Libertarianism – An Overview

The rise of liberalism as a theory of welfare state in the 20^th century and its intervention in all walks of life an individual prepared the ground for the emergence of libertarianism. Libertarianism as a theory emerged in the 1950s and became very popular in the 1960s. It got wide attention only in 1974 when Robert Nozick published his famous works, ‘Anarchy, State, and Utopia’. Despite its claim of universal appeal, libertarianism remains culture-bound, limited to the Anglo-American culture. 

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What is Libertarianism

Karl Popper, Talmon, Milton Friedman, F.A. Hayek, Isaac Berlin, Robert Nozick, M. Rothbard, and Ayn Rand are the main propounders of the theory of libertarianism. Libertarianism takes an extreme view of liberty and freedom. It regards liberty as the only interest and link between the state and citizens. The only reason desire state for the state is the safeguard of the liberty and freedom.

The basic premise of libertarianism is that freedom and liberty are fundamental values, and they must be the guiding principles of all social relations, economic activities, and the organization of the political system. Libertarianism prefers the voluntary cooperation between individuals in a free market to that of the coercion of the state. They are very skeptical of the role played by the state. They stand for minimal state activity and maximum individual initiative.

They deny the state even the right to interfere in the name of the community. The state, according to libertarians, has no right to act on behalf of the community, and to trample, the liberty and freedom of the individuals in the name of common goals. They also deny the state to redistribute wealth, interfere in the cultural and social sphere of the people, and help the agricultural sector and small firms. It wants the state to limit itself to the protection of individual freedom and the maintenance of law and order. Their view resembles that of early classical liberalism.

Although libertarianism stands for the formal equality of all before the law, it is least bothered about the inequalities resulting from the play of market forces. They maintain that poverty and equality are handled by the free play of market forces and the private initiative and charities would deal with the problem of poverty and inequality. They are also against any collective initiative and are dead against the collectivist ideology. For them, individual liberty is an end in itself and cannot and should not be curtailed or infringed in the name of the collective goals.

Libertarianism has been put to various usage and varied meanings but only two types of libertarianism are accepted; Anarcho-capitalist and Minarchist. The Anarcho-capitalist stand for the disappearance of the state and doing away with all governmental institutions. They go even to the extent of declaring that all basic and vital functions of the state should be privatized, handing over these to the individual or their groups. Minarchists are a bit pragmatic and restrained so far as the scope of the state activity is concerned. They stand for partial and restricted state activities.

Hence, the concept of libertarianism left a long-lasting impact on the policies of modern-day states.