is always at odds with the government.
Read Locke, Mill, Smith, Hayek, Rothbard, Mises, and Friedman. Hope this helps clear some things up.
Christian Torres
*Pre-FDR. The Gilded Age was the most libertarian era in our history.
Parker Jenkins
sure, libertarianism is something that 17 year olds like when they just get into politics because their brains aren't fully developed :3
Robert Campbell
Read Practical Economics by Nika Gilauri.
You can download it for free:
link.springer.com
Even though he doesn't use the word "libertarian" even once, what he does is describe the Georgian (country, not state) reform government's actions, which almost entirely fit into a libertarian frame of mind. (And not into an anarchist one, which your screenshot is making fun of)
He specifically mentions removing seat-belt regulations and allowing food-serving businesses to start selling products before ever being inspected by government agents, for example.
What followed was a skyrocketing rise in GDP and a reduction in the rate of poverty from ~50% to ~10%, even though the time period included both the 2008 crisis, and a literal invasion of Georgia by Russia.
Also, there's a hilarious anecdote about a monk at the end.
Dominic Myers
I think the a era is best example indeed - that libertarianism is only transitive stage until sufficiently powerful warlord arises, and unifies the "free" but balkanized bands of primitives into a state hiearchy. Same pattern repeated over and over throughout history. Even the fucking internet - early on a diverse, independent frontier place, now consolidated into 7 or so "superpowers".
The tribal stage can go on for long periods of time only during stagnation - where there are no resource or human capital to build empire. However there's always strong market pressure for consolidated power during periods of growth.
Mason Wright
I'm not sure if minarchy vs police state is all that good of an argument, as that just demonstrates benefits of benevolent dictator vs corrupt one. Still a dictator - top-down, not nearest-neighbor projection of power.
Christopher Sullivan
How was that relevant to my post?
Ian Mitchell
It's free market capitalism, except there are somehow arbitrary limits as to what extent you are allowed to exercise your power and influence and equally vague ideas about how to prevent you from doing it.
David Wood
read henry george for libertarianism that might actually work.
Jackson Brooks
Now I'm flashing back to a debate in class in graduate school that ended with a woman shrieking at me, "Who will do garbage collection?!?"
Brody Lopez
Saakashvili was an oligarch who pretty much owns half the country. A benevolent one, but still a dictator. Same story is known in other places (Persia, Lybia, Singapore...). It is an ongoing argument between Hayekians whether enlightened fascist populism really is the only way to get there, as it is rather counter-intuitive to the thought of rugged individualism where power is to be elected on-demand via market (bounty sheriff vs self-appointed Sheriff), not imposed by virtue of monopolizing the violence market (own majority of everything).
Moreover, Saakashvili got ousted by less enlightened (putin-aligned?) clique recently, and georgia is back on track to be utterly corrupt slav shithole.
Sebastian Gonzalez
libertarianism is anarchism but for people who think it is okay for private businesses and muh free market to rule society rather than the people who make up the society.
just skip the meme and read some Bakunin, Kropotkin, Proudhon.
Jaxon Johnson
>Saakashvili was an oligarch who pretty much owns half the country. A benevolent one, but still a dictator.
He was voted in, then he was voted out later. He was never a dictator. You'd maybe have a point about Singapore, but not Georgia.
By the way, I personally wouldn't really care how a minarchist setup was created. I don't see how/why you couldn't call that libertarianism.
And the fact that Georgia is on the way down again means nothing. It went well while it was libertarian/minarchist, then stopped when it wasn't anymore. I don't see how that is an argument against libertarianism.
Xavier Young
>He was voted in
So was Hitler.
>By the way, I personally wouldn't really care how a minarchist setup was created. I don't see how/why you couldn't call that libertarianism.
Libertarianism is a self-perpetuating system produced by market equilibrium - not a person.
>It went well while it was libertarian/minarchist, then stopped when it wasn't anymore. I don't see how that is an argument against libertarianism.
The crux of the argument is that benevolent tyrants introduce single point of failure, it's not robust enough to survive as a system as there's no guarantee the next clique will pick up where the previous one left off - as there's not enough market incentive for that to be the case.
Canonical example is Gaddafi or Shah Pahlavi where country turned 180 downwards the moment they lost their power.
Nolan Collins
So your response to an alternate viewpoint is derision and condescension, followed by the encouragement of ignorance.
I love reading the posts of leftists like you. It always reinforces me in my belief that you're wrong and I'm right.
People who are right do not need to belittle people who disagree with them; they can explain why they're right and why the others are wrong.
Connor Rogers
>Libertarianism is a self-perpetuating system produced by market equilibrium - not a person.
That's capitalism, kind of, not libertarianism. Libertarianism is just an ideal of limited government, it's not the result of the market itself.
Jason Fisher
>dictionary.cambridge.org
>dictator
>noun [ C ] disapproving UK /dJkˈteJ.tər/ US /ˈdJk.teJ.t̬ɚ/
>a leader who has complete power in a country and has not been elected by the people
By the way, I don't remember reading about Hitler being voted out and stepping down in my history books.
>Libertarianism is a self-perpetuating system produced by market equilibrium - not a person.
See >The crux of the argument is that benevolent tyrants introduce single point of failure
All kinds of hierarchies introduce points of failure, there's never any guarantee that a political system will stay as it is.
Christopher Diaz
>>By the way, I don't remember reading about Hitler being voted out and stepping down in my history books.
This is political hair-splitting. If a dictator gets democratically, and then suspends democracy, it's a dictatorship, you can't argue that the demos we're "asking for it". How dictators get ousted is not relevant.
Non-Sequitur. Capitalism is the underlying operating principle, the point is to delegate as much of government function to market. But it's not the same thing ontologically - one is a market, the second is commodity (violence) traded (or monopolized) on the market.
>All kinds of hierarchies introduce points of failure, there's never any guarantee that a political system will stay as it is.
Economic theory 101: competetive markets are robust as there are many peer-to-peer interests with large power graph connectivity. Only monopolies (dictatorship) are prone to black swans. You're argumenting "monopolies always fail, duh" whereas I'm saying "this is why encouraging monopolies is not a good idea".
Cooper James
>Non-Sequitur. Capitalism is the underlying operating principle, the point is to delegate as much of government function to market. But it's not the same thing ontologically - one is a market, the second is commodity (violence) traded (or monopolized) on the market.
It's not a non-sequitur when the context is your inability to deconvolute meta-politics (mode of government) from ideology.
Austin Wood
>This is political hair-splitting. If a dictator gets democratically, and then suspends democracy
Explain to me how Saakashvili suspended democracy. He was quite literally VOTED OUT.
>Non-sequitur
If you mean your original comment was one, I agree. Libertarianism is a limited government ideal. It was never/will never be produced by any market.
>But it's not the same thing ontologically - one is a market, the second is commodity (violence) traded (or monopolized) on the market.
You're trying to pass off babbling as an argument. We weren't talking about violence, but about libertarianism and what produces it.
>Only monopolies (dictatorship) are prone to black swans.
Well, since you arbitrarily redefine political systems as dictatorships, sure.
You're being dishonest and trying to muddle the waters because you've realized that you're wrong.
I'm sincerely sorry you can't handle this situation, user. I hope you will one day be strong enough to admit to having been wrong to internet strangers. Bye.
Christopher Hughes
Just read Rothbard and something and you'll realize that he developed his whole philosophy just because he was a horny pedo much like libertarians on the left.
Leo Scott
I don't know the context of point 1, but point 2 was said in the context of adoption. America used to have free-floating adoption prices, but some complained because white and Asian babies cost more than black babies, according to supply and demand. Government instituted price-fixing, and as a result the white and Asian baby supply dried up and black baby adoption times increases several-fold.
Adam Wood
>but point 2 was said in the context of adoption. America used to have free-floating adoption prices, but some complained because white and Asian babies cost more than black babies, according to supply and demand. Government instituted price-fixing, and as a result the white and Asian baby supply dried up and black baby adoption times increases several-fold.
But even Rothbard admitted it sounds monstrous and inhumane.
Asher Hall
That poster is free to grow their own food and get knowledgeable before making car decisions. But they want the gubment to do it for them at other taxpayers' expense because life is hard :(
Caleb Watson
Nice gigantic straw man.
Ryan Rodriguez
>Explain to me how Saakashvili suspended democracy. He was quite literally VOTED OUT.
No, Ivanishvili just got outmaneuvered within the oligarchy game. You seem to play rather fast and loose with democracy. Nobody gets 95% votes in democracy (Saakashvili). Nobody buys 600k votes for 500M in democracy (Ivanishvili). I assume Putin russia is democratic too?
>your inability to deconvolute meta-politics (mode of government) from ideology
Not sure what you mean, I presume you're arguing for left-libertarian (ie anarchist) stance. If this is the case, just say so.
And indeed, I consider left-libertarianism an oxymoron mostly because I subscribe to ideology of empiricism. There's evidence that anarchy can work only in very limited circumstances, whereas left-libertarianism had been implemented to some (if transient) extent on country scales. Money scales better than ideologically forcing tournament apes to be nice to each other.
>Explain to me how Saakashvili suspended democracy.
He overstepped power given to him by the voters (surprise, that's undemocratic!). In turn it gave political cassus belli to his oligarch competitors.
>We weren't talking about violence, but about libertarianism and what produces it.
All power is violence, or proxies for it. Don't pay your taxes? You'll get assraped in jail. Don't pay your warlord protection money? You'll be shot unless you leave the property. Power is violence. Civilization is using proxies for it.
>I'm sincerely sorry you can't handle this situation, user. I hope you will one day be strong enough to admit to having been wrong to internet strangers. Bye.
It's fine to refute arguments, but try to work on your rhetorics - less ad-hominems, more inquiry.
Cameron Flores
s/whereas left-libertarianism/right-libertarianism
Ayden Ramirez
>Nobody gets 95% votes in democracy (Saakashvili).
Tell that to George Washington
Adrian Sullivan
Indeed. 1.8% of population voted (the oligarchy). At least washington was a successful and popular warlord who defeated the British, so even a popular vote would for sure bring him in (though probably less than 90% he got with oligarchy).
Christopher Brooks
It’s for people who will drive a car, but believe they ran
Benjamin Rodriguez
Libertarians willfully ignore the fact that individuals can and are just as evil as the State.
The libertarian archetypal paragon is the Drug Dealer.
Aiden Stewart
Didn't the north have some pretty heavy proteccionism on its industry pre-civil war?
en.wikipedia.org
Jayden Ross
>Libertarians willfully ignore the fact that individuals can and are just as evil as the State.
No we don't, we just realize that evil individuals are easier to kill.
Ian Morales
>calling washington a warlord
kek
Andrew Evans
They love freedom so much that they want to commoditize it on the open market.
Henry Stewart
Protectionism was US policy until FDR really.
Jose King
>image and its point
Seems that regulations have changed places with values. What gives? Why are democratic people such pieces of shit?
Colton Young
Libertarians' idealized version of the market as a wise force selecting the best and rewarding intelligence, hard work, and creativity is hilarious to me
Humans as an aggregate crowd are absolute fucking retards incapable of selecting for anything, if some authority doesn't guide us and manipulate our wants versus our needs for us then we'll all die within a century from one of dozens of possible bullshit doomsday scenarios that could be avoided easily if we weren't so fucking shortsighted and obscenely stupid
Hunter Jones
That's kind of why they propose the market as a sort of superhuman authority lol. Because humans cannot decide for themselves, this is how they critique central planning mostly.
Not saying that I agree with them since the market is just as if not more potentially prone to make us go extinct in the near future but that's their logic.
Asher Brooks
But the ideal market is the most democratic possible force, composed of perfectly informed (lol) consumers making perfectly wise (lol) choices. It is humanity in aggregate deciding what it wants.
Central planning, flawed in plenty of other ways, is at least an acknowledgement that somebody needs to take control and lead the rabble.
Mason Edwards
read your own theorists.
Alexander Parker
How'd that work out? I seem to recall something about deregulation and a Depression. Might've been a Great one, actually.