Libertarianism vs Anarchy

[sysyphus]

I have a vague idea of what each of these two philosophies are about, still not sure what the real distinct difference is between them. Is it that Libertarians still believe in some form of organised government, just with very limited influence?

Enlighten me please.

Side note: There is an anarchist club here in Toronto, and they elect a leader. Not doing very well are they.

 

[Elden]

Originally posted by sysyphus
Side note: There is an anarchist club here in Toronto, and they elect a leader. Not doing very well are they.

ROTFLMAO - I can't believe it

 

[andrewgprv]

Well I am not sure but my guess would be:

Anarchy: No Gov.

Libertarian: Goverenment performs duties such as police, fire, national security etc... but for the most part stays out of people's personal lives and the market.

 

[Aphex_Twin]

"Some" goverment is still better than no goverment. In fact, it's even better than "more" goverment.

 

[Black Waltz]

Libertarians believe that Governments should not have a lot of control in everyday lives. In other words they think that Governments should be a lot like the Monarchy of 19th century Britain. Allowing their citizerns to do pretty much anything aslong as it doesn't hurt people TOO much.

Anarchism is more the belief that all Governments are oppressive and overbearing and thus they must be abolished.

 

[Shadylookin]

Originally posted by sysyphus
Side note: There is an anarchist club here in Toronto, and they elect a leader. Not doing very well are they.

we need anarchy so we can kill the morons legally

i don't think there is much difference between a very liberal government and anarchy, except taxes

 

[Mojotronica]

The Libertarians central tenent is "The government that governs best is the government that governs least." In America, Libertarians want a strict interpretation of the Constitution, taxation to be user-based (voluntary -- sales tax and tariffs) and minimal, and oppose laws against consensual activities (such as prostitution or drug use.)

 

[Mojotronica]

Strict interpretation means that the Federal gov't is limited in jurisdiction by what is mentioned in the Constitution. That means that anything NOT mentioned in the Constution is the jurisdiction of the state governments.

However Libertarians ALSO act on the state lvl, and try to limit taxation and scale of gov't there as well.

The core idea behind this is the same philosophy you might get in Greenish UTNE reader -- local gov't is more responsive an more accountable to the people, so it's more transparent than big gov't.

I can't speak for the Anarchists, because I never really understood their idealogy. Black Waltz summed it up my impression of their philosophy in post # 5, above.

I disagree w/ Shadylookin, in that I don't think that the Anarchists and liberals really have the same agenda. They are lumped together right now because they have common enemies, much as Fundamentalist Christians and militant lesbians have found a common enemy in the porn industry.

 

[YNCS]

Libertarians tend to speak in slogans - "we want freedom," "we are against bureaucracy" - and not in political programs. Even when they give a direct definition of libertarianism, it is not necessarily true.

Non-coercion:

The principle of non-coercion, or non-initiation of force, appears in most self-definitions. It is the equivalent of the liberal concept of "negative liberty" and some libertarians use that term. Libertarians say they are against coercion, but they support the free market. The introduction of a free market in Russia after 1989, lead to an excess mortality of about 3 million people. I call that force (and not defensive or retaliatory force): libertarians do not. Some employers require their employees to smile at all customers, or lose their job. I call that coercion: libertarians call it freedom of contract. There is no point in further discussion of these issues: they are examples of irreconcilable value conflicts.

Moral Autonomy:

Libertarians claim to value the moral autonomy of the individual. However, in the free market which they advocate, there is no connection between individual action and social outcome. A one-person boycott of meat will not stop the slaughter of animals. In reality, the individual is powerless in the face of the market--and without some decision-making power there is no real moral autonomy. The implicit position of most libertarians is that this must be accepted--that the outcome of the market is morally legitimate, even if it does not correspond to the conscience of the individual. Certainly, all libertarians distrust even limited interference with the market: many reject it entirely.

Political Freedom:

Libertarians say they favor political freedom. But even to simply enforce the outcome of the market, the apparatus of a state would be necessary--an army to prevent invasions, a police force to suppress internal revolt, a judicial system. Most libertarians go much further: they want a libertarian regime, a political system. Some of them have written complete and detailed constitutions. But like any state, a libertarian state will have to enforce its constitution--or it will remain a proposed constitution. Even if the state is founded on Mars (as some libertarians suggest), someone else with different ideas will probably arrive sometime. The libertarian constitutions might work in a freshly established libertarian colony, inhabited only by committed libertarians. But sooner or later there will be an opposition, perhaps resolutely hostile to the founding principles. States, which fail to enforce their own political system against opposition to the state itself, ultimately collapse or disappear. If libertarian states want to survive in such circumstances, they will use political repression against their internal opponents.

In the case of libertarianism within existing states, the position is much clearer. There is no question of a fresh start with a fresh population. The Libertarian Party of the United States, for instance, seeks to impose a libertarian system on the United States. It is an imposition, and can not be anything else. Unless they are prepared to accept the division of the country, they will have to deal with millions of anti-libertarians, who reject the regime entirely. They might call the riot police the Liberty Police, they might call the prisons Liberty Camps, but it's still not "political freedom."

 

[Richard III]

The distinction I've heard from spending too much time with both is...

Libertarians believe that the protection of persons and property is the legitimate role of a state, if one is to exist at all.

Anarchists believe that the smashing of property and assisting the people with replacing it is the legitimate role of a state, if one is to exist at all.

 

[sysyphus]

So what would be the Libertarian view on regulation?

For example, regulation of the airline industry... I'll say that it is a safe claim that regulation improves the safety of air travel.

Would a Libertarian find it improper for a government to impose such regulation?

The problem I would find with that is that not having such regulation inhibits the personal freedoms of the public at large as more dangerous air travel limits their ability to move around as they see fit.

Catch-22? Am I off base?

 

[Perfection]

No, because if the airlines have unsafe practices, the people who are killed will be free to sue their pants off, that threat would be enough to prevent most people from doing it.

 

[Richard III]

Sysphus: for the usual university-age, Ayn Rand-loving gutter libertarian, the answer is no. However, I was pleasantly surprised to read "Against the Dead Hand," by Brink Lindsay, a prominent Cato Institute Director and therefore, by definition, a libertarian; he insists that practically speaking, "protection of persons and property" can, should and does include reasonable public health regs, for example.

So, with that in mind, I think there's a spectrum of libertarian views out there wherein moderates can support a careful and modest battery of safety, environmental and public health regulations. Which is why I can consider myself somewhat libertarian

The real question your post raises though is just what is a safety regulation? And I have to tell you, I've seen more than one "safety" regulation cross my desk that is really an anti-competitive regulation in disguise....

R.III

 

[sysyphus]

Originally posted by Richard III
The real question your post raises though is just what is a safety regulation? And I have to tell you, I've seen more than one "safety" regulation cross my desk that is really an anti-competitive regulation in disguise....

Hey, you don't need to make that point to me, I work in nuclear power you know!

An interetsting perspective RIII, thanks.

 

[YNCS]

The Libertarian Philosophy

* In the beginning, man dwelt in a state of Nature, until the serpent Government tempted man into Initial Coercion.
* Government is the Great Satan. All Evil comes from Government, and all Good from the Market, according to the Ayatollah Rand.
* We must worship the Horatio Alger fantasy that the meritorious few will just happen to have the lucky breaks that make them rich. Libertarians happen to be the meritorious few by ideological correctness. The rest can go hang.
* Government cannot own things because only individuals can own things. Except for corporations, partnerships, joint ownership, marriage, and anything else we except but government.
* Parrot these arguments, and you too will be a singular, creative, reasoning individualist.
* Parents cannot choose a government for their children any more than they can choose language, residence, school, or religion.
* Taxation is theft because we have a right to squat in the country and benefit from defense, infrastructure, police, courts, etc. without obligation.
* Magic incantations can overturn society and bring about libertopia. Sovereign citizenry! The 16th Amendment is invalid! States rights!
* Objectivist/Neo-Tech Advantage #69i : The true measure of fully integrated honesty is whether the sucker has opened his wallet. Thus sayeth the Profit Wallace. Zonpower Rules Nerdspace!
* The great Zen riddle of libertarianism: minimal government is necessary and unnecessary. The answer is only to be found by individuals.

The Libertarian Concept of Government

* Libertarians invented outrage over government waste, bureaucracy, injustice, etc. Nobody else thinks they are bad, knows they exist, or works to stop them.
* Enlightenment comes only through repetition of the sacred mantra "Government does not work" according to Guru Browne.
* Only government is force, no matter how many Indians were killed by settlers to acquire their property, no matter how many blacks were enslaved and sold by private companies, no matter how many heads of union members are broken by private police.
* Money that government touches spontaneously combusts, destroying the economy. Money retained by individuals grows the economy, even if literally burnt.
* Private education works, public education doesn't. The publicly educated masses that have grown the modern economies of the past 150 years are an illusion.
* Market failures, trusts, and oligopolies are lies spread by the evil economists serving the government as described in the "Protocols of the Elders of Statism".
* Central planning cannot work. Which is why all businesses internally are run like little markets, with no centralized leadership.
* Paternalism is the worst thing that can be inflicted upon people, as everyone knows that fathers are the most hated and reviled figures in the world.
* Government is like fire, a dangerous servant and a fearsome master. Therefore, we should avoid it entirely, as we do all forms of combustion.

 

[EdwardTking]

Libertarianism and Anarchism are much the same
and may be understood by the following equation.

Libertarianism = Organised Anarchy

Anarchy means 'no rules' and 'no organisation'

Libertarianism means organising and planning 'no rules'.

Ur- but planning with others, more advanced
than sharks homimg in on blood, requires
organisations and rules; so libertarianism
is mathematically impossible and does not exist.

 

[Richard III]

Originally posted by YNCS
The Libertarian Philosophy

* In the beginning, man dwelt in a state of Nature, until the serpent Government tempted man into Initial Coercion.
* Government is the Great Satan. All Evil comes from Government, and all Good from the Market, according to the Ayatollah Rand.
* We must worship the Horatio Alger fantasy that the meritorious few will just happen to have the lucky breaks that make them rich. Libertarians happen to be the meritorious few by ideological correctness. The rest can go hang....


(Bla bla bla)

Yes, thanks for telling me what I believe; you got it bang on!

What you've just done up there is the equivelant of me saying everyone who believes in socialist economics is a fanatic, doctrinaire worshipper of the ideals of Fourrier, and is also by definition a war criminal alongside Pol Pot and Stalin.

Want to try again? Because from where I sit, what I talk about when I say "libertarian" is a lot more practical than what you say when you say "government," and - not incidentally, "libertarian" is much more anti-greed than you imply. I've been parachuted into something like five or six government ministries now, and been briefed on the doings of almost all the rest, and that's just in the last half of my career. And I have to tell you, as I noted to Sysphus: the sector that gets most from government: established businesses. The sector that comes to government asking for something most often: business. The most common means of protecting de facto or de jure monopolies: government regulation. The sector that hurts ordinary people the most on behalf of business? It's not business, it's government - often on behalf of business. I could go on.

So, suddenly, when I and others like me say that's a bad thing, and say that we want government to focus on protecting people enforcing basic contract rights, and instead pay service providers to provide service and leave the market to the market, you want to spin that somehow to make it as though I'm worshipping profit just because a few punks you don't like read Ayn Rand?

R.III

For the record, I haven't. On principle.

 

[Mojotronica]

Originally posted by Richard III



Yes, thanks for telling me what I believe; you got it bang on!

What you've just done up there is the equivelant of me saying everyone who believes in socialist economics is a fanatic, doctrinaire worshipper of the ideals of Fourrier, and is also by definition a war criminal alongside Pol Pot and Stalin.

I didn't get that f/ his post. I took it for a sarcastic critique of Libertarian ideals, and not incompatible w/ Socialist economics at all.

 

[Mojotronica]

I am completely on board w/ the Libertarians social agenda, but I have mixed feelings about their economic agenda. When I took John-LP's mini-quiz I was all "Yeses" on the first part but "Maybes" on the second part.

 

[Richard III]

Originally posted by Mojotronica
I didn't get that f/ his post. I took it for a sarcastic critique of Libertarian ideals, and not incompatible w/ Socialist economics at all.

Mojo, I know what he was saying.

Perhaps you misread my point: I am arguing that his sarcastic critique was about as fair and valid as those who smear all socialists with the notion that they are all Fourrier-worshiping Khmer Rouge lovers.

R.III