What is the Difference between Anarchists and Libertarians?

Post Reply New Topic

Anarchists say that all power structures should be questioned.
Libertarians say that all power structures should be questioned except the institution of property.

To put it another way: libertarians think that taxation is theft unless rigorously justified, but anarchists go even further: they think that property is theft unless rigorously justified.

Basically, I think that anarchists are simply intellectually honest libertarians. What people call "libertarians" are actually just useful idiots for the power structure. They question every kind of violence except the most relevant one: the violence committed by a person who claims to own something and therefore deprives everyone else of it.

^ I sympathize with this statement.

Libertarians want to the government to leave their rights and such alone.

Anarchists want to abolish the government.

Pretty big difference, really.

Are you sure you're not confusing personal property for private/real property? Because IIRC, some anarchists take issue with the latter two rather than the former.

Property isn't a "power structure". It is a recognition that a) some things can only be used by a finite number of people at any one time and b) who has ownership, and thus ultimate command, of that good.

Now, a court system to determine who has right of way and who trespasses may be considered a "power structure", but this need not involve the state, and didn't always (see The Enterprise of Law for historical examples).

hm. bump... wondering why nobody reacts on my last post in this thread…

maybe i should quote less and more specific and emphasize some of the interesting part...

maybe this helped.

Oh? And who is the property being stolen from?

And you do realize that without property laws the term theft has no meaning, right?


So, uh, that computer of yours. Can you mail it to me? I would like to use it, and you wouldn't want to commit violence by depriving me of its use would you?

Most Libertarians believe in a limited government, whose singular role is to protect each citizen's right to life, liberty and property.

Most Anarchists would prefer no government at all.

(Note: This is only true in the United States. In some countries, "Libertarians" are Anarchists.)

Libertarians value industry, not preexisting wealth.

We do not believe anything should be handed to anyone.

We believe anyone should be able to earn anything.

Last edited by scubasteve on 13 Mar 2012, 2:23 am, edited 1 time in total.

Yes and no. In French at least, we have two terms, "libertaire" and "libertarien", to describe both realities.

Both groups are slaves.
Both groups will fail in their desire to change the existing power structure.
Both groups will serve the Masters until death.
The Masters will punish anyone who defies them.

You're wrong. More and more young Americans are joining both of these groups. When enough young people believe in an idea, they can change the world.

Yes it is. "This is my property" means exactly "if you take this, I can use the government to apprehend you". That's a power structure.



Everyone else who could have used it if it wasn't claimed as property by someone.



I disagree. It has a moral meaning. Libertarians will often say "taxation is theft". But taxation isn't illegal! If "taxation is theft" makes sense, then "property is theft" makes sense.



I am not claiming that I am going to right all of the wrongs in the world. We are faced with the world as it is. But the foundational issues are still important. A libertarian would claim that I own my computer. How, exactly, did this come to pass? Well, I bought it with my money. Well, why was it my money? Because I earned it by working. Well, why did the money belong to the people who I worked for? Trace it back. There is a crime, long ago, that started all of this.

How does it matter why the money belonged to your employers? If you earned it through honest work, it is rightfully yours. That's how the reward system works. Without property, there is no reward. Without rewards, the only way to motivate people is by holding a gun to their head.

Not necessarly.

Ultimately, something might have been stolen to "nature", which can be understood as stealing from every other human and every other living thing (and even that is far-fetched), but the computer is also what was done to it, the actual human work and transformation. This property was then transferred against someone else's work, work which had been exchanged for money. That is what founds property, if we "trace it back". This includes intellectual property, too, which is, well... the result of intellectual rather than physical work. Of course, it becomes very muddled when it gets closer to land claims and property, and even exploited land has changed hands so many times and for so many reasons that the actual, original human work of clearing the land is lost to our knowledge.

However, the justification of property is entirely unimportant and pointless. The real question is: is property useful, or is it not? Also, thence: Would we be better without it? What would happen without it? How would the change be possible?