Difference between revisions of "Interview With Mike Huben, Creator Of Critiques Of Libertarianism"

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{{DES | des = An exploration of why libertarians can believe the kinds of things they believe.  How they can be so callous, ignore obvious problems,  be so dogmatic, etc. | show=}}

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Eric Snyder: With the Critiques of Libertarianism website you've compiled what is likely the single best resource to be found anywhere. It's really an incredible achievement. You've been reflecting on this political-economic ideology for many years and likely have a more nuanced and learned perspective on libertarianism than probably the vast majority of either its critics or adherents. What stands out for you over the years you've been learning and thinking about libertarianism? What are the major insights you've gained? What has changed most in your understanding of it?

Mike Huben: Actually, it is still two websites: I've hardly begun bringing over the old links from the old site to the new wiki-based site. I've been so busy building infrastructure and entering new information as I find it that I haven't had time to bring over the 500+ links form the old site. The new site already has 600+ links. I also have more than a thousand candidate links in my bookmarks and 250+ books to enter. Slow work, since everything needs to be categorized meaningfully.

ES: In my own encounters with libertarianism I've been struck repeatedly by a moral callousness and lack of ethical seriousness. For instance, I recall a libertarian discussant arguing that it would be better to not pay taxes even if the result were people dying because they couldn't afford, let's say, dialysis or medications. One libertarian with whom I debated stated that the latter part of 19th century America was a high point of freedom in the country, an ideal towards which we should return. But I noticed that when I mentioned brutal and dangerous working conditions, savage racism and violence, gender inequality, he was unphased. None of that mattered nearly as much as the government not doing all that much. There's Ayn Rand herself, in particular her admiration of a sociopath, about whom she said "Other people do not exist for him, and he does not see why they should." "He has the true, innate psychology of a Superman. He can never realize and feel other people." I'm reluctant to make generalizations based on my necessarily limited experience and knowledge, but there does seem to be quite a lot of evidence for--call it the--moral callousness thesis. What's your take on this?

MH: Upton Sinclair wrote: "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!" Likewise, it is difficult to get a man to understand something when his ideology or prior beliefs depend upon it. Some libertarians, the Bleeding Heart Libertarians, admit this is a big problem for libertarianism. Then they attempt to wiggle through all sorts of pseudo-academic contortions to resolve this in-your-face problem.  

ES: In his Development as Freedom, economist Amartya Sen notes how conditions of human degradation, suffering and death are perfectly compatible with a libertarian conception of rights: "...as is shown in my Poverty and Famines, even gigantic famines can result without anyone's libertarian rights (including property rights) being violated. The destitutes such as the unemployed or the impoverished may starve precisely because their "entitlements"--legitimate as they are--do not give them enough food. This might look like a special case of a "catastrophic moral horror," but horrors of any degree of seriousness--all the way from gigantic famines to regular undernourishment and endemic but nonextreme hunger--can be shown to be consistent with a system in which no one's libertarian rights are violated. Similarly, deprivation of other types (for example, the lack of medical care for curable illnesses) can coexist with all libertarian rights (including rights of property ownership) being fully satisfied."[3] I trust we both find this basic criticism correct and quite obvious. And yet here we have a political philosophy that either refuses to see the limitations of its theory of rights and freedom or, if it does see it, is not particularly troubled by it. Perhaps both. How are we to understand this?

MH: First, Amartya Sen is one of my great heroes. His Capability Approach (with Martha Nussman) is a huge leap beyond the usual rights talk because it is pragmatic, progressive and not utopian. I wish progressives would seize upon it and smash the rigid ideology of rights in the US.

ES: I'm sometimes almost incredulous that libertarianism even exists or is even taken seriously given its many flaws. In the main it seems impervious to evidence. For example, neoclassical economics, a key intellectual foundation for some libertarians, appears to be a theory in terminal crisis (to this non-economist), with challenges from ecological economics, to Steven Keen's Debunking Economics and more. And yet it's the seemingly eternal go-to theory. There's the fact that in some cases 'market liberalization' can have disastrous results for human well-being and life.[4] And yet they still call for more. What do you make of this? Does libertarianism strike you in any way as a kind of secular religion? What explains the dogmatism? And, perhaps more importantly, what can be done?  

MH: Once again, the political face of libertarianism is mostly owned by the Kochtopus. The Koch brothers have profited enormously through regulatory capture, and the small fraction of those billions that they have invested in the Kochtopus have spawned hundreds of think-tanks and other organizations that spew the opinions and support the crank academics that justify their policies to politicians and the law public. For 30+ years they have bought their own "facts": they have sponsored generations of students, training for judges and politicians, departments in universities, revisionist histories, science denialism, dirty tricks, public deception, and a lot more. Because control of politics is highly profitable. This is their profession, concentrating wealth through plutocracy, and they have created massive institutions to serve their profession. The opposition, seeking to democratically spread the wealth, is seriously outgunned, uncoordinated, underfunded, undertrained and mostly volunteer or part time rather than professional. That includes me.  

ES: I'm wondering if you could give readers who might have not spent a lot of time thinking about libertarianism a quick tour of articles and pages you think are most important on Critiques of Libertarianism.

MH: Well, that's the purpose of the Basics section of the welcome page. The "Introduction To Libertarianism" page gives the biggest picture: I divide libertarianism into Political (Koch-sponsored), Individual (the true believers) and Philosophical (non-Koch attempts to convince people.) "The Short, Simple Dismissal Of Libertarianism" gives a mere 20 reasons why libertarianism could be rejected out of hand as undesirable, unlikely, untrue or unacceptable. "A Non-Libertarian FAQ", my first writing about libertarians, is long but has held up very well for over 20 years. I think it largely worked: I don't see the arguments it criticizes used nearly as much any more. Most libertarians who wrote critiques of it said about half of it was good, but none of them agreed on which half. :-) And the "Descriptions Of Libertarianism" index has two good articles with critical descriptions of what libertarianism is. The first gives more than 20 critical views of the nature of libertarianism. The second gives an unusually insightful conservative view of libertarianism and its flaws.  

ES: Thank you, Mike!