Political Philosophy
Ed Feser: Libertarianism's Claims to Neutrality
Barnett really seems to be saying is not that ‘moral rights’ and ‘consequentialist’ libertarian theories are compatible, but rather that although they are incompatible as they stand, they can and ought to be reinterpreted – specifically, in an instrumentalist ‘problem-solving’ fashion – so that the incompatibilities disappear. But the ‘neutrality’ between moral theories that results is bogus, in two respects. First, it is not a neutrality between existing moral theories – which is surely what matters if libertarianism is to be impartial in some interesting sense – but only between theories that Barnett thinks should exist in the place of the ones that actually exist.
Patrick Deenen FPR: Phillip Blond and Subsidiarity
[O]ur time is defined by a pincer movement mutually arising from, on the one hand, liberalism’s tendency to understand the human creature in individualistic and monadic terms, and on the other, the rise of a centralized Nanny State. Our current political alignments regard these two as opposites, the one the philosophy of heroic Randian individuals, the other, the specter of the Nanny State – or (as described from another perspective), on one side, greedy industrial plunderers, and on the other, the Government as protector of and provider for the people. The pincer movement is directed against all intermediary and binding associations: both the Market and the State seek to be monopolistic in their spheres, disempowering or dislocating intermediary identifications. Community, family, church, society – all are to be remade in the voluntarist image, and their functions are to be replaced by the State.
And similarities to Robert Nisbet
Barnett really seems to be saying is not that ‘moral rights’ and ‘consequentialist’ libertarian theories are compatible, but rather that although they are incompatible as they stand, they can and ought to be reinterpreted – specifically, in an instrumentalist ‘problem-solving’ fashion – so that the incompatibilities disappear. But the ‘neutrality’ between moral theories that results is bogus, in two respects. First, it is not a neutrality between existing moral theories – which is surely what matters if libertarianism is to be impartial in some interesting sense – but only between theories that Barnett thinks should exist in the place of the ones that actually exist.
Patrick Deenen FPR: Phillip Blond and Subsidiarity
[O]ur time is defined by a pincer movement mutually arising from, on the one hand, liberalism’s tendency to understand the human creature in individualistic and monadic terms, and on the other, the rise of a centralized Nanny State. Our current political alignments regard these two as opposites, the one the philosophy of heroic Randian individuals, the other, the specter of the Nanny State – or (as described from another perspective), on one side, greedy industrial plunderers, and on the other, the Government as protector of and provider for the people. The pincer movement is directed against all intermediary and binding associations: both the Market and the State seek to be monopolistic in their spheres, disempowering or dislocating intermediary identifications. Community, family, church, society – all are to be remade in the voluntarist image, and their functions are to be replaced by the State.
And similarities to Robert Nisbet
posted by martin at December 31, 2010
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