Comments on: Positive vs. Negative Libertarianism

By: Noah Brisbin

Noah Brisbin — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 08:23:43 +0000

I think you misquote Churchill… if I can recall, it’s “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the other forms that have been tried.” I wouldn’t argue with the quotation’s applicability to the economic arena, though.

By: thrica

thrica — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 18:34:52 +0000

Thanks, and true enough. I don’t mean to say that we should strive for something outside of or beyond the market (Mises and Hayek make good cases that it’s the best that can possibly be done) – rather to be realistic about human systems and to make sure we don’t let our zeal for the market cause us to put undue faith in humanity (unless we want to end up like the Progressive movement).

By: Arthur Bingqian Ma

Arthur Bingqian Ma — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 14:50:04 +0000

Excellent article Cameron, you managed to explain a lot with a concise number of words. I think most of us libertarians believe in both arguments above though, and being a purely negative libertarian with no belief in the first argument is to set far too high standards for any system. Given what “opulence” the market system has already granted us, to call it the “worst” system at all is asking too much of any system, isn’t it?