Murray Rothbard

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Murray Rothbard during the 1990s

Murray Newton Rothbard (born March 2, 1926 New York City , † January 7, 1995 ibid) was an American economist and political philosopher . He also published articles in the field of history .

Rothbard was a major pioneer of the anarcho-capitalist movement in the United States and the Libertarian Party . As an economist he was in the tradition of the Austrian school . Culturally he was conservative and as a young man was influenced by the spirit of the American Old Right and is therefore also included in paleoliberarianism .

Life

Rothbard was born in New York City , where he also spent most of his life. His father, David Rothbard, a chemist, came to the USA as a penniless Jewish immigrant from a Polish shtetl , but assimilated quickly there. Murray Rothbard was very much shaped by his father's liberal and individualistic thinking. Rothbard said about his youth that he and his father were the only " rightists " in a left-liberal to communist environment. Rothbard studied mathematics and economics at the private Columbia University in New York.

Viewpoints

Meaning personal rights

Rothbard argues radically natural law , citing John Locke . In his view, every human being by nature has certain rights: freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of information, freedom of contract, but above all the “right to one's own person and to the fruits of one's labor”. Rothbard derives each of these rights from a "natural right to property". He stands in the tradition of the Stoa , medieval scholasticism and classical liberalism .

Furthermore, Rothbard's thinking is shaped by Ludwig von Mises ' analysis of the exchange of goods and by the specifically North American libertarian tradition ( paleolibertarianism ).

Murray Rothbard (around 1955)

His creed essentially consists of two axioms :

  • (i) Everyone, whether young, old, poor, rich, male or female, has the absolute and natural right in and to themselves , known as self-property .
  • (ii) Everyone, again without exception, has an equally absolute and natural right to a “homestead” that he has taken into use.

These two axioms are assumed by Rothbard to be non-negotiable.

From his axiomatic assumptions, Rothbard develops anti-paternalistic arguments. Any claim to be able to determine the benefit for another person better than that person is rejected by him. For him, the basic characteristic of a free coexistence is the free exchange of goods and services. Rothbard also sees areas that are protected by natural law in gambling , prostitution , pornography , sexual deviations, the carrying of firearms and drug consumption .

Denationalization

Rothbard regards the state as the embodiment of paternalism . The state is not just a guardian of the citizens, but a blatant aggressor, in that it constantly and on a large scale violates the natural rights of the citizens. Rothbard names as examples the military recruitment, taxation and compulsory education . Compulsory schooling systematically creates uniformity, undermines individual diversity and also systematically violates (natural) parental rights. In addition, it imposes a decision-making problem on the state that it cannot solve in principle. B. be more progressive or more conservative? If the parents disagree on this question, a considerable minority, perhaps even a majority, is always seriously injured in their interests. The tax collection is robbery, at best a compulsion to pay for services that have not been ordered. The military was essentially slavery. If the representatives of the state are of the opinion that the state must be defended, then, like every citizen in his business, they should turn to the market and recruit people there through appropriate offers.

Every state, including a democratic constitutional state, violates natural, individual rights, since every state is ultimately a monopoly of force and force. The usual democratic procedures and the usual constitutions are state institutions that always function in the interests of those in power. Effective protection of the individual can only be brought about and guaranteed through radical denationalisation. This denationalization should also affect traffic routes, schools, universities, the police, the legal system and the armed forces.

criticism

Rothbard's critics are of the opinion that a community cannot do without “fundamental coercive force”. If individuals formed protective associations in order to defend themselves against aggressors, there would be a risk of war between these associations. The only remedy would be a "fundamental force of coercion" endowed with such superior power that it could authoritatively and definitely settle any internal dispute. This coercive force is the state with the state's monopoly of force . That states repeatedly violate positive or natural rights (if any) is inevitable. But the citizens of a modern state would have the opportunity to keep such violations in check and to seek compensation. This is the difference between a democratic constitutional state and an autocratic arbitrary state. Rothbard's positions on criticism are mainly found in Power and Market and For a New Liberty: The Libertarian Manifesto .

Publications (selection)

literature

  • Norman P. Barry: On Classical Liberalism and Libertarianism. (Reprint, first 1986) Macmillan, London / Hampshire 1989.
  • Norman P. Barry: Anarchism. In: Nigel Ashford, Stephen Davis: A Dictionary of Conservative and Libertarian Thought. Routledge, London / New York 1991, pp. 4-7.
  • Norman P. Barry: Libertarianism. In: Nigel Ashford, Stephen Davis, A Dictionary of Conservative and Libertarian Thought. Routledge, London / New York 1991, pp. 163-166.
  • David Boaz: Libertarianism: A Primer. The Free Press, New York 1998.
  • Horst Wolfgang Boger: Anarchism and radical liberalism. In: Yearbook on Liberalism Research. 2nd year, ed. by Hans-Georg Fleck, Jürgen Frölich , Beate-Carola Padtberg. Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft, Baden-Baden 1990, pp. 46–66.
  • Justin Raimondo : An Enemy of the State: The Life of Murray N. Rothbard. Prometheus Books, New York 2000.
  • Richard Sylvan: Anarchism. In: Robert E. Goodin, Philip Pettit (Eds.): A Companion to Contemporary Political Philosophy. Basil Blackwell, Oxford / Cambridge, MA 1993, pp. 215-243.
  • Roberta Modugno Crocetta: The anarcho-capitalist political theory of Murray N. Rothbard in its historical and intellectual context. (PDF; 84 kB). Ludwig von Mises Institute .

Web links

Commons : Murray Rothbard  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. Biography of Murray N. Rothbard (1926–1995) ( November 11, 2014 memento in the Internet Archive ) on the Mises Institute website, accessed January 14, 2014.
  2. 1 - DEFENSE SERVICES ON THE FREE MARKET
  3. ^ The Public Sector, III: Police, Law, and the Courts