More deep thoughts on libertarianism
January 21st, 2009 | by Simon |It just won’t let me go. I promised myself I’d give it up, but here it is – I think I’ve arrived at a sort of a synthesis of my previous two posts on the subject:
Libertarians are looking for a maximum of liberty for the individual. However, if liberty is understood as a lack of reliance on outside factors, the world is heading in the opposite direction, largely unifying people into a cybersociety where any talk of genuine individualism is moot. And there’s no turning back, unless some unthinkable disaster strikes or a new band of Luddites takes over and turns us all Amish.
The Internet – or the world computer, as I’m beginning to think of it – is here to stay, incorporating increasing numbers of human neurons into it. However, the analogy to the Borg I gave a couple of posts down is a bit misleading in the sense that the Borg were controlled by their “hive”. The new cybersociety, even when we’re all wearing nifty brain implant communicators, is unlikely to work that way – mainly because the Internet operates on a commercial paradigm that has productivity at its heart. So individualists will continue to think they are individuals, and the fact that they are hard-wired into a network will not likely change that view – just as we today don’t think ourselves any less individual than our predecessors did, even if our lives and livelihoods are completely dependent on technologies that couldn’t exist without the collaboration of thousands of people.
Here I must warn you – the next bit is a bit weird, even for my usual standards. So if you have no mind for that sort of thing, go have some cocoa.
Now that the linear thinkers are gone, I can continue: I’ve started to think of society – no matter what kind – not as a collection of individuals, but as sort of a doughy cellular matter – the Blob, let’s call it. In this model people are not in any way individuals – everyone is connected to everyone else, though some are at the very center and some at the periphery. Here’s the key thing – some cells are stronger, some weaker. Some can barely impact their own vicinity of the matter field, some are strong enough to move entire sections of it. However, no single cell can move the whole mass – you can only act at distance by influence.
What’s the point of all this, you ask? Well, my idea is that this cyberblob – or call it “society” if the imagery offends – affords its cells unrestricted freedom within the system. Its actions are a resultant of their combined wills and actions. Each cell can decide what it wants to do, where it wants to push the whole mass, and is limited only by its own strength and the resistance of its neighbors, BUT NOT BY THE BLOB ITSELF, which does not have an individual will of its own. And exiting the mass is no more of an option for large segments of the blob than a mass dropping out of society is for us – if we all dropped out, we’d just coagulate into another blob somewhere else.
Now for the serious stuff – libertarianism calls for the establishment of free markets and for governments to butt out of people’s business. All fine-sounding slogans. However, if you allow yourself to adopt the blob analogy for a while, you can see that there’s no such thing as complete freedom. Free-market economics may rid you of government interference, but that doesn’t mean they’ll rid you of interference as such. You’ll always have somebody pushing you this way or that, and it’s only up to your strength of will whether you yield or stand. Now stick that in your pipe and smoke it.
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3 Responses to “More deep thoughts on libertarianism”
By Steve on Jan 24, 2009 | Reply
The last three paragraphs here have been summarized, perhaps not with the same intent, by John Donne with the phrase “No man is an island, entire of itself.” Very well, I agree.
The point of libertarianism (and liberty) is not to exile yourself from society, it’s to live with as little compulsion as possible. You are absolutely correct in your conclusion that where any human interaction exists, positive and/or negative consequences result for all those involved. However, the force of open interaction is not the same as the force of government. A business can put me out of a job, but it can’t prevent me from finding work elsewhere, it can’t seize my property, it can’t tell me who I can worship or marry, and it can’t tell me where to go or what to do. In short, it can’t encroach on any “unrestricted freedoms within the system.” These encroachments, however, are well within the domain of any government, and governments historically have done all of these things and will continue to do so.
Libertarians don’t want NO government, they just want a LIMITED government. That is, a government which uses force only as a last resort, and plays by a fair set of rules. For all its wealth, Microsoft could never burst into your home, cuff you, throw you in prison, and execute you. That’s because the government has laws against things like trespassing, kidnapping, murder, etc. But who is to prevent that power of law enforcement from being turned on the citizenry? Who, in short, will police the police? Certainly not those who, after having their homes ransacked and property seized in the name of the “greater good”, would turn to the hand of power and bemoan their ineffectual status as a mere cell in a vast, immovable blob of society.
Well hell, you’ve already acknowledged that much yourself: “[...]and it’s only up to your strength of will whether you yield or stand.”
Using my strength of will to determine whether I yield or stand? Sounds a lot like liberty to me. Liberty isn’t about constant happiness or total isolation from the ill-effects of the choices of others, it’s about the ability to protect (even if unsuccessfully) your own interests. I’ll take it any day.
By Simon on Jan 25, 2009 | Reply
Thanks for your comment. I don’t agree with you on several points – I’ll just outline those here, saving a more rounded reply for a later post.
First, you write “A business can put me out of a job, but it can’t prevent me from finding work elsewhere, it can’t seize my property, it can’t tell me who I can worship or marry, and it can’t tell me where to go or what to do.
That’s almost true, except that the limitations on what a business can do to you are exactly due to the control put on them by the government. Also, when I referred to employers’ limitations on employee liberty, I wasn’t referring to what they can do AFTER they fire you.
Then you go on: “These encroachments, however, are well within the domain of any government, and governments historically have done all of these things and will continue to do so.”
Well, yes. That’s why I’m all for maximum transparency and accountability in government. However, these have precious little to do with the extent of control a government has over the public sphere.
You: “Libertarians don’t want NO government, they just want a LIMITED government. That is, a government which uses force only as a last resort, and plays by a fair set of rules.”
Nice sounding stuff, but fact is that the world of power does not like a vacuum. Where one kind of power recedes, another rears its ugly head. Deregulation since the 1980s has strengthened corporations to the point where they’re barely accountable to anyone any more. How does that expand your personal freedom?
And finally: “For all its wealth, Microsoft could never burst into your home, cuff you, throw you in prison, and execute you. That’s because the government has laws against things like trespassing, kidnapping, murder, etc.”
The government also has laws against keeping people locked up in sweatshops, child labor and other niceties of completely unregulated economies. For all of Milton Friedman’s rhetoric, I don’t see how these are the founts of personal liberty. Regarding the power of corporations, if it wasn’t for government regulation, I’m not sure if the likes of Microsoft wouldn’t deal with obstacles to their business in a much more direct way than they do today.
In conclusion, I’m no less interested in expanding people’s scope of personal freedom (and hey, my own along with it) than you are. I’m just not as dead-sure that a dogmatic approach calling for the removal of government regulation is the way to accomplish that goal.