(2003-08-22) Arnold Kling Libertarian Manifesto

Arnold Kling's Libertarian manifesto - Above all, I am an empiricist, so that I distrust any ideology that has not been tested in practice - including libertarianism. I allow for the possibility that libertarian policies, such as School Vouchers or Drug Legalization, could have some of the adverse consequences of their critics. I am prepared to change my mind depending on how policies play out... I am glad that Irving Kristol spelled out what he means by neoconservatism. By putting his cards on the table, he inspired me to show mine. I understand his argument that his neoconservative persuasion is more potent politically than my libertarian persuasion. By giving ground on the welfare state and making an alliance with religious conservatives, the Neo-Con-s are able to forge a successful coalition. But I see risks in the neocon approach. By leaving intact the apparatus of Big Government, the neocons may permit the revival of the "dead hand" of socialist planning. By allying with social conservatives, the neocons are saying that the "CultureWar" belongs in the political arena, where I fear it may do nothing but corrode and divide our society.

This is in response to Irving Kristol's Neo-Con essay - This leads to the issue of the role of the state. Neocons do not like the concentration of services in the Welfare State and are happy to study alternative ways of delivering these services. But they are impatient with the Hayekian (F A Hayek) notion that we are on "the Road To Serfdom." Neocons do not feel that kind of alarm or anxiety about the growth of the state in the past century, seeing it as natural, indeed inevitable. Because they tend to be more interested in history than economics or sociology, they know that the 19th-century idea, so neatly propounded by Herbert Spencer in his "The Man Versus The State," was a historical eccentricity. People have always preferred strong government to weak government, although they certainly have no liking for anything that smacks of overly intrusive government. Neocons feel at home in today's America to a degree that more traditional conservatives do not. Though they find much to be critical about, they tend to seek intellectual guidance in the democratic wisdom of Alexis De Tocqueville, rather than in the Tory nostalgia of, say, Russell Kirk. But it is only to a degree that neocons are comfortable in modern America. The steady decline in our democratic culture, sinking to new levels of vulgarity, does unite neocons with traditional conservatives - though not with those Libertarian conservatives who are conservative in economics but unmindful of the Culture. The upshot is a quite unexpected alliance between neocons, who include a fair proportion of secular intellectuals, and religious traditionalists. They are united on issues concerning the quality of education, the relations of Church And State, the regulation of Porno Graphy, and the like, all of which they regard as proper candidates for the government's attention. And since the Republican Party now has a substantial base among the religious, this gives neocons a certain influence and even power. Because religious conservatism is so feeble in Europe, the neoconservative potential there is correspondingly weak.