Writing for The American Conservative, Robert Locke indicts liberatarianism as the "Marxism of the Right". Particular aspects of Locke's critique are effective, at least at the level of general, unsophisticated political theory-- the only one most conservatives, with their good v. evil mindset, seem to want to explore. For example, Locke writes as if libertarians automatically accept the Randian dichotomy of individualism v. collectivism.
If Marxism is the delusion that one can run society purely on altruism and collectivism, then libertarianism is the mirror-image delusion that one can run it purely on selfishness and individualism. Society in fact requires both individualism and collectivism, both selfishness and altruism, to function. Like Marxism, libertarianism offers the fraudulent intellectual security of a complete a priori account of the political good without the effort of empirical investigation. Like Marxism, it aspires, overtly or covertly, to reduce social life to economics. And like Marxism, it has its historical myths and a genius for making its followers feel like an elect unbound by the moral rules of their society.
In truth, however, most libertarian "individualists" are joiners, group members, church-goers, family members, etc. Libertarians are not "selfish" at the expense of being altruistic-- one does not preclude the other. You can be an "individual" before the law (or an individualist about the law) without forsaking your role in the community or as a member of society.
Libertarians accept a little gray where conservatives see only black and white, right or wrong, good or bad. While conservatives elevate preferences to the status of moral doctrine (i.e. sexual preferences being an obvious example), libertarians prefer to call a preference precisely what it is-- a preference. Given that conservatives spend so much time defining the enemy in broad, black strokes, they tend to get fussy over the libertarian tendency to be skeptical of received wisdoms and banalities.
Uncomfortable with questions or choices, Locke's preference is one of moral lock-down. Since people might not always make the choice that Locke prefers, they should not be allowed to make any choice. Conveniently, Locke also forgets that the foundation for libertarian ethics is a strong sense of individual responsibility and accountability. He writes (about libertarians):
They forget that for much of the population, preaching maximum freedom merely results in drunkenness, drugs, failure to hold a job, and pregnancy out of wedlock. Society is dependent upon inculcated self-restraint if it is not to slide into barbarism, and libertarians attack this self-restraint. Ironically, this often results in internal restraints being replaced by the external restraints of police and prison, resulting in less freedom, not more.
This contempt for self-restraint is emblematic of a deeper problem: libertarianism has a lot to say about freedom but little about learning to handle it. Freedom without judgment is dangerous at best, useless at worst. Yet libertarianism is philosophically incapable of evolving a theory of how to use freedom well because of its root dogma that all free choices are equal, which it cannot abandon except at the cost of admitting that there are other goods than freedom. Conservatives should know better.
A wise, upstanding gentleman like Locke should know better than to lose the most important part of his argument due to sloppiness in the last few paragraphs. How does moral lock-down inculcate self-restraint? How does top-down social discipline lead to more humane outcomes and improved moral deliberation? Let's think for a moment about the abuse of drugs, prostitutes, and alcohol, not to mention the glorification of violence, prevalent in our own, highly-disciplined armed forces.
Let's think about that and then consider the meaning of barbarism. Pray tell, what is more "barbaric", Mr. Locke, than war? How is the reluctance to legislate moral preferences more likely to create an even more barbaric environment than our current one?
And what does this "all free choices are equal" mean? Are all free choices epistemolgically equal? Equal before the law? Elucidation is in order. Most choices made freely carry the gravitas of consequence. For example, striking your spouse in anger might carry the consequence of divorce. Clearly the decision to strike your spouse cannot be called "equal" to the decision to refrain from striking you spouse in any meaningful sense of the word.
These generalities and snippy moral high-groundings do little to make a case against libertarianism and more to reveal Locke's deep and unabiding resentment of tolerance as a social virtue. Maybe Locke didn't mean to address libertarians at all when he wrote this essay. Maybe Locke wanted to remind open-minded conservatives that they must choose between their conservatism and their open-mindedness. Ultimately, in the battle of ideas, conservatism and tolerance never slept well together. I hope, for all of our sakes, that conservatives back away from the fundamentalisms and consider alternative perspectives. The "we are better people than you" position, sophisticated thought it might be, won't win many decent hearts or minds.
