Hello,
I just started on the mises.org home study course and this question is proving a little tricky for me to answer. My first instinct was to say that yes, but then I recall reading about F.A. Hayek later in life not necessarily being as stringent regarding pure laissez-faire, but then I was confused as to whether or not that makes him not an Austrian or rather redefines my understanding of Austrian to not mandate also a pure laissez-faire principle. Any help in sorting this out for me would be greatly appreciated. Thanks,
Robert
This question came up a few days ago.
Hayek wasn’t entirely libertarian, furthermore at times he comes across as advocating social democracy. Furthermore, his teacher Wieser was a socialist, but is usually considered one of the early members of the Austrian school (although, some have said he was in fact a member of the Lausanne school of Leon Walras, which to some extent is true of Hayek also).
Traditionally, Austrians have been classic liberals. Menger, Mises, Bohm Bawerk certainly were. Since Rothbard it has been even more pronounced, since as a result of his work Austrian economists have largely been anarchists. But it needn’t necessarily be so, for example Strigl, was, I belive a communist whilst he did important work in Austrian capital theory. Hayek has remarked that a lot of people in Mises’ circle in Vienna did not share the political beliefs of their teacher, Mises.
Thank you very much for the response. Yea, that’s pretty much whatI felt the answer would come down to. That in general Austrian Economics and laissez-faire certainly go hand in hand, but not all Austrians have necessarily been totally laissez-faire. Thanks again for the response.
Robert
Mises covers wertfreiheit in his Theory and History and his The Epistemological Problems of Economics, both of which IMO are his most important books on methodology (I found UFOES dull by contrast to these brilliant works.) That explains why one can be an Austrian but not necessarily be fully in favour of Iaissez-faire, even if one would think Austrian economics ought to suggest such a move. It depends on the values of the economist in question and the extent to which they compartmentalise their findings (e.g. many scientists do not apply naturalism so far as to include their belief in god.)
What makes UFOES worse than the other two? Is it still worth reading?
It is definitely but Mises doesn’t put the same amount of effort into it that he does in those two IMO. Hoppe’s own ESAM is superior. Mises makes a lot of good and interesting points on a lot of topics in UFOES (especially game theory), but I think Hoppe’s book is more systematic and rooted in epistemology, whereas Mises’s work covers a broader swathe of topics and is less focused.
These are just my personal thoughts.
Austrian economics to me includes praxeology and the STV. Both of those ideas demand decentralization and individualism.
With that in mind, laissez-faire seems to be the only rational AND ethical choice. To me, the value of Rothbard was his radicalism. And by radical, I mean radic or “root”. Murray Rothbard seemed unrestrained by any sense of convention, tradition, superstition etc. He followed things back to their root.