Archive for Hayek

Conscription, Coercion & The Rule of Law

August 24, 2009 at 2:09 pm · Filed under Hayek, Libertarianism, Politics ·Tagged , , , , , ,

This is a long overdue reply to the characterisation of compulsory military conscription as “coercive” and anathema to alleged “liberal values.” I’ve perhaps not captured here the level of moral indignation expressed by Mr Andrew’s in his blog. That said I always find sifting through platitude to uncover salient argument a nauseating exercise. His diatribe can be viewed in all it’s glory here: http://insidethemindoftim.wordpress.com/2009/01/23/the-morally-repugnant-proposal-of-australian-conscription/

Hayek & Conscription:

I’ve made our friend aware of the position of perhaps the most celebrated of classical-liberal of last century. Hayek considered neither taxation nor compulsory military service as examples of “coercion.”

” …are not supposed to be avoidable, they are at least predictable and are enforced irrespective of how the individual would otherwise employ his energies: this deprives them largely of the evil nature of coercion.” The Constitution of Liberty; p153.

Mr Andrews suggests that a law is coercive if it fails the test of voluntariness. My question is: How is that consonant with The Rule of Law? It’s not!

As I see it there are three possible responses to this logical entailment:

(i) The concept of coercion relied upon here is no good. We need to develop a notion of coercion that is consistent with The Rule of Law; or

(ii) We accept that coercion is not always so bad. Thus, we accept that in some circumstances coercion is justified or legitimised by The Rule of Law; or

(iii) We hold freedom from coercion to the trump The Rule of Law, and thus to slide towards anarchism.

If Mr Andrews believes (ii) he must say why conscription is not legitimate ends for coercive state power. I ask him why taxation is permissible, but we should deprive the state of a right to conscript able-bodied men? I ask why it’s so repugnant to expect the citizenry who are protected by the state from external threat to owe a concominant duty to the state.

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Great Article: Defusing the American Right by Don Arthur

February 17, 2009 at 11:25 am · Filed under Centre for Independent Studies, Conservativism, Fusionism, GOP, George Bush, Hayek, Libertarianism, Politics ·Tagged , , , , , ,

I meant to blog about this fabulous article by Don Arthur earlier (viewable here: http://www.cis.org.au/Policy/Summer08-09/arthur_summer08.html). It appeared in the Summer edition 2009 of Policy Magazine.

The article is primarily about the growing rift between conservatives and “libertarians” within the GOP. He discusses the view proposed by various libertarian thinkers and activists to realign themselves with the political left and the Democratic Party. The article mostly concerns the rift between social conservatives and libertarians – though he does later refer to “neo-conservatives” who are not necessarily social conservative. I was particularly captured by his depiction of the “conservative mind.” He refers to Haidt’s theory that people’s moral intuitions may be characterised as fitting into two groups: (i) J.S. Mill social contract theory; and (ii) Durkheimian theory of society. Conservatives adhere to the Durkheimian vision which he summarises as:

(i)               Harm/ Care principle;

(ii)              Fairness/ reciprocity;

(iii)             Ingroup Loyalty;

(iv)             Authority/respect; and

(v)              Purity/sanctity.

Libertarians adhere to the Millian world view which consists of (i) & (ii) to the exclusion of (iii), (iv) & (v).

The article is thought provoking and well written. However, I think “Fusionism” is not given a fair hearing. In doing so he makes selective use of Hayek, and overlooks the considerable Burkean influences on Hayek’s political philosophy. Without a lengthy excursion through either Hayek or Burke a few points could be made:

(i)         both reject rational design and share a similar “organic” view of society (Hayek termed this view “spontaneous order.”)

(ii)         Hayekian liberalism does not deny the importance of Burkean traditional institutions.

(iii)        both reject “natural rights” in place of “prescriptive rights” or time-honoured expectations that derive from custom. (Both no doubt would reject current proposals to implement a legislative Bill of Rights, and Hayek’s criticism of the UN Declaration of Universal Human Rights can be found in Law, Legislation and Liberty.)

All of which Arthur has overlooked or cast aside in providing us with this skewed narrative - that libertarians and conservatives face an ideological impasse.

I must confess a bias in all of this – I am a ‘fusionist” of sorts.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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