Category Archives: Political Philosophy/Theory

Current Events, Discourse, Economics, Ethical Issues, Free Speech, Political Philosophy/Theory, Social Criticism, Toleration

Continue to give the gift of questioning in the New Year! 

I was recently on C-Span discussing civil discourse, was on the Newstalk STL radio show discussing it, and was interviewed for a piece posted at MLive. I thought I’d follow those up with a couple of posts encouraging civil discourse over the holidays. Here’s the second.

The gift giving holiday season is ending.  My hope, though, is that we can nonetheless use the spirit of the holidays to the advantage of the polity by continuing to give each other the gift of questioning in the New Year.  Questioning each other and ourselves is always useful, perhaps especially in politics.  

Fortunately (and despite fears), the midterm elections of 2022 went well.  There were very few worries raised about election integrity and those falsely pressing claims about past problems with election integrity mostly found themselves on the losing end of elections.  While this is great news, we shouldn’t rush to conclude that democracy is now secure.  We need, and should expect, more from ourselves than we’ve been giving.  In particular, we need more from those we disagree with, whether they be family members, friends, neighbors, or people we know in the cyberspace of social media.  And they need more from us.  I hope more people can work on this and begin to satisfy those needs and, in the process, perhaps, give the world the gift ofsecure democracy.

Consider the sort of vehement disagreements we often hear about (or take part in) about who the best candidate is for any particular post.  These are not new.  We’ve always had them and likely always will.  What matters is that we not devolve into thinking that the candidate we favor is ideal, completely above partisanship, ideology, and plain self-interestedness, while the candidate we oppose is partisan, ideological, self-interested, and out to destroy our lives.  To pretend that “our candidate” is as kind as Ol’ St. Nick or that “their candidate” is as terrible as Scrooge himself would not be in the spirit of the holidays.  

Those seeking our votes for political office usually have their own interests in mind.  As economist James Buchanan pointed out, there is a symmetry of motivations between politicians and those in business (or any other area).  Recognizing this is important.  It means, for example, that a politician that promises something that seems to be against her own interests is deserving of our skepticism.  Admitting that skepticism to each other—both to those who vote like us and those who do not—might be the single most important gift citizens in a democracy can give one another.  This questioning—especially of own political parties—would reduce political rancor and polarization, promote more informed voting, and perhaps get us better political leaders.

Given the symmetry of motivations between business people and politicians, we should consider a standard sort of constraint we impose on business people: the expectation of honesty.  It must apply to politicians as well as anyone.  At a minimum, after all, we want our elected officials to be honest.

We have to expect that those seeking office will work to get votes and we have to realize this incentive might discourage honesty.  We should, nonetheless, expect candidates for office to be honest in the process of campaigning and, if they win, while in office.  We should expect them not to intentionally seek to deceive. We should expect them to answer any questions put to them forthrightly.  (At least with regard to any questions relevant to the post to which they seek election.)  If they are caught failing in this regard, they should lose our support.  We should not vote for them, even if they are members of the party to which we claim some form of allegiance.  Voting for the polity, rather than voting for your party, is another gift of and to our democratic polity.

That we should not vote for a member of the party to which we claim some allegiance requires that we reject identifying ourselves as member of that party.  As soon as a member of “our” party (or other group) shows that he or she is not worthy of our trust, we ought not support them.  We ought to care more about the values of honesty and trustworthiness—as well as the polity as a whole—than we do about party affiliation.  

Consider committing to this as a New Year’s Resolution: I will question my own party as much as the other party and vote for polity over party.  There will be times, of course, that voting for the polity will be voting for your party.  At times, your party will have the better candidate.  To think it always has the better candidate, however, would stretch credulity as much as thinking Santa lives in a Chanukah menorah under the sea.  

I realize that putting honesty, trustworthiness, and the polity above party affiliation is a hard sell in our current political climate.  To see that it is not unreasonable, consider two intraparty conflicts.  

Reagan Republicans would likely endorse the recently proposed Federal American Dream Downpayment Act, which would allow people to start savings accounts with tax exempt funds to be used for a down payment on a home (similar to 529 accounts for college savings).  Many Republicans, however, seem to talk about this as a socialist give away rather than a reduction in taxes to incentivize home buying.  This is an intraparty conflict; the two groups can’t fully identify as the same.

On the other side of the aisle, it is very hard to imagine a Clinton Democrat endorsing anything like the populist economic policies of Bernie Sanders or the economic policies supported by those like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, rooted as they are in “Modern Monetary Theory.”  The details of those views do not matter here.  What matters is that this is another intraparty conflict; the two groups can’t fully identify as the same.

Given those intra-party debates, its clearly possible to cleave space for individuals to accept parts of a party’s platform while questioning and even rejecting other parts.  Doing that is part and parcel of the openness to discourse—disagreement!—that I seek to encourage.  We can encourage this by being willing to question each other, the candidates we are considering, and the platforms of the parties, especially our own.  If we can do this, we can more honestly evaluate candidates and policies from all parties.  That would help reduce polarization.  We would no longer adhere to a party line, endorsing a candidate merely so that “our party”—our team—can be in control.  We would be looking instead for what is the best way forward. There is no better gift to give each other in these polarized times.

I urge everyone to make a New Year’s Resolution to question their party as much as the other party and vote for polity over party.

Externalities, Political Philosophy/Theory, Toleration, Uncategorized

Two Syllogisms about Government Action

50 Comments

This post began with an idea of a simple syllogism (A) and possible objections to that syllogism. Ultimately, I came to see that the objections (likely) succeed but that made me realize my core idea was really my standard anti-paternalist view.

(A) The syllogism

1. Government actions entail coercion.

2. Coercion entails that someone is made worse off.

3. A move is Pareto optimal if someone is made better off and no one is made worse off.

4. Government actions cannot be Pareto optimal.

(B) Discussion

I wanted the argument in (A) to be sound. I think it’s not, because premise 2 is (likely) false. Someone might be coerced and yet be better off. How might someone be coerced and yet better off? The intuition behind premise 2 is, after all, straightforward: if you have to coerce me to X its because I didn’t want to X, so when I do X, I am worse off. (I don’t think this entails a completely subjective conception of the good; more on that below.) Put another way, X is against my interests. We might add that most of us have an interest in choosing on our own regardless of what we choose and that interest itself is set back when we are coerced. Nonetheless, it’s a common idea amongst political theorists that one can be coerced and better off.

One standard reason it is suggested that people can be coerced and yet better off is that we (at least some of us) actually want to be coerced, via taxation, to pay to help others and so when we are coerced it is really only superficially coercion. In fact, though, it’s really consensual (or something we would consent to if we thought about it). Those that make such claims add that most of us want to be charitable, but realize that we may fail to be if left to our own devices, so we should be coerced into giving “charity.” (Scare quotes as this is unlike genuine charity, which entails that one gives of one’s own accord to help another.) Typically, the claim is not that we merely want to be coerced individually, but that we want everyone (or everyone who can afford it) to be coerced in the specified way, so as to solve a collective action problem—we want ourselves and others to contribute to the solution to that problem but worry we won’t when given the option. Whether that addition is included or not, the point is that then when we are coerced to provide aid to others, we actually get what we want and so are better off, not worse off. We are better off because we want to live in a world where people are taken care of—where people do not starve, die of easily treated illnesses, are educated, treated justly, etc. I don’t find this persuasive. It would only hold, I assume, for those that have a particular psychological makeup.

A second possibility is that one can be better off even though coerced if compensated. The idea here is that while one is made worse off by the coercion—at least because one is prevented from doing what one would choose (our interest in doing what we wish is thwarted)—but is somehow compensated for the worsening enough to make one better off. There are two general ways this can happen. First, though being taxed would set back one’s interests, the government could provide you a direct benefit that (more than) compensates for the loss. This seems unlikely since the direct benefit provided would require further resources, meaning the government would have to coerce still more people in order to provide the benefit. The problem would thus simply be pushed back a step—are the people coerced to pay for the new benefit also better off even though coerced?

A final (third) possibility is that we can be better off even though coerced, because of (a) the objective component of well-being and (b) indirect benefits. This is plausible: one might be better off because although one was not allowed to choose how to spend one’s money, one received membership in a better, more educated and more just society than one would have otherwise been in. The indirect benefit here is not, at least initially, monetary. There is simply great satisfaction in living in a more educated and just society and though such benefits are not easily quantified, they surely matter. And, we can add, it is likely that a more educated and more just society would be more economically advanced, so the indirect material benefit—measurable—might be quite significant. (Those advocating the first idea above might treat these as things rational agents know and accept, so consent to.) Indeed, we should recognize that people often have subjective interests in things that are bad for them and it’s not unreasonable to think that there are objective interests that matter more. I don’t allow my child to eat only ice cream and cookies even though that may well be what he prefers, for example. Letting him indulge his subjective interests would leave him leading a worse life than he could—as an objective matter.

I tend to think an adequate account of the good must have an objective component like that just roughly articulated. That there is an objective element of well-being and that such an element may be better achieved with coercion than without, however, does not settle the issue. At least, it doesn’t for anyone that rejects paternalism. The core issue, after all, is not whether it is permissible to coerce children (to eat well, rest, attend to their hygiene, do their school work, etc). We are concerned about government coercion of rational adults.

As frequent readers likely realize, I reject paternalism. For a great recent work explaining that rejection, see William Glod’s excellent book Why Its OK To Make Bad Choices. Rejecting paternalism does not entail rejecting the claim that there are objective facts about what makes people better off. It entails only rejecting the use of such facts as a reason to coerce people. Put this to the side.

Given that there is an objective component of well-being and that it is at least possible that government can know what will make people better off (not a small assumption), we should admit that premise 2 is false—coercion can make people better off. This is both because their subjective desires may, if satisfied, make them worse off regardless of anything else and because of indirect benefits that result from the coercion (especially if it solves collective action problems).

Where are we left? Premise 2 is likely false. The syllogism is unsound. Nonetheless, I oppose government paternalism. So…

(C) Another syllogism

1. Government actions entail coercion.

2. If coercion makes the coerced better off, it is permissible

3. Government coercion makes the coerced better off.

4. Government action is permissible.

(D) Discussion

Here, I think, we need to explicitly recognize that one may be better off in one way while being worse off in another—and whether one is better or worse off overall would then be an open question. (This is implicit in both the second and third paths discussed in (C) above.)

When government uses coercion to improve society in the way that the third path in (B) assumes, those coerced are treated disrespectfully. I think that weighs extremely heavily in the final calculus determining permissibility.

The situation is analogous to a parent offering a child a delicious chocolate shake to which they surreptitiously added a vegetable (or medicine) the child hates. If successful, this may well make the child better off, but it does so by treating the child as… a child. This is, we assume, ok when dealing with children, but is not OK—or at least may not be—when dealing with an adult. Not letting an adult make the choice to eat (or not) the vegetable is disrespectful. It treats the adult as a child. In that regard—which I take to be of significant importance—the adult is made worse off.

In a fashion similar to that of tricking the adult to take their medicine, coercing adults to pay for things they do not want to, is disrespectful to the coerced. That the coercion would be in the service of making the world better for them, as well as those directly aided, does not change that. That disrespect weighs so heavy that I am doubtful we can say those coerced are overall better off. We might say that some of them are—presumably those who upon learning of how they and others benefit are comfortable with having been coerced (to whom the first justification in (B) above would appeal). I suspect, however, that some will not be so sanguine. They may well be worse off overall. Government coercion would be impermissible on these grounds.

The second syllogism (C) is, it seems, as unsound (because premise 3 is at least sometimes false) as the first (A). A government action may be Pareto optimal; it may also be unacceptably paternalist and impermissible for that reason.

(E) A final note

Nothing said here, of course, entails a claim that we shouldn’t try to solve collection action problems or try to make people better off. Probably we should. But we should do so by trying to persuade them, rationally, to make choices that will lead them to be better off and, where appropriate, solve the collection action problems that contribute to that.

Current Events, Ethical Issues, immigration, Political Philosophy/Theory, Toleration

On immigration

I was recently part of a discussion about immigration that prompted some thoughts. I thought I’d share them.

First, I’ll note that too many people think about immigration as an issue about immigrants alone. That is a mistake. See Chandran Kukathas’s new book, Immigration and Freedom, for a very well worked out argument, but here just note that limits on immigration are essentially limits on us—those of us in the country to whom a potential immigrant wants to come. If you are a US citizen and want to marry someone from outside the US, you’ll have to deal with the government to see about the possibility of that person coming here. You may want to live in the US with this person, but whether you will have the freedom to do so depends on immigration law. Similarly, of course, if you want to form a business partnership with someone from abroad. Or if you want to hire someone from abroad. Your freedom to marry or work with non-citizens is limited by immigration law. That’s really just scratching the surface of the issue, but its enough to show that limits to liberty caused by immigration restrictions can affect any of us.

Some will say that the loss of freedom is a price worth paying—it is, after all, a freedom to do something many will not want to do. (Perhaps failing to fully grasp the truth that a government empowered to stop others from doing what they want is a government empowered to stop you from doing what you want.) It’s true that if we allow too many immigrants to enter a country, they can dramatically alter our lives. (Of course, if this is true of countries, it’s also true of local jurisdictions, but I’ll leave that aside.) If 50 million immigrants from a country with an authoritarian government and an “authoritarian culture” (where everyone prefers living under an authoritarian government) came en masse to a country of 300 million, no matter how liberal the latter country was until then, their arrival may will lead to a change in the culture. (I take the basic idea for this argument from Hrishikesh Joshi’s excellent “For (Some) Immigration Restrictions“—the only thing I remember reading in the last few years that seriously made me doubt my pro-immigration stance.)

This worry about an immigrant group altering a country’s culture rather than being assimilated into it doesn’t seem very powerful in the normal course of American politics—a large enough group (50 million, eg) is unlikely to come in a short enough time span to have the effect. If that is wrong, though, we should ask whether such a group would want to alter their new home. It seems more likely that most people who move to a new place move there thinking it—as it is—has something worth moving for and so would not want to change it.

Some may think that these things are not matters of choice, that people from other cultures are simply different from Americans (or Americans and Europeans, from whom so much of our political culture is derived) and so can’t help themselves. The idea would be that if they were raised in an authoritarian or socialist regime, they can’t stop being authoritarian or socialist at heart. This idea, though, requires an unsubstantiated essentialism: Americans (and perhaps Europeans) are essentially freedom-lovers, individuals willing to do whatever is necessary to get ahead in liberal marketplaces and everyone else is … not. They are essentially authoritarian, socialist, or whatever is the dominant way of living in their culture of origin. Again, though, this claim is unsubstantiated. Indeed, it is contradicted by the millions of immigrants already present in the US (and Europe) who come to adopt the culture of their new homes.

Perhaps a more plausible view is that while culture does not make individual essences, it does causally affect people as a contingent but important matter with lasting effects. The thought would be that though they can adapt, people from other cultures are statistically unlikely to be suited for liberal markets and countries as they are and would likely take too long to change, if they change at all. There may be some truth to this claim, but without further investigation, it seems incomplete. There are, after all, historical and international events that affect people in many ways. Ignoring the history of imperialism and colonialism, for example, is likely to leave a lot out of the discussion. Ignoring these sort of world altering events and processes would basically be to essentialize cultures—failing to recognize that they are what they are due to causal factors and they can also change . Like the essentializing of individuals, this essentializing of cultures is unsubstantiated.

The fact is cultures change. I’d go further and say they either change or they die. They may die slow deaths, but stagnation is death nonetheless. Once this is recognized, much of the rest becomes less significant. We should embrace change and hope it will lead to growth. Indeed, with more people with different backgrounds, skill sets, and beliefs, our markets grow and make us all better off. As our markets grow, so does our culture.

Embrace change.  Embrace pro-immigration policies.

Current Events, Ethical Issues, Free Speech, Law & Legal Philosophy, Political Philosophy/Theory, Toleration

About Service To All

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Political polarization is a now common phenomenon. Whereas people in the past believed their children should not marry someone of a different race or religion, it now seems that a growing number of people believe their children should not marry someone of a different political party. (See this.) Perhaps this switch is understandable.

Humans tend to be tribal (see Greene) and as the tribal connections based on race, religion, and even ethnicity, have grown weaker, it may be that bonds based on political affiliation have become more important. In any case, we have seen instances where store owners want to refuse service to those who reject their ideological commitments—perhaps only one (mask wearing requirements vs mask wearing prohibitions) and we may see more (Democrat vs Republican). Should store owners be legally permitted to refuse service to those they disagree with on some ideological ground? This is not a new question; it’s an old question simply focused on a new sort of difference.

In the past, we’ve asked whether white store owners should be able to refuse service to people of color, whether heterosexual store owners should be able to refuse service to homosexuals, whether Christian store owners should be able to refuse service to non-Christians. My answer here is the same as my answer to all of those: yes, with a caveat. (NOTE: I am not asking if someone from one group should refuse service to anyone outside their group; I am asking if they should be legally allowed to. In my view, it is frequently the case that people ought to be legally allowed to do things they ought not do.)

My basic view is that in denying a person service, the store owner is not essentially doing anything to the individual and so cannot be said to be harming them. I won’t press that point though. It is sufficient that if it is harming them, it does so without violating their rights or otherwise wronging them (it may be stupid or misguided; I suspect that for many refusing service to someone of a particular group, it is less about those others and more about their desire to live their own life as they think they should).

Absent wrongful harm I do not think interference—e.g., to require the store owner provide the service—is permissible. Putting this differently, my basic view is that one needs an argument to show that a business-owner’s refusing to serve a particular customer wrongfully harms that customer if one wants to override the presumption of liberty that the store owner has to run her store as she wishes. While I suspect such weighty arguments are rare, I do think they can be made in certain instances. For example, if all of the grocery stores in a given area refused to sell to someone, it would likely be a clear and wrongful harm to that individual (especially if, as in the relevant historical case, those being denied service had no recourse). A single store doing so, by contrast, is unlikely to hurt the person (or at least not in anything but a de minimis way).

I imagine that some would suggest that there is always a wrongful harm here in the form of a dignatarian harm—i.e., a harm to the individual’s dignity—perhaps especially if the refusal is based on the individual’s race, religion, or ideology. Pointing to a dignatarian harm, of course, does not suggest there are no other harms (causing someone to starve by refusing them service, for example, is an obvious harm; plausibly causing them to have to travel a great distance for service would as well). Here, though, I am assuming there are no other harms at issue—if there are (and they are not de minimis), interference may well be warranted. I am skeptical, though, of the likelihood of dignatarian harms being caused by a store owner refusing service to someone—at least absent structural issues. If 99 of 100 stores of the relevant type are willing to serve the individual, why would a single outlier cause a harm to the person’s dignity? Where I live, there are (I think) six chain grocery stores. It’s hard to believe that the owners or employees of the four I never enter have their dignity harmed by my withholding my utilizing of their businesses. If you think this is only because they are corporate owned, I will add that a bit further away there are several family owned grocery stores and none of them seem to have their dignity harmed by my choice either.

Some might suggest there is a difference between store owners and customers that is somehow relevant. Perhaps so. The only difference I can think of (actually, I didn’t think of it myself!) is that the customer is (or might be) engaging in the transaction to get something needed, while the storeowner is only getting money. The customer is thus supposedly at the mercy of the storeowner in a way that the reverse is not true. I do not think this difference is real. After all, the store owner is looking to get money from the transaction so that they can pay for the things they need. If all stores refuse to serve a particular person, that person will suffer; if everyone refuses to buy from a particular store, that store owner will suffer. Again, so long as the customer can go elsewhere for what they need, I think there is little cause for concern. (Again, if there are no competing storeowners willing or able to do business with the customer, the situation may be different.)

I am not sure what other relevant difference there might be between store owners and customers. Surely, if I intentionally and loudly boycott a particular store, broadcasting my complaints about the store—perhaps truthfully talking about the incompetent owner and workers—the store owner could plausibly have their dignity harmed. If, though, I merely refuse to buy from them without broadcasting my claims (perhaps add that my claims would be neither defamatory nor otherwise tortious), it is hard to believe my refusal to buy from them wrongly causes them a harm. (Indeed, it’s hard to take seriously the claim that I have done anything to them at all.). Merely refusing to sell to someone seems to be the same. No harm to dignity seems plausible. (Again, mass or universal refusal or legal inability to sell to members of a group—and mass or universal refusal or legal inability to buy from members of a group—may be different.)

I’ll end by being clear that I do not see any reason to deny that there are real dignatarian harms. In a theocratic society where women are denied the rights to vote, to own property, to work outside the home, etc, it seems entirely reasonable to think there is a wrongful setback to their interest in their own personal dignity. Such harms would plausibly be independent of physical, financial, or even psychological harms. These would be harms even to women who were happy in the society, well treated, and financially, physically, and psychologically secure. Similarly, as already indicated, if all storeowners were united—or forced—to withhold service to some group of individuals there would be plausible dignatarian harm. But if we are talking of an individual store owner refusing service to such a group, it seems implausible.

Thanks to Payden Alder for getting me thinking about this stuff again and to Jim Taggart, Connor Kianpour, and Andrew I. Cohen for comments on a draft. (Connor gave the possible objection about a difference between storeowners and customers.)

Current Events, Ethical Issues, Law & Legal Philosophy, Moral Theory, Political Philosophy/Theory, Toleration

Libertarianism and Abortion

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I offer this as a tentative foray into a discussion about abortion, obviously spurred by the recent SCOTUS decision, Dobbs v. Jackson.  I note that I have long been convinced that as brilliant as Judith Jarvis Thomson’s contribution to the debate was, it doesn’t actually solve anything. (For more on that, see the chapter Lauren Hall and I co-authored in The Routledge Companion to Libertarianism.)

Different libertarians define their political ideology in different ways.  (No surprise; different egalitarians do this, different socialists do this, different welfare liberals do this; in short, all political ideologies are multiply defined.  Presumably those adopting the same name have at least a family resemblance.)  

Some libertarians adopt the Non-Aggression Principle. Others adopt a view that indicates simply that individual liberty is the predominant value, never set aside to promote any other value. Others accept that natural rights are the foundation for the view. Others adopt some form of consequentialism. My own libertarianism is defined by commitment to the harm principle: no interference with an individual or consensual group is permissible except to rectify or prevent genuine significant harm.

What does this my form of libertarianism say about abortion? If the principle was only about harm to persons, abortion would presumably be clearly permissible since the fetus is not a person even though it is human. Of course, religious libertarians are likely to believe that all human life is sacred and that the intentional ending of such is necessarily wrongful. While I do not believe that, the harm principle in my view is not only about persons or humans. Genuine significant harm can occur to non-humans and merit interference, so whether or not the fetus is a person is not all that matters.

The question then is: is abortion a genuine significant harm? To clarify, I use the term “significant” to indicate that de minimis harms are not the sorts of things we interfere with (the cost of doing so may be a greater loss than the harm itself). I use the term “genuine” to indicate we are not discussing mere hurts or offenses, but hurts that wrongfully set back the interests of another (for more on this, see Feinberg or chapter 3 of my 2018). Once this is recognized, it should be clear that some abortions may well be genuine significant harms and some may not. Aborting an 8 month old fetus merely because one decided on the spur of the moment to take a world tour is, I think, wrongful. It would also be significant—ending the life of a human that could have been very good. On the other hand, aborting a 6 week old fetus because one was raped is unlikely to be wrongful and is at least plausibly less significant since at that stage spontaneous abortions are not uncommon.

Some will now likely object that what is wrongful is subjective. I basically think this is false—it is at least false if meant in anyway that is troubling for what I am saying here. People do not simply decide for themselves what is wrongful.   For more on this, see this BHL post and this one.

Assume I am right thus far: some abortions are genuinely and significantly harmful and some are not. What does that mean for law? On my view, answering this means first recognizing that law is a blunt instrument and as such has to wielded carefully. Perhaps making all abortions illegal after 8 months pregnant is reasonable. Making all abortions illegal is not. If a clear set of guidelines for wrongfulness can be decided upon, perhaps laws against abortions that are wrongful would be reasonable. I can’t here work out what such a list would include, but I do think a law against aborting 8 month old fetuses reasonable. Perhaps also a law against aborting a fetus on a whim (perhaps have a 5 day waiting period). Laws requiring parental (or spousal) consent might sound good but are likely to run up against significant objections, including the real possibility of rape and incest and unacceptable familial pressure. The final list will be difficult to determine and absent a final list, jurisdictions may adopt differing lists (as SCOTUS allows).

Importantly, the jurisdiction issue is more complicated than some recognize. Philosophers have long debated what would give a government legitimate jurisdiction over a group of people. I won’t be able to delve into that here, but will simply assert that I do not believe any of the US state governments is likely to have genuine legitimacy over all people within their borders. For that reason, it strikes me as perfectly acceptable for the federal government or other state governments to aid an abortion-seeker in a state wherein they are unable to get an abortion legally. (For one way this can work, see this interesting story.)

Current Events, Discourse, Law & Legal Philosophy, Moral Theory, Political Philosophy/Theory, Social Criticism

Moralism and Contemporary Politics

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People have asked me why I seem so focused on moralism.  There are multiple reasons, including having too much personal experience with people who operate as moralists, but what it really comes down to is that if we take moralism broadly to be a view that we should use the machinery of law to impose a moral view on the jurisdiction, most people in politics today are moralists.  (So, not just a justification of a specific law, but of the whole system of law.  A loss of viewpoint neutrality.)

On the right, we we have what are called “common good constitutionalists” or “common good conservatives” who basically say we should interpret the Constitution of the United States of America in such a way that will get us the common good of society.  Of course, what they mean by “the common good” follows from their conservative beliefs (see Patrick Deneen and Adrian Vermuele).  

On the left, you see basically the same thing without the claim made explicit. You have people pushing a particular view about how to guarantee equality and freedom in society, meaning a particular view about how society should be set up—and of course, that is a way meant to attain their view of the common good.

Of course those on the left and those on the right disagree about what the common good is.  This is what “culture clashes” are. So, for an obvious example, the two camps here would take opposing sides with regard to today’s SCOTUS decision in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization.  One side (or at least some on that side) thinks all human life is deserving of the same basic respect as all other human life; the other thinks women deserve the respect that would enable them to control their own lives.

Both sides seem to believe that the machinery of the state—the law—should be used to make society moral, given their own (competing) views about what that entails.   (And we are likely to see this play out from SCOTUS fairly quickly.)

Importantly, libertarians are different.  We believe that people should be free to live their lives as they see fit subject only to the restriction that they don’t wrongfully harm others.  Some might say that this is a form of moralism as well—one wherein the view of morality is simply thinner than those of the other two views.  Perhaps that is right, but consider how it plays out.  Those on the left would want to force people to recognize and work for equal rights for women and to pay for programs meant to help with that.  Those on the right want to force women to carry pregnancies to term.  Meanwhile, libertarians want to force people not to force people to do anything.  That last seems obviously better.

Blog News, Current Events, Political Philosophy/Theory, Social Criticism

Why ‘ProSocial Libertarians’?

I am wary of isms and labels. They are used too often by too many as excuses to stop thinking. Worse, no doubt aware of the human tendency to avoid ideas that challenge our preconceptions, unscrupulous advocates on all sides use labels such as ‘socialism’ or ‘far right’ to pillory views with which they disagree, in effect saying ‘These ideas are beyond the pale. You can ignore them.’ This, in turn, further discourages people from venturing outside the safety of their thought bubbles and trying to understand why others might hold different views. 

Although I am quite sensitive to this thought-stultifying use of labels — having taught critical thinking for years — I am sure I am not the only person for whom effectively labeling something as beyond the pale piques one’s curiosity instead of squelching it. (This, by the way, is the main reason — along with my name — that I first read Ayn Rand.) So, fortunately, there are also people who want to be challenged and seek out ideas that put their preconceptions under strain. If you fall into this group, you should enjoy this blog.

Despite the risks that labels bring, we cannot manage without them. To minimize the risks, we should acknowledge that labels are only a starting point for discussion and that the meaning of any politically interesting terms will need to be clarified on an ongoing basis. 

In light of all this, if I had to choose a label that best captures my political orientation, that label would be ‘libertarian’. I found it dismaying, then, during the COVID-19 pandemic, to see the term ‘libertarian’ — as well as related terms like ‘freedom’ — arrogated by a rogue’s gallery of activists and politicians who have been called — with some justification —antisocial. 

What was dismaying was that these so-called ‘libertarians’ were acting out an old, muddleheaded conception of libertarianism that many people could (wrongly) take as reason to dismiss libertarian ideas as unworthy of serious consideration. For, according to this old, muddleheaded conception, libertarians just _are_ antisocial. Like Randy Weaver, libertarians on this conception want nothing more than to be left alone and they will happily head to the woods with their guns and family to achieve this end. Properly understood, however, libertarians need not be Randy Weavers. Or, at least, so I believe. (Please note: In no way do I intend for my use of Randy Weaver as an example of an antisocial libertarian to diminish the tragedy and injustice that befell him and his family at the hands of the United States government.)

Given what the honest use of labels requires, I want to be as clear as I can about what I mean by ‘libertarian’ and why being a libertarian involves being prosocial, not antisocial. But there is no such thing as a conceptual dictator, so any work towards understanding libertarianism will, of necessity, be a joint enterprise. Hence, the idea of this blog: a civil forum for exploring what it means to be a libertarian and the ways being a libertarian involves being prosocial. Hence also, our name: ProSocial Libertarians.

Economics, Ethical Issues, Externalities, Law & Legal Philosophy, Political Philosophy/Theory, Social Criticism

Employment, Coercion, and Voting

Sally works for a big corporation.  She works 9 to 5, with a half hour lunch, Monday through Friday.  She often brings work home with her and on Saturdays, she takes a class, hoping it will help her receive a promotion and raise.  On Sundays, she cleans her home and preps for the following week.  This is her schedule every week unless she manages to get a vacation day or two (or if she gets sick)—in which case, work backs up and her return is hard.

Sally does not like her job but there are no other jobs available that she would like.  She wishes she didn’t have to work. Some will say she only takes the job because of coercion. This would be “circumstance-based,” “background,” or “situational” coercion (for discussions, see chapter 7 of Scanlon or chapter 4 of Cohen-Almagor). In this sort of coercion, there is no individual person or clear corporate entity that does anything coercive. There is no one to blame for Sally’s situation and no one to interfere with to help Sally.

Some will insist that what is described is not coercive at all—that without a coercer, there cannot be coercion.  They might also insist that Sally consents to the the employment.  They might even say Sally consents to the social system within which she is employed.  Some of this is true—Sally does, I think, consent to her employment. What about the claim that there is no coercion?

Generally speaking, we think of coercion as one agent, P, acting to get a second agent, Q, to do some action, A, typically by threatening to do something Q does not want to happen (firing Q, harming Q’s relative, etc).  When P does this, it is reasonable to think P is responsible—or at least partly responsible—for Q’s (coerced) actions and that P is subject to justifiable interference.  In Sally’s case, there simply is no P acting to get Sally to keep working.  There are only the facts of the social, political, and economic world which jointly make it such that if Sally does not work, she will not be able to afford to live. The circumstances are what matters and circumstances aren’t agents that do things.

Does this mean it makes no sense to say Sally is coerced?  I’m skeptical.  Sally is not doing as she wants to do.  She acts counter-preferentially because of the way the social, political, and economic world she (and we) inhabit is set up.  While there is no particular agent to blame or interfere with, we can still think there is something unfortunate going on.  If you don’t want to call it coercion, call it shcoercion.  The important point is not one of conceptual analysis but of the morality of the situation.

Some think that the situation is not merely unfortunate but that it is so unjust we ought to change things in the political and economic order so that Sally (and the rest of us) would not be coerced (or shcoerced) by circumstances to work a particular job.  Marxists and others on the left might even say the situation is so unjust that we ought to have the government act to make it such that Sally would not have to work at all.  (See, for example, Van Parijs.)

While I would deny that the world should be set up in such a way that anyone can choose not to work at all if they prefer that, it seems clear that a situation where many people have to work at jobs they don’t like at all is at least unfortunate. (I’m also OK with saying it is coercive or shcoercive, but would note that not all coercion or shcoercion is bad).

A world in which most people work is good for all of us.  A world in which many have to work at jobs they don’t like is, obviously, less good than one in which all of us could work at jobs we like.  This is not a Marxist or socialist claim.  Indeed, I believe the most reasonable way to actualize such a situation—where all or most can work at jobs they like—is to move far more toward a free market (or freed market—see, for example, Carson) than we have.  I’ll keep further thoughts about that for a possible future post. 

In the meantime, here’s what really strikes me as odd: the same people that think they are unjustly coerced into working will often also say that voting in a democratic system—including a democratic system like ours—is indication of consent to the system.  This strikes me as completely incongruous with the view that they are coerced into working.  I didn’t have any part in making our democratic system and I deny that when I vote within that system, I am thereby consenting to it.  I vote, when I do, thinking “I wish we had a better system, but I want to vote now even though I am participating in what seems to me a clearly illegitimate system.”  No one asked for my consent to a two party system.  Or a system within which the majority can ruin the lives of a minority.  Perhaps this system is less coercive than the employment system—but if so, its because I can choose simply not to vote at all.  I’m not, that is, coerced into voting.  I am, though, coerced into voting in a bad system if I wish to vote at all.  Its not like I can go out and vote in a good system—that option is not possible for me.

If it’s true that others made impossible the option of Sally not working at all—or not working at all given the system we live in (I doubt it)—then the coercion there would be on par with the coercion that leaves me only able to vote in what seems to me an illegitimate system. It strikes me as more likely that it is circumstance-based coercion (or shcoercion) in both cases. In both cases, I think, there is no specific agent to blame or interfere with. In neither case does this mean we should rest comfortable with the social-political-economic order. If we ought to think of changing things for people like Sally, we ought to think of changing things for people like me. But many people seem to think Sally is treated unjustly and I am not. Why? That is, why do people believe that voting in a system they had no part in making constitutes consent to that system but working for an employer in a system they had no part in making does not?

Discourse, Political Philosophy/Theory, Social Criticism, Toleration

Community, Selfish Miscreants, and Civil Discourse

In my last post, I discussed the paradox of community. Recently, I was reminded of one standard way that paradox is ignored and debates within communities are badly framed.  Its worth considering this as a way not to proceed if one wants to improve civil discourse.

Typically, one of the parties in a dispute about the way the community should move—and this could be newcomers or long time members, though it’s more likely to be the latter simply because they likely have some cohesiveness as a group—is to claim they represent the overall community while the other side is simply selfishly representing themselves.  The dialogue might be explicitly put in terms of those who are selfish and those who are selfless or in terms of those interested only in themselves and those interested in the community as a whole. 

Here is an example: One group might say they are seeking to add a pool to the community (at the expense of all community members) because it would be good for the community as a whole, giving community members a location and activity in which to foster discussion which is good for encouraging community (by strengthening the relationships of community members) while also (of course) providing a form of exercise to keep community members healthy. Advocates of the pool might then say they’ve talked to many of the others in the community who also want the pool and so those who advocate for the pool are really the “we” while those arguing against the pool are selfishly concerned only with their own finances and not with the health of their community members or the community itself. 

The pool issue is thus framed as one between those concerned with “we, the community” and those concerned with “the me”—anyone arguing against the pool is portrayed as being selfishly concerned only with their own interests, unable to suppress their selfishness for the greater good of the “we” that is the whole community. They don’t even understand that as part of the “we,” getting the pool would be good for them! This, of course, is nonsense. (See Isaiah Berlin’s statement about “positive liberty” on pages 22-24 here.)

Consider a different way the issue might have been framed if those opposing the pool started the discussion.  They would insist they have the community’s interests at heart, worried that the added expense will be hard on community members, that some may genuinely fear a pool (perhaps a sibling drowned in in a pool), and that all community members will have additional liability, not merely financial, moving forward.  In short, on their view, the addition of a pool puts a strain on community members, and thereby strains the community.  They then insist that those advocating for a pool are selfish, interested in something only a few swimmers will benefit from, while all share the costs.  

Again, the pool issue is framed as one between those concerned with “we, the community” and those concerned with “the me”—this time, anyone arguing for the pool is portrayed as being selfishly concerned only with their own interests, unable to suppress their selfishness for the greater good of the “we” that is the whole community. They don’t even understand that as part of the “we,” not getting a pool would be good for them!  This, of course, is again nonsense.

In both scenarios—one where pool advocates control the terms of debate and one where anti-pool folks control the terms of the debate—the other side Is said to be selfish, each on that side only concerned with the “I.”  The possibility that they are genuinely concerned with the entire community is disregarded in the normal Orwellian move to use language to one’s advantage regardless of truth. (If it’s old-timers arguing for one side, they might even try to “explain”—Orwell style—that those arguing against it are newcomers who don’t understand the importance of the “we” in this community because they are still embedded in the “me” culture.  They may even believe this.)*

This way of engaging in discourse with others—whether in a small community or a large polity—is misguided at best.  Once again, what we need is open and honest discourse where all realize that disagreement is possible (even likely) and useful and that those we disagree with can be honest and well meaning.  Insistence on labeling those we disagree with “selfish” is a more likely indication that one is a miscreant than being so labeled.

*For my part, I wish people would get over thinking there was something wrong with being concerned with one’s own interests. If people would really concern themselves with their own interests (and that of their own family and friends), they would spend less time bothering others (see this). They might even be more receptive to open and honest dialogue.

Law & Legal Philosophy, Political Philosophy/Theory

A Trilemma for “Taxation is Theft”-Libertarians

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Claiming that taxation is theft is an effective way to signal that you think of yourself as a libertarian of the more radical, uncompromising, and possibly more Rothbard-inspired sort. But are there substantive reasons to endorse the slogan? It is easy to point at differences between taxation and theft, after all: Taxation is widely regarded as legitimate, taxation is expected, institutionalized and to some extent automated, (at least some) taxation is put to good public use, etc. More sophisticated defenders of the “taxation is theft”-slogan will not deny these differences, though; they will concede that theft and taxation aren’t the same in every respect. Instead, they will explain that the fact that taxation is legal is morally irrelevant, and that taxation and theft are thus on equal footing in one important respect: they are both coercive takings of property and as such pro tanto morally wrong (see for example Michael Huemer’s defense of the claim that taxation is theft here and here).

Obviously, legal conventions determine people’s legal property entitlements. But it is less obvious what role legal conventions play for people’s moral property entitlements. In the following, I will try to sketch a trilemma for libertarians who endorse the “taxation is theft”-slogan, arguing that none of the three basic positions one can take on the role of legal conventions supports their cause.

A (pure) conventionalist position is that people’s moral property entitlements are simply determined by whatever legal property entitlements are conveyed by the law. That position is quite implausible in its own right (surely there are at least moral criteria that legal property conventions should meet to be morally justifiable), and of course it doesn’t help to make sense of the “taxation is theft”-slogan. If moral property entitlements were simply determined by legal conventions, then the fact that taxation is legal would imply that what we morally own is what we own post-tax. Obviously, conventionalism is also not a position many libertarians will be drawn into.

An anti-conventionalist position is that people’s moral property entitlements are determined by natural, non-conventional criteria (i.e., principles of just acquisition and just transfer, as in Nozick’s entitlement theory of justice). Legal conventions may at best have a minor role to play in specifying what is left vague and indeterminate in people’s natural property rights. This position lends some support to the “taxation is theft”-slogan: If the only morally relevant role of legal conventions is to carve out the more precise specification of antecedent natural property rights, and if that may be done without taxation, then the fact that taxation is legal is morally irrelevant and all infringements of natural property rights are morally on a par, no matter if it is state agents or non-state agents that engage in them.

The problem, though, is that the anti-conventionalist view arguably implies that almost all of today’s legal property entitlements are morally void (compare Twin Nozick in Loren Lomasky’s article and Matt Zwolinski’s related discussion at Bleeding Heart Libertarians). After all, hardly anyone can claim to own property with a clean record of title transfers going back to a just acquisition from the state of nature. I don’t even know how to look for such a record for all the materials that are built into my laptop, for example. If that means that I don’t really own it, from a moral (natural property rights-) perspective, then taxing my purchase of it can also not count as an infringement of my moral property entitlements. In other words, while the anti-conventionalist position in principle makes sense of equating taxation and theft, it can depict neither taxation nor theft in today’s societies as a violation of moral property entitlements, simply because all (or most) claims to property would be morally suspicious. This is an implication most “taxation is theft”-libertarians will not be willing to endorse.

The most plausible view is a mixed view about the role of legal conventions. On this view, there are moral standards for legal property conventions (they must be something useful for us, after all), but at least when a basic moral threshold is met, then legal conventions do determine pro tanto moral property entitlements. This quite plausibly explains why it is morally wrong to steal even in the non-perfect societies we are living in, where most property titles can’t be proven to have a clean track record going back to an initial acquisition from the state of nature, but where property conventions may well be taken to meet the basic moral threshold, while having considerable room to improve in many respects.

Of course, there is a wide range of views one could take about what exactly the moral standards for legal property conventions are and where the basic moral threshold is to be set. But, just to have some criteria on the table, arguably property rights should be conveyed by well-defined and transparent rules, they should give owners sufficient control over what they own, they should be properly enforced, violations should be properly rectified, and they should be in line with broader moral principles, like, for example, equality before the law. It is also plausible that principles of just acquisition and just transfer should be incorporated into legal conventions, such that, for example, somebody who creates something valuable from something she legally owns should also own the creation (because creating or adding value to something should be taken to ground property entitlements).

But whatever the moral standards for property conventions may be in detail, on the mixed view taxation cannot be equated to theft. The fact that the former is legal, while the latter is not, is of moral relevance. What moral property entitlements people have will depend on legal conventions, at least as long as these meet the basic threshold, and in our societies taxation is part of these legal conventions. What people morally own will thus be what they own post-tax – but not post-theft. Obviously, this should not be confused with an “anything goes” position about taxation; one can evaluate and criticize different tax policies in light of the moral standards property conventions should meet, of course, even after the basic moral threshold is met (see also Andrew J. Cohen’s related discussion at Bleeding Heart Libertarians).

Some libertarians may say that no system of property that includes taxation meets the basic moral threshold (according to their interpretation of it). But if this were so, we would get back to the problems of the anti-conventionalist position. If current legal conventions don’t meet the basic threshold, then neither taxation nor theft will violate moral property entitlements in today’s societies, since current legal conventions would fail to give rise to moral property entitlements. One cannot cherry-pick and accept the moral relevance of current legal conventions when it comes to the property titles they assign, but reject their moral relevance when it comes to taxation.

(Thanks to Andrew J. Cohen for feedback on a draft version).