Category Archives: Blog

If pressed to sum up their political philosophy in a single sentence, many libertarians will cite the following proposition, formulated by Ayn Rand in her essay “Man’s Rights”:

A civilized society is one in which physical force is banned from human relationships–in which the government, acting as a policeman, may use force only in retaliation and only against those who initiate force.

In a second essay, “The Nature of Government,” she expresses the same essential idea in a slightly different way:

The precondition of a civilized society is the barring of physical force from social relationships–thus establishing the principle that if men wish to deal with one another, they may do so only by means of reason: by discussion, persuasion and voluntary, uncoerced agreement.

The moral stance referenced above has come to be known as the “non-aggression principle” (or”axiom”). Continue Reading »

One of the major fault lines in libertarian theory runs between those who regard the state as inherently evil (the “anarcho-capitalists”) and those who contend that the minimal state, i.e. one limited essentially to the provision of national defense and  domestic law enforcement, is morally legitimate. The anarcho-capitalist indictment of the state is quite simple and straight-forward: any coercion employed against innocent persons (those not themselves engaged in aggression against others) is wrong (the “non-aggression principle”). Since the minimal state, among other things, collects taxes on a non-consensual basis to fund its activities, it is morally objectionable. Continue Reading »

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