A Thinking Reed

Liberty and/or Virtue?

Written by

Lee M.

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A debate in the American Conservative between Robert Locke and Daniel McCarthy.

Locke:

Libertarianism’s abstract and absolutist view of freedom leads to bizarre conclusions. Like slavery, libertarianism would have to allow one to sell oneself into it. (It has been possible at certain times in history to do just that by assuming debts one could not repay.) And libertarianism degenerates into outright idiocy when confronted with the problem of children, whom it treats like adults, supporting the abolition of compulsory education and all child-specific laws, like those against child labor and child sex. It likewise cannot handle the insane and the senile.

McCarthy:

Libertarianism is a political philosophy, not a complete system of ethics or metaphysics. Political philosophies address specifically the state and, more generally, justice in human society. The distinguishing characteristic of libertarianism is that it applies to the state the same ethical rules that apply to everyone else. Given that murder and theft are wrong—views not unique to libertarianism, of course—the libertarian contends that the state, which is to say those individuals who purport to act in the name of the common good, has no more right to seize the property of others, beat them, conscript them, or otherwise harm them than any other institution or individual has. Beyond this, libertarianism says only that a society without institutionalized violence can indeed exist and even thrive.

Comments

5 responses to “Liberty and/or Virtue?”

  1. Joshie

    lol when I first skimmed that I thought it was supposed to be between John Locke and Joseph McCarthy

    Reply
  2. Andy

    I’ve never heard libertarianism explained in this way (a la McCarthy) . . . I’ll have to learn more.

    Is libertarianism in this sense with any notion of the common good?

    I know you have a series of posts on this I need to check out.

    Reply
  3. Lee

    Andy, there is a strain of what might be called “conservative libertarianism” which holds that the growth of the state tends to choke off genuine community. The general thesis goes like this: as the market and the state take over tasks that were previously performed by households and communities (everything from economic production to education to child care) those same communities and households tend to wither for lack of purpose. Further it is claimed that the growth of the state, paradoxically, results in a more individualistic society b/c it “loosens” people from their places in the “little platoons” of community and family. The best explication of this general thesis is probably Robert Nibet’s “The Quest for Community.”

    In some respects this is similar to the anarchism propounded by thinkers like Kropotkin and Proudhon who want to replace coercive relationships with relationships characterized by voluntarism and mutual aid. It’s a kind of communitarian libertarianism.

    Reply
  4. Andy

    I normally equate “libertarianism” with the gospel of rugged individualism preached by so many AM talk show hosts.

    Thus, I’ve always placed communitarians (where I tend to be moving) and libertarians on opposite ends of the spectrum.

    A possible difference with that strain of libertarian thought is that I see much of the modern state’s role as an unfortunately necessary counterweight to the hegemony of the market and enormous economic forces oblivious to the needs of individuals and communities.

    I’m all for scaling back both simultaneously. But how?

    Reply
  5. Lee

    Well, some folks in this tradition would argue that the state actually props up the current economic status quo via its various forms of privilege (monopoly grants, subsidies, tariffs, regulations, etc.). I don’t necessarily buy that argument, but if interested you might check out this piece from a self-proclaimed “free market anti-capitalist”:

    http://www.mutualist.org/id4.html

    You might also read this article by William Cavanaugh:

    http://www.jesusradicals.com/library/cavanaugh/telephone.pdf

    Reply

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