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Tag Archives | Anarchy

Molto Grazie

By on July 23, 2009 44

They say nobody knows you when you’re down and out – but wow, it sure isn’t true in my case. The outpouring of support and assistance from the libertarian community has been tremendous – over $5000 in gifts and loans in just two days, from all around the world, whether from old friends or from people I’ve never even met. To say that it has exceeded my expectations would be an understatement; it simply takes my breath away. Thank you all so much.

Once I’ve got my own situation together again I’d like to do what I can to “pay it forward” by contributing in some way to the creation and funding of some sort of libertarian mutual-aid network. Any thoughts or suggestions on how this might work?

In other news, my radio interview from this afternoon with “Little Alex in Wonderland” is now online to play or download. We ended up talking about natural law, racism, children’s rights, anarchism, class conflict theory, and left-libertarianism rather than about agorism specifically. He also has interviews available with Scott Horton (just before me on today’s show) and Gary Chartier (from the previous show), which I haven’t had a chance to listen to yet.

Radical Spencerians Online

By on July 21, 2009 5

Radical Spencerians like Auberon Herbert and Wordworth Donisthorpe represent an interesting bridge between the “capitalist” and “socialist” wings of libertarianism, palling around with the Liberty and Property Defence League on the one hand and Benjamin Tucker on the other (and being hailed by the latter as fellow anarchists – evidently the benighted Tucker had never had a chance to read the AFAQ).

Auberon Herbert, Wordsworth Donisthorpe, and Richard Harding DavisI see that Google Books now offers some previously hard-to-find works by Herbert and Donisthorpe. One is Herbert’s A Politician In Trouble About His Soul (1884), a presentation of political philosophy in dialogue form. The quasi-anarchistic last chapter is widely reprinted as a separate article under the title “A Politician In Sight of Haven,” but the full work has not previously been available online.

There are also four books by Donisthorpe: Principles of Plutology (1876), Individualism: A System of Politics (1889), Law in a Free State (1895), and Down the Stream of Civilization (1898). Of these the second and third have been available online for a while, but the first and the fourth have not.

Down the Stream is a memoir of Donisthorpe’s travels in the Mediterranean; his sometimes bigoted opinions can make it annoying (anomalously for a radical Spencerian and an anarchist, he was an apologist for British imperialism), but it is also witty and enjoyable, and makes a nice pairing with Richard Harding Davis’s somewhat similar Rulers of the Mediterranean (1894), also newly available on Google Books. Rothbard speaks highly of Plutology in his History of Economic Thought. Left-libertarians will be especially interested in Donisthorpe’s theories of “labour capitalisation” in chapters 6 and 7 of Individualism and chapter 8 of Law in a Free State.

Radio Free Roderick, Redux

By on July 20, 2009 3

I’m going to be interviewed on Chicago’s Little Alex in Wonderland radio show this coming Thursday at 4:00 Central; we’ll probably be talking about agorism. (I was interviewed last week on James Hines’ New Orleans Saint and Fools radio show, but it doesn’t seem to be online yet; the topic was the use of logical fallacies in political discourse.)

Bash Back

By on July 13, 2009 7

A letter I just sent:

Dear members of the LP National and/or Platform Committees:

Liberty betrayedI’m writing to express my concern over reported comments by LP Platform Committee member Rick Randall to the effect that free-market anarchists are not genuine Libertarians and should be ousted from the Party: “Every time they surface, the mainstream (true) Libertarians quickly recognize them for what they are (people more interested in promoting in-fighting and, well … anarchy, than liberty) and oust them.”

I’m frankly worried about the ability of Mr. Randall to carry out his duties fairly and objectively, given how poorly informed, and evidently prejudiced, he appears to be relative to the Party’s longtime anarchist contingent.

I urge the Committees to demand an apology from Mr. Randall; and I urge Mr. Randall himself to acquaint himself more thoroughly both with the basics of anarchist theory and with the history of the party he claims to represent.

Flourish in liberty,

Roderick T. Long
Associate Professor of Philosophy, Auburn University
President, Molinari Institute
Region 3 Representative, Libertarian Party of Alabama

Anarchobama!

By on July 13, 2009 15

Speaking in Ghana, President Obama recently called for the abolition of the American form of government:

AnarchobamaNo country is going to create wealth if its leaders exploit the economy to enrich themselves, or if police can be bought off by drug traffickers.

No business wants to invest in a place where the government skims 20 percent off the top, or the head of the Port Authority is corrupt. No person wants to live in a society where the rule of law gives way to the rule of brutality and bribery.

That is not democracy, that is tyranny, even if occasionally you sprinkle an election in there, and now is the time for that style of governance to end.

Oh, wait. Sorry, I’ve just been informed that the president intended his remarks to apply solely to Africa ….

ParALLax View

By on July 13, 2009 83

What the Alliance of the Libertarian Left looks like to right-libertarians:

rioters burning stuff

What the Alliance of the Libertarian Left looks like to social anarchists:

capitalist exploiters

What the Alliance of the Libertarian Left looks like to pan-secessionists:

Sweet Transvestite

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