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Anarchism and Libertarianism

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Anarchism and Libertarianism CHAPTER 10 Anarchism and Libertarianism Roderick T. Long Introduction “Libertarianism,” understood as a term for a specific political ideology, origi- nated as a synonym for anarchism, and more precisely the communist anar- chism of Joseph Déjacque (1821–1864), whose use of “libertaire” in this sense dates to 18571—though individualist anarchists soon picked up the term as well.2 Nowadays, however, the term “libertarianism” is frequently associated, particularly in English-speaking countries, with a movement favoring free mar- kets, private property, and economic laissez-faire, generally resting either on the efficiency of the price system in coordinating individuals’ plans,3 or else on an ethical principle of self-ownership or non-aggression4 which is taken to define individuals’ rights against forcible interference with their persons and (justly acquired) property. This is the sense in which the term “libertarian” will be employed here. (Today French actually has two words corresponding to the English libertarian: “libertaire,” meaning an anarchist, particularly a left-wing anarchist, and “libertarien,” for the free-market advocate.) It is with the relation of libertarianism (in the free-market sense) to anarchism that this chapter is concerned. While sometimes considered a form of conservatism, libertarianism dif- fers from typical versions of conservatism in endorsing a broad range of social liberties, and thus opposing, e.g., drug laws, censorship laws, laws restricting consensual sexual activity, and the like. (Libertarians usually, though not al- ways, differ from typical conservatives in opposing military interventionism 1 Joseph Déjacque, De l’être-humain mâle et femelle: Lettre à P.J. Proudhon (New Orleans: Lamarre, 1857). Déjacque began publishing his own journal Le Libertaire in 1858. 2 The individualist use of the term was common among the writers for Benjamin R. Tucker’s journal Liberty (1881–1908); see, e.g., Tucker’s “A Want Supplied,” Liberty 3, no. 13 (15 Aug. 1885): 4. 3 See, e.g., F.A. Hayek, “The Use of Knowledge in Society,” American Economic Review 35, no. 4 (Sept. 1945): 519–530. 4 R.T. Long, “Nonaggression Axiom,” in The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism, ed. R. Hamowy (Thousand Oaks, Calif.: SAGE Publications, 2008), 357–360. © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���8 | doi ��.��63/9789004356894_0�� 286 Long as well.) Libertarians see their support for social freedom and their support for free markets as two sides of the same principle: the individual’s freedom to do as she chooses with her own life and property, so long as she respects the right of others to do likewise with their own. Most libertarians favor a minimal or “night-watchman” state, with functions limited to the protection of individuals’ negative rights against interference, and consequently are known as “minarchists.” But a large and increasingly promi- nent minority of libertarians favor dispensing with the state entirely, leaving the function of rights-protection instead to the competitive market. These lib- ertarians usually claim the title of anarchist, and specifically “anarcho- capitalist” (sometimes “ancap” for short).5 Their relation to the broader anarchist move- ment is fraught with controversy, since that movement has traditionally opposed capitalism, and sometimes even seen opposition to capitalism as an essential component of anarchism. Social anarchists in particular are strongly inclined to deny anarcho-capitalism’s status as a form of anarchism; libertarians are often eager to return the favor, denying the term “libertarian” to anyone who rejects free markets. Can Libertarians be Anarchists? Many of the leading grounds on which social anarchists question anarcho- capitalism’s anarchist bona fides are usefully collected in the popular internet resource An Anarchist FAQ, edited by Iain McKay.6 The principal charges are two. The first is that anarcho-capitalists are only pseudo-anarchists because they do not truly reject the state—since the competing protection agencies they usually favor are just so many mini-states. Anarcho-capitalists would deny this on the grounds that a state has to be a territorial monopoly; but many social anarchists 5 Many free-market anarchists, though not all, repudiate electoral politics in favor of educa- tion, direct action, and building alternative institutions. U.S. Libertarian Party presidential candidates have included both anarchist and minarchists (as well as individuals who were arguably neither). Free-market anarchist ideas, of both capitalist and anti-capitalist varieties, have been dramatized (both favorably and otherwise) in science-fiction stories and novels by Eric Frank Russell, Robert A. Heinlein, C.M. Kornbluth, James Hogan, L. Neil Smith, J. Neil Schulman, Vernor Vinge, Neal Stephenson, Ken MacLeod, and Naomi Kritzer, among others. 6 I. McKay, ed., An Anarchist FAQ, Version 13.4 (2010), http://www.infoshop.org/AnAnarchist FAQ. See in particular “Section F: Is ‘Anarcho’-Capitalism a Type of Anarchism?” and “Section G: Is Individualistic Anarchism Capitalistic?” A hard copy of an earlier version of the FAQ has been published as I. McKay, ed., An Anarchist FAQ, 2 vols. (Oakland, Calif.: AK Press, 2008–2012)..
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