Are you saying an active minority can wield disproportionate influence in electoral politics? It seems to me that politics relies on mass public opinion. Democracy is populist, not elitist (and we want an elitist strategy, following the 80/20 rule).
Heh. The Fed is just a branch of government. The root is the territorial monopoly on ultimate jurisdiction. Ron Paul is still hacking at branches, albeit large ones.
I don’t think anyone follows a strategy consisting exclusively of non-voting. Education, secession, seasteading, entrepreneurship, politics, etc. are all part of a comprehensive attack on the State.
Voting can be useful, the more votes and individual like Ron Paul gets the more legitimacy his ideas get. And that’s good for us.
Any strategy of liberty that ignores politics is not going to work, with democracy the state is essentially giving us a platform to use to preach our ideas for a relatively low cost. In the case of Ron Paul it was from that platform that he was able to convert thousands. The same applies for academia, the state universities provide Austrians with the ability to preach a message whilst refining their ideas, given that power rests of legitimacy this is important.
In spite of this voting won’t shrink the government, the game is rigged, not will attempting to convert intellectuals who are heavily invested in human capital that allows them publish in the top journals (read: irrelevant maths). Academia and politics are supplements to a more fundamental strategy, that of building the institutions of a stateless society.
Taking over academia is a poor strategy for libertarianism. But if we’re talking about advancing economic science, then I don’t see any real alternative to joining and engaging the scientific community.
I don’t think it’s possible to take academia over, Hayek and Boettke are simply wrong. What’s worse is that they (Boettke, Leeson etc.) are wasting their time investing in the intellectual capital to be able to published in the top journals meanwhile not contributing anything to Austrianism.
That’s not to say we should exclude ourselves from the scientific community, just, they are better things to do than to try and compete with the mainstream in their own territory.
Negative. Revolution and overthrow. You can’t vote for a revolution, nor to eliminate the state. Besides, the state doesn’t own you, no matter how much it or you believes it does, so there’s no reason to vote if you oppose government. Simply stop obeying them, and start defending yourself. Revolutions are always acheived by the minority.
Yeah, I wrote down Ron Paul on the last ballot. With a few other anti-state, anti-war, pro market quotes. [:D]
It used to be if you were enrolled and didn’t vote, it was fineable. Now they have amped it up by making sure you get enrolled and it is fineable if you are not.
There is a guy down in Sydney who each year, refuses to vote. And pay the fine. He spends a week in goal (jail) every time.
There was also a court case, where the guy ‘voted’, i.e wrote in a ballot, but he refused to do it properly. He said he didn’t want to vote for any of them to represent him. The court held, he HAD to make a choice. He also got punished. So screwing up a ballot is also punishable in the eyes of the state, except the thing is - it is totally unenforceable. Secret ballot, on paper. However, I guess they could use finger printing.. lol [:|]
Nope, that’s not what I’m saying. What I’m speaking of, is much like the first American revolution.
Were it necessary to bring a majority into a comprehension of the libertarian philosophy, the cause of liberty would be utterly hopeless. Every significant movement in history has been led by one or just a few individuals with a small minority of energetic supporters. – Leonard E. Read
A small group of thoughtful people could change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has. - Margaret Mead
Secession. He’s talked about it. Completely ending Departments of government is radical. The Case for Radical Idealism / Toward a Theory of Strategy for Liberty by Murray N. Rothbard.
Since I’m too lazy to read this entire thread, I’ll assume that some anti-voting individuals will say that voting is an act of coercion.
But if I vote for somebody who runs on the platform of non-coercion, and that candidate makes good on that promise, is it an act of coercion? Is it aggression to vote for a non-aggressor?
So you’re saying electoral politics is inefficient for abolishing government, but useful for education? Again, I don’t see how a “small group of thoughtful people” alone can win out in a majoritarian system.
Talk isn’t good enough! We need action! But seriously, I think an actual philosopher like Christopher Wellman will have more influence in legitimizing secession than a politician.
I’m using the word radical in the sense of “going to the root.” So the most radical strategy is to attack the root of government, it’s territorial monopoly on ultimate jurisdiction. As Hoppe writes: “one must never hesitate to strike at the very heart of the legitimacy of the state: its alleged indispensable role as producer of private protection and security.”
If you’re defining radical as “extreme,” then yes, ending departments is radical.
I’m not going to post what I think publicly. If you’re paying attention, you can see it. If you want to drop me a private message about it, feel free to do so.
But to carry on as some do, that Ron Paul is trying to effect political change, or he is a minarchist is really missing the big picture.
There’s also the fact that it actually isn’t purely majoritarian - it’s a matter of “numerical majorities”, which need not be an actual majority and excludes all those who do not participate in the voting process (who are nonetheless effected anyways). Everyone is effected regaurdless of whether or not they vote or who/what they vote for. Before such voting takes place, one’s options are limited through a primary process and whittled down to two canidates from two parties that already are in power and linked together in the same institution. Moreover, so-called “representation” is incredibly indirect, and in actual fact the state is still an oligarchy in “democracies”. So the reality is that “numerical majorities” sway the outcome of which narrow group controls an oligarchy. Hence, so-called “democratic” change is not systematic change, it is only a game of musical chairs within an oligarchy.
Taking all of this into account reveals voting as the rather meaningless mechanism that it is. The oppurtunity cost of voting and political activism is the time and resources that could have been used to directly address the issues oneself. The power that a single vote has is neglidgable when one takes into account all of the preceding “rules of the game” before one even gets a chance to play. The voter and non-voter alike are alienated from the decision-making process itself when it comes down to it. The institutional structure of the state and its incentives are self-perpetuating and the democratic process functions to counteract the forces of individual initiative and any sort of competition with the institution itself. Political democracy is a means of transitioning decision-making power within an oligarchy through a process that is only nominally inclusive, which serves the function of providing the illusion of legitimacy by consent.
I don’t think that Ron Paul is an anarchist in any extent. I think he is a Constitutionalist who falls into the same logical fallacy that others like him and his followers do. It is the believe that the Constitution is not subject to the will and interpretation of the very power it is suppose to limit, when clearly, where does the powers of the Constitution originate from? The people who are so easily coerced and stepped on by the state apparatus? To paraphrase Lysander Spooner either the Constitution has created the environment that we now reside in, or it has been unable to stop it. In either case it is unfit to continue.