Libertarianism, Feminism, and Nonviolent Action: a Synthesis
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LIBERTARIAN PAPERS VOL. 4, NO. 2 (2012) LIBERTARIANISM, FEMINISM, AND NONVIOLENT ACTION: A SYNTHESIS GRANT BABCOCK* I. Introduction MURRAY ROTHBARD’S CONTRIBUTION to libertarian ethics was to outline a theory prohibiting aggressive violence (1978, p. 27-30). The influence of Rothbard’s ethics,1 combined with a decades-long political alliance with conservatives based on anticommunism, has produced a debate within libertarian circles about whether libertarians qua libertarians must take positions against certain forms of repression that do not involve aggressive violence. The non-aggression principle is as good a libertarian litmus test as has been suggested. Often, the voices who levy allegations of non-aggressive (or at least not exclusively aggressive) oppression come from the political left, and have un-libertarian (read: aggressive) solutions in mind, even if they do not conceive of those solutions as violent. Despite these considerations, I do believe that libertarians qua libertarians are obligated to say something about the kind of non-aggressive oppression that these voices from the left have raised regarding issues including, but not limited to, race, class, gender, and sexual orientation. Making the case that libertarians have these obligations irrespective of their * Grant Babcock ([email protected]) is an independent scholar. My thanks to Robert Churchill, Matthew McCaffrey, Ross Kenyon, and two anonymous referees for their help and encouragement. The paper’s merits are largely a result of their influence; any remaining errors are my own. CITATION INFORMATION FOR THIS ARTICLE: Grant Babcock. 2012. “Libertarianism, Feminism, and Nonviolent Action: A Synthesis.” Libertarian Papers. 4 (2): 119-138. ONLINE AT: libertarianpapers.org. THIS ARTICLE IS subject to a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License (creativecommons.org/licenses). 1 Or at least superficial readings of it. 119 120 LIBERTARIAN PAPERS 4 (2), (2012) libertarianism would be an easier task. Libertarianism is not, my view at least, a complete ethical system. Acts may be right or wrong for reasons outside of libertarianism; in these cases libertarianism will only come into play as offering side constraints on acceptable solutions.2 My argument here is different: some forms of non-aggressive action are nevertheless problematic on libertarian grounds. I have in mind the type of social problems described by Roderick Long and Charles Johnson in their essay “Libertarian Feminism: Can This Marriage Be Saved?” They write: Libertarian temptations to the contrary notwithstanding, it makes no sense to regard the state as the root of all social evil, for there is at least one social evil that cannot be blamed on the state—and that is the state itself. If no social evil can arise or be sustained except by the state, how does the state arise, and how is it sustained? As libertarians from La Boétie to Rothbard have rightly insisted, since rulers are generally outnumbered by those they rule, the state itself cannot survive except through popular acceptance which the state lacks the power to compel; hence state power is always part of an interlocking system of mutually reinforcing social practices and structures, not all of which are violations of the nonaggression axiom. (Long and Johnson, 2005, §2) I shall, for the rest of this paper, take patriarchy as the model case of a repressive social relation often considered beyond the scope of the libertarian project. In doing so, I will examine those aspects of patriarchy which would not already be condemned under libertarian ethics. Libertarians need no help condemning rape, yet they often hesitate to condemn expressions of patriarchy which stop short of violence. If libertarians are serious about transforming the way humans interrelate, they must take into account more than aggression, and especially, must take into account more than aggression by the state. In doing so they must go beyond the (relatively) obvious observations that we have natural rights against both state and non-state actors, and that all individuals, male or female, possess these rights. As Long and Johnson argue, “libertarians who are serious about ending all forms of political violence need to fight, at least, a two-front war, against both statism and male supremacy” (Long and Johnson, 2005, §2). This entails condemning and combating acts which are 2 In the typology proposed by Charles Johnson (2008), my argument falls closest to “strategic thickness,” although I don’t find the descriptor “thick libertarianism” terribly helpful in understanding my argument. LIBERTARIANISM, FEMINISM, AND NONVIOLENT ACTION 121 not, in themselves, rights violations. It means reconciling libertarian socio- political tolerance with an urgent understanding that some opinions are ethically intolerable. This makes many libertarians uncomfortable because it seems like a speedy way to end up with political commitments that are not libertarian in even the remotest sense. A large number of the proposed and/or implemented measures aimed against patriarchy are violations of libertarian ethics: affirmative action, subsidization of birth control, pornography bans, and restrictions on “hate speech” all come to mind. This much I concede. The proper response, however, is not to recoil from the necessary task of attacking patriarchy but to embrace that task with greater vigor and imagination. Methods for combating patriarchy compatible with libertarian ethics must be developed to the point that parties concerned about feminist issues cannot help but take them seriously. Steps in this direction have already been taken, although not necessarily by people working in a consciously libertarian tradition. Notable are the efforts of Gene Sharp. In The Politics of Nonviolent Action, Sharp lays out a theory of power—I will argue a libertarian theory, although he does not so identify it—upon which state power is based. He then offers an expansive typology of nonviolent methods of resistance, each category illustrated by historical examples, usually from multiple eras and places. He concludes with a description of the changes nonviolent action produces in target groups and in nonviolent actors themselves. After demonstrating Sharp’s compatibility with libertarian thinking on political power, I will examine bell hooks’s theory of patriarchy. I will show that hooks’ theory of patriarchy has many features in common with Sharp’s theory of political power. This suggests that many of Sharp’s techniques for combating political power will be applicable directly to attacking patriarchy as defined by hooks. Furthermore, one can generate additional nonviolent techniques using hooks’ theory of patriarchy in a manner analogous to the way Sharp generates techniques using his theory of political power. I will briefly discuss several nonviolent techniques for attacking patriarchy, both adapted from Sharp and generated from hooks, often with historical examples. It is my intention that the discussion be taken not as a comprehensive solution to the problem but as a proof of concept for the idea that truly serious, truly libertarian action against patriarchy is not only possible, but promising. By generating this proof of concept, I hope to offer evidence that efforts based on Sharp’s analytic framework might work against other non-aggressive forms of oppression. 122 LIBERTARIAN PAPERS 4 (2), (2012) II. Libertarian Nonviolent Action Sharp’s Theory of Power “Every ruler uses the obedience and cooperation he receives from part of the society to rule the whole…This requires and produces a hierarchical system” (Sharp, 1973, p. 24). This obedience can be secured in a variety of ways; it can also be lost. The withdrawal of obedience cripples the regime, which may attempt to respond to the withdrawal with violent repression. This repression is not guaranteed to work, as is sometimes supposed. Sharp explains that this is because repression is not an end in itself. “Punishment of one who disobeys a command,” he writes, “does not achieve the objective (for example, the ditch remains undug even if the men who refused to dig it have been shot)” (Sharp, 1973, pp. 27-28). “The answer to the problem of uncontrolled power,” Sharp concludes, “may therefore lie in learning how to carry out and maintain such withdrawal despite repression” (Sharp, 1973, p. 32). This is the theme he develops in the bulk of The Politics of Nonviolent Action. Linking the Traditions The theory of power adopted by Sharp is the same theory Long and Johnson ascribe above to “libertarians from La Boétie to Rothbard” (2005, §2). This construction suggests that Long and Johnson believe that Etienne de la Boétie is the earliest exponent of the Rothbardian strand of the libertarian tradition, a characterization I would have little quarrel with. Interestingly, Sharp identifies Boétie as also being among the first to articulate the theory of power upon which his understanding of nonviolent action is based (Sharp, 1973, p. 34). Sharp traces Boétie’s influence on later theorists of nonviolence: Boétie’s views—reputedly written at the age of eighteen—exerted a great influence upon Thoreau and Tolstoy. Through Tolstoy, those views also influenced Gandhi who saw in them a confirmation of the theory of power he had already grasped, and the political potential he had already begun to explore. (Sharp, 1973, pp. 34-35) In addition to direct citations of Boétie’s seminal essay, we can draw lines from the chain of thinkers described by Sharp above to thinkers in the libertarian tradition. For instance, Wendy McElroy identifies Transcendentalism, with which Thoreau is associated, as “an important vehicle for individualistic women” and places it within the libertarian tradition (McElroy, 2002, p. 7). LIBERTARIANISM, FEMINISM, AND NONVIOLENT ACTION 123 Sharp also cites the more modern political philosopher Bertrand de Jouvenel as an important theorist on the idea of withdrawal of support (Sharp, 1973, p. 35). Jouvenel influenced Rothbard as well, who quotes him in For a New Liberty on the role played by tradition and habit in securing obedience (Rothbard, 1978 p.