A Handout for Statists
Submitted by atrickpay on Wed, 02/13/2008 - 13:07
I came across this on the Strike The Root website. I thought it was really mind-opening as it questions the need for any government at all. It's written by an anarcho-capitalist named Stefan Molyneux:
ps. did you know that the great Austrian economist Murray Rothbard was also an anarcho-capitalist?
I've read his book What Has Government Done with Our Money?, but I had automtically assumed he was for limited government.
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Great stuff
I used to consider myself a minarchist, and I credit Molyneux with helping convert me to anarchism. His position on statism is superb: he starts with the immorality of the initiation of violence, so all coercive government is immoral.
Same thing happened to me...
I saw the glaring logical contradiction in how I was only applying the principle that the initiation of violence is immoral to certain situations.
Constitutionalistism, while a very important step, was not the destination. I'm now consider myself a libertarian.
Molyneux is full of himself
He's a self-righteous jerk who in incompetent at philosophy.
Really?
From what I've seen Molyneux seems like a very cordial guy.
Why do you say that he is incompetent at philosophy? For myself, I can say that he has been very helpful as he pointed out him that libertarianism's nonaggression principle taking to its logical conclusion means that there's no room for a government.
Also, I think some of his ideas on how libertarianism can actually succeed are very helpful to our movement.
So, from what I've seen I would have to disagree.
Molyneux is brilliant
I've been reading more of his stuff at lewrockwell.com this afternoon, its a whole new level of libertarian philosophy. He's now my favorite writer. I just read his very first article, which describes how a stateless society would take care of dispute resolution, collective services and pollution better than the State can: The Stateless Society
I found some good insights in that article
I like this question that Molyneux poses in introduction: "Why, then, do most people believe that a society will crumble without a coercive and monopolistic social agency at its core?"
Reading that article reinforced for me the notion that a failure of imagination is what scares people from the idea of a stateless society.
Because it will
The lack of a monopoly on coercion is what is known as war. Factions fight for the monopoly. When that monopoly is gained, then you have peace.
Error in your reasoning?
I don't see why a lack of monopoly on coercion would automatically lead to war. Wars are extremely expensive, so generally, only a coercive monopoly can afford them (by confiscation of wealth through taxation). According to Roderick Long (scholar associated with the Ludwig Von Mises Institute), in a free market, it would not be in someone's best interest to do combat. It is much more profitable to cooperate.
I also found this article from Molyneux which thoroughly puts this idea to rest:
Would government reappear in a truly free society?
You won't convince
Another post that is off-topic. You will NOT convince mainstream republicans to vote for RP with 'anarchism'. Just isn't going to work. We got to where we are with too much government incrementally and will have to get back to less government the same way.
I agree that the path to abolishing the state...
would be a gradual one.
Haha, ya mainstream Republicans would probably recoil in horror! But I didn't post this for that reason. I posted to get more of the new Ron Paul supporters thinking about what I believe might be the long range view of libertarianism: no government.
I'm a libertarian, but I seriously disagree with the above.
A stateless society is impossible; read Thomas Paine's works. The State's needed, however, it should be consistently scaled down to its minimum. Thus, I'm a minarchist. Collectivism is slavery.
Collectivism is slavery.
Thanks for the tip on Paine's work...
Which book in particular?
I used to think that a society without the beastly State was impossible. But, the more I look into it the more it seems like that the reasons against it are just a failure of imagination.
If Rothbard was for a stateless society, I'm not going to brush it off lightly. Also, Milton Friedman's son David is also an anarcho-capitalist. Both of them are no intellectual slouches...
Read "Common Sense"; it's available for free online.
Specifically, check out this section:
"Of the origin and design of government"
http://www.ushistory.org/paine/commonsense/sense2.htm
Collectivism is slavery.
Collectivism is slavery.
Paine commits a logical error
He recognizes that it needs to be an institution which protects individuals from initiation of violence. However his logical error is that he assumes it must be done by a government.
I've seen Murray Rothbard rip this type of argument to shreds.
Yeah
I'm a minarchist as well.
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Freedom - Peace - Prosperity
More good articles found!
I found some more of Stefan Molyneux's articles on LewRockwell.com. He's got some excellent arguments for libertarianism.
I recommend this article: The Argument From Morality - Or, how we will win.... It goes right to the root of why the state is immoral. Don't miss it!
Well worth reading!
Thanks atrickpay. I hope that all the Ron Paul libertarians take libertarianism to its logical end, a stateless society, as Rothbard did.
Here's another article about libertarian anarchism that was very informative.
bumparoo..
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