A Thinking Reed

Category: Libertarianism

  • Rights-talk and some distinctions

    I think I unhelpfully ran a few ideas together in the post on libertarianism that should be more clearly distinguished. First, there is the distinction between “negative” and “positive” rights. That is, I asserted that, in practical political terms, this distinction is fuzzier than often imagined because the protection of any right–positive or negative–requires dedicated resources. For example, my right to life isn’t a mere claim against others not to kill me, but something that we think society is obliged to take positive steps to protect (via laws, police, courts, etc.). Similarly with other rights. So, the distinction between a “negative” right to life and a “positive” right to, say, welfare does less work than libertarians sometimes suppose.

    The second issue, which I didn’t adequately distinguish, is how rights are justified in the first place. A consequentialist justification would be that, all things considered, having a society that protects certain rights will, over the long run, result in a balance of good over evil consequences (bracketing the question of what “the good” consists in). As Mill said, they are the precondition of our pursuing any worthwhile projects. A deontological justification, on the other hand, would be that people (and possibly other animals) have rights simply in virtue of the kinds of beings they are. Specifically, they cannot be used merely as means for the benefit of others. Or one might say that they have the right to freedom and well-being, independently of any value they may contribute to others.

    I’m more amenable to deontological arguments than the post made it sound. Indeed, I think my main point–that strict (anarcho-) libertarianism has unacceptable consequences–could be couched in more deontological terms. If human beings have certain rights in virtue of the kinds of beings they are, then a just society is one, at least, in which those rights are adequately protected. My claim was that the anarcho-libertarian utopia will not adequately protect rights because, inter alia, the rights of the weak and dependent would be dependent on either their ability to pay or on the charity of others. Moreover, if one of the rights that people have is access to the basic goods which are the precondition of any meaningful life, there are good reasons to think that a thoroughgoing laissez-faire regime would also fail miserably at securing those rights.

  • Libertarianism re-visited

    William Bradford has a good write-up of Robert Nozick’s classic Anarchy, State & Utopia, which William just finished reading for the first time.

    I’ll admit that reading Nozick (and following it up with Hayek, von Mises, Rothbard, etc.) turned me into a libertarian for a while. But the problem with Nozick’s view, as nearly every critic has pointed out, is that he doesn’t attempt to justify his intuition that people have Lockean-style natural rights. He just assumes it. Others, like Rothbard, have attempted to justify it, though I think without success. What Rothbard is, perhaps, more successful at is arguing that if you accept natural rights, then you are logically committed to anarchism, since, contra Nozick, no state can exist that doesn’t violate someone’s rights, so defined.

    Now, I’m inclined to see Rothbard’s conclusion as a reductio ad absurdum of rights-based libertarianism. It just seems clear that the consequences of anarchism would be so terrible that there must be something wrong with the argument that gets you there. In this case, that would be the premise that there are libertarian-style natural rights.

    If, instead of confining yourself to a natural rights position, you begin with a more consequentialist starting point, the justification of the state is pretty straightforward: everyone (or nearly everyone) would be a lot better off with a government than without it. Particularly, one might add, those who are weak or dependent in some way. Even supposing that the system of competing “protection agencies” beloved of anarcho-libertarian speculation could actually work, does anyone really want to live in a society in which your entitlement to not being killed, enslaved, or otherwise exploited was dependent upon your ability to pay?

    This is where John Stuart Mill, incidentally, is better than some of his libertarian acolytes. Mill recognizes that the security provided by society is what later theorists would call a “positive” freedom rather than a sheerly “negative” one. Security of life, liberty, and property isn’t merely a matter of being “left alone,” but requires the state to take positive steps, devote resources, etc. And Mill is likewise clear that these basic rights ultimately have a consequentialist justification: a society that protects these basic rights is one that gives its citizens a better shot at flourishing.

    The consequentialist justification of basic rights seems stronger to me than most natural-rights-style views, which often lean heavily on appeals to intuition. But once the distinction between positive and negative freedom is undermined, it’s hard to see why the government’s duties must be limited to those of a libertarian “night-watchman” state. All rights are positive rights in a sense, so why can’t rights to welfare, or health care, or what have you can, potentially, be justified on similar consequentialist grounds?

  • Freedom’s just another word

    In a Reason symposium on libertarianism and culture, Kerry Howley argues that libertarians should be concerned not just with minimizing government coercion, but with critiquing cultural barriers to human freedom. For instance, she points out that a woman trapped in a repressively patriarchal culture, or one that merely reinforces “traditional” gender roles, is hardly capable of fully exercising her freedom.

    I agree with that. (Though I would demure at Ms. Howley’s insistence the the pill, porn, and 600 channels of TV are all on a par as examples of the “power of culture itself to liberate.”) But it’s no less true that someone who’s starving, or doesn’t have adequate access to health care, or doesn’t have clean air to breath or clean water to drink is incapable of fully exercising her freedom. Which is basically why, from J.S. Mill onward, most liberals have rejected laissez-faire in favor of some variety of state-action or welfare liberalism. In other words, valuing freedom is sometimes a good reason not to be a libertarian.

  • “Statism” revisited

    John makes some fair points in his response to this post. In particular, I probably did paint with too broad a brush in characterizing conservatives and libertarians as “mostly deny[ing] that [the environment, health care, etc.] are problems and/or that government has any role in addressing them.”

    At the same time, John is painting what strikes me as a bit too rosy a picture in some cases. For instance, is the mainstream conservative position really to favor carbon taxes instead of cap-and-trade? I think the mainstream conservative position (i.e., the position adhered to by most self-described conservatives) is to favor doing nothing about global warming either because a) it isn’t happening, b) humans aren’t causing it, or c) technology will save us. It’s true that some smart conservatives have made the case that a carbon tax is preferable to cap-and-trade, but I’m unconvinced they’re anything but a tiny minority. (Indeed, it’s usually lefty environmentalists who favor carbon taxes over against cap-and-trade because they don’t like the “trade” part.) I would be delighted to be proven wrong here, though, since it would mean that real progress on this front should be possible.

    That’s not to deny that conservatives do often provide alternative policy proposals for various problems, as John points out, but I still think that “anti-statism” functions as more of an article of faith on the Right than “pro-statism” does on the Left. It’s not uncommon for conservatives to denounce the New Deal and the Great Society in toto, which collectively constitute much of the framework of the regulatory and welfare state. This may be largely rhetorical posturing (though conservatives have put a lot of political muscle behind efforts to “privatize” Social Security among other things), but it is evidence of a particular mindset that instinctively distrusts government efforts to do much more than protect life and property.

    I don’t want to get hung up on a terminological debate, though; I agree with John that “the real debates are over what, in each instance that seems to call for a role for government, the appropriate role will be.” John is a conservative (of some kind or another) and I suppose I’m a liberal (of some kind or another), so we’re likely to disagree about the appropriate role for government in many (though not all) cases, but I’d be much happier to see the debate carried on in those terms.

  • Statism

    “Statism” is a word that obscures more than it clarifies. Conservatives and libertarians tend to use it for any government program they don’t like. But everyone who’s not an anarchist admits the need of a state of some sort. The question is what the appropriate duties of the state are.

    Hence, I don’t find this column by Gene Healy (via John), fretting about the “statism” of the so-called Millenial generation, very persuasive:

    In May, the Center for American Progress released a lengthy survey of polling data on Millennials, concluding that they’re a “Progressive Generation,” eager to increase federal power.

    CAP is the leading Democratic think tank, so it has a vested interest in that conclusion. But they’re on to something. In the last election, 18-to-29 year-olds went for Barack Obama by a 34-point margin.

    The CAP report shows that Gen Y is substantially more likely to support universal health care, labor unions, and education spending than older voters. And other surveys support CAP’s “Progressive Generation” thesis.

    In 2008, the nonpartisan National Election Study asked Americans whether “the free market” or “a strong government” would better handle “today’s complex economic problems.” By a margin of 78 to 22 percent, Millennials opted for “strong government.”

    Kids today are a credulous bunch. The 2007 Pew Political Values survey revealed “a generation gap in cynicism.” Where 62 percent of Americans overall view the federal government as wasteful and inefficient, just 42 percent of young people agree.

    No wonder, then, that GenNext responds to President Obama’s call for “public service,” roughly translated as “a federal paycheck.”

    Here, they differ dramatically from their skeptical “Generation X” predecessors. A 1999 survey asked Gen X college seniors to name their ideal employers; they “filled the entire list with for-profit businesses like Microsoft and Cisco.” What a difference a generation makes. In the same poll today, Gen Y prefers the State Department, Teach for America, and the Peace Corps. That’s a problem for a country built on the entrepreneurial spirit.

    What I think is missing from Healy’s analysis (and, let it be said, I think he’s written some fantastic stuff on executive power) is any distinction between the appropriate functions of the market and the state. No one in the U.S., left, right, or center, thinks we can dispose of the market or yearns to implement a Soviet-style command economy.

    But what many people–not just those naive youngsters–conclude is that the market does not, left to its own devices, magically solve our “complex economic problems.” What exactly is the “free market” solution to the fact that tens of millions of Americans lack health insurance? Or to environmental problems? Or to ensuring an adequate education for all kids? Funny how Microsoft and Cisco haven’t taken care of all this. Would these companies pick up the slack if we axed what Healy calls our “wealth-destroying Social Security system”?

    Conservatives and libertarians are, of course, free to propose solutions to these problems that are more in keeping with their philosophy, but what they mostly do is deny that they are problems and/or that government has any role in addressing them. Liberals, progressives, social democrats, and others, by contrast, see a role for government in stepping into the gaps left by the market. If that’s statism, I’m happy to be counted among the statists.

  • The Life You Can Save 1

    I finally got my hands on a copy of Peter Singer’s The Life You Can Save: Acting Now To End World Poverty, courtesy of the DC city library, and have been working my way through it. Like most of what Singer writes, it’s extremely clear and accessible, filled with facts as much as philosophical arguments.

    Chapter 1     begins with what the late philosopher Robert Nozick would call an intuition-pump: a thought-experiment designed to prompt a certain moral response. Singer asks us to imagine passing by a shallow pond and seeing a drowning child in it. If we can save the child at very little cost to ourselves (muddy shoes, a ruined suit, being late to work say), isn’t that the right thing to do? Moreover, wouldn’t be be guilty of a serious wrong if we didn’t wade in and save the child?

    But this, Singer maintains, is analogous to the situation we (that is, we in the rich parts of the world) are in with respect to people elsewhere in the world who live in extreme poverty. We routinely spend money on things that are, by any reasonable definition, luxuries, especially when you consider the situation of extremely poor people living on the equivalent of $1.25 per day.

    And he’s not just talking about the ultra-rich here. He’s talking about those of us who routinely spend money on bottled water, iTunes downloads, nice vacations, dinners out, and so on. The money we spend on these luxuries could be going to help desperately poor people elsewhere in the world without any significant blow to our well-being. So, aren’t we just as guilty as we would be if we refused to pull the drowning child out of the pond?

    In chapter 2, Singer provides a more formal version of the argument:

    1. Suffering and death from lack of food, shelter, and medical care are bad.

    2. If it is in your power to prevent something bad from happening, without sacrificing anything nearly as important, it is wrong not to do so.

    3. By donating to aid agencies, you can prevent suffering and death from lack of food, shelter, and medical care, without sacrificing anything nearly as important.

    Therefore, if you do not donate to aid agencies, you are doing something wrong. (See pp. 15-16.)

    Singer points out (correctly, I think) that premises 1 and 2 of this argument are pretty difficult to object to. Premise 3 looks like the most controversial, and Singer will spend much of the book defending the notion that giving to aid agencies can make a difference. But, bracketing that issue for the moment, it looks like a pretty solid argument based on fairly uncontroversial premises.

    But this deceptively innocuous argument, Singer says, would have radical implications for how we live our lives. It would require us, at a minimum, to consider giving away much of what we now spend on luxuries (as defined above; we’re not just talking about giving up our private jets and jewel-encrusted Rolexes here) to agencies dedicated to helping people living in extreme poverty.

    Chapter 2 concludes with a review of traditional religious attitudes to giving charity. Traditional Christian, Jewish, and Muslim authorities, Singer says, are united in insisting on the duty of charity. To cite one example, St. Thomas Aquinas maintained that “whatever we have in ‘superabundance’–that is, above and beyond what will reasonably satisfy our own needs and those of our family, for the present and foreseeable future–‘is owed, of natural right, to the poor for their sustenance’” (p. 20).

    In chapter 3, Singer considers some common objections to the argument above. Not all of these are equally compelling (e.g., an appeal to relativism, that there’s no universal moral code for everyone), but he does consider a serious challenge from libertarian philosopher Jan Narveson. Narveson says

    We are certainly responsible for evils we inflict on others, no matter where, and we owe those people compensation … Nevertheless, I have seen no plausible argument that we owe something, as a matter general duty, to those to whom we have done nothing wrong. (quoted on p. 28, ellipses in Singer’s text)

    Singer has a two-part response to this. First, he appeals to the general implausibility of libertarianism as a political philosophy which would require abolishing “all state-supported welfare schemes for those who can’t get a job or are ill or disabled, and all state-funded health care for the aged and for those who are too poor to pay for their own health insurance” (pp. 28-9). Even many libertarians balk at such conclusions and thus, implicitly at least, reject the principle that we owe nothing to those whom we haven’t previously wronged.

    But even if you do accept that principle, Singer says, there is still ample reason to believe that we have obligations to the world’s poor because we have wronged them in various ways. Singer offers the examples of overfishing by Europe, China, and Russia in African coastal waters, which has devastated the livelihood of subsistence fishermen; the extraction of oil and minerals from poor countries, which, at best, enriches a tiny minority and essentially constitutes stealing those nation’s wealth; and the rich nations’ use of our shared atmosphere as a carbon sink, leading to global warming that will disproportionately harm very poor people. Even by the strictest libertarian standards, rich nations have committed aggression in various forms against the world’s poor.

    Singer also debunks some other common myths about aid, including that the U.S. is excessively generous with foreign aid. Interestingly, surveys find that people frequently support cutting foreign aid, but they also drastically overestimate how much the U.S. actually gives in aid. For instance, one survey found that a majority of people think the U.S. gives too much in aid. However, the median respondent estimate of what the U.S. gives was 20% of the federal budget! (The actual figure is about 1%.) Meanwhile, the median preferred amount was 10%, ten times the actual amount!

    Singer considers other objections, but toward the end of the chapter bumps up against what he sees as a crucial issue: it just seems to go against human nature to extend our circle of concern beyond our immediate family and personal relations, community, and perhaps our nation. Singer takes up this question of “human nature” in part 2, which I’ll talk about in the next post.

  • The differences between liberals and libertarians

    An interesting piece here, part of a symposium on common ground between liberals and libertarians and the prospects for political cooperation.

    However, I increasingly think that the liberal reliance (at least among intellectual types) on John Rawls’ philosophical framework is a mistake. I’ve moved in a more egalitarian-liberal direction myself, but I’m starting to think that liberals need a more positive account of the good than is allowed by Rawls’ system and its attempt to withdraw from any claims about the good life. I don’t think anybody really buys the idea that liberal policies embody some kind of metaphysical “neutrality” anyway.

  • Of liberals, libertarians, and utilitarians

    I don’t recall exactly how I came across it, but this is interesting: from a 1975 issue of the New York Review of Books, Peter Singer reviews philosopher Robert Nozick’s libertarian classic Anarchy, State, and Utopia.

    Surprisingly, Singer suggests that many of Nozick’s criticisms of John Rawls’ redistributionist liberalism hit their mark. In fact, Singer seems to want to use Nozick’s position as a kind of reductio ad absurdum of Rawls’ rights-based liberalism, thus clearing the way for utilitarianism (Singer’s preferred ethical theory) to underwrite the kind of distributive policies that liberals favor.

    I’m actually quite sympathetic to Singer’s view that we should be utilitarians, at least as far as property rights are concerned. Certainly I don’t think that libertarians have provided a convincing or adequate account of how property rights are initially acquired, much less that the property holdings in our current society are, in general, derived from just initial acquisitions. (If anything, the historical record would suggest the opposite.)

  • How I (sort of) joined the vast left-wing conspiracy: confessions of a pessimistic liberal

    In the wake of talk of a new conservative-libertarian fusionism on the right, these remarks from political theorist Jacob T. Levy make for interesting reading. I used to consider myself a libertarian, and even voted Republican in the late 90s and early oughts, but was soon driven away from the GOP for reasons to familiar to re-hash. (Hint: it rhymes with Schmorge Schmush.) Since then I have definitely moved to the Left on a number of issues (primarily economic and environmental), but still retain some vestigial libertarian tendencies (a Millian anti-paternalism still looms large in my political make-up). Moreover, though, I feel no sense of identification with the contemporary American Right (especially the newly-“Palinized” right), however much I admire some of the writing and thinking going on among the smart, young “reformist” conservative set clustered around publications like Culture 11 and the American Scene. For better or worse, I am now–de facto at least–on the Left.

    And yet–I’m not completely comfortable with progressive cultural or social positions. (I’m pro-gay marriage, for example, but opposed to embryonic stem cell research, in addition to being a squish on abortion.) And, though it’s often overstated by conservatives, there is a strain of anti-religious hostility among liberals and a drive to enshrine a completely secular worldview. Meanwhile, my small-l liberalism is rooted in a more conservative (philosophically speaking) and religious worldview that emphasizes both the dignity and the fallenness of human beings. So I can’t work up quite the same zeal for marching into the brave new future that some “progressives” seem able to muster. (This sensibility also makes me uncomfortable with the earnestness and certitude of parts of the religious Left; possibly it’s just a character flaw on my part.)

    Indeed, I sometimes toy with calling myself an “anti-progressive” liberal, though I suspect that would breed too much confusion. More apt, perhaps, would be “pessimistic liberal.” I think liberal (“negative”) freedom is necessary for a tolerable society, but also leads to bad consequences. And I think government action is necessary–more necessary than libertarians will admit–to ameliorate those consequences (like vast inequalities or environmental destruction). But I don’t think we’ll ever reach a progressive promised land (or return to a conservative golden age); at best, we’ll muddle through, hopefully making incremental improvements to our lot and that of our neighbors.

    This is all, of course, subject to revision. 😉

  • The new new new fusionism?

    I remember those days of–what?–three years ago when the “new fusionism” was supposed to be an alliance of pro-lifers and foreign policy hawks. And then there was “liberaltarianism.” Now it’s an alliance between “neo-Benedictines” and “libertarians.” The idea is that folks who want to live in Alasdair MacIntyre-style local communities heavy on religious identity and traditional morality can make common cause with libertarians to get the state off their backs and allow them to set up communities that reflect their values.

    As Rod “Crunchy Con” Dreher says:

    the Benedict Option is looking to be the only viable solution to a truly conservative/traditionalist social order. If that can only exist in America within a libertarian meta-order, then perhaps we should explore the possibilities of a new fusionism.

    Philosophy geeks may be reminded of the “utopia” section of libertarian philosopher Robert Nozick’s Anarchy, State, and Utopia. Nozick argued that a libertarian political order could allow for just these types of experiments in community life and that utopia just was the possibility of multiple such experiments coexisting side-by-side.

    The trick, though, with the idea of “thick” communities enjoying autonomy from the dread liberal state is that it’s not clear how you balance communities’ desires for self-determination with the individual rights that good liberals think the state should protect. It may be unfair that advocates of federalism and states’ rights have been tarred with the brush of white supremacy, but the ugly historical reality is that community autonomy has all-too-often been used to oppress individuals and minorities.

    Of course, a true traditionalist might argue that individuals are properly subordinate to the community and that liberal individualism is a decadent system that makes true virtue impossible and undermines communal bonds. And such a person might argue that individual and minority interests must sometimes be sacrificed for the good of the whole.

    Personally, as I’ve argued before, I think we ought to be more circumspect about our ability to clearly perceive the good and that the fragility of human selves ought to make us wary of demanding political communities that embody a “thick” conception of the good. And I believe this for theological reasons: we are finite, sinful creatures prone to running roughshod over the weak. One of the justifications of the liberal state, as I understand it, is to protect the weak from the certainties of the strong. I don’t want to pretend that this is an easy or obvious balancing act, but I’m not prepared to endorse the “night-watchman” state as a recipe for social peace.

    p.s.     Be sure to check out John Schwenkler’s take.