Rated
Nov 16
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1 review
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philosophy, politics, libertarianism
• samizdata.net
"I am ambivalent about the whole libertarian label to be frank (I prefer 'social individualist') but I suppose it has the virtue of differentiating minarchist classical liberals of my ilk from conservative right-statists like Robert Locke. Locke rightly points out that libertarians come in many flavours but contrary to what he says, it seems to me that most libertarians I know have nothing against collective action (most rather like the idea of voluntary collectives like companies and associations) or altruism (most rather like charities and organizations like the RNLI or volunteer militaries etc.)... moreover they want roads maintained, diseases combated, children educated, garbage collected and fires put out as much as socialists and conservatives do. Where they depart from both the left and right statists is that they think all these things are more likely to get done effectively and more morally when they are not done at gunpoint (i.e. compelled by law). To be a libertarian is to believe that society (which is the sum of its parts but not more than that), not the state, is what actually matters, and moreover the state, far from being society's protector as conservatives fondly imagine, is as often as not highly corrosive to many of the very values conservatives often implausibly claim to champion."