The Libertarian History paradox

I have just recently been able to formulate something that I have known at an instinctual level for a long time: that libertarian ideology faces a serious paradox when confronted with historical fact, and that so far libertarians have only managed to find two solutions - both of them quite absurd - to this paradox.

Libertarians start from the premise that free market capitalism is good for the vast majority of the population. But then they encounter a problem when faced with the reality of the fact that the vast majority of the population of every country at almost any given time in history has opposed their brand of extreme free market capitalism.

How do you reconcile your belief that free markets are good for the people with the reality that the people do not want free markets? Clearly, the people must be either stupid or deceived.

Those libertarians who conclude that people are too stupid to know what's good for them take an elitist approach to politics and often end up as bitter reactionary opponents of democracy. Hans-Herman Hoppe, for example - the leader of the Mises Institute - is an extremist libertarian and an advocate of absolute monarchy. This kind of ideological stance can only be described as bizzare; it takes a lot of doublethink to believe at the same time that people are perfect rational actors in the market but somehow too stupid to see their own interests in the voting booth.

The second and more common libertarian solution to the apparent paradox described above is to postulate the existence of some kind of vast statist conspiracy that has somehow managed to brainwash the majority of the population. This stance does not require any orwellian doublethink, but it does require a high dose of paranoia and historical revisionism. It requires you to believe that the 19th century was a golden age when everyone was happy and life was only getting better, until some dark group of evil statists magically persuaded the people that they were unhappy (when in fact everyone was happy and singing kum ba yah). It requires you to believe that all the depictions we have of the extreme misery, poverty and filth that engulfed the life of ordinary people in the 19th century are statist propaganda.

I have not yet met a single libertarian who did not fall into either one of these two categories: elitist doublethinker or conspiracy theorist. Libertarian ideology is too easily refuted by simple historical fact unless you either believe that the people are stupid or that recorded history is a lie.

Portugal says "meh" to abortion

It's been quite a while since the last update, and I have only recently realized that the reason I found it so difficult to write another blog entry was because I was trying too hard to focus on my "definitions" series. It is much easier to write about news than about political science topics.

So, in that vein, I now bring to your attention the recent referendum in Portugal regarding abortion law. As things currently stand, Portugal has some of the most pro-life abortion laws in the European Union (and more pro-life than the United States, too). Abortions are allowed in the first 24 weeks of pregnancy to save a woman's life or to preserve her mental or physical health. That limit is extended to 16 weeks in cases of rape or other sexual crimes and up to 24 weeks in cases where the child is likely to be born with an incurable disease or malformation (as certified by a doctor other than the one who is to perform the operation). Overall, this seems to be one of the better abortion laws in the world - I wouldn't endorse it enthusiastically, but I do support it and it does seem to fall in line with Christian ethics (except for the part that allows late abortions when the child is likely to be born with an incurable disease, which comes dangerously close to suggesting that some lives are not worth living).

Now, this past Sunday - February 11th - a referendum was held in Portugal on the question of introducing a more liberal abortion law. The left-wing government of Jose Socrates proposed to make abortion on demand legal during the first 10 weeks of pregnancy. The results were as follows:

Of all voters,
24% said yes
16% said no
60% did not bother to show up to the polls

The result, in other words, was a resounding "meh". This was to some extent predictable, given that abortion is simply not regarded as a major political issue in Europe (unlike in the United States, where it seems to be the cornerstone of the entire Christian conservative movement). I personally lean towards the European paradigm. Though abortion certainly is an issue, it has been blown out of all proportion in the United States.

But that still doesn't excuse people not showing up for a referendum. Jose Socrates has said he will go ahead with his plans to liberalize abortion law because the majority of the people who voted said yes.

Like Prime Minister Socrates, I am a leftist. But unlike him, I was never able to understand the left's infatuation with the legalization of abortion. It probably comes from the fact that the modern Western left has taken an overdose of liberal individualist ideology over the past few decades, and is currently experiencing a mild delusional episode. By "delusional episode" I mean the dogmatic insistence on an individual's prerogative to do anything and everything to his or her own body, even when that may have negative consequences. This kind of ultra-individualist insanity is usually found among libertarians. Leftists should really know better.

A woman's right to choose is often invoked in defense of abortion. But surely, in a developed Western society where condoms and other forms of contraception are widely available, a woman has already made her choice when she decided to have unprotected sex. Abortion has less to do with the right to choose and more to do with the right to change your mind. Now, I'll be the first to agree that people make mistakes and everyone deserves a second chance. That is why there is always the option to give up the child for adoption. So, given that you can make a choice to use contraception before the pregnancy, and you can later change your mind by giving the child up for adoption after the pregnancy, abortion can only be justified when there is some exceptional reason to make a choice mid-pregnancy (such as health issues), or when the initial choice was denied to the mother (such as in cases of rape).

Further information: The BBC has a very informative survey of abortion laws in the European Union.