Dual Paths… « On ALLiance…

A study by CommonWealth Magazine awhile back grouped the US into 10 cultural regions (summary: http://chasblogspot.blogspot.com/2007/09/really-cool-political-map-of-usa.html). What was interesting about the study, when I looked at the data, was that areas considered less statist also had more income equality.

I think many libertarians chafe at the idea that income equality is a desirable end goal, but I suspect that it is symptomatic of a more voluntary society.

Very few people enjoy working as serfs, so they will become entrepreneurs if the opportunity is available. And a catallaxy teeming with would-be entrepreneurs makes it very difficult for existing ‘owners of the means of production’ to sustain windfall profits – unless they are providing a service that substantially outclasses (excuse the pun) all their competitors. [I would consider Apple a prime example of this.]

It is true that the poor have the most to lose from statism, so I expect their revolutionary urgency will be a great asset to the liberty movement… as it is in the Middle East right now. It’s just important for us well-educated, bourgie folks to spread memes that help people help themselves.

Anyway, thoughtful essay. Keep ‘em coming.

Respectfully,
Mike

That is the whole point of society.

This topic has become very dear to my heart as I fit awkwardly into the categorical proletariat class. Although I don’t identify with such abstractions, in my daily interactions at work, the theme of absolute subordination is the order of the day.

The whole working arrangement is anti-cooperative because fundamentally, it seems workers want to be self directing. I know I do. I want the privilege to tell the boss ‘No, that is a retarded task and I’m not going to waste my time on it.” That is what it boils down to. People don’t like being ordered around, even for a paycheck.

I don’t call myself a Left Libertarian, however. I’m as an-cap as they come because I make no distinction between labor and capital. Labor is capital, of a peculiar nature. I simply think the nature of the labor/capital relationship is skewed because of state meddling. Should that end, laborers may have more options.

Well, I found most of the people who exemplify this trend in the ALLiance of the Left Libertarian/Center for a Stateless Society orbit. Most of them are wage earners or academic allies and it definitely influences how and why they think the way that they do. They’re a weird group though because it is very syncretic; drawing influences from the classical liberal tradition as well as the socialist tradition.

“Libertarian Feminism: Can This Marriage be Saved?” is one of my favorite essays of all time. It is incredibly poignant and I wish more libertarians would read it. Charles Johnson writes on the topic quite a bit at http://www.radgeek.com, though that essay is a big one. http://all-left.net has essays on feminism in the same thick vein which goes beyond the sort of equality before the law obsession which libertarians go on about and instead focuses on changing culture away from oppressive and undesirable non-violations of the Non-Aggression Principle. Just because it isn’t active assault doesn’t mean we should just not care how we treat one another, especially if it means making people feel excluded or less than fully autonomous.

I’d definitely parouse their footnotes in that essay and see where that takes you as well.

I hate to open with an objection, but it’s the first thing that popped out at me:

I don’t consider left-libertarian ideas to be “divergences” from some mythical “standard libertarian politics.”

If there is a “standard libertarian politics” from which one or more strains are “divergences,” then I’d posit the early 19th century class analysis of Comte/Dunoyer et. al and the “left libertarianism” that descends from it as the “standard,” and the late-20th century rightward revisions of e.g. the Randians and Rothbardians as the “divergences.”