A Thinking Reed

Government and Values

Written by

Lee M.

in

This is the sort of thing that drives libertarians nuts. And yet, It’s hard to deny the logic of a statement like this:

…modern government, with its myriad prescriptions, proscriptions and incentives, cannot help but endorse and, to some extent, enforce certain values. So it should be thoughtful and articulate about it.

This is essentially no different from the insight of various “postmodern” theorists (e.g. Stanley Fish) that there is no “neutral” ground to stand on politically. Someone’s values are going to prevail one way or another.

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One response to “Government and Values”

  1. Eric Lee

    I *think* this relates to your invocation of Stanley Fish: did you see Telford Work’s new FAQ entitled Is Christianity a Religion? a cop-out?. Vaughn (at ichthus.vaughnthompson.com) has mentioned that particular Stanley Fish article a couple times before and those two things seem to relate rather well. I hadn’t gotten around to reading that Fish article until you reminded me of it today, though.

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