Wednesday, November 7, 2007

Are you a Libertarian?

There is only one rule in Libertarianism. If you agree with it, then you are a libertarian. This one rule is the Non-Aggression Principle (NAP). It states:
no one has the right, under any circumstances, to initiate force against another human being, nor to delegate its initiation.

Are you a Libertarian?

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hello, iih.

I am a Libertarian.

Ali said...

lurker jack:

NAP is actually a very broad principle. Hence, many people (including so-called hawks) would indeed be libertarian. My personal beliefs is that most human beings are, but because of politics and fictitious pretenses they are made to believe that they are not.

highnumber said...

Get cracking, iih!

Get back to work. More blog entries. More. More More!

Did you read the Dondero interview at Urkobold? I would love for you to write a response to some of his comments.

Ali said...

highnumber-

:-) Sure will!

Anonymous said...

The Non-Aggression Principle, as you have stated it, would prohibit ANY involuntary taxation (as opposed to voluntarily subscribing to government-run defense, police, fire, road etc. services). Thus, this take on libertarianism would limit it to anarcho-capitalists, who are in fact a tiny subset of libertarians as that is commonly defined.

I would say that a libertarian is someone who agrees in principle with the NAP, even if they allow some exceptions.

Ali said...

prolefeed-

I disagree with you. To guarantee that NAP holds, there must be a police to enforce it. This gets paid for by tax-payers. So I do not see this directly and necessarily leading to anarchism. NAP is an all encompassing principle. Its degree of application depends on the members of society. As I say in a comment above, it can also be used to justify pre-emptive wars.

But in the spirit of this blog, yes, I agree with you that NAP can lead to anarchism, but a peaceful one for, otherwise, it will fundamentally violate NAP. To reiterate my original point, though, NAP does not necessarily lead to anarchy.

Anonymous said...

iih -- Using taxes to finance the police enforcing the NAP would itself be a violation of the NAP, since taking money from someone without their consent IS initiation of aggression. To be perfectly consistent with the NAP, the police would need to be privitized, similar to an insurance company / private security firm insuring your safety, along with the court system.

Ali said...

prolefeed --

Not if you have a tax form where you pick and choose where your tax money goes. You could also have "None of the above" as an option if you do not wish to receive police protection, but do expect to be arrested if you break the common law. Once you step outside your home (in a stateless society), you'd technically be in the common public space that is shared by all except you (the non-tax payer). So unless you are willing to live in your house for ever, feel free to refuse paying any kind of tax, but expect to just bear the consequences. So this show that under NAP, most people will choose to have some sort of police protection, we might just as well to give it to a local government (that is why we rely mainly on PDs in today's America for policing).

But in any case, I see that you are worried about one of the extreme implications of the law.

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