John Rawls can be called many things, but “libertarian” isn’t one of them. To combine Rawls and libertarianism doesn’t seem like a promising project, but this is just what John Tomasi, a political philosopher who taught at Brown University when his book Free Market Fairness was published in 2012, attempted to do. The book remains the best and most comprehensive defense of the position just described.
Praxeology is defined as “the study of human conduct.” This study is one building cornerstone in Austrian economics showing individual choices are key for a person’s future direction. We thank Ludwig von Mises for pioneering praxeology and its importance to one of his defining books, Human Action.
A few early episodes of US history are commonly employed as alleged historical precedents and justifications for modern US foreign interventionism in foreign policy. One such episode is Jefferson’s dealings with the Barbary pirates during his administration without a congressional declaration of war.
The early modern period witnessed one of the most profound transformations in political thought: the emergence of absolutism and the idea of the raison d’état—the “reason of state.” As Murray Rothbard emphasizes, this shift entailed a subtle but powerful transmutation: what had once been justified as best for the ruler came to be portrayed as synonymous with the welfare of the people.
