John Locke Lite

The strange philosophy of a "left libertarian".

Tom Palmer from the January 2005 issue

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Libertarianism Without Inequality is a good example of the dead end so much contemporary political philosophy has reached. Rather than being informed by history, jurisprudence, economics, psychology, sociology, anthropology, or even a close knowledge of classic texts, it posits outlandish examples as the central tests of all theories. Thus Otsuka explains "self-ownership" and the right to the fruits of our labor by asking us "to imagine a highly artificial 'society' of two strangers, each of whom will freeze to death unless clothed. Unfortunately, the only source of material for clothing is human hair, which can be woven into clothing. One of the two is hirsute and capable of weaving, whereas the other is bald and incapable of weaving." Otsuka concludes that to force the hairy one to weave his own hair into (presumably rather uncomfortable) garments for the bald one merely to achieve an egalitarian outcome would be a violation of the hairy one's rights. That kind of philosophizing provides little or no useful guidance in the world in which we live.

After affirming that full libertarianism is achieved when you can sell your body hair to other people but the state (or someone) assigns you your property in everything else and adjusts your shares on what, for consistency's sake, would have to be at least a minute-by-minute basis, Otsuka goes on to show that the kind of government he has in mind would be radically voluntary. It would be like Nozick, man! Only better!

Otsuka spills a lot of pixels discussing such staples of the theory of political legitimacy as the difference between express consent and tacit consent and whether residence constitutes consent. His approach reads like a parody of libertarianism, according to which people might give their "consent" to live in radically unequal, feudal, slavish conditions, meaning that libertarianism (as Otsuka understands it) would lead to truly disturbing forms of oppression. But that would be cool, as far as Otsuka is concerned, because they would be chosen.

Otsuka brings up exit rights only to dismiss them as uninteresting. He never tries to apply the theory of consent to interesting real-world examples, such as condominium associations, gated communities, and religious cloisters that have rules governing pet size, loud music, religious observances, and so forth. (I consented to governance by my condo association when I bought my condo. People who like large pets would not have consented and so wouldn't live in my condo building. But no one can put me to death if I play my music too loudly or invite my boyfriend over for the night.) None of that for Otsuka. Instead, in Otsuka's world, people would freely choose to be governed by feudal lords with powers of life and death over them.

After a tedious and unhelpful treatment of consent, Otsuka gives the game away. Remember that all that free choice has to be fair to everyone else, so your property would be constantly readjusted to reflect the claims of others, as demanded by Otsuka's proviso. That means there would have to be constant readjustment of property claims among people subject to different governments. There would also have to be some adjudication of conflicts among the governments. Otsuka therefore imagines "a fluid confederation of political societies and monities [a monity is 'a political society of one'] that is regulated by an interpolitical governing body." He explains:

"It would be necessary for this governing body to possess limited powers which encompass the overseeing of the drawing of the boundaries that demarcate these societies and monities and the settling of disputes that might arise among these parties. While the legitimate authority of the governments of the various societies would be based upon consent, the legitimate authority of this governing body would not necessarily be so based. Given the disorder and chaos which would ensue in the absence of such a governing body, all individuals would legitimately be subject to its authority--even those who do not consent to it. Hence, the ideal of political societies as voluntary associations would need to be underpinned by involuntary governance at the interpolitical level."

In other words, Otsuka "solves" the problems his theory of political legitimacy throws up by positing a nonconsensual government that would rule over the consensual ones. That body would exercise power legitimately because without it there would be "disorder and chaos." But legitimacy is supposed to be a solution to the problem of who has the authority to exercise power, a problem that Otsuka simply waves away in a footnote.

In that note, Otsuka concedes that, "given this interpolitical governing body, what I have just called the 'governments' of what I have just called '[political] societies' would not retain complete monopolies on the powers to legislate and punish. Therefore, given my definitions at the beginning of this chapter, we do not, strictly speaking, have 'governments' and 'political societies' here." Still, he says, "they are close enough to be called that."

Libertarianism Without Inequality is kind of like a serious book, but not really close enough to be called that.�