Martin Elson
Libertarianism is the refusal of rule: the view that no one holds a natural right to decide for others. It began as a name anarchists gave themselves (see The Origins of the Word “Libertarian”), and its roots are radical, not conservative.
Radical, not merely liberal
Eric Patton’s CounterPunch essay Liberalism vs. Radicalism draws the line cleanly. A liberal accepts that someone has the right to decide and asks them to decide better. A radical denies that right and holds that those affected by a decision should make it. Its image is the plantation: removing the owner changes little if the split between those who decide and those who carry out remains. Libertarianism, in this sense, is radicalism that challenges every hierarchy to justify itself. Rule never can; authority that is lent, recallable and open to exit sometimes can. The aim is not a flat world but a heterarchy: many centers, roles that answer to the people they serve, and no fixed top.
Heir to classical liberalism — in context
Mario Rizzo argues that classical liberalism and libertarianism are one spectrum of thought, running from limited-government liberals to individualist anarchists such as Spooner, Herbert and Tucker. They share a center: property, contract, autonomy, and the state as the main threat to liberty. They split on grounding (natural law, utility, contract) and on empirical questions such as public goods and foreign policy.
The Freedom This Time essay adds the needed caution. Wilhelm von Humboldt limited the state because, in his day, it was the only concentrated power; private persons competed, lost fortunes and died. Corporations in the US are now immortal legal persons that escape those limits. A consistent Humboldt today would restrain them too. Taking classical-liberal conclusions out of their setting turns a theory of liberty into a defense of whoever is powerful now.
They saw it coming
Nineteenth-century libertarians already described the system later called fascism. Roderick Long’s C4SS talk They Saw It Coming shows Bastiat, Molinari, Comte and Dunoyer locating the ruling class in political access, not production. Spencer, Sumner and Spooner tied plutocracy to militarism: war enriches insiders while the public pays in debt and taxes. Because rule depends on popular consent, they also attacked its cultural supports — nationalism, militarism, patriarchy. Spencer’s name for the drift was “re-barbarization”: the slide from a civil society of contract and cooperation back to one of command.
One family, two wings
The tradition has an individualist wing (mutualists, egoists, agorists) and a communal wing (anarcho-communists, syndicalists, collectivists). Individualists want occupancy-and-use in place of absentee property, and expect free competition to abolish rent, interest and profit. Communists want social ownership and distribution by need, and fear markets amplify inequality. Benjamin Tucker and Kropotkin fought bitterly over this. The wings have since drawn closer. Murray Bookchin’s libertarian municipalism — face-to-face assemblies, federated city to city — gave the communal wing a democracy without a state. From the market side, Kevin Carson has argued for much the same networked, municipal model. Bob Black’s answer is the site’s too: “The apparent contradiction between individualism and communism rests on a misunderstanding of both.” Both reject the state; both reject wage labor as privilege. Where they differ — means, not ends — the honest position is anarchism without adjectives. Markets are a good tool, not the only one. A free society can run on a mix of markets, commons, co-ops and mutual aid, and free communities should be left to try the blend that works for them.
Sources
- Eric Patton, “Liberalism vs. Radicalism” (CounterPunch, 10 May 2013). Who has the right to decide; the plantation. original · copy here
- Mario Rizzo, “Libertarianism and Classical Liberalism: Is There a Difference?” (ThinkMarkets, 2014). Liberty as one spectrum. original · copy here
- David, “What Kind of Libertarian Are You?” (Freedom This Time, 2011). Humboldt in context; the immortal corporation. original · copy here
- Wilhelm von Humboldt, The Limits of State Action (written 1792; published 1852). Online Library of Liberty
- Roderick T. Long, “They Saw It Coming: The 19th-Century Libertarian Critique of Fascism” (talk, Mises Institute, The Economics of Fascism; LewRockwell.com, 2005; C4SS, 2012). Plutocracy, militarism, Spencer’s re-barbarization. C4SS · copy here
- Bob Black, Nightmares of Reason (2010). Individualism and communism as one misunderstanding. The Anarchist Library
- An Anarchist FAQ, section I. Libertarian socialism as the original libertarianism. anarchistfaq.org (PDF) · copy here
- “The Libertarian Spectrum” (compiled). The two wings side by side. copy here
- Martin Elson, “The Origins of the Word ‘Libertarian’.” Belsham to Déjacque to the Libertarian Party. here
- Murray Bookchin, The Next Revolution: Popular Assemblies and the Promise of Direct Democracy, ed. Debbie Bookchin and Blair Taylor (Verso, 2015). Libertarian municipalism; the communal wing’s democracy without a state. contents and introduction
- Kevin A. Carson, “Libertarian Municipalism: Networked Cities as Resilient Platforms for Post-Capitalist Transition” (Center for a Stateless Society, January 2018). The market wing meeting the municipalists. C4SS study (PDF)