This may seem like a basic question, but is there an individually attributed with being the Father/Founder of anarcho-capitalism, similar to Menger as the Father/Founder of the Austrian School?
Mises was close, but IIRC, he was more of a minarchist. My guess and obvious choice would be Rothbard. But perhaps there are other thinkers outside the Austrian realm that developed anarcho-capitalist ideas before Rothbard?
de Molinari is close to the consensus.
Ah, that makes sense. No wonder Roderick Long is into him.
I’m sure there are others from earlier times but whom I do not know. From first century USA I guess I’d vote for Lysander Spooner?
May I reccomend the Mises Daily: Wednesday, December 23, 2009
“Two centuries later, Lao Tzu’s great follower Chuang Tzu (369–c.286 BC) built on the master’s ideas of laissez-faire to push them to their logical conclusion: individualist anarchism.”
It’d be fun to take an economic history class based on Rothbards’ Austrian Perspective.
Good day
If Mises preceded Rothbard, but Molinari and Spooner preceded both of the above, why did Mises not fully embrace ancap?
Neither of them were ever very well known, Mises probably hadn’t read them… or even heard of them.
I had a class on Lao Tzu last year, and I don’t think Rothbard grasped the whole of Lao Tzu’s thought. While it is true that Lao Tzu has some critical remarks on government, It doesn’t follow that he is either an anarchist in particular or a libertarian in general.
Take a look at this list:
That is very hard to believe. I am almost certain he read and knew both of them.
I’ve had a class on East Asian Religion and Philosophy too and I differ from what you say Adrian. I’ve also read outside of class on this person and other similar people of this Dao-de-jing understanding. But I’m not an expert or anything but I don’t see how Rothbard didn’t grasp this.
Mises did not learn french until he arrived in Geneva, so it’s actually quite plausible.
I would say Rothbard. There were other anarchists before him, but I think Rothbard was the first true anarcho-capitalist. He was the first to really bring anarchism and free market capitalism together.
It’s arguable whether this was a good thing, and whether we would have been better served distancing capitalism from anarchism and going the Molinari route.
I wholly agree. Individualist anarchism (which fits Molinari and Spooner) is not the same thing as anarcho-capitalism. One must have a thorough understanding of capitalism to be an anarcho-capitalist. And the sad fact is, until Mises developed a full theory of economic calculation, NOBODY had a thorough understanding of capitalism.
If you want to be a great leader,
you must learn to follow the Tao.
Stop trying to control.
Let go of fixed plans and concepts,
and the world will govern itself.
The more prohibitions you have,
the less virtuous people will be.
The more weapons you have,
the less secure people will be.
The more subsidies you have,
the less self-reliant people will be.
Therefore the Master says:
I let go of the law,
and people become honest.
I let go of economics,
and people become prosperous.
I let go of religion,
and people become serene.
I let go of all desire for the common good,
and the good becomes common as grass.
Lao Tsu
?
If you think the answer to protection and arbitration is open entry and competition, then how is that not anarcho-capitalism?
That;'s a good point. How are we to define anarcho-capitalism?
I would tend to agree, with the classical anarchists, that anarcho-capitalism is a contradiction in terms. Capitalism implies sophisticated organization, while anarchism is the opposite of this.
Rothbard called anarcho-capitalism “anarcho-capitalism” to differentiate “stateless” capitalism from other forms of capitalism.