If you've spent a decent amount of time talking to skeptics you've probably noticed that politically, skeptics generally tend to fall either one of two ways: liberal or libertarian. Now both camps can claim great skeptical names to their credit. But when our politics do come up in conversation, it seems that while the former displays its share of occasional nonsense, the later is just full of it.
I know I'm violating the first rule of skeptical etiquette by discussing politics, but I'm hardly the first. And after my fellow Gotham Skeptic, The Quixotic Man, briefly brought up some of the endless BS that comes out of the Cato Institute in a recent post as well as a recent heated libertarian debate I got into on Massimo Pigliucci's Facebook page that began with an insulting comment he quoted about Atlas Shrugged and Objectivism (debate reprinted here), I realized I had more to say on the issue than I thought.
So without further delay (except with the caveat, which should go without saying, that I can't argue against every version of the libertarian position), here's my own two cents on why government is important and libertarianism is not a real solution.
Tyranny by the corporation is still tyranny, and every bit as controlling as governmental tyranny. An age of robber barons didn't work in the past and it won't work in the future. Shifting responsibility from governmental powers onto commercial ones doesn't further the cause of liberty as nothing has fundamentally changed. It's just a cheap magic trick where you've given the impression that you've transferred the ball from one hand to the other and then made it vanish when in actually, the ball never moved.
The only difference is that under a representative democracy, the interests of individuals ideally are actually represented, whereas under corporate control, it's only the shareholders whose interests are represented. Real liberty comes from a system where strong checks and balances exist within and between governmental and commercial powers to optimize our means of catching and stamping out corruption.
When I hear a libertarian argue that government needs to give power "back" to the individual, I'm forced to ask, back from when? John Locke & Thomas Jefferson's statements were incomplete. For the whole of human history, individuals did not have unalienable rights but were at the mercy of those other individuals who amassed greater power, enough to control the masses. It was only after new governments built on Enlightenment principles changed the fundamental nature of government into our present form of democracy that the individual was empowered to take ownership of their own lives in the first place.
And while libertarians may say they have no desire to completely rid the individual of the state's protection, that seems to clearly be the inevitable consequence of a libertarian system. Protecting the individual means ensuring the most people in the society have access to quality education, quality health care, food, employment, roads, bridges, etc.
And since all those things will be necessary for the foreseeable future, it seems to me that what we're talking about is knocking down civilization only to just rebuild a nearly identical one only with slightly different people making the big decisions. Cause ultimately, you're still going to need people to make these decisions about education and health care and roads and bridges. You're still going to need people who to ensure people have access to clean water and who will acknowledge the science of global climate change without retreating to their ideology. These are important issues and they can't just be waved away with faith-based promises involving invisible hands. This requires teamwork not individuals out for themselves. You need a clear, carefully laid out infrastructure to address these concerns and to ensure it's done right. Now you can call that whatever you want but government by any other name is still government.
The problem in the past was that without a system advocating for the individual, a right or freedom unacknowledged by rulers was functionally identical to no having the right at all because there was no one to enforce those rights. This is a key factor that distinguishes modern Western governments from pre-revolutionary era rulers. While deeply flawed, our government serves multiple purposes. And one of those key purposes established by the U.S. Founders was to protect and advocate for the rights of the individual through statutory law and case law.
Now in the debate that motivated this piece (linked to above), one libertarian argued:
"Now, as for health care, roads and such. Why stop there? Why shouldn't the government be in charge of *everything*?"
Now besides this arguably being an appeal to final consequences, my response is that I wouldn't stop there. I think it's entirely sensible to have varying degrees of regulation and governmental oversight in virtually all areas of commerce and public services so long as, of course, representatives from other non-governmental spheres are also watching the watchers to keep them honest too. The powers should be as balanced as possible to best detect fraud on either end.
The same libertarian as above continued:
"This is, remember, the same governments that can't even count votes correctly. And name me one thing that the public sector does more efficiently than the private sector?"
Sure government screws up. As do private corporations like Toyota, BP, and the Catholic Church. Government, like evolution...like science itself, is a trial and error process, one that's marked by gradual progress. There will always be errors we can point to as with anything else. Ironically, I hear the same argument from Communists pointing to all the problems that are Capitalism's fault. It's always easy to point to errors in the current system because its visible. It's proving the validity of a rival system that's much harder.
As for a system that's better in the public sector than private, no problem. The U.S. armed forces are vastly superior to private mercenaries like Black Water. And unless you're wealthy enough to afford 24-hour private security, public police departments are typically vastly better at deterring and handling crime than no police. Do the Guardian Angel Safety Patrols really make anyone in New York City feel much safer? If so, I think if given a choice, most people would prefer the NYPD. Then there's the public fire departments, which are better than their non-existent private competitors. And the public health care provided for our troops, to quote Bill Krystal of The Weekly Standard, is "first class." As for the U.S. postal service, well at least they've remained remarkably successful since the days of Ben Franklin. I'd guess that at least 99% of their mail gets delivered to the right place. That's a completely made up figure but it's probably fairly accurate. And if so, that's not shabby considering all the many possible things that could happen to your mail between the time you give over your package and the time it arrives at its destination. But to be fair, the internet may soon kill the public library.
The essential benefit of capitalism, which I think many libertarians will agree, is the competition incentive. And that is indeed a huge benefit. But again, you still need someone to watch out to make sure companies don't conspire with each other to price-fix for their mutual benefit and to keep them from sinking the entire economy with the derivatives market. Capitalism is a good thing because of the competition incentive. I just believe we should go one competitor further, one that's government maintained, paid by tax dolloars, and free to all.
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Comments
I'm kind of curious to see this stated as really a "skeptic" case. Not because I question someone being skeptical of libertarianism, in fact I would expect nothing less, but rather because *this* doesn't seem particularly skeptical. It seems rather reactionary to a subset of people who *claim* a philosophy.
Your suggestion here seems to be that libertarianism requires that the state cease to exist and ALL functions go to private corporations. Nothing could be further from the truth. Libertarianism recognizes the existence of economic public goods. The difference is in a definition of what those public goods are. As amusingly snide as the comment is, an actual libertarian (lower case intended) wouldn't question the responsibility of government in road care.
But at some point, there is a moral ground where one person should not be *required* to pay to support another person - UNLESS they choose to do so.
Sigh. Character limits. part 2:
You assume that it's fair to approach from the moral standpoint that *you* can *force* a person to provide for another. Not to sound too 'Randian' because I disagree with various parts of her philosophy, but you imply a right to take by the force of a gun one person's earnings to give to another.
And to shift gears, you imply that corporations today are truly what the libertarian ideal suggests a corporation should be. Corporations and government are terribly intertwined today. No one needs to look further than the recent bailouts to at least consider that.
Heck, I haven't read it yet, but the Time that arrived in the mail today had a cover story about how much has been spent on lobbying - and the results. What we exist in today is far from a capitalist society, and in many ways so was the 'robber baron' era you so condemn.
Ugh. And the comments appear in reverse chronological order... so Part 3 (parts 2 below):
I am equally guilty some of the broad suggestions I make that some magical utopia could arrive from the philosophical libertarian ideal. Certainly this isn't the case, because nothing in the real world is so simple.
And I have no problem condemning 95% of the people (an equally made up statistic as yours in the article) that claim to be Libertarians (capital 'L' on purpose). They choose a politically appealing title for themselves while ignoring the true meaning.
But the ultimate point for me is that you step significantly beyond moral boundaries that I, given a true choice, would not do.
Feel free to mock it how you will, but I feel no entitlement to my neighbor's earnings regardless of how desperate I am.
I'd love to expand on a number of the points I've brought up and others, but sadly, 1000 character limit is too annoying. /end
Erm. P.S. (again.. this is the 4th comment in a chain due to character limitations):
Having fairly recently moved to NYC, and hoping to get involved in the Skeptic / Atheist scene, I'm a little disappointed that this is considered a reasonable representation of that audience. So much as one person can be so.
James,
I'm well aware of the fact that I'm briefly stepping out of the realm of science to discuss topics as subjective as politics & philosophy. & I acknowledge this right at the outset. I'm sorry if this isn't "skeptic" enough for you. I'm fairly sure that all skepticism is reactionary as some1 has to first assert a claim before we have anything to say about it. I also recognize (& expressly state) that I can't be expected to address the position of every1 who chooses to call themselves a libertarian. And while I think you're right that few libertarians question public road care, I also find few self-identified libertarians who support public education & healthcare. As I argue, these are essential components for providing for the common defense. How can you possibly be free if you're too poorly educated to know what's in your own best interests? That's not freedom; it's slavery. And its estimated that 20,000 Americans die each year from lack of healthcare. Is that free?
pt. 2
We live in a community where we depend on each other. What affects your neighbors will inevitably affect you too. & now that we're a global community, what happens around the world affects us too. I'm not advocating Communism here. Enjoying the privileges of society comes at a price & that's giving back to the society. There's a reason every intelligent species on this planet is social & that's because it's the optimal means for survival of the whole group. But if you just want to be a freeloader who takes all the advantages of society but doesn't want to give back to it, this is not only destructive to the society but to the individual. Poor education leads to higher unemployment, which in turn leads to higher crime rate. & we already pay for those uncovered w/ health insurance. If anyone considered the banks too big to fail then all of society is definitely too big to fail. Having public alternatives w/ reasonable standards makes sense & is effective around the world.
pt.3
"You assume that it's fair to approach from the moral standpoint that *you* can *force* a person to provide for another."
If you mean taxes, then it's not my assumption but the prevailing system employed by every nation in the civilized world. All I'm saying is providing for the common defense has a far greater scope than libertarians tend to acknowledge & that private corporations or whatever organization you can imagine are capable of just as much bad judgment & corruption as any gov't.
As for guns, I simply believe in regulations w/ sensible limitations. But as for why any rational person today thinks that they could buy up enough guns to build a militia strong enough to seriously challenge the U.S. military is beyond me. And if this is just a hunting thing, then I'd rather the Constitution wasn't exploited just so one can kill deer w/ a bazooka.
If you think I'm accurately addressing 95% of those saying they're libertarians, that's good enough for me.
My complaint about skepticism & this article isn't so much about the topic (in fact if I have to debate politics, it should be with a skeptic). :) It's more in the structure of the argument.
That said, there's no doubt that private corporations are just as susceptible to poor decisions and mismanagement as govt. The fundamental problem is that the govt is rarely held accountable. Under an ideal system, a company that makes poor decisions will fail and be replaced by a more efficient company.
The reality (imho) is that an expanded govt responsive to corporate influence has allowed and protected massive inefficiencies in telecom, health care, defense, and other industries.
I don't think any major corp. wants a small efficient govt because it would hurt their bottom line too much. There are so many massive & wasteful costs in health care that it's no wonder private insurance is so expensive.
Your solution seems to be to add more waste on top to mask the issue. Not a sustainable soluti
"Not to sound too 'Randian' because I disagree with various parts of her philosophy, but you imply a right to take by the force of a gun one person's earnings to give to another."
I was suddenly reminded of my old political philosophy subject at uni and John Locke popped into my head. It seems the libertarian view is based in paranoia, that others will take what is mine. On the other hand government, as John Locke would put it, is based on a social contract with its people. I can't really imagine how a society of hoarding individuals would prosper.
I guess you'll need a contract with that private security force when the desperate out-of-work poor, without a safety net, take to looting on the streets or house invasions just to feed themselves.
"Not to sound too 'Randian' because I disagree with various parts of her philosophy, but you imply a right to take by the force of a gun one person's earnings to give to another."
I was suddenly reminded of my old political philosophy subject at uni and John Locke popped into my head. It seems the libertarian view is based in paranoia, that others will take what is mine. On the other hand government, as John Locke would put it, is based on a social contract with its people. I can't really imagine how a society of hoarding individuals would prosper.
I guess you'll need a contract with that private security force when the desperate out-of-work poor, without a safety net, take to looting on the streets or house invasions just to feed themselves.
Hey that's neat, hit the refresh button and posts all my words again, despite them not being in the input box :D
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