Liberty in a State of Nature: a Libertarian Viewpoint

"These three principal, positive, prima facie, rules of liberty in practice fit abstract liberty in itself almost perfectly"

liberty in a state of nature  If the two theories of ^*liberty in itself and ^*liberty maximisation were to be applied to a so-called ^*“state of nature”, then what general rules of liberty in practice would this entail? Note that this question is not assuming any mechanism by which such liberty must or would likely then be observed. Neither is it asserting that such liberty is either desirable or ^*moral. This is only hypothetically looking at the effects that are logically and practically entailed by assuming that there are humans prior to any rules of interpersonal interactions who want to apply the two libertarian theories in order to obtain such rules.

First and foremost, people want to have initial ultimate control of the human bodies that they more or less are. They do not ^*initiate impositions on other people by having this, unless trivially and reciprocally by merely existing and being composed of ^*resources thereby unavailable to other people. Therefore, liberty-maximisation entails that they have this initial ultimate control of their bodies. Next, people want to have initial ultimate control of any unused resources they start using, and thereby closely involve in their want-satisfactions (the resources they use for food, clothing, tools, habitation, etc.). They do not initiate impositions on other people by having this, unless trivially and reciprocally by their chosen uses and those resources thereby being unavailable to other people. Therefore, liberty-maximisation entails that they have this initial ultimate control of their used resources. Otherwise, or consequently, all interpersonal interactions and resource-transfers are strongly wanted to be ^*consensual. So, this could be the third rule—if only to be clear (it is arguably implied by the first two rules).

These three principal, positive, prima facie, rules of liberty in practice fit abstract liberty in itself almost perfectly. They maximally internalise ^*externalities with respect to want-satisfaction, and (as modern ^*economics explains) are thereby ^*economically efficient in the sense of maximising general want-satisfaction. To break any of these three positive rules would infringe interpersonal liberty prima facie. However, unusual and problematic cases may require resort to the abstract or to the maximisation theories of liberty (or even to further philosophy).

Although none of this is to assert or explain that such rules must or would or should be observed, it is relevant that they could be observed. That is, we can imagine (however implausibly) a society of people that understand and do not breach these three rules out of choice. And if they breach them unintentionally, then they use liberty maximisation rules to rectify liberty as far as possible. By doing this they would, therefore, be observing interpersonal liberty in practice without the institution of ^*property or ^*law generally. Hence, it should be clear that libertarianism is not inherently about a theory of law (as some of its advocates argue); let alone a theory of law uninformed by any explicit theories of liberty in itself and liberty maximisation. But libertarianism is, as its name suggests, inherently about liberty.

However, it is now possible to proceed to ^*liberty in propertarian practice.

(This is an entry from A Libertarian Dictionary: Explaining a Philosophical Theory [draft currently being revised]. Asterisks indicate other entries.)