Reason.com - Free Minds and Free Markets
Reason logo Reason logo
  • Latest
  • Magazine
    • Current Issue
    • Archives
    • Subscribe
    • Crossword
  • Video
  • Podcasts
    • All Shows
    • The Reason Roundtable
    • The Reason Interview With Nick Gillespie
    • The Soho Forum Debates
    • Just Asking Questions
    • The Best of Reason Magazine
    • Why We Can't Have Nice Things
  • Volokh
  • Newsletters
  • Donate
    • Donate Online
    • Donate Crypto
    • Ways To Give To Reason Foundation
    • Torchbearer Society
    • Planned Giving
  • Subscribe
    • Reason Plus Subscription
    • Print Subscription
    • Gift Subscriptions
    • Subscriber Support

Login Form

Create new account
Forgot password

Policy

James K. Pinkerton, on Declaration of Independents: "libertarian polemicists, whether they like it or not, will indeed be kept far from real-world politics and real-world victories"

Matt Welch | 7.7.2011 4:29 PM

Share on FacebookShare on XShare on RedditShare by emailPrint friendly versionCopy page URL
Media Contact & Reprint Requests

Over at The American Conservative, James P. Pinkerton throws cold water on the "breezy," "gonzo-wannabe," "neo-Whiggish" optimism of The Declaration of Independents: How Libertarian Politics Can Fix What's Wrong with America. A chunk of Pinkerton's critique:

They invoke cyberspace: "The generation raised on the Internet has essentially been raised libertarian." And it's true that for decades theoreticians ranging from Howard Rheingold on the left to George Gilder on the right have rhapsodized about the libertarian potential of cyberspace—everyone free to be you and me, self-organizing in a non-hierarchical way.

Yet a substantial body of counter-utopianism about the World Wide Web has been building in recent years. Authors such as Debora Spar and Tim Wu have argued that the openness of the Net is just a phase in the cycle preceding ineluctable corporate control, while others, such as A.J. Keen, go so far as to envision "digital feudalism"—that is, a few giant castles of Net power, surrounded by microserfs. And Evgeny Morozov predicts a new and fearful wave of Web-based surveillance, a concern echoed by Julian Assange, describing just one component of this Brave Net World.

Facebook in particular is the most appalling spying machine that has ever been invented. Here we have the world's most comprehensive database about people, their relationships, their names, their addresses, their locations and the communications with each other, their relatives, all sitting within the United States, all accessible to U.S. intelligence.

Even if the U.S. government didn't exist, would we trust Facebook by itself? What do libertarians have to say about the prospect of corporations growing so strong and all-knowing that they become, in effect, their own kind of government?

As for policy prescriptions, Gillespie-and-Welch-style libertarianism is a mixed bag. We might agree that school choice is an idea whose time has come, while exuberant foreign wars and endless nation-building are crazes that need to go. But then we confront other issues: What's the libertarian position on abortion? How about legalizing drugs? Or opening the U.S.-Mexico border? […]

The authors' solution [to health care], of course, is the free market. Yet the idea of a free market for Medicare was trounced in the May 24 special election in New York, in which mostly Republican voters rejected Rep. Paul Ryan's "empowerment" approach to senior healthcare.

Bonus reading:
* Reason on legalizing drugs.
* Adam Thierer, on Tim Wu and "The Rise of Cybercollectivism"
* Jesse Walker, on The Social Network
* And James P. Pinkerton, from May 2008, on "The State of Libertarianism, 2058: How the Rand Era gave way to the Surveillance Era—and what we can do about it. A speculative flight into the future."

Start your day with Reason. Get a daily brief of the most important stories and trends every weekday morning when you subscribe to Reason Roundup.

This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

NEXT: The Last (Government Run) Space Bus Is Leaving the Station

Matt Welch is an editor at large at Reason.

PolicyNanny StateWar on DrugsScience & TechnologyCultureObamacareInternetIntellectual PropertyDrug PolicyDrugsThe Declaration of Independents
Share on FacebookShare on XShare on RedditShare by emailPrint friendly versionCopy page URL
Media Contact & Reprint Requests

Show Comments (104)

Latest

America Party

Liz Wolfe | 7.1.2025 9:34 AM

I'm No Fan of UVA's President. That Doesn't Mean the Government Should Force Him Out.

Emma Camp | 7.1.2025 7:30 AM

Trump Is Now More Powerful Thanks to the Supreme Court. But Will It Last?

Damon Root | 7.1.2025 7:00 AM

Why Free Movement Is Essential to a Free Society

Katherine Mangu-Ward | From the August/September 2025 issue

Brickbat: Too Hot to Cool Off

Charles Oliver | 7.1.2025 4:00 AM

Recommended

  • About
  • Browse Topics
  • Events
  • Staff
  • Jobs
  • Donate
  • Advertise
  • Subscribe
  • Contact
  • Media
  • Shop
  • Amazon
Reason Facebook@reason on XReason InstagramReason TikTokReason YoutubeApple PodcastsReason on FlipboardReason RSS

© 2024 Reason Foundation | Accessibility | Privacy Policy | Terms Of Use

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

r

Do you care about free minds and free markets? Sign up to get the biggest stories from Reason in your inbox every afternoon.

This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

This modal will close in 10

Reason Plus

Special Offer!

  • Full digital edition access
  • No ads
  • Commenting privileges

Just $25 per year

Join Today!