Scott:
Continuing with the Fukuyama example, I think his case proves your point that moral clarity would have provided significant evidence against the invasion of Iraq. Fukuyama supported covert action and military aid to Iraqi dissidents, but when push came to shove, he opposed the decision to invade Iraq (if memory serves correctly).
Freddie: I absolutely agree with you on that. My point is that intellectual neoconservatism is not (or at least was not) necessarily a reflexive belief that military force could or should solve just about every problem, nor is it a belief that any actions can be justified if they are intended to spread and/or protect liberal democracy. That many, relying on a dumbed-down version of neo-conservatism, think that it does provide such justification is not an indictment of the seminal neo-conservative thinkers, but an indictment of the way in which nuance gets lost when a fairly complex intellectual idea gets translated to the masses.
Chris:
I think you're onto something here with respect to Congress' abdication of responsibility in the foreign policy arena. Granted, they've had the help of some SCOTUS decisions in doing so, but the fact is that Congress has done a really good job of abdicating responsibility to the Executive for quite some time.
But I'm wondering how much of this is actually specific to foreign policy. The fact is that in order to create the modern regulatory state, Congress had (and has) to delegate a ton of its legislative powers to the Executive, delegations that likely would have been found unconstitutional prior to the New Deal era court.
As an aside, and just thinking aloud: My thoughts on New Deal-era jurisprudence aside (the failure of liberals to acknowledge the long-term impact of FDR's court-packing scheme annoys me to no end) I'm wondering if maybe the only way to avoid Congressional abdication of power to the Executive without scrapping the regulatory state is in a Parliamentary system where the Executive is technically part of the legislature. Perhaps a topic for the future, and it's not something I've thought about for more than a minute or two.
Cascadian and Dave - thanks for reminding me that we need a discussion on the 14th. One of these days I may even get around to it (I really do mean to). Of course, as much as I enjoy ConLaw, I think it's an issue that is separate and apart from the normative issues of what government should and should not do.
That said, I'm entirely in favor of allowing greater decision-making on the local level; what worries me is when that decision-making, as Dave suggests, starts to infringe on some clear individual rights.
Mike: There's a subtle point that I think a lot of people are missing here, perhaps understandably. But that point is that you have to imagine what conservatism would be like if it did not have any libertarian wing (simultaneously, you have to imagine what liberalism would be like if it lost some of its more populist wings).
The example you give, vouchers, is a proposal that as far as I know originated with the libertarian wing of movement conservatism. It is, to be sure, an idea that has a lot of appeal to other types of conservatives, but for vastly different reasons than it appeals to libertarians. For the traditionalist who supports vouchers, the idea has appeal not because it will introduce competition to the school system but because it will allow them to have more control over the values their children learn. In other words, most conservatives who support vouchers do so primarily because it allows them to make sure they preserve traditional values, since public education is of necessity secular.
And this isn't to say that conservatives of a Burkean variety are incapable of proposing change; rather it is to say that a conservative worldview will emphasize changes that promote stability over growth.
Mike:
That sounds about right. I may have been a bit curt with that comment, since conservatism is not completely about putting a halt to progress; but it is very much about keeping progress from going too fast. It may well be better described as anti-radicalism, making sure we're not tossing out hundreds of years of accumulated/cultural knowledge on a whim.
Regardless, conservatism is not usually a forceful engine of change, wheras liberalism (both classical and modern) very much are. Again, though, I view this as a very important and necessary role.
E.D. - I should have mentioned (and will emphasize later) that we are talking long term here - at least a decade, and probably more (especially with the way that the economic crisis and response has mucked things up), before the realignment would be complete.
I'm still working on my post on the various responses to my liber-al-tarianism theme. But what you have written here pretty well explains why I think severing libertarianism from conservatism would be a healthy thing for the country writ large, creating a party of stability and tradition to align against a party of change, growth, and dynamism.
The short version of the argument I'm going to be making on that point is that severing libertarianism from conservatism will (ion the long run) make the remaining conservatism very appealing to some core constituencies of the modern Left that philosophically have much more in common with conservatives than liberals. The departure of those groups from the Left would, simultaneously, make the Left more classically liberal, making the Left actually appealing to libertarians in a way that it is not currently.
Too many good comments on this thread! Alright, last response from me until tonight.
Dan - I think your question is pretty similar to what Ross is arguing are the flaws in my argument, so I'll have a nice and long answer tonight. But the short, short response to your more specific question is that this imagined new conservative coalition along the lines of Deneen, Dreher, and Larison need not be "anti-growth." It's much more "pro-stability." There is some pretty interesting polling data out there that would suggest such a platform would be quite electorally viable - one really good example of that is the fact that a significant majority of Americans are opposed to free trade (at least as long as you don't associate the concept with either party), even though it's close to indisputable that free trade spurs economic growth. Part of that, I think, is that people really do place a lot of value in stability and security.
I guess one way to think of it is this: would you rather be in a situation where you knew you would be able to have the same job for the next 20 years, earning $40,000 a year that whole time ($2,000,000 total) or where you would likely have to change jobs every four or five years, possibly move to a new city once or twice in the process, but also likely earn 50% more in the process (maybe allowing you to retire a little sooner)? For me, I'd probably choose the latter....but even for me, it's not an easy question.
IM:
It's important to distinguish movement conservatism from conservative political theory. You have to remember that movement conservatism, just like movement liberalism (to the extent it exists), is kind of a Frankenstein's Monster of various forms of conservatism, plus libertarianism, plus some other constituent groups that aren't so easily classified.
The nature of the coalition was always such that the libertarian viewpoint was always the most influential on issues of economics.
So while it was appropriate for conservatives to resist implementation of social security and to even seek to reverse it in the years and initial decades after it passed, once it became fully institutionalized, a truly conservative position would have sought to preserve it, though perhaps with some slight modifications useful in ensuring its survival. But traditional conservatism by the 1980s or so had ceased to have any relevance to formation of movement conservatism economic views.
Matoko:
No. True conservatism is not about recreating long-dead traditions; it is about preserving existing traditions. If SSM were to be legalized today, 100 years from now the appropriate conservative position on SSM would be to preserve it if there were a movement to eliminate it.
Mike: I'll admit that my use of the phrase "morally just" was perhaps inartful, since I wasn't so much getting at a moral vision of society as I was getting at a shared vision of ordered liberty. The conservative mindset, at its most pure, places tremendous value, perhaps even primary value, on the preservation of cultural, political, and social institutions. The liberal and libertarian vision, however, places primary value on protecting the rights of individuals to choose the most possible courses of action....in essence, it emphasizes cultural, political, and social dynamism.
Now, in many ways modern (but still classically-based) conservatism likewise holds liberal freedoms in equally high esteem as do liberals and libertarians. But the basis for this is, I think, less a commitment to liberal ideals unto themselves than it is the fact that liberal ideals are a tremendously important part of our social, cultural, and political traditions at this point. In some respects, one could argue - and I think Larison actually has argued - that this actually makes philosophical conservatives more passionate about protecting existing freedoms than liberals, and maybe even libertarians.
This is a really nuanced distinction, I know, so I'll point to an area where the distinction is a bit more clear: same sex marriage.
On that issue, a purist, dynamic (to borrow Virginia Postrel's word from Ross Douthat) liberalism almost has to come down on the side of permitting SSM (and I do). But the conservative mindset - and here is where I disagree with Br. E.D. Kain and Andrew Sullivan - almost has to come down against it, and not necessarily on religious grounds. It is, to the conservative, a fundamental change in a critical cultural and social institution that has evolved from the combined understanding and knowledge of countless generations; that this knowledge could seemingly be thrown away over the course of a few years strikes the conservative as folly.
The two viewpoints are effectively irreconcilable because they ultimately boil down to differences on principle rather than the means of protecting common principles. But both viewpoints are also deeply principled, honest, and sincere. (And yes, there are some, even many, who oppose SSM on completely bigoted grounds; but there are also many who oppose it because they legitimately believe it to be a fundamental systemic change that flies in the face of hundreds of years of cultural knowledge).
Good questions. I started drafting a response, but for a variety of reasons, it's going to be best left for a full post later on, perhaps tonight. Suffice it to say that a lot of it builds on the whole theory of political coalitions you may or may not remember that I developed at my old site.
I'm beginning work on a follow-up to this, but the short, short answer to your question is, I think, that changes in political alignment can do pretty interesting things. It's worth remembering that our political coalitions are more historical accidents than they are entrenched advocates for competing governing philosophies.
Well, I would disagree with the assertion that paleo-libertarians as a group were never part of the coalition of the Right. There have long been, to say the least, a lot of ties between paleo-conservatives and paleo-libertarians. And it's not exactly a coincidence that Ron Paul is a Republican.
But none of this is to say that ALL libertarians of any stripe were part of the coalition of the Right. What it is to say, however, is that many libertarians of all stripes, cosmopolitan, paleo, Objectivists, or otherwise have found themselves long affiliated with the political Right - a pattern that, I jump to add, has begun to change significantly in recent years.
Simply put, we live in a two-party system. Unless you either don't vote at all or only vote for the LP, there will always be one party that you find more palatable than the other. When that party is consistently more palatable than the other party for a period of years (as was the case for several decades), it is inevitable that the various ideologies that make up that coalition will cross-polinate.
And by the way, I'm not arguing that there's anything wrong with getting involved in the two party system, corrupt as it may be. In fact, I tend to think that it's the most worthwhile way of attempting to enact legitimate change. But it's worth being aware of the way in which coalition politics can affect one's worldview in the long-run.
I think you're exactly right that the difference between libertarianism and liberalism lies in "taste for governance." But the fact that this is where the difference lies helps to explain why the bridge between the two really isn't that wide. To the extent these 7 tenets are an accurate description of modern liberalism, the "taste for governance" is the sole tenet that expresses a preference related to means rather than ends.
In essence, for the libertarian, the lack of a "taste for governance" emerges from a general skepticism about the ability of government to achieve that which it sets out to do without imposing unintended consequences that undermine the achievement of tenets 1 through 6. This is where the writings of FA Hayek come into play so strongly.
But, as I said, these are differences over means rather than ends. As a result, a libertarian should be open to arguments for various government programs, provided that the liberal can convince him that the program will, in fact, achieve at least one of goals 1-6 without excessively undermining others of those goals.
Similarly, a philosophical liberal ought to be open to libertarian arguments that a proposed policy will either fail to achieve its goals or will excessively undermine at least one of goals 1-6 in the process of achieving its stated goal.
Assuming that both the liberal and the libertarian act as they should, then the end result is a discussion in which the two can arrive at a compromise that is as narrowly tailored towards the achievement of the stated end as possible.
Unfortunately, the current political alignment has caused many liberals to treat point 7 as an end unto itself rather than a means, just as the current alignment has caused many libertarians to treat its antithesis as an end unto itself rather than a means. As such, there has been all too little room for compromise on something that otherwise ought to be utterly subject to compromise.
As for the relationship of all this to conservatism, I suppose it really depends on the brand of conservatism about which you are speaking. But I'm not sure that most conservatives would really adhere to many of the 7 liberal tenets; this isn't to say that they reject these tenets outright, but rather that they likely don't hold these tenets as core goals of government. Speaking in an overly general manner, I'd say that a conservatism untethered from libertarianism would most likely be primarily concerned with things like social stability and the preservation of cultural tradition....in essence, it would closely resemble paleoconservatism.
Well, one thing that's important to note here is that Wilkinson (like me) is not a reformist conservative, and I don't think it's quite fair - to either group - to lump reformist libertarians as the same group as reformist conservatives. One of the things that I've been trying to point in my last few posts is that, although conservatism and libertarianism are often to be found as political allies, they share very different philosophical roots. While I do not want to pretend to speak for Wilkinson, the idea of reformist libertarianism is precisely to separate it from conservatism and to bring it back more to its classical roots, and to acknowledge that the affiliation between the two distinct ideologies has at the very least corrupted libertarianism (and quite possibly has corrupted both). But that doesn't mean we stop being libertarians.
In fact, in many ways, a critique of liberalism is even more important to reformist libertarians than a critique of conservatism - we've essentially given up trying to move conservatism in a more libertarian direction, and recognize that in many ways we may have more in common, at least philosophically, with modern liberals. Because of that, we (well, at least I, since I can't speak for others) believe that critiquing liberals may actually do some good in terms of changing liberals' minds.
And when you're talking about either reformist conservatives or reformist libertarians, I think it's important to recognize that at the moment liberals have complete control over the policy direction of the country. So a critique of conservatives doesn't really have much value since conservatives don't have much control over policy.
As for the articulation of a purely positive vision of society, I think that's where the difference between reformist conservatives and reformist libertarians is most significant. The reformist conservative is much more Burkean by nature, and is thus deeply suspicious of politically-mandated change; articulation of a positive vision for society is simply incompatible with this worldview, which at its core rejects idealism of almost any sort (I don't think this is a bad thing, by the way, and is in fact a tremendously important counterweight to radicalism). But reformist libertarians absolutely hold to an idealistic vision of society (even if it's not exactly utopian in the traditional meaning of that word), and for that reason I think reformist libertarians typically advocate quite strongly for specific and significant policy changes.
Will: Wow. Thanks for the compliment! I'm flattered.
Joseph: Except for anarchists and (arguably) minarchists, most libertarians do not believe in a "utopia," at least not in the manner that word is traditionally defined. To be sure, most libertarians have an idealistic vision of a truly libertarian government that has little chance of becoming reality, but the same could be said about adherents of any political philosophy save perhaps Burkean conservatives.
I also think you miss an important underlying premise of my argument, which is that a liber-al-tarian (I hope that makes it easier, ED!) worldview is no less idealistic than other forms of libertarianism, and indeed is at least arguably (and I would argue clearly) more of a "pure" libertarianism than the libertarianism that has developed over the last 50 years or so of affiliation with the political Right.
I'm glad you think that the version of libertarianism I advocate here is more pragmatic and politically viable than some of the more prevalent versions of libertarianism, but ultimately I'm less concerned with making libertarianism more pragmatic than I am with making it more consistent with its philosophical roots. In that sense there is quite a bit in common between my view and Long's more radical view: both are primarily concerned with reforming libertarianism and recognizing, as Will says above, that "the long alliance with the right has tainted classical liberalism." That Long is more focused on systemic issues that are less achievable is largely unimportant to me - if systems are to ever change, someone has to argue for systemic change. But I think that libertarian critiques, both of the systemic and more policy-specific variety, will be far more persuasive in general if they are more consistent with their philosophical basis.
As for the issue of numbers, the fact is that most people who are loosely defined as "libertarians," much like most people who are loosely defined as "conservatives" or "liberals" are not terribly concerned about deeper philosophical issues; put another way, most loosely defined "libertarians" just like most loosely defined "conservatives" and "liberals" are not part of a political "movement," even though most politicians for whom they vote, and columnists they read, are part of a "movement." Consider that, despite being the foundation for much of modern libertarianism, Road To Serfdom has only ever sold 400,000 copies (1,000,000 if you include the condensed version) in its 65 years of existence. And yet there are perhaps tens of millions of people who can be loosely defined as small 'l' libertarians (depending on how loose your definition is, of course). The point is that it's only necessary to persuade a relatively small number of people, ie those who are intimately part of the "movement," to a viewpoint in order for that viewpoint to become influential on a wider scale.
As for whether the average reader of Reason is interested in political power, the answer is that, just like a reader of any liberal or conservative movement magazine, they are interested in political power, but are not willing to sell out their political philosophy in order to do so. What liber-al-tarianism seeks to do is to persuade those libertarians qua libertarians to take a slightly different worldview. That this worldview may be more persuasive to non-movement libertarians (and non-libertarians as well) is a important, but secondary, effect. Far more important is that it does not involve sacrificing core libertarian principles.
Cascadian - I assume you mean movement libertarians, roughly speaking. And to the extent you are talking about the more paleo variety of movement libertarians, you're probably right.
But those of us of the more "soft" Hayekian variety do have quite a bit in common with liberals as a foundational matter, at least in the sense of having similar intellectual roots. On that basis I think it is well worth pursuing not so much a formal alliance as an open dialogue aimed at finding some common ground on which liberals would be willing to pander to libertarians.
But ultimately the idea of a permanent and inflexible alliance with either conservatives or liberals is in my mind foolish. Conservatism and libertarianism have always been different worldviews, and liberalism has evolved enough from its roots that it's a clearly independent worldview from classical liberalism, so a complete reunion is likely not achievable.
So really what I'm looking for is to at some point have liberals at least willing to listen to libertarians on economic issues, and conservatives at least willing to listen to us on social issues. In the meantime, the best approach for libertarians is to simply be political free agents, supporting Dems who are libertarian where Dems are supposed to be libertarian, and supporting Republicans who are libertarian where they are supposed to be libertarian.
The issue of foreign ownership of American debt is really quite frightening, which is one reason why our massive deficit spending of the last 8+ years is so disturbing to me.
That said, in terms of currency stabilization and/or something of a global equilibrium, that definitely sounds like a Dave question. But I do know that the gold standard, or at least the pure gold standard advocated by Ron Paul, is a really bad idea. There's really little reason to think that it is any more stable than any other form of currency (and a lot of economists will cite it as a major cause of the Great Depression). As our friend Kip has pointed out a few times, you could fit all the gold ever mined in human history in a cube the size of a baseball diamond. The justification for the gold standard in many ways derives from the mistaken belief that gold production roughly tracks increases in overall productivity; but of course there are gold booms and busts, and technological advances in the production of goods that ensure that productivity will not track particularly well with the extraction of gold (which also has the downside of existing in the earth in finite quantities).
Just to add to Will's point - another moral consequence of free trade is that there appears to be a pretty strong correlation between free trade and peaceful relations. In other words, there is a strong argument to be made that increased free trade is an essential element to world peace. This actually makes quite a bit of sense when you think about it - the more your economy is dependent on the free flow of goods to and from other nations, the less likely you will be to act aggressively towards those other nations. There's also a fair amount of research suggesting that free trade is the best way to encourage the spread of liberalism/pluralism more generally.
And that says nothing about the moral implications of the unintended consequences of protectionism (especially Third World food shortages; I really can't emphasize that enough).
Chris: No doubt that the West has been more than a bit hypocritical in its imposition of policies on developing nations. Frankly, if a developing nation imposes high tariffs on Western goods, the likely effect on the Western nation is going to be de minimis; whereas a Western nation imposing a high tariff on a developing nation's goods (or subsidizing a good that is produced cheaply in a developing nation) may well prevent the developing nation from, well, developing.
As for the issue of Ricardian theory on comparative advantage no longer holding true.....First, you'll get a much better explanation on that from a professional economist, although the answer is going to be a "no."; several rather well-known such economists are remarkably willing to entertain questions such as that. That said, it's well worth pointing to Krugman for a pretty good answer (it really pains me as a libertarian to so repeatedly cite him, but the fact is that there's probably no one better on the issue of international trade). See this article, for starters: http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/ricardo.htm
Also - Krugman's Nobel-winning theories are largely credited as refining Ricardo.
ED - the thing about trade is that ultimately it winds up benefiting both nations (although one may benefit more than the other, but both wind up in better shape). So, even if you don't much care about the developing world (which I think is a mistake, not just on humanitarian grounds, but also on realpolitik grounds), as long as you accept the principle of comparative advantage, free trade does not hurt either country. It may, to be sure, hurt a particular industry in a country; but what is unseen is the benefits it has on other industries in that country.
But one of the great hindrances to free trade is, I think, the fact that it's something of a prisoner's dilemma. If only one nation reduces its protectionism, it may do poorly because of the other nation's barriers; if neither nation does so, neither is worse off; and if both nations do so, both are better off. This is why increasing free trade via treaty and international organizations is essential (a concept that puts me at odds with some libertarians).
On “Overlearning Lessons”
Scott:
Continuing with the Fukuyama example, I think his case proves your point that moral clarity would have provided significant evidence against the invasion of Iraq. Fukuyama supported covert action and military aid to Iraqi dissidents, but when push came to shove, he opposed the decision to invade Iraq (if memory serves correctly).
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Freddie: I absolutely agree with you on that. My point is that intellectual neoconservatism is not (or at least was not) necessarily a reflexive belief that military force could or should solve just about every problem, nor is it a belief that any actions can be justified if they are intended to spread and/or protect liberal democracy. That many, relying on a dumbed-down version of neo-conservatism, think that it does provide such justification is not an indictment of the seminal neo-conservative thinkers, but an indictment of the way in which nuance gets lost when a fairly complex intellectual idea gets translated to the masses.
On “Obama and The (Quasi?)Imperial Presidency”
Chris:
I think you're onto something here with respect to Congress' abdication of responsibility in the foreign policy arena. Granted, they've had the help of some SCOTUS decisions in doing so, but the fact is that Congress has done a really good job of abdicating responsibility to the Executive for quite some time.
But I'm wondering how much of this is actually specific to foreign policy. The fact is that in order to create the modern regulatory state, Congress had (and has) to delegate a ton of its legislative powers to the Executive, delegations that likely would have been found unconstitutional prior to the New Deal era court.
As an aside, and just thinking aloud: My thoughts on New Deal-era jurisprudence aside (the failure of liberals to acknowledge the long-term impact of FDR's court-packing scheme annoys me to no end) I'm wondering if maybe the only way to avoid Congressional abdication of power to the Executive without scrapping the regulatory state is in a Parliamentary system where the Executive is technically part of the legislature. Perhaps a topic for the future, and it's not something I've thought about for more than a minute or two.
On “The Final Word on Liber-al-tarianism”
Cascadian and Dave - thanks for reminding me that we need a discussion on the 14th. One of these days I may even get around to it (I really do mean to). Of course, as much as I enjoy ConLaw, I think it's an issue that is separate and apart from the normative issues of what government should and should not do.
That said, I'm entirely in favor of allowing greater decision-making on the local level; what worries me is when that decision-making, as Dave suggests, starts to infringe on some clear individual rights.
On “Killing Frankenstein’s Monster”
Mike: There's a subtle point that I think a lot of people are missing here, perhaps understandably. But that point is that you have to imagine what conservatism would be like if it did not have any libertarian wing (simultaneously, you have to imagine what liberalism would be like if it lost some of its more populist wings).
The example you give, vouchers, is a proposal that as far as I know originated with the libertarian wing of movement conservatism. It is, to be sure, an idea that has a lot of appeal to other types of conservatives, but for vastly different reasons than it appeals to libertarians. For the traditionalist who supports vouchers, the idea has appeal not because it will introduce competition to the school system but because it will allow them to have more control over the values their children learn. In other words, most conservatives who support vouchers do so primarily because it allows them to make sure they preserve traditional values, since public education is of necessity secular.
And this isn't to say that conservatives of a Burkean variety are incapable of proposing change; rather it is to say that a conservative worldview will emphasize changes that promote stability over growth.
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Mike:
That sounds about right. I may have been a bit curt with that comment, since conservatism is not completely about putting a halt to progress; but it is very much about keeping progress from going too fast. It may well be better described as anti-radicalism, making sure we're not tossing out hundreds of years of accumulated/cultural knowledge on a whim.
Regardless, conservatism is not usually a forceful engine of change, wheras liberalism (both classical and modern) very much are. Again, though, I view this as a very important and necessary role.
On “Growth and Prosperity”
E.D. - I should have mentioned (and will emphasize later) that we are talking long term here - at least a decade, and probably more (especially with the way that the economic crisis and response has mucked things up), before the realignment would be complete.
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I'm still working on my post on the various responses to my liber-al-tarianism theme. But what you have written here pretty well explains why I think severing libertarianism from conservatism would be a healthy thing for the country writ large, creating a party of stability and tradition to align against a party of change, growth, and dynamism.
The short version of the argument I'm going to be making on that point is that severing libertarianism from conservatism will (ion the long run) make the remaining conservatism very appealing to some core constituencies of the modern Left that philosophically have much more in common with conservatives than liberals. The departure of those groups from the Left would, simultaneously, make the Left more classically liberal, making the Left actually appealing to libertarians in a way that it is not currently.
On “Killing Frankenstein’s Monster”
Too many good comments on this thread! Alright, last response from me until tonight.
Dan - I think your question is pretty similar to what Ross is arguing are the flaws in my argument, so I'll have a nice and long answer tonight. But the short, short response to your more specific question is that this imagined new conservative coalition along the lines of Deneen, Dreher, and Larison need not be "anti-growth." It's much more "pro-stability." There is some pretty interesting polling data out there that would suggest such a platform would be quite electorally viable - one really good example of that is the fact that a significant majority of Americans are opposed to free trade (at least as long as you don't associate the concept with either party), even though it's close to indisputable that free trade spurs economic growth. Part of that, I think, is that people really do place a lot of value in stability and security.
I guess one way to think of it is this: would you rather be in a situation where you knew you would be able to have the same job for the next 20 years, earning $40,000 a year that whole time ($2,000,000 total) or where you would likely have to change jobs every four or five years, possibly move to a new city once or twice in the process, but also likely earn 50% more in the process (maybe allowing you to retire a little sooner)? For me, I'd probably choose the latter....but even for me, it's not an easy question.
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IM:
It's important to distinguish movement conservatism from conservative political theory. You have to remember that movement conservatism, just like movement liberalism (to the extent it exists), is kind of a Frankenstein's Monster of various forms of conservatism, plus libertarianism, plus some other constituent groups that aren't so easily classified.
The nature of the coalition was always such that the libertarian viewpoint was always the most influential on issues of economics.
So while it was appropriate for conservatives to resist implementation of social security and to even seek to reverse it in the years and initial decades after it passed, once it became fully institutionalized, a truly conservative position would have sought to preserve it, though perhaps with some slight modifications useful in ensuring its survival. But traditional conservatism by the 1980s or so had ceased to have any relevance to formation of movement conservatism economic views.
On “The Promise of Liberaltarianism”
Thanks, E.D.
Oh - the response I'm going to put up to night is to Ross' and the other Will's points from the related thread.
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Thanks, Mike! Expect a worthy response to Ross' (and Will's) points sometime late tonight.
On “Killing Frankenstein’s Monster”
Matoko:
No. True conservatism is not about recreating long-dead traditions; it is about preserving existing traditions. If SSM were to be legalized today, 100 years from now the appropriate conservative position on SSM would be to preserve it if there were a movement to eliminate it.
On “A Time for Anger: Fisking the Times”
DH: I have no doubt that you're right. And, I know you've heard this a million times before, but keep up the good work on this!
On “Killing Frankenstein’s Monster”
Mike: I'll admit that my use of the phrase "morally just" was perhaps inartful, since I wasn't so much getting at a moral vision of society as I was getting at a shared vision of ordered liberty. The conservative mindset, at its most pure, places tremendous value, perhaps even primary value, on the preservation of cultural, political, and social institutions. The liberal and libertarian vision, however, places primary value on protecting the rights of individuals to choose the most possible courses of action....in essence, it emphasizes cultural, political, and social dynamism.
Now, in many ways modern (but still classically-based) conservatism likewise holds liberal freedoms in equally high esteem as do liberals and libertarians. But the basis for this is, I think, less a commitment to liberal ideals unto themselves than it is the fact that liberal ideals are a tremendously important part of our social, cultural, and political traditions at this point. In some respects, one could argue - and I think Larison actually has argued - that this actually makes philosophical conservatives more passionate about protecting existing freedoms than liberals, and maybe even libertarians.
This is a really nuanced distinction, I know, so I'll point to an area where the distinction is a bit more clear: same sex marriage.
On that issue, a purist, dynamic (to borrow Virginia Postrel's word from Ross Douthat) liberalism almost has to come down on the side of permitting SSM (and I do). But the conservative mindset - and here is where I disagree with Br. E.D. Kain and Andrew Sullivan - almost has to come down against it, and not necessarily on religious grounds. It is, to the conservative, a fundamental change in a critical cultural and social institution that has evolved from the combined understanding and knowledge of countless generations; that this knowledge could seemingly be thrown away over the course of a few years strikes the conservative as folly.
The two viewpoints are effectively irreconcilable because they ultimately boil down to differences on principle rather than the means of protecting common principles. But both viewpoints are also deeply principled, honest, and sincere. (And yes, there are some, even many, who oppose SSM on completely bigoted grounds; but there are also many who oppose it because they legitimately believe it to be a fundamental systemic change that flies in the face of hundreds of years of cultural knowledge).
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Will:
Good questions. I started drafting a response, but for a variety of reasons, it's going to be best left for a full post later on, perhaps tonight. Suffice it to say that a lot of it builds on the whole theory of political coalitions you may or may not remember that I developed at my old site.
On “liberalisms”
I'm beginning work on a follow-up to this, but the short, short answer to your question is, I think, that changes in political alignment can do pretty interesting things. It's worth remembering that our political coalitions are more historical accidents than they are entrenched advocates for competing governing philosophies.
On “The Tone-Deafness of the “Statism” Charge”
Well, I would disagree with the assertion that paleo-libertarians as a group were never part of the coalition of the Right. There have long been, to say the least, a lot of ties between paleo-conservatives and paleo-libertarians. And it's not exactly a coincidence that Ron Paul is a Republican.
But none of this is to say that ALL libertarians of any stripe were part of the coalition of the Right. What it is to say, however, is that many libertarians of all stripes, cosmopolitan, paleo, Objectivists, or otherwise have found themselves long affiliated with the political Right - a pattern that, I jump to add, has begun to change significantly in recent years.
Simply put, we live in a two-party system. Unless you either don't vote at all or only vote for the LP, there will always be one party that you find more palatable than the other. When that party is consistently more palatable than the other party for a period of years (as was the case for several decades), it is inevitable that the various ideologies that make up that coalition will cross-polinate.
And by the way, I'm not arguing that there's anything wrong with getting involved in the two party system, corrupt as it may be. In fact, I tend to think that it's the most worthwhile way of attempting to enact legitimate change. But it's worth being aware of the way in which coalition politics can affect one's worldview in the long-run.
On “liberalisms”
I think you're exactly right that the difference between libertarianism and liberalism lies in "taste for governance." But the fact that this is where the difference lies helps to explain why the bridge between the two really isn't that wide. To the extent these 7 tenets are an accurate description of modern liberalism, the "taste for governance" is the sole tenet that expresses a preference related to means rather than ends.
In essence, for the libertarian, the lack of a "taste for governance" emerges from a general skepticism about the ability of government to achieve that which it sets out to do without imposing unintended consequences that undermine the achievement of tenets 1 through 6. This is where the writings of FA Hayek come into play so strongly.
But, as I said, these are differences over means rather than ends. As a result, a libertarian should be open to arguments for various government programs, provided that the liberal can convince him that the program will, in fact, achieve at least one of goals 1-6 without excessively undermining others of those goals.
Similarly, a philosophical liberal ought to be open to libertarian arguments that a proposed policy will either fail to achieve its goals or will excessively undermine at least one of goals 1-6 in the process of achieving its stated goal.
Assuming that both the liberal and the libertarian act as they should, then the end result is a discussion in which the two can arrive at a compromise that is as narrowly tailored towards the achievement of the stated end as possible.
Unfortunately, the current political alignment has caused many liberals to treat point 7 as an end unto itself rather than a means, just as the current alignment has caused many libertarians to treat its antithesis as an end unto itself rather than a means. As such, there has been all too little room for compromise on something that otherwise ought to be utterly subject to compromise.
As for the relationship of all this to conservatism, I suppose it really depends on the brand of conservatism about which you are speaking. But I'm not sure that most conservatives would really adhere to many of the 7 liberal tenets; this isn't to say that they reject these tenets outright, but rather that they likely don't hold these tenets as core goals of government. Speaking in an overly general manner, I'd say that a conservatism untethered from libertarianism would most likely be primarily concerned with things like social stability and the preservation of cultural tradition....in essence, it would closely resemble paleoconservatism.
On “the foul rag and bone shop of real politics”
Well, one thing that's important to note here is that Wilkinson (like me) is not a reformist conservative, and I don't think it's quite fair - to either group - to lump reformist libertarians as the same group as reformist conservatives. One of the things that I've been trying to point in my last few posts is that, although conservatism and libertarianism are often to be found as political allies, they share very different philosophical roots. While I do not want to pretend to speak for Wilkinson, the idea of reformist libertarianism is precisely to separate it from conservatism and to bring it back more to its classical roots, and to acknowledge that the affiliation between the two distinct ideologies has at the very least corrupted libertarianism (and quite possibly has corrupted both). But that doesn't mean we stop being libertarians.
In fact, in many ways, a critique of liberalism is even more important to reformist libertarians than a critique of conservatism - we've essentially given up trying to move conservatism in a more libertarian direction, and recognize that in many ways we may have more in common, at least philosophically, with modern liberals. Because of that, we (well, at least I, since I can't speak for others) believe that critiquing liberals may actually do some good in terms of changing liberals' minds.
And when you're talking about either reformist conservatives or reformist libertarians, I think it's important to recognize that at the moment liberals have complete control over the policy direction of the country. So a critique of conservatives doesn't really have much value since conservatives don't have much control over policy.
As for the articulation of a purely positive vision of society, I think that's where the difference between reformist conservatives and reformist libertarians is most significant. The reformist conservative is much more Burkean by nature, and is thus deeply suspicious of politically-mandated change; articulation of a positive vision for society is simply incompatible with this worldview, which at its core rejects idealism of almost any sort (I don't think this is a bad thing, by the way, and is in fact a tremendously important counterweight to radicalism). But reformist libertarians absolutely hold to an idealistic vision of society (even if it's not exactly utopian in the traditional meaning of that word), and for that reason I think reformist libertarians typically advocate quite strongly for specific and significant policy changes.
On “The Promise of Liberaltarianism”
Will: Wow. Thanks for the compliment! I'm flattered.
Joseph: Except for anarchists and (arguably) minarchists, most libertarians do not believe in a "utopia," at least not in the manner that word is traditionally defined. To be sure, most libertarians have an idealistic vision of a truly libertarian government that has little chance of becoming reality, but the same could be said about adherents of any political philosophy save perhaps Burkean conservatives.
I also think you miss an important underlying premise of my argument, which is that a liber-al-tarian (I hope that makes it easier, ED!) worldview is no less idealistic than other forms of libertarianism, and indeed is at least arguably (and I would argue clearly) more of a "pure" libertarianism than the libertarianism that has developed over the last 50 years or so of affiliation with the political Right.
I'm glad you think that the version of libertarianism I advocate here is more pragmatic and politically viable than some of the more prevalent versions of libertarianism, but ultimately I'm less concerned with making libertarianism more pragmatic than I am with making it more consistent with its philosophical roots. In that sense there is quite a bit in common between my view and Long's more radical view: both are primarily concerned with reforming libertarianism and recognizing, as Will says above, that "the long alliance with the right has tainted classical liberalism." That Long is more focused on systemic issues that are less achievable is largely unimportant to me - if systems are to ever change, someone has to argue for systemic change. But I think that libertarian critiques, both of the systemic and more policy-specific variety, will be far more persuasive in general if they are more consistent with their philosophical basis.
As for the issue of numbers, the fact is that most people who are loosely defined as "libertarians," much like most people who are loosely defined as "conservatives" or "liberals" are not terribly concerned about deeper philosophical issues; put another way, most loosely defined "libertarians" just like most loosely defined "conservatives" and "liberals" are not part of a political "movement," even though most politicians for whom they vote, and columnists they read, are part of a "movement." Consider that, despite being the foundation for much of modern libertarianism, Road To Serfdom has only ever sold 400,000 copies (1,000,000 if you include the condensed version) in its 65 years of existence. And yet there are perhaps tens of millions of people who can be loosely defined as small 'l' libertarians (depending on how loose your definition is, of course). The point is that it's only necessary to persuade a relatively small number of people, ie those who are intimately part of the "movement," to a viewpoint in order for that viewpoint to become influential on a wider scale.
As for whether the average reader of Reason is interested in political power, the answer is that, just like a reader of any liberal or conservative movement magazine, they are interested in political power, but are not willing to sell out their political philosophy in order to do so. What liber-al-tarianism seeks to do is to persuade those libertarians qua libertarians to take a slightly different worldview. That this worldview may be more persuasive to non-movement libertarians (and non-libertarians as well) is a important, but secondary, effect. Far more important is that it does not involve sacrificing core libertarian principles.
On “Liberaltarianism in a Liberal Age”
Cascadian - I assume you mean movement libertarians, roughly speaking. And to the extent you are talking about the more paleo variety of movement libertarians, you're probably right.
But those of us of the more "soft" Hayekian variety do have quite a bit in common with liberals as a foundational matter, at least in the sense of having similar intellectual roots. On that basis I think it is well worth pursuing not so much a formal alliance as an open dialogue aimed at finding some common ground on which liberals would be willing to pander to libertarians.
But ultimately the idea of a permanent and inflexible alliance with either conservatives or liberals is in my mind foolish. Conservatism and libertarianism have always been different worldviews, and liberalism has evolved enough from its roots that it's a clearly independent worldview from classical liberalism, so a complete reunion is likely not achievable.
So really what I'm looking for is to at some point have liberals at least willing to listen to libertarians on economic issues, and conservatives at least willing to listen to us on social issues. In the meantime, the best approach for libertarians is to simply be political free agents, supporting Dems who are libertarian where Dems are supposed to be libertarian, and supporting Republicans who are libertarian where they are supposed to be libertarian.
On “Can The (Economic) Ladder Be Restored?”
The issue of foreign ownership of American debt is really quite frightening, which is one reason why our massive deficit spending of the last 8+ years is so disturbing to me.
That said, in terms of currency stabilization and/or something of a global equilibrium, that definitely sounds like a Dave question. But I do know that the gold standard, or at least the pure gold standard advocated by Ron Paul, is a really bad idea. There's really little reason to think that it is any more stable than any other form of currency (and a lot of economists will cite it as a major cause of the Great Depression). As our friend Kip has pointed out a few times, you could fit all the gold ever mined in human history in a cube the size of a baseball diamond. The justification for the gold standard in many ways derives from the mistaken belief that gold production roughly tracks increases in overall productivity; but of course there are gold booms and busts, and technological advances in the production of goods that ensure that productivity will not track particularly well with the extraction of gold (which also has the downside of existing in the earth in finite quantities).
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Just to add to Will's point - another moral consequence of free trade is that there appears to be a pretty strong correlation between free trade and peaceful relations. In other words, there is a strong argument to be made that increased free trade is an essential element to world peace. This actually makes quite a bit of sense when you think about it - the more your economy is dependent on the free flow of goods to and from other nations, the less likely you will be to act aggressively towards those other nations. There's also a fair amount of research suggesting that free trade is the best way to encourage the spread of liberalism/pluralism more generally.
And that says nothing about the moral implications of the unintended consequences of protectionism (especially Third World food shortages; I really can't emphasize that enough).
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Chris: No doubt that the West has been more than a bit hypocritical in its imposition of policies on developing nations. Frankly, if a developing nation imposes high tariffs on Western goods, the likely effect on the Western nation is going to be de minimis; whereas a Western nation imposing a high tariff on a developing nation's goods (or subsidizing a good that is produced cheaply in a developing nation) may well prevent the developing nation from, well, developing.
As for the issue of Ricardian theory on comparative advantage no longer holding true.....First, you'll get a much better explanation on that from a professional economist, although the answer is going to be a "no."; several rather well-known such economists are remarkably willing to entertain questions such as that. That said, it's well worth pointing to Krugman for a pretty good answer (it really pains me as a libertarian to so repeatedly cite him, but the fact is that there's probably no one better on the issue of international trade). See this article, for starters: http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/ricardo.htm
Also - Krugman's Nobel-winning theories are largely credited as refining Ricardo.
ED - the thing about trade is that ultimately it winds up benefiting both nations (although one may benefit more than the other, but both wind up in better shape). So, even if you don't much care about the developing world (which I think is a mistake, not just on humanitarian grounds, but also on realpolitik grounds), as long as you accept the principle of comparative advantage, free trade does not hurt either country. It may, to be sure, hurt a particular industry in a country; but what is unseen is the benefits it has on other industries in that country.
But one of the great hindrances to free trade is, I think, the fact that it's something of a prisoner's dilemma. If only one nation reduces its protectionism, it may do poorly because of the other nation's barriers; if neither nation does so, neither is worse off; and if both nations do so, both are better off. This is why increasing free trade via treaty and international organizations is essential (a concept that puts me at odds with some libertarians).