Yesterday afternoon, Butler Shaffer , one of the great pioneers of the libertarian movement, passed away, two weeks before his eighty-fifth birthday. In a column written in December 2014, he tells us, “My interest in what is now called ‘libertarian’ thinking was kindled in college in the late 1950s. There was no coherent philosophy by that name in
We usually think of Friedrich Hayek as a moderate, as least when compared with Mises and Rothbard, but he had a radical side as well. Hidden away in a note to the third volume of Law, Legislation, and Liberty , he makes a comment that puts him far outside “respectable” public opinion. He says that the inventor of “freedom from want” was “the
In Anarchy, State, and Utopia , Robert Nozick argues that If people benefit you by their activities, you have no obligation to pay them for what you have gained. Nozick provides a well-known example to illustrate this point: “Suppose some of the people in your neighborhood (there are 364 other adults) have found a public address system and decide
In an earlier post, I noted Robert Nozick’s criticism of the view that the state may tax us because we are in part ‘social products’. Much of Nozick’s Anarchy, State, and Utopia reflects Rothbard’s influence, and this topic is no exception. As so often, Rothbard was there first, and Nozick did no more than restate his insights in more complicated
In a characteristically excellent post , the Bionic Mosquito calls attention to Murray Rothbard’s ethical “absolutism”. In this view, human beings can grasp what is objectively case in ethics. If, for example, stealing is wrong, its being wrong is not just an expression of individual or group preference. Rothbard held that an adequate defense of
In a series of outstanding posts, the Bionic Mosquito has written on “The Search for Liberty.” In these posts, he presents a penetrating analysis of natural law and metaphysics. I admire these posts and have learned a great deal from them In his latest post , he argues that Murray Rothbard’s defense of natural law fails. Rothbard thinks that
Neil Schulman, who passed away August 10, was best known as a science fiction writer, and his Alongside Night and The Rainbow Cadenza are libertarian classics. He was one of several brilliant writers and thinkers associated with the great Sam Konkin’s “anarcho—village.” I met Neil only a few times, but his commanding presence and vigorous defense
Admirers of the work of Hans-Hermann Hoppe will be pleased by some news from our friend Youssif Almoayyed, an outstanding supporter of the Mises Institute who lives in Bahrain. Youssif informs us that books by Hans have been translated into Arabic and are selling very well. His A Short History of Man was brought out by a small Iraqi publisher
Today would have been the ninety-first birthday of Burt Blumert, one of the greatest personalities of the modern libertarian movement. Burt was the indispensable man behind the scenes and was a key figure in the Mises Institute, the Center for Libertarian Studies, and LewRockwell.com. He was one of Murray Rothbard’s closest friends, and when you
Can a Roman Catholic be an Austro-Libertarian as well? Christopher Ferrara in a book called The Church and the Libertarian says that one cannot. In Ferrara’s view, Austrian economists deny that the moral law applies to the economy. Instead, Austrians say, strictly scientific laws govern the economy and these limit what the State or the Church can
What is the Mises Institute?
The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard.
Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.