From Marginal Revolution:
The libertarian vice is to assume that the quality of government is fixed. […] If the quality of government is fixed, the battle is then “government vs. market.” Not everyone will agree with libertarian views, but libertarians are comfortable on this terrain.
But sometimes governments do a pretty good job, even if you like me are generally skeptical of government. The Finnish government has supported superb architecture. The Swedes have made a good go at a welfare state. The Interstate Highway System in the U.S. was a high-return investment. […]
The libertarian approach treats government vs. market as the central question. Another approach, promoted by many liberals, tries to improve the quality of government. This endeavor does not seem more utopian than most libertarian proposals. The libertarian cannot reject it on the grounds of excess utopianism, even though much government will remain wasteful, stupid, and venal. More parts of government could in fact be much better, and to significant human benefit and yes that includes more human liberty in the libertarian sense of the word. […]
It is possible to agree with the positive claims of libertarians about the virtues of markets but still think that improving the quality of government is the central task before us. One could love markets yet be some version of a modern liberal rather than a classical liberal. This possibility makes libertarians nervous…
Read, as they say, the whole thing.
Also, from another of Tyler’s posts:
The modern liberal vice is to think that everyone can be taken care of, and/or to rule out foreigners from the relevant moral universe. Too many issues are (incorrectly) framed as “taking care” vs. serving the avarice of the wealthy.
In turn, a conservative and libertarian vice is to get too obsessed with “desert.” Another conservative and libertarian vice is come up with some better means of helping people — usually involving markets — and if that doesn’t happen, to be content with doing nothing.
All of that seems very on-target to me, but I’d be curious to know what other folks think.
Curtsy: Crooked Timber.
[Crossposted at Creative Destruction, where libertarians play in the hay all day.]
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I agree that it’s all very on-target. One of the most frustrating things about debating with someone who doesn’t sit down and really think or study other theories is that Liberalism in particular is criticized as being “idealistic”, but of course all of the systems rely on things working the way the theory says they should.
They are ALL equally idealistic, and indeed every one of them would be acceptable if they worked as they were intended. I’d be perfectly happy in a neo-conservative fascist state if it really did provide all the benefits it advertised, we’d all be perfectly happy in a socialist state if people really were selfless enough to make it work, we’d all be happy in a libertarian minimalist state if market forces really did self-regulate the way they’re “supposed” to.
The problem of course is that NONE of the economic or social systems work the way they’re supposed to, so we’re all left debating ideals while implementing pragmatic compromises. It just becomes impossible to reach a good middle ground if Liberalism is singled out as being idealistic, while somehow libertarianism and conservatism are considered more “realistic”, despite them both depending equally on systems working in specific idealistic ways.
I tried to post this comment over at Marginal Revolution, but I’m not sure it worked — and, in any event, here it’s less likely to get burried under libertarian defensiveness. Also, it synchs with what Nathaniel just wrote. So I’ll post it here to:
Is there perhaps another side to this: that (another) libertarian vice is to hold the value of markets constant — namely, high? It seems to me that one of the central liberal critiques of libertarianism is that markets too can vary in value — and that often they become better markets through government action. Thus, financial markets are better with regulation to prevent insider trading and the like; food markets are better with regulations insisting that consumers be provided with accurate information about the contents of their purchases (the better to make informed decisions); real estate markets work better by eliminating irrational factors such as racial discrimination; monopolies ought to be broken up to increase competition; etc. I’m not saying that this analysis accounts for all liberal positions — health care is probably an exception, for instance — but it seems to me that in addition to trying to make governments better, liberals also believe that markets can be made better — that they’re not naturally good, but have to be made good.