Libertarian Takedown

Tristero at Hullabaloo:

. . . to the extent that libertarians hold up the individual as primary and fail to recognize that individuals simply cannot physically exist without a social/cultural/environmental context, libertarianism is worthless. To the extent that libertarianism does recognize the complex dialectic between the individual and her/his social and physical environment, libertarianism is indistinguishable from liberalism.

As a moral philosophy, by failing to recognize an indisputable physical and ethical reality - namely, that the conflict between the one and the many is primary - libertarianism is all but useless. As a political philosophy, especially when it comes to issues affecting the "rights of businesses", libertarianism is often deeply immoral, providing flimsy rationales for destructive acquisition, thievery, fraud, and greed - typically, and ironically, in the service of the largest corporations, not individuals. When political libertarianism does pursue goals worthwhile to the individual and to society - eg, in calling for the end of sodomy laws - they add no arguments to the debate that liberals and progressives haven't already expressed.

The whole piece is worth reading.

My sense of the kind of typical, often very intelligent person who is attracted to Randian Libertarianism or the candidacies of people like Ron Paul is that they are like fundamentalists or old-fashioned communist party members or anybody, really, that has a need to live within a closed ideas system.  They embrace a rigid set of ideas, sometimes simplistic, sometimes complex, that has a certain interior logic or sense to it so long as you stay inside its bubble.  Problems arise, though, when they try to make the complexity of the world fit into their bubble, because too much of it does not and cannot fit. It's a form of idolatry, if by idolatry we mean the absolutizing and worshipping of a partial truth.

Here's a post I wrote expanding on the second rate-ness of Libertarian thinking a couple of years ago.

Comments

[Patrick]

Jack,

Libertarians aren't all Rand-freaks. Many libertarian thinkers (especially Hayek) have affirmed the necessity of safety nets, even "minimum incomes."

So I don't think that, for example, people who advocate simple transfer payments over a European-style welfare state systems--like Will Wilkinson and some others--are really represented by the borderline autistic caricature of libertarians that progressives like to draw.

There are some intelligent, humane people, who pay attention to empirical evidence, that simply believe a more "unfair" system will ultimately clothe, feed, and shelter more poor people. They see progressivism the same way you see libertarianism: an ideology based around abstractions like fairness that progressives want to impose on the world, when in reality the least among us might actually be better served by Uncle Sam getting out of the way and then writing checks to the poor at the end of the day.

I know Objectivism is a really hateful thing, but libertarianism--just like progressivism--has more than just one breed. Rand is the Stalin of classical liberals.

So yeah, most libertarians are rich kids who like weed or nerds without empathy, but we can certainly construct analogous images of progressives, and so on.

[Jack Whelan]

Patrick--

I respect anybody who is flexible in his thinking. I've read Wilkinson from time to time, and while I might not agree with him, I think he makes arguments that are worth taking seriously on a pragmatic issue-by-issue grounds.

But I tend to agree with Tristero, that when intelligent, sensible Libertarians offer pragmatic arguments, they really don't differ much from intelligent, pragmatic Liberals. We can debate the point if you want.

I don't respect those Libertarians who see the government as a near-absolute enemy and markets as a near-absolute remedy for all our ills, especially those Libertarians who are blind to the way Libertarian ideology provides a front for corporate power.

[Patrick]

"But I tend to agree with Tristero, that when intelligent, sensible Libertarians offer pragmatic arguments, they really don't differ much from intelligent, pragmatic Liberals."

Well, that is a point but a pretty weak one. I think if you were to examine side-by-side the bottom-line policy preferences of a Wilkinson and an Yglesias, you would see a massive difference.

Including "intelligent" and "pragmatic" as qualifiers approaches question-begging. Granted that in matters of abstract philosophy "intelligent, pragmatic" libertarians and progressives aren't so far apart; still the ISMs haven't sprung up out of nothing, and their respective narratives, emphases, and pedigrees really do matter.

Somehow related to this is Deneen's recent post ( http://patrickdeneen.blogspot.com/2009/08/time-past-present-and-future.html ). I struck me as being rather ATFian, so I'd be interested in your response.

[Jack Whelan]

I'll read the Deneen piece and get back to you on that.

But a point of clarification about my own position, which I see as an integration point between left liberalism, which really is influenced by Marxist ideas, whether consciously or unconsciously, and market-center libertarian capitalism. As I've written about here on several occasions, I'm a subsidiarist, which means that I want as much of cultural and economic life as possible to be conducted with as little interference from governments as possible. I'm a bottom up guy, not a top down one.

Nevertheless subsidiarity requires social organizations at a higher level to intervene when markets, individuals, or local organizations prove incapable of solving a problem, whether its segregation or a hurricane, or now healthcare.

Bottom line: let people do as they please until problems arise that need some kind of help or intervention from outside. Eisenhower needed to send the troops into Little Rock. And whether the New Deal was self-consciously subsidiarist, I see it as following for the most part a subsidiarist paradigm.

I think I would also say that some of the Great Society programs were developed outside of the subsidiarist paradigm, and it's the Dems's and the courts' over-reaching in the sixties and seventies that caused something of a backlash toward Libertarian rejection of any kind of government interventionism. This is at the heart of the so-called Reagan revolution, which is, IMO, the cause of a terrible systemic imbalance that we suffer now and that I fervently hope can be redressed.

And in that, even though I do not think of myself as a Liberal, I see Liberals like Digby and Tristero as more natural allies than I see Libertarians, especially those Libertarians who think that Reagan's approach is superior to FDR's. Where would Wilkinson fit on that spectrum? I don't know his work well enough to say for sure, but my guess is he's more in the Reagan/Thatcher camp.

[Matt Zemek]

Patrick--

Is the inclination to impose on other people a unique or prominent feature of progressivism, or are modern-day progressives simply inept as political operators in the implementation or legislative maneuvering needed to turn their plans into reality?

Phrased differently, is progressivism an inherently more imposing political viewpoint because it more willingly and readily cites government as a needed partner in forging solutions, whereas other philosophies and sensibilities don't?

[Patrick]

Hey, Matt.

One of us may misunderstand the other. To begin with, I don't think the two options you present in your first question are mutually exclusive.

When I spoke of "imposing [abstractions] on the world," I was simply reformulating Jack's phrase, "[trying] to make the complexity of the wor[l]d fit into their bubble." I'm not referring to the idea that progressivism as a political philosophy relies more on government coercion. It does, but in its defense, this needs to be read within the context of the many other types of perfectly legal coercion.

I think this inclination is a feature of any man-made ideology when it's taken as Truth instead of a reasonable approximation or a model that roughly corresponds to reality.

[Matt Zemek]

Patrick -

Thanks for clarifying.

In light of your response, perhaps the sticking point between you and Jack concerns the perception of which philosophy first entered the mainstream of American political life.

Both of you can correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems to me that Jack views liberalism as being on the political stage longer than economic libertarianism, and that as a result, libertarians are relatively ineffective add-ons to a longstanding debate/confrontation between liberalism and conservatism.

Again, if I'm wrong or off the mark, I'd like to be corrected. That's just a tentative early read of what I'm sensing here...

[Patrick]

Well, most libertarians conceive of themselves as classical liberals, but to me that's a work of genealogical mythology comparable to the Aeneid. The Deneen essay to which I linked above might be kind of illuminating if we're approaching this territory.

Let me just add one thing to make this exchange a little spicier.

Part of what I was after with this whole "imposition" business is that progressivism's emphasis on equality, especially in the material realm of social justice, betrays a sort of abstract thinking that's absurd from an empirical or scientific standpoint. Of course, as a Christian, this is an absurdity that I affirm whole-heartedly. But from a hardcore libertarian's point of view, the liberal accusation (of imposing one's ideology onto a complicated messy world) must taste strongly of irony.

My drive here is simply to argue that if you support upholding the rule of law, restoring civil liberties, and improving the material conditions of the poorest human beings, libertarians are your friends. I think they should be represented in any credible political conversation.

[jack Whelan]

Patrick, I haven't had time yet to get to the Deneen lecture, but I will.

But a quick comment about equality and poverty. The argument is not primarily about the goal but the role of government in getting there. Certainly Libertarians look at government as playing a counterproductive role as a matter of principle. If they don't, then they've ceased to be libertarians and have become liberal.

On a second level my quarrel with Libertarians lies in their not understanding the practical implications of their principles no matter what their intentions might be. Reagan, I'm sure sincerely wanted all Americans to prosper, but the practical implications of Reaganism have been a return to Gilded Age disparities in wealth distribution and the domination of the government by powerful moneyed interests.

Wilkinson might be well-intentioned, but I am interested to know whether Wilkinson 's philosophy aligns more with Reagan or Roosevelt. What do you think? If the former, no matter what his conscious intentions, I cannot see him as a practical ally even if he might be one in spirit.

[Jack Whelan]

Patrick--

RE: http://patrickdeneen.blogspot.com/2009/08/time-past-present-and-future.html

Read the Deneen piece and I mostly agree with his idea about our temporally fractured condition. I am a big Christopher Lasch fan, and I am a big fan of any attempt or project that seeks as its goal to integrate our fractured psychic life.

My working definition of 'idolatry' is when one takes a partial truth and absolutizes it as if it embraced the whole. And while there are many kinds of idolatry, I think Deneen accurately identifies three major forms when past, present, and future fall out of relationship with one another and become dissociated quasi-absolutes.

I think I've written about how Marxism is a kind of idolatry of the Future and Fascism an idolatry of the past. Deneen's description of Liberalism is really a description of the idolatry I wrote about in this post regarding Libertarianism. In its predominant scientific and economic materialist form, it does in fact promote a kind of existence stripped of meaningful memory or hope. It promotes a self-absorbed nihilism well represented by Rand's Objectivism or Grover Norquist's leavemealone-ism.

I think what in our discussion we've been calling Liberalism, Deneen calls progressivism, and I think think his terminology is more accurate. But I think Progressivism and Libertarianism are both forms of Liberalism, it's just that Progressivism is the Liberalism of the Left and Libertarianism is the Liberalism of the Right.

I think there is a tendency for Libertarians to live in a-historical abstractions and for Progressives to want to engineer or force change to conform to a blueprint formed in their fantasy of an ideal future. Both tendencies lead to terrible mistakes.

I, of course, reject both forms of Liberalism, but I do believe that greater degrees of justice are attainable. The civil rights legislation of the sixties did not deliver us into Utopia, but it did correct an egregious injustice. I don't believe in political meta programs like those envisioned by Marxists, but I do believe that civic-minded, decent people can come together use their common sense to solve problems and resolve conflicts. And I believe that in fits and starts, cumulatively over time, these attempts to reject injustice and work out solutions to problems have resulted in social progress. I believe that modernity is an advancement over premodernity, and I don't believe modernity constitutes the final chapter in the human evolutionary drama. I'm a Teilhardian. I believer there is an Omega Point.

So in that sense I am sympathetic to the progressive temperament, while I understand its limitations. And while I honor critical consciousness of modern rationality and have honor the great souls who have gone before us, unlike Deneen, I don't think there is any ancestral wisdom that can be passed on from generation to generation because it simply doesn't live in the collective consciousness anymore. I do think, though, that it can be retrieved by individual and collective efforts. And I would also add that Christianity, as an eschatological religion, has a bias toward the future, and that's why I've titled this blog as I have. But this bias toward the future cannot be allowed to push out of view a clear-headed understanding of where we are now and where we've come from.

[Patrick]

1) The feeling I get is that Reagan was actually a bona fide bastard, but if you're willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, then so will I. I can't really speak for Wilkinson with respect to the Reagan/FDR question, but he has written admiringly of Nordic social democracies, even if he doesn't think their respective States are set up as efficiently as they could be. I know that another small-l libertarian (whose thinking doesn't impress me), Megan McArdle, voted Obama when push came to shove. I know for a fact that W thinks of Democrats as more natural allies than Republicans. This is a major theme for him.

2) Let's just say that it's possible to have strong and visceral libertarian instincts even if one isn't an absolutist about applying the principles across the board. Let me give you a scenario. We've got economic models of a progressive income tax and a luxury consumption tax. If the former allows on average one dollar more to be put into the pockets of each working-class person each year, is it an open-and-shut case that that's the way to go? Isn't the more powerful coercion involved in the former tax method cause for hesitation? I'm not articulating a non-coercion principle per se, I'm just saying that there are crazy ideological libertarians, and then there are pragmatic ones, who may still have libertarian instincts, for lack of a better term. And I don't think those instincts are entirely bad; I think our country might be worse off without them.

3) Re: your Burkean conservatism (the newest post). This is a very important point, and is a mode of thinking through which we can fight tooth and nail for certain principles without lapsing into idolatry. The Constitution is not a universal Truth. On the contrary, it's a product of particular customs and values from a specific context, and is built on a foundation of at least four centuries of other culturally bounded jazz. But that's what makes conserving the place of that document so important and difficult. Its power is fragile, so it must be continually possessed and re-possessed by each generation.

[Jack Whelan]

Patrick--

A couple of points in response. First I have no quarrel with anything you've just written, and I accept the idea of Libertarian instincts as different from Libertarian ideolgy that typifies the like Grover Norquist, Ron Paul, Ayn Rand, Milton Friedman, Alan Greenspan Reason Magazine, Cato Institute, and some others who define mainstream Libertarianism.

These are also the people who Deneen calls the Liberals, and I reject root and branch the thinking and policy that group represents. That being said, I think there's room for maverick libertarians like Wilkinson and Reihan Salam. To the degree that they share the same goals and make suggestions that might be more efficient, I'm willing to listen, and I will make a point of reading them more frequently. (It's interesting to me that while I can read someone like Larison or Deneed and disagree with them, I still find them interesting and attractive. I've never found that to be true when readinag Wilkinson or Salam. But I'll give them another shot.

To your point about Reagan: My take on him was that he was sincere in the sense that he truly believed his own propaganda. I see him as living in a fantasy world that was organized around a kind of 19th century myth of rugged individualism, and he was otherwise just a good old boy who wanted to have a Scotch, sit with other good old boys, and swap stories all the while oblivious of the destructive consequences of their policies on ordinary people not in his set. He was like the Lost Cause Southerner who sincerely believed the slaves, with the exception of a few obstreperous malcontents, were quite happy to be slaves.

I think that most of that group of Libertarians listed above lived in a similar, self-reinforcing, delusional bubble--they really have no idea about how their thinking and the policies that flow from them impact people. It's not their ideas that bother me so much as their abject cluelessness.