ROTHBARDIANS IN THE TEETH AT EVERY OPPORTUNITY —In his article “Myth and Truth

http://disq.us/8ji084KICKING ROTHBARDIANS IN THE TEETH AT EVERY OPPORTUNITY

—In his article “Myth and Truth About Libertarianism,” Murray Rothbard addresses the lie that “[l]ibertarians are libertines”—

Wendy,

It doesn’t matter what libertarians CLAIM to be. That’s an obfuscatory statement, like many of Rothbards obfuscations. It matters what society would evolve under rothbardian ethics. And rothbardian ethics are reduced to statements of property rights. And the only thing that matters in an anarchic polity is what property rights are defensible under polycentric law. Rothbard defined property as that which is intersubjectively verifiable (ISV). He not only abandons all notions of a normative commons, or even the material commons itself, but most importantly, Rothbard’s definition of property as that which is ISV, explicitly licenses conduct that is unethical (deceptions) and immoral (externalizations) and prohibits not only legal recourse, but any form of retaliation for immoral and unethical conduct . First, unethical and immoral actions – so common outside of our out-bred, out-wed, high trust northern european civilization – raise transaction costs rapidly. And it our western competitive advantage over the rest of the world would evaporate rapidly as transaction costs, economic velocity, and wealth rapidly declined. Second, it is irrational for people to choose a high transaction political order under Rothbarian anarchy to a costly state that suppresses immoral and unethical conduct by a multitude of legal means. It is rational to choose high trust low transaction cost polities with high bureaucratic overhead costs, over low trust, high transaction cost polities without high bureaucratic transaction costs. Because while expensive, at least economic velocity and local trust and culture can evolve under such a state. So Rothbardian Anarchy is impossible because it is irrational to choose to live in such a polity. Third, even if a polity did form somehow, against all rational analysis, a polity that acted with such low trust could not compete. Fourth, even if it could compete it would be rapidly ostracized, punished or exterminated by neighbors who will not tolerate low-trust unethical parasitism. Which has been demonstrated repeatedly in history by both the Gypsies and pre-enlightenment if not pre-war Jews. Both of whom practice high trust ethics in-group but low-trust ethics out-group. Or more recently, the tolerance for limited offshore banking, but the recent suppression of that industry by both European and American governments.

So, no. Rothbard was either dishonest or he profoundly erred. Which is a frequent question any serious philosopher has to ask himself in any study of Rothbard.

As for Tucker, like most of the left libertarians, they have little more than intuitions that something is wrong with Rothbardian ethics. But equipped only with classical liberal psychology, and micro economics, they appeal for a kinder gentler liberty without any program, argument or philosophy, other than what appears to be a secular restatement of christianity. Which doesn’t give them much argumentative power in ideology, philosophy or political economy. As such they resort to ideas such as buying off the citizenry in an effort to get people to like them. Which while a tried and true technique of all points of the ideological compass, doesn’t really contribute anything new to the debate.

However, if it’s a further criticism of Rothbardianism and it diminishes the negative impact that the Rothbardians have on the tradition of western aristocratic liberty, criticism of rothbardian immorality is good enough for me, and the rest of mankind as well.

Curt Doolittle

The Propertarian Institute

Kiev, Ukraine