FEDERATION OR UNION?

"Neil Block," a poster over at Reason's Hit & Run, turned me on to this.

Chandran Kukathas, the paper's author, outlines two worlds in which a quite pure application of libertarian principles regarding personal liberty and non-aggression viably produces societies rife with problems. I'm just not smart enough -- yet -- about the range and literalness of libertarianism to refute Kukathas' claims, or design additional thought models to counter his arguments. In the absence of alternatives to the Federation of Liberty and the Union of Liberty, I don't find either model particularly appealing.

Kukathas, as provocative as he may be, fails to score on four points. First, he hints at but does not illuminate the constitutional framework any libertarian society would require. A libertarian's view of limited government does not mean no government at all. The operation of government, through constitutional enumerations and restrictions, would quite naturally have to account for the complexity and diversity Kukathas seems to believe are in conflict with the theoretical magnitude of personal liberty.

Second, he pays a relatively large amount of time in his society models using slavery as an easy foil for libertarianism. But he doesn't account for a simple constitutional article or amendment (such as our own Amendment XIII) that would render his argument irrelevant. When individual liberties are clearly protected in plain constitutional language, many of the conflicts Kukathas explores evaporate. Quite simply, he sees complexity where there is none. A capital L libertarian world would outlaw the suppression of individual rights. If that creates a problem for groups bent on suppressing individual rights, they would be in violation of the law. If these groups want to establish a paradise where suppression reigns, great, go someplace else or foment a revolution. Kukathas minimizes the value inherent in individual liberty by conflating it with an overestimation of the "diversity" that creates groups dedicated to authoritarianism.

Third, Kukathas doesn't seem to realize that a confluence of the Federation and Union he describes is the United States of America. On the Federation side, we have strong political and religious disagreements, all held in check by the authority of the constitution and untold deviations from it. On the Union side, at the federal level, we absolutely have a central authority -- representative as it claims to be -- of a few hundred elected officials plus 9 justices. In the perverse world of modern American politics, one could argue that the composition of the "few hundred" consists of a large mix of non-government agents and only a few dozen elected officials, the rest of them muted by process and bloat.

Fourth, Kukathas gives no merit to the theoretical power of the contract, which, as we know it today, is often a response to regulation and intrusive legislation rather than a refinement and reinforcement of the elementary agreement.

The best compliment I can give to Kukathas is that his article made me think hard. Apologies if Chandran is, in fact, a woman.