Libertarianism and the “Alt-Right”

Annually Hans Hoppe and his wife Gulcin host a conference of the Property and Freedom Society, in Bodrum, Turkey.  From the “About” page:

The Property and Freedom Society stands for an uncompromising intellectual radicalism: for justly acquired private property, freedom of contract, freedom of association—which logically implies the right to not associate with, or to discriminate against—anyone in one’s personal and business relations—and unconditional free trade. It condemns imperialism and militarism and their fomenters, and champions peace. It rejects positivism, relativism, and egalitarianism in any form, whether of “outcome” or “opportunity,” and it has an outspoken distaste for politics and politicians.

Ever since this year’s conference, I have awaited publication of Hoppe’s speech from the conference; the title of this post is also the title of his speech.

Hoppe is at his best in this speech (but I cannot point to a speech he has given when he wasn’t).  He weaves a narrative through the co-opting of the terms liberal and liberalism, the current co-opting of the term libertarian, a strong critique of left-libertarians (including less-than-flattering words for Jeffrey Tucker).

He identifies the alt-right movement as beginning with Pat Buchanan in the early 1990s.  He draws the connections between the alt-right movement and libertarianism. 

He focusses on two questions: How to maintain a libertarian order once you have achieved it?  How to attain a libertarian order from a non-libertarian starting point?  To answer these questions, in addition to libertarian theory you need to understand human psychology and sociology.  While holding a coherent theory, many libertarians are blind to this reality of humans being human.

Alternatively, the alt-right better understands human psychology and sociology, yet has no coherent underlying theory; Hoppe describes the several positions of the alt-right that are contrary to libertarian theory.  Yet, the alt-right has brought to the surface the questions that libertarians (other than those like Hoppe) have been unable, or even impotent, to answer.

As must be obvious to anyone reading this blog for any period of time, I walk along a similar path…albeit about seven light-years behind Hoppe.

The video of his speech can be found here.  I understand a transcript will soon be available.  When it is, I will write a more extensive post.