Whoops. In error I responded to Michael alone rather than the list.. ---------------------------- Original Message ---------------------------- Subject: Libertarianism (was Re: [luv-talk] torrent software) From: "Lev Lafayette" <lev@levlafayette.com> Date: Fri, April 10, 2015 9:56 am To: "Michael Verrenkamp" <jabjabs@fastmail.com.au> -------------------------------------------------------------------------- On Thu, April 9, 2015 8:43 pm, Michael Verrenkamp wrote:
" Not sure you can be "a bit" of a libertarian. Either you are, or you
aren't. If you support some regulation, then you're probably not a libertarian. Essentially, what you're saying is that you only like the laws that you like. "
Sounds like me :P I like the broad concept of libertarians but I don't actually think it would be a great overall system. We should limit governments powers but libertarians can go a little too far at times. I also could be talking total crap right now.
Of course one of the big political changes from the 1970s was the ability of neoliberals to co-opt the word 'libertarian' which historically, and on a continuing basis, was associated with anarcho-socialists. a) The first person to identify as a libertarian in the political sense was Joseph Dejacque, an anarcho-communist and signatory to the First International. b) The first periodical to identify with libertarian politics was "Le Libertaire, Journal du Mouvement social" which was a hot-bed of anarchist, socialist and communist thought. c) To this day even in the United States, the first political organisation to use the named is the Libertarian Book Club, which distributes anarcho-syndalist and council communist texts. d) In the UK, the avowedly socialist Common Wealth Party had the journal; "The Libertarian" and so it goes on. The Anarchist FAQ provides an interesting combination. http://www.infoshop.org/AnarchistFAQ-PDF
From the FAQ
While the Greek words anarchos and anarchia are often taken to mean "having no government" or "being without a government," as can be seen, the strict, original meaning of anarchism was not simply "no government." "An-archy" means "without a ruler," or more generally, "without authority," and it is in this sense that anarchists have continually used the word. For example, we find Kropotkin arguing that anarchism "attacks not only capital, but also the main sources of the power of capitalism: law, authority, and the State." [Op. Cit., p. 150] For anarchists, anarchy means "not necessarily absence of order, as is generally supposed, but an absence of rule." ... In such a [anarchist] society the whole conception of government would change. The economic structure would come to replace the traditional government apparatus. The need for government in the tradition sense would disappear, to be replaced by the planning and administration of trade and industry. The government of people would be replaced by the administration of things. There would be no need for democracy. The administrators would be appointed on the basis of their professional competence. Considering definitions from the American Heritage Dictionary, we find: LIBERTARIAN: one who believes in freedom of action and thought; one who believes in free will. SOCIALISM: a social system in which the producers possess both political power and the means of producing and distributing goods. Just taking those two first definitions and fusing them yields: LIBERTARIAN SOCIALISM: a social system which believes in freedom of action and thought and free will, in which the producers possess both political power and the means of producing and distributing goods. However, due to the creation of the Libertarian Party in the USA, many people now consider the idea of "libertarian socialism" to be a contradiction in terms. Indeed, many "Libertarians" think anarchists are just attempting to associate the "anti-libertarian" ideas of "socialism" (as Libertarians conceive it) with Libertarian ideology in order to make those "socialist" ideas more "acceptable" -- in other words, trying to steal the "libertarian" label from its rightful possessors. Nothing could be further from the truth. Anarchists have been using the term "libertarian" to describe themselves and their ideas since the 1850's. According to anarchist historian Max Nettlau, the revolutionary anarchist Joseph Dejacque published Le Libertaire, Journal du Mouvement Social in New York between 1858 and 1861 while the use of the term "libertarian communism" dates from November, 1880 when a French anarchist congress adopted it. [Max Nettlau, A Short History of Anarchism, p. 75 and p. 145] The use of the term "Libertarian" by anarchists became more popular from the 1890s onward after it was used in France in an attempt to get round anti-anarchist laws and to avoid the negative associations of the word "anarchy" in the popular mind (Sebastien Faure and Louise Michel published the paper Le Libertaire -- The Libertarian -- in France in 1895, for example). Since then, particularly outside America, it has always been associated with anarchist ideas and movements. Taking a more recent example, in the USA, anarchists organised "The Libertarian League" in July 1954, which had staunch anarcho-syndicalist principles and lasted until 1965. The US-based "Libertarian" Party, on the other hand has only existed since the early 1970's, well over 100 years after anarchists first used the term to describe their political ideas (and 90 years after the expression "libertarian communism" was first adopted). It is that party, not the anarchists, who have "stolen" the word. Later, in Section B, we will discuss why the idea of a "libertarian" capitalism (as desired by the Libertarian Party) is a contradiction in terms. Hope this helps, -- Lev Lafayette, BA (Hons), GradCertTerAdEd (Murdoch), GradCertPM, MBA (Tech Mngmnt) (Chifley) mobile: 0432 255 208 RFC 1855 Netiquette Guidelines http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc1855.txt -- Lev Lafayette, BA (Hons), GradCertTerAdEd (Murdoch), GradCertPM, MBA (Tech Mngmnt) (Chifley) mobile: 0432 255 208 RFC 1855 Netiquette Guidelines http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc1855.txt