Forgive the ignorance but who is ERO? But can you link a critique of it? I’ve had a look round the web before and couldn’t really find any. It seems to be a book enthusiastically accepted by the Rothbardian branch and just abused by everyone else.
Check amazon. The book is highly controversial, and Hoppe’s argument appears to be rooted in social darwinism. I haven’t read it, so I don’t really know, but the public choice school has probably put forth a much stronger case against democracy. If Hoppe is indeed supporting social darwinism, then it would be wise for the libertarian movement to disassociate themselves from Hoppe and his dangerous ideology. Most people support capitalism and freedom because it will elevate the masses to opulence, and not because it kills off the “weak.”
So how did Hoppe manage to deduce his hatred of homosexuals from liberty, eh? How did he logically deduce that they would be excluded completely in a free society? And what the hell is even wrong with the followers of “alternative, non-family centered lifestyles” anyway? Don’t these people deserve freedom too? Hans-Hermann Hoppe doesn’t seem to think so.
Does Mr. Hoppe think he knows how to best run peoples’ lives; like the state?
Well then, if he does, I say we make Hans-Herrman Hoppe a king! Hey, since he truely believes that he knows which lifestyle everyone should follow, why shouldn’t he be?
It is Hoppe who is the one trapped in self-contradiction and self-refutation.
Hoppe’s comments about homosexuals and society are completely supportable based on observation. Societies that have tolerated homosexual behavior are historically few in number. Furthermore, any society that is truly free must not only permit individuals to engage in socially discouraged behavior, but must also permit the rest of society to shun individuals who engage in those behaviors - discrimination being the very essence of liberty.
I think it is a rather poor justification to engage in neo-victorian behavior. Homosexuals ekk! On a side note, this mantra is why libertarianism can’t simply be about the NAP and must contain non-state forms of oppression. How long before you take away the human rights of a group that is actively being dehumanized?
Because nobody outside the “Rothbardian bunch” even takes Hoppe seriously, I’m not even trying to be insulting here, it’s just a fact. Look, one can find many economists who would identify themselves as Austrian who would be considered serious economists outside the Austrian community, hell, Peter Leeson is visiting at Chicago.
I’m not sure I can think of anybody outside of LRC and the LvMI community who considers Hoppe to be anything but a bad joke (and this is being generous, most people haven’t even heard of him). There are no reviews or criticism of the book because nobody takes it seriously. I might post some arguments up when I get some time, but I doubt I’ll get to it because I don’t feel like wading through Hoppe’s angry rhetoric in search for something substantive.
Well, the fact that you have to search to know what public choice is probably reveals more about yourself than it does about anybody else. I’m not really sure that it makes much sense to reject public choice based on one simplifying assumption it makes, all the more so when Hoppe makes a very similar assumption and is quite explicit about it, I might even post some quotes from the introduction if I get around to it. In fact, one of the problems I have with the Hoppe book is precisely that assumption, which is why I referenced the Brennan and Lomasky work which also rejects that approach to explaining democracy.
From the Coordination Problem blog, I saw this:
Now, Hoppe can’t be faulted for not discussing a book that was released a few years after Democracy: The God That Failed but what about the Brennan & Pettit paper that was cited? Somehow I think I must have missed that in the footnotes. Like I said, any serious work would have to take these sorts of discussions into hand, instead Hoppe thinks he can prove that monarchy is somehow superior to democracy in 50 short pages.
Who is saying anything about taking anything away from anyone? In a free society free people will choose who they want to associate with. And they are entitled to do so for whatever reason they choose, including reasons you don’t like.
It’s hard enough to get people to follow the NAP on issues they deem a necessary evil. Legislation that offers equal protection of human rights under law is hardly necessary to individuals who wish to maintain a free society. I think the gay community itself has a long way to go before they can stop fighting for equal rights under law.
There have been few, if not no true instances of anarchy throughout history. So do you not support anarchy, because there have been no real historical instances of it? I don’t know about you, but I’d still like to see the end of the state. (^o^)
Historically, it has been the state which has oppressed homosexuals. And when it wasn’t the state, homosexuals were oppressed by violence. As libertarians, who hold true to the non-aggression axiom, we are against violence; whether commited by the state or any other gang of thugs .
What is socially discouraged behaviour? How can you, an individual, decide everything for the “collective”? Does the “collective” even exist? Do you know what’s best for everyone? Some people (socialists) would consider making a profit off a good to be “evil” behaviour; are they right?
Of course not.
The fact of the matter is homosexuality is as natural as setting up a business in order to provide a service to their fellow man. So long as it is voluntary, EVERYBODY WINS!
And yes you can “permit” discrimination (so long as it’s non-violent), but you cannot enforce it.
So would everyone in a free society decide to cast the homosexuals out to the forests? Such a claim is as ridiculous as saying voluntary socialism could work. There is no way such a massive collective desicion would be made when the market naturally brings people of all kinds together through the division of labour and cooperation.
Of course homosexuals would have a place in a free society; especially in this changing world of ours.
Markets breed diversity not discrimination.
Freedom from violence is the very essence of liberty. That is if you hold to non-agression axiom. Discrimination is in most cases defeated by diversity as discrimination is often very impratical.
The state divides us! Freedom brings us together! ^o^
I end with this quote from Murray Rothbard:
“And how can the rightist trumpet his devotion to private property and free enterprise while at the same time favoring war, conscription, and the outlawing of noninvasive activities and practices that he deems immoral?”
Not a scholarly one, but I take issue with Hoppe’s portrayal of feudalism:
I disagree that feudalism was a “stateless” society.
Giles, I searched for the 2 authors you mentioned. I know what public choice is. Your only “argument” is an argumentum ad populem or appeal to public sentiment. Most people once believed that the sun revolved around the Earth too. I gave you 2 papers regarding “public goods” in your ridiculous asteroid thread. These assumptions of a homo economicus are part of the flaws of the scientistic professional economist.
I will give you and the others another chance to prove that you actually own the book by scanning/transcribing from pg. 211 where most of today’s false claims are addressed.
Going to meet his statist mob buddies is he? [;)]
Well Sean Gabb would and does and he’s not on the inside of the LRC or LvMI. Heck, is a Humean minarchist to boot although he’s relatively socially conservative.
So in answer to my question of whether you can provide a link for a decent critique that would be a no then. I’ve looked at some on Amazon and the most substantive claims are that he doesn’t detail Monarchical practice in detail and assumes the government to be a monolithic entity. The former has most weight and even though the latter holds it’s an empirical matter and thus not covered by the counterfactual nature of the analysis.
Your analogy doesn’t even begin to work. To end the state all you have to do is remove it. To end discrimination against homosexuals you have to use force against those who would discriminate.
And what does the state get out of it but the approval of the population? Suppression of homosexual behavior has always been primarily a social imperative, though the state sometimes lends its weight. In any case the subject at hand is the free society in which state violence is not an issue. In such a society socially undesireable behavior can and almost certainly will be shunned.
Murder is socially discouraged behavior. So is theft. So is farting in elevators.
I haven’t. Societies have norms though and they look for ways to enforce them. Some methods of enforcement are perfectly legitimate.
Have you ever had a homeowner’s association? Have you ever belonged to a church? There certainly are ways to enforce social norms and societies are pretty god at finding them. Remember human society is a lot older than the state and social norms have been with us all along.
In almost every society that has existed to date that is exactly what they have done. Is opposition to homosexual behavior an intrinsic characteristic of the state or is it perhaps an intrinsic characteristic of human society?
BTW for examples of voluntary socialism working see all of the medieval monasteries.
Freedom to do what? Liberty is the freedom to exclude others from your property. It is your right to discriminate.
LOL - That’s the Paris Hilton fallacy (i.e “Just wait until the new technologies kick in.”)
I really don’t have time to respond to every unsubstantiated claim from people who haven’t read the book.
So how did Hoppe manage to deduce his hatred of homosexuals from liberty, eh?
Where does he say this? Oh right, he doesn’t ever say he hates homosexuals, at least to my knowledge. You obviously don’t understand Austrian methodology. Hatred of whatever group is a personal value. Libertarianism is only concerned with defending property rights, and all human rights are property rights. From the non-aggression principle is deduced the right of free association. It is impossible for this fact of our existence to either condone or condemn things like racism, homosexuality, bestiality, etc. Whether you, me, or Hoppe likes left-handed leper sex is besides the point. Also, no amount of civil rights or “affirmative action” laws will eliminate things like racism in practice.
How did he logically deduce that they would be excluded completely in a free society?
from pg 212:
First of all, there is this trend around here for people to get so caught up in trying to prove themselves right that they are unable to have an honest discussion. For instance, I tried to ask a simple question of the 2 “libertarians” on this forum who think it is okay for parents to rape and murder their children. Given that you say that this is consistent with libertarianism, how do children become free of their slavedriving parents? I don’t wish to discuss this topic here, just point out that in 12 pages of discussion they couldn’t answer this simple question.
Now, I urge everyone who wishes to not make a fool of themselves to actually read Hoppe’s work before and after what I quoted. He is discussing “a society in which the right to exclusion is fully restored to owners of private property…”, then there is also a lengthy footnote including passage from Rothbard that starts, “To avoid any misunderstanding…”
Any possible problems with this passage are not a matter of deduction, but of prediction. Hoppe makes it sound like he is talking about male gay couples holding hands in public or such things. In my opinion, there could be some secular religious communities that ban such things. I don’t think this is true for the bulk of American or European society. There is an economic incentive for shopkeepers to not ban homosexual PDA’s assuming that his profit from such couples outweighs the amount of bigots who will boycott him. Should I allow tank tops and sandals in my $150 entree restaurant, or will it turn away my clientele?
In that context when he uses the word “state” he means specifically the modern state. Feudal states were not modern states. Absolute monarchies were.
DBratton – it’s bigots like you who are stoping this ideology from flourishing into the mainstream.
“The land that you homestead and claim is yours is actually mine and therefore if you prevent me from burning down the house that you built (and I own), you are committing an act of aggression.” How would you respond to someone who says this? The idea of who legitimately owns what and therefore what constitutes aggression is relative to each person. For example, if you prevent a group of people from entering your property to rescue an injured child, I (and 99% of the population) would view that as an act of aggression and a crime on your part. The NAP barely makes sense in the context of moral relativism.
I don’t see Hoppe “logically deducing” anything. This is just speculation.
I read the book a while ago and I didn’t like it at all. Caplan’s book is much better.
What was the difference? Should the absolute monarchy of the Sumerian Kings, or the Pharaoh, or the King of Sparta, or Julius Cesar be considered modern states?
It kills me that so many libertarians don’t understand this. “Ya, I believe fully in the core tenets of libertarianism, but no matter what the costs we have to make sure you’re not racist/sexist/etc…”
I thought libertarianism and free markets was more about social expression, whether someone likes that social expression or not.
You need to read my post again.
See Block’s, Is There an “Anomalous” Section of the Laffer Curve?.
“The land that you homestead and claim is yours is actually mine and therefore if you prevent me from burning down the house that you built (and I own), you are committing an act of aggression.” How would you respond to someone who says this?
The latecomer would need some proof in a courtroom…?
For the injured child hypothetical, keep this in mind. We might call the actions of the rescuers trespass, or assault, on the homeowner. This is within an exact scientific framework or praxeological legal theory. Still, a judge could simply refuse to press charges against the trespassers. His action as arbitrator is to determine the maximum allowable punishment which he or his security force will uphold.
Also, this would be something good to discuss in my Police Forces thread, rather than here about Hoppe. First of all, people are going to make contractual agreements with security and justice providers ahead of time in many instances. These various agencies will reach agreement amongst themselves. When you sign up with Acme Security Inc., you are ceding your right to determine your own spin on justice and take all matters into your own hands. You are agreeing to abide by their rulings and whatever this may lead to because of the company’s other preexisting arrangements. There very may become common a clause to the effect of, “Given no apparent threat to one’s own life, the customer agrees to allow rescue efforts on his property, and any restitution for property damage”…[will be handled along such and such lines].