Libertarianism and the limits of government: QCE Philosophy and Reason

What this dot point is asking

Libertarianism is one of the four political philosophies in Unit 4 Topic 2, and is closely tied to the question of the limits of governmental power. You need to explain its central ideas, use the arguments of key thinkers such as Robert Nozick, and evaluate them against objections. The thinkers named below are examples, not a syllabus list, so confirm the exact dot point wording and any required thinkers in the current QCAA syllabus.

Core ideas

Self-ownership

Each person has a right to control their own body, labour and life. Nobody may use you as a mere means to the ends of others.

Property rights

What people acquire justly, by first appropriating unowned things (Locke's idea of mixing labour) or by voluntary exchange and gift, they own. Markets are the free outcome of these voluntary transfers.

Negative liberty

Freedom is the absence of coercive interference. A person is free if others do not force them, even if they are poor.

The limited state

The state's legitimate role is protection: stopping violence, theft and fraud, and enforcing contracts. Anything more, such as paternalism or redistribution, violates rights.

Key thinkers

Robert Nozick (Anarchy, State, and Utopia, 1974). He argues that a minimal state can arise from a state of nature without violating anyone's rights, as protective associations merge, and that nothing more extensive is justified. His entitlement theory of justice has three parts: justice in acquisition, justice in transfer, and rectification of past injustice. If holdings arise by just steps, the pattern of distribution is just, whatever it looks like. He argues that patterned principles (for example "to each according to need") require continual interference. His Wilt Chamberlain example imagines fans freely paying a basketball star a small fee, so that he becomes rich: if the starting distribution was just and each transfer was voluntary, the resulting inequality is just.

Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman defended free markets as a way of using dispersed knowledge and protecting liberty, with a limited government role. Their views are often called classical liberal or libertarian, although they accepted somewhat more state activity than Nozick.

Note that "libertarian" here means the political philosophy, not the free will position of the same name.

Arguments for

1. Moral argument. Persons are separate and inviolable, so using people for social goals without their consent is wrong.
2. Liberty and consent. A society of voluntary exchange respects individual choice.
3. Knowledge and efficiency. Markets coordinate decentralised information better than planners.
4. Rights as side constraints. Rights are limits on what may be done in pursuit of goals, not goals to be traded off.

Objections

1. The initial acquisition problem. Almost all property has a history involving force, theft or exclusion. If original acquisition was unjust, the entitlement theory requires large rectification, which Nozick leaves vague. Locke's own proviso (leave enough and as good for others) is hard to satisfy.
2. Self-ownership may not imply property. G. A. Cohen argued that owning oneself does not automatically give exclusive ownership of external resources.
3. Poverty and real freedom. Social liberals and socialists argue that a person who lacks food or education is not meaningfully free, so negative liberty alone is too thin.
4. Public goods and externalities. Some goods, such as clean air, cannot be provided by voluntary exchange alone.
5. Rawlsian objection. Rawls argues that natural talents and social starting points are morally arbitrary, so the gains from them should be shared. See theories of justice.
6. Wilt Chamberlain reply. Critics note that a just starting point is an assumption, and that inequality may erode equal political influence.

Worked response

Practice questions

1. State the three parts of Nozick's entitlement theory.

Answer. Justice in acquisition (how unowned things are legitimately taken), justice in transfer (voluntary exchange and gift) and rectification of past violations.

2. Explain what the Wilt Chamberlain example is meant to show.

Answer. If a just distribution is followed by free transfers, the resulting unequal distribution is also just. So any patterned principle (such as equality) can only be maintained by constantly interfering with voluntary exchange.

3. Outline one objection to the libertarian view of liberty.

Answer. Negative liberty counts a person as free if no one stops them, even if poverty leaves them unable to act on their choices. Critics say real freedom requires resources and opportunities, which the state may need to supply.