Sunday 25 November 2007

Libertarianism & pragmatism (1)

There are those who say that libertarianism is actually a belief system. I am not actually sure whether I believe in anything apart from commonsense and intellectual honesty, or 'pragmatism' for want of a catchy name, I am a political atheist and therefore only a libertarian by default.

Just for fun, let's try giving pragmatic answers to the first six of Dave Bergland's killer questions, which distinguish between traditionally left-wing, right-wing and libertarian replies and see how similar they are to the libertarian answers:

Should there be a draft for military purposes?
Pragmatic: Certainly not during peacetime, and only during war time if there is a real threat that the country will be invaded and conquered.

Should government own or control newspapers, radio, or television?
Pragmatic: No, why? It just ends up as taxpayer-funded propaganda. People don't like propaganda, it's boring, if nothing else, so that is just a waste of money.

Should government regulate sexual activity among consenting adults, including prostitution?
Pragmatic: No certainly not. To be able to regulate what goes on behind closed doors properly and fairly, you'd need a surveillance state. Making (activities related to) prostitution illegal make it more dangerous for prostitutes. There are states where prostitution/brothels are legal/regulated and things work just fine.

Should drugs like marijuana, cocaine, and heroin be legalized?
Pragmatic: People will take drugs anyway, whether they are legal or not. Making them illegal attracts criminals as suppliers, reduces the quality (so increasing the burden on health services) and increases the price (thus pushing users into crime or prostitution to fund their habits). These drugs should be legally available, suitable regulated and taxed to ensure that the user pays the 'social costs' of the drugs.

And, leaving the question about immigration until post 6 in this series...

Should government subsidize farmers and regulate what they grow?
Pragmatic: No, certainly not. One man's subsidy is another man's tax burden. Subsidies for land-owernship are the worst subsidies of all. The decision as to what to grow is best left to individual farmers, who in turn respond to what households actually want to eat. Conversely, if farmers are left to their own devices, then the government takes less of the blame when things go wrong.

In summary, I don't see any real difference between the libertarian answers and the pragmatic answers. Have I missed something here?

This is quite good fun actually, I think I'll answer the rest of the questions in the next instalments to this series.

14 comments:

Simon Fawthrop said...

I can't argue with the pragmatist view so far and am looking forward to part 2, which appears to have more contintious questions.

Scott Freeman said...

Two minor points:

A lot of libertarians would oppose conscription even if the country was going to be invaded because slavery is always wrong (that would be the libertarian view) and because if nobody is willing to defend their country then they probably either don't mind being invaded or would rather fight as guerilla war than join a traditional military organisation (that would be the pragmatic view).

Whilst I agree that sex between consenting adults shouldn't be regulated, I think saying that it should not because it happens behind closed doors is a poor argument for not doing so. For instance, domestic abuse usually goes on behind closed doors, but it should certainly not be allowed. I suppose the pragmatic argument would be "why the hell should it be? It just doesn't hurt anyone."

Scott Freeman said...

p.s.

Whenever I comment on your blog it gives me an error the first time, but not the second :S Doesn't happen on other Blogger blogs... weird.

Mark Wadsworth said...

SC, good point on guerrilla warfare, but I think Britain fared a lot better in WW2 than did France.

With domestic violence, there is a victim who is (or should be) free to go to the police. With kinky sex, there is no victim!

Devil's Kitchen said...

"For instance, domestic abuse usually goes on behind closed doors, but it should certainly not be allowed."

Domestic violence is the initiation of force against another, and thus an infringement of their liberties.

The pragmatic view could actually be more libertarian, since this is absolutely against the most fundamental law of libertarianism.

However, as Mark says, the victim must go to the police (or whatever agency is set up to be reported to) as opposed to having a surveillance state.

DK

Scott Freeman said...

There you go Mark, a much better argument :D

To be honest, I'm not sure how much of a role conscription played in saving Britain from Germany. What stopped an invasion was not the man power of a vast army, but our air force and our navy - which I believe were both mostly made up of volunteers.

This argument of Francs vs Britain doesn't worth though, because France had a lot more conscription than Britain, but still got invaded!

Scott Freeman said...

DK - not sure if you misunderstand me but just so you know: I am a libertarian - preaching to the choir ;)

Simon Fawthrop said...

I think WW2 can summed in this context a conscript army invades other countries with under manned conscript armies. Meanwhile volunter army, navy and airforce hold out (with the aid of a large body of water) long enough for scientists to start giving them the edge and for a consciprt army to be raised and trained.

The point being that if it wasn't for conscipted armies we probably wouldn't even need volunteer armies. When was the last time one volunteer army attcked a country that only had volunteer armed forces?

In a libertarian/pragmatist argument the leadership could never raise an armed force that could be used to attack another libertarian country.

Neil Harding said...

Mark, I agree with you on all these points but a few things to remember. I want a completely free media. Do we have that when a few media tycoons own and control it? How do we make it more free? - government intervention is needed to introduce and maintain healthy competition in most markets which tend towards dysfunctionality and the media is no different. Also publicly funded broadcasters like the BBC have been invaluable to give a perspective not completely controlled by advertisers. The BBC can give a voice to consumers that advertiser funded media would not.

Also, the same goes for the environment. We all dislike the CAP but we sometimes need to plan longer term. We may not need agricultural land now, when we import everything from 'more efficient' producers elsewhere. But how quickly could we get it back if we covered it all in concrete. Subsidies are sometimes needed.

Mark Wadsworth said...

Neil, since when were you a NIMBY?

Nobody's going to cover everything in concrete (only 10% of UK by area is actually developed), in any event. it's restrictive planning permission and not agricultural subsidies that prevent it.

Steve_Roberts said...

About conscription: In the event of "a real threat that the country will be invaded and conquered" there will be no shortage of volunteers and no need for conscription.

About media concentration: That is largely an effect of economies of scale in production and distribution which have been more or less totally undermined by the net - it is now a zombie ie dead but doesn't know it. Secondly media concentration is bolstered by government control of transmission frequencies and granting of licences to broadcast - also rapidly becoming irrelevant.

With regard to agriculture and: "we sometimes need to plan longer term."
Aren't CAP and CFP sufficient proof that central planning does not necessarily lead to desireable outcomes ? Supporters of central planning make several false assumptions: that the data required to make a good plan can be gathered; that it will be gathered; that it will be used to make a good plan, as opposed to a bad plan; that nature, people and events will conform to planning assumptions; that the planned outcomes will be as desirble when attained as they seemed when the plan was developed; etc

Mark Wadsworth said...

SR, excellent points. You've fleshed out what I was thinking, but I had to keep my original post reasonably brief.

As to farming, if the worst came to the worst, we'd just eat more vegetables and less meat, the UK could easily be self-sufficient if we were all vegetarians (a bit boring, but it keeps you alive).

Neil Harding said...

Mark, Steve, NIMBYs are sometimes right, although usually for the wrong reasons. Uneconomic agricultural land needs looking after - if we are not going to let farmers do this through subsidies then the pressure to develop it for other uses will become intense - some legitimate, most not, and planning rules are easily changed. Good point about vegetarianism. As well as energy security we also need to start thinking about food security. Food & water are going to become more scarce as the climate changes and biofuels compete for land to feed car growth. For all its faults the CAP has at least maintained large areas of agricultural production across Europe that will see us in good stead in the future. Even before the CAP, the UK saw the need to subsidise farmers.

steve, I hope you are right about the net - it is helping, but most people still get their news from elsewhere. Also net use is heavily influenced by the deadwood media and the net is now becoming increasingly concentrated to a few sites.

Simon Fawthrop said...

"Uneconomic agricultural land needs looking after - if we are not going to let farmers do this through subsidies then the pressure to develop it for other uses will become intense - some legitimate, most not, and planning rules are easily changed. "

Neil,

You base the need for agricultural subsidies on the premise that global warming will lead to food shortages, which isn't proved and it may be the opposite. Anyway, that's not the point I want to make.

Experience has shown that subsidies always lead to inefficiencies and never address the real problem, even if there is one.

Furthermore, you don't take in to account the opportunity cost. These subsidies are not being invested in wealth creation, which may address your perceived problem anyway.

Finally, by subsiding inefficient Euorpean farming we are distorting the market and making it more difficult for African and other farmers to develop their businesses efficiently, addressing 2 problems in one go.