answersLogoWhite

0

A movement is an effort by many people aimed at a common goal. Since the 1970's, there have been people in the U.S. (and now around the world) who define themselves as part of a "libertarian movement."

Most loosely defined, their common goal is more human freedom. More specifically, libertarians advocate a radically limited role for government and strict respect for individual rights.

The libertarian movement encompasses all kinds of organizations and individuals, including hundreds of think tanks (the largest is the Cato Institute), periodicals (e.g. Reason), political parties (e.g. the U.S. Libertarian Party), intellectuals, academics, activists, and a few politicians.

It's worth noting that many libertarians disagree with each other; some so vehemently that they disassociate themselves from "Libertarianism" altogether. Most notably, fans of Ayn Rand and her philosophy of Objectivism are by any reasonable definition "libertarians," but many don't like to called libertarian.

AnswerThere are two movements that call themselves libertarian that are fundamentally different. The first libertarian movement is also called libertarian socialist. Libertarian socialists believe in a socialism where the workers are recognized as the legitimate owners of the means of production as opposed to the government. They see complete free market capitalism as being against freedom, since workers do not control the means of production and must obey orders from the boss, who often doesn't do any of the work. Anarchists don't even want a government, while council communists want a government based on a federation of worker's councils and a central committee, but they want it to have limited powers with most power residing in the workers themselves.

The other libertarian movement sees private property rights as being essential to freedom, including the right to work for a boss. They believe that a person has the right to rent their labor to others. At its extreme some libertarians, such as Robert Nozick want to make it legal to sell yourself into slavery seeing it as a voluntary exchange of one's lifetime of labor for money or some other reward. These libertarians are divided into minarchists who believe in some limited government to protect private property rights and provide some basic services such as defense and anarchocapitalists who believe that all services the government currently provides should be replaced with private defense agencies. Many socialist anarchists disagree that these are real anarchists.

User Avatar

Wiki User

14y ago

What else can I help you with?

Related Questions