345: Anarchy, State, and Utopia

Anarchy, State, and Utopia by Robert Nozick

Perhaps this book should have gone into the collection I've assembled for Conservative Month, or maybe I should have put together a collection for Libertarian month. Regardless, this book is important for progressives to understand, so they can better understand the arguments of Libertarians who argue for a smaller government.

This is a perfect companion piece to the more progressive A Theory of Justice by John Rawls.

In this well-argued, though somewhat dense, work of political philosophy, Nozick concludes that the government that governs least governs best. (While Nozick is in favor of small government, he does not support the anarchist dream of no government.)

There are many points where liberal political philosophy and libertarian political philosophy overlap, and many places in this book where liberals and progressives will find themselves nodding their heads in agreement.

However, progressives respond that Nozick is naive, ahistorical, and somewhat cold-hearted when it comes to human suffering.

A common adage among Libertarians is that a government big enough to give you anything you want is a government big enough to take away everything you have.

The progressive response is that a corporation big enough to give you anything you want is a corporation big enough to take away everything you have. To avoid corporate control of the political system it is essential that the government be larger than the corporation. This can happen either by having big business and big government, or by having small businesses and small government. When corporations are more powerful than the government then it become easy for them to take the reigns of government out of the hands of the people.

Note that Nozick eventually backed away from some of the arguments he made in this book:

"The libertarian position I once propounded," Nozick wrote in an essay published in the late '80s, "now seems to me seriously inadequate."

Why this is progressive/liberal: It isn't, but it's an important argument for progressives to understand.

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