YOUR RIGHT TO SWING YOUR FIST ENDS AT MY NOSE (and other such nonsense)
(wrote this a couple years ago, pretty sure I didn't post it then, just discovered it again)
That the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection. – John Stuart Mill
Freedom is generally considered to be a good thing, which can make it hard to argue against. The “harm principle” as put forth by Mill and Locke, and butchered by many a hack such as myself, is the principle that the state and its laws should only ever violate freedom to prevent harm to another person. It is a necessary counter-balance to what Mill called “the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling,” a sentiment which can easily become embedded into the laws of a state—think of sodomy laws or alcohol prohibition. This principle is found at the heart of a lot of debates, anything that comes down to a “big government/social good” versus “individual freedom” clash.
However, “freedom” as an absolute value doesn’t exist in isolation, and whilst as far as moral arguments go, freedom=good is a powerful one, the vital next step is to demonstrate that it actually has useful effects. The harm principle is, first and foremost, a utilitarian one based on the idea that individuals respecting other individuals are the best basis for a happy and fair society. People left to make their own choices usually make appropriate ones whilst bureaucrats and lawmakers don’t, and freedom to do what we want is a good thing because we know what makes us happy. Limiting choice and forcing people to fit to standard norms of behaviour is harmful, and most government attempts to limit peoples’ freedom usually does more harm than good (being jailed for possession of drugs or prostitution, for example).
When invoked, the ghost of JS Mill can be argued against on a number of grounds. One can, at one level of analysis, accept the basic premise that liberty maximises happiness, but argue about its specific application. Maybe some harm to others does exist and an action therefore violates another’s rights (freedom to smoke violates other people's freedom to breathe clean air). Or perhaps a lack of informed consent means the state is justified in intervening in order to facilitate a proper free choice which would otherwise not exist due to lack of information (this is particularly salient on issues like consumer or worker rights).
At another level of analysis, this principle can be attacked on the grounds that there are other justifications for states imposing laws which violate individual freedom of action—such as protecting people from their own shortcomings (hence seatbelt laws or mandatory superannuation) or promoting behavioural norms such as, say, not taking drugs or screwing donkeys.
However, there’s a third angle of argument—accept the premise that more freedom is basically a good thing, but that to guarantee it for everyone, setting laws solely by the "butt the hell out" principle isn’t the best way. The interesting thing about the arguments discussed so far is the assumption that the governments going hands-off is the most liberty-maximising legislative option. Even the arguments against this view tend to assume that there is a trade-off between state-intervention and freedom when they argue that reduced freedom is justified under certain circumstances. But it’s not always the case that non-intervention is the most freedom-maximising option.
Governments, after all, govern public spaces. For our purposes, they control the streets. Therefore, legalised drugs or a lack of any gun control is an imposed tolerance of these things—tolerance of drugs or guns in every neighbourhood, potentially anywhere. With these sorts of questions, “no control” actually means advocating something called anarchic polycentric control, and the spontaneous order that arises in such an environment. In other words, a market. If we’re talking censorship, for example, then when we say there should be no censorship we’re advocating that the best way to regulate what goes on the air or gets published is to leave it to the simple pressures of public opinion, the so-called marketplace of ideas. Meanwhile, nobody would argue that a lessaiz-faire approach to resolving traffic control problems on our roads increases freedom while driving.
However, the spontaneous order that arises where government does not intervene isn’t necessarily more “free”. An anything-goes approach to prostitution (even assuming effective enforcement of the rights of prostitutes) would eliminate the ability of people to choose to live in a neighbourhood free of brothels, and therefore their freedom to avoid the more unsavoury aspects of that industry. Would this be greater freedom for everyone? More to the point, if liberty is good because of the utility it has, this anything-goes approach simply isn’t effective because of its impositions on others. Perhaps limited, licensed brothels or heroin shooting galleries in designated areas would be better, by allowing something that should not be illegal to exist, whilst creating choice and freedom from it for others. Or one could argue that a gun law regime which allows private ownership, but regulates carrying in public and mandates licensing to help track and fight crime, is more freedom-maximising since it protects people from higher levels of gun-violence and fear.
The point of the harm principle isn’t that the state going “hands-off” is intrinsically a virtue, it's a utilitarian argument. The state cannot simply withdraw from a question altogether on many issues like guns or drugs or prostitution, because its position sets a policy monopoly no matter what its stance. Moreover, “freedom” as an intrinsic value often isn’t best safeguarded by this purely harm-principle based approach—sometimes the absence of state intervention reduces certain choices in order to allow for others. The point of the harm principle is that freedom of action, unfettered by state intervention except to protect others from harm, is good because it maximises happiness. It still applies in most cases. Just not all of them.
(wrote this a couple years ago, pretty sure I didn't post it then, just discovered it again)
That the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection. – John Stuart Mill
Freedom is generally considered to be a good thing, which can make it hard to argue against. The “harm principle” as put forth by Mill and Locke, and butchered by many a hack such as myself, is the principle that the state and its laws should only ever violate freedom to prevent harm to another person. It is a necessary counter-balance to what Mill called “the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling,” a sentiment which can easily become embedded into the laws of a state—think of sodomy laws or alcohol prohibition. This principle is found at the heart of a lot of debates, anything that comes down to a “big government/social good” versus “individual freedom” clash.
However, “freedom” as an absolute value doesn’t exist in isolation, and whilst as far as moral arguments go, freedom=good is a powerful one, the vital next step is to demonstrate that it actually has useful effects. The harm principle is, first and foremost, a utilitarian one based on the idea that individuals respecting other individuals are the best basis for a happy and fair society. People left to make their own choices usually make appropriate ones whilst bureaucrats and lawmakers don’t, and freedom to do what we want is a good thing because we know what makes us happy. Limiting choice and forcing people to fit to standard norms of behaviour is harmful, and most government attempts to limit peoples’ freedom usually does more harm than good (being jailed for possession of drugs or prostitution, for example).
When invoked, the ghost of JS Mill can be argued against on a number of grounds. One can, at one level of analysis, accept the basic premise that liberty maximises happiness, but argue about its specific application. Maybe some harm to others does exist and an action therefore violates another’s rights (freedom to smoke violates other people's freedom to breathe clean air). Or perhaps a lack of informed consent means the state is justified in intervening in order to facilitate a proper free choice which would otherwise not exist due to lack of information (this is particularly salient on issues like consumer or worker rights).
At another level of analysis, this principle can be attacked on the grounds that there are other justifications for states imposing laws which violate individual freedom of action—such as protecting people from their own shortcomings (hence seatbelt laws or mandatory superannuation) or promoting behavioural norms such as, say, not taking drugs or screwing donkeys.
However, there’s a third angle of argument—accept the premise that more freedom is basically a good thing, but that to guarantee it for everyone, setting laws solely by the "butt the hell out" principle isn’t the best way. The interesting thing about the arguments discussed so far is the assumption that the governments going hands-off is the most liberty-maximising legislative option. Even the arguments against this view tend to assume that there is a trade-off between state-intervention and freedom when they argue that reduced freedom is justified under certain circumstances. But it’s not always the case that non-intervention is the most freedom-maximising option.
Governments, after all, govern public spaces. For our purposes, they control the streets. Therefore, legalised drugs or a lack of any gun control is an imposed tolerance of these things—tolerance of drugs or guns in every neighbourhood, potentially anywhere. With these sorts of questions, “no control” actually means advocating something called anarchic polycentric control, and the spontaneous order that arises in such an environment. In other words, a market. If we’re talking censorship, for example, then when we say there should be no censorship we’re advocating that the best way to regulate what goes on the air or gets published is to leave it to the simple pressures of public opinion, the so-called marketplace of ideas. Meanwhile, nobody would argue that a lessaiz-faire approach to resolving traffic control problems on our roads increases freedom while driving.
However, the spontaneous order that arises where government does not intervene isn’t necessarily more “free”. An anything-goes approach to prostitution (even assuming effective enforcement of the rights of prostitutes) would eliminate the ability of people to choose to live in a neighbourhood free of brothels, and therefore their freedom to avoid the more unsavoury aspects of that industry. Would this be greater freedom for everyone? More to the point, if liberty is good because of the utility it has, this anything-goes approach simply isn’t effective because of its impositions on others. Perhaps limited, licensed brothels or heroin shooting galleries in designated areas would be better, by allowing something that should not be illegal to exist, whilst creating choice and freedom from it for others. Or one could argue that a gun law regime which allows private ownership, but regulates carrying in public and mandates licensing to help track and fight crime, is more freedom-maximising since it protects people from higher levels of gun-violence and fear.
The point of the harm principle isn’t that the state going “hands-off” is intrinsically a virtue, it's a utilitarian argument. The state cannot simply withdraw from a question altogether on many issues like guns or drugs or prostitution, because its position sets a policy monopoly no matter what its stance. Moreover, “freedom” as an intrinsic value often isn’t best safeguarded by this purely harm-principle based approach—sometimes the absence of state intervention reduces certain choices in order to allow for others. The point of the harm principle is that freedom of action, unfettered by state intervention except to protect others from harm, is good because it maximises happiness. It still applies in most cases. Just not all of them.
