Is government a necessary institution? To answer this question, many theorists begin with an account of a state of nature in which there are no “rules” or institutions to regulate human behavior. They then compare that state of nature with outcomes that are theoretically achieved with a monopoly rule enforcer—a government.
Following the fall of communism in Eastern Europe in the early 1990s, smaller, independent, ethnically-based political entities emerged. In the years since, academics from various disciplines have renewed their interest in the topic of secession. A lively discussion in the academic mainstream on the morality and legality of secession has occurred among predominantly liberal democratic political philosophers, a discussion that was non-existent prior to the fall of the Berlin Wall.
In this article, David Gordon and Roberta A. Modugno review of J.C. Lester’s Escape From Leviathan: Liberty, Welfare, and Anarchy Reconciled.
This article begins by contrasting the distinctive methodological starting points of Weber and Mises, and proceeds to review and discuss each thinker’s analysis of bureaucracy, both as a theoretical construct and as a dynamic element within a society’s structural and cultural organization.
Surveys of libertarian-leaning individuals in America show that the intellectual champions they venerate the most are Thomas Jefferson and Ayn Rand. The author of the Declaration of Independence is an inspiring source for individuals longing for liberty all around the world, since he was a devotee of individual rights, freedom of choice, limited government, and, above all, the natural origin, and thus the inalienable character, of a personal right to property.
In this article, Enrico Colombatto reviews Joseph E. Stiglitz’ Globalization and Its Discontents.
Frank van Dun, in his article “Against Libertarian Legalism,” criticizes prior articles by N. Stephan Kinsella and me. Although his article constitutes, in part, a radical if not blistering attack on my prior article, at least it has the merit of fully understanding that which it criticizes. All too often, negative appraisals of libertarianism address themselves to straw men. Say what you will about Van Dun’s article —and I will have many critical things to say about it—it cannot be fairly asserted that he does not comprehend his target.
In this article, Frank van Dun offers a reply to Walter Block’s paper reviewing one of Dun’s previous works.
In a recent issue of The Journal of Libertarian Studies, Frank van Dun commented on my views on intellectual property, and on Walter Block’s views on blackmail. In this reply, I will concentrate on two aspects of Van Dun’s comments: the non-aggression principle & libertarianism, and trademark & contract.
In his article “Natural Law and the Jurisprudence of Freedom,” my friend and colleague Frank van Dun offers two options as my possible categorizations of his views: “anti-libertarian” or “confusion and inconsistency on the part of a libertarian sympathiser.”1 Given these two sharp alternatives, I choose the second, for I certainly do not consider him “anti-libertarian.” To the contrary, I consider him one of the leading libertarian theorists of the present day.
