Libertarianism in Ireland

Dave!

Hey guys,

I had a search and can't seem to find any recent threads about Libertarianism. I'm reading through an old one and it's interesting, but people don't tend to like bumping old threads, so...

I was wondering what do ye think is the likelihood of a Libertarian party ever forming in Ireland, and would they have any chance of getting into government, even as a junior coalition party?

I'm aware of one Libertarian elected representative in Ireland – a Fine Gael Councillor, Keith Redmond. I think he kept his philosophies pretty quiet until after he got elected, but now he's pretty vocal about it on Twitter at least.

Would a Libertarian low tax message resonate with the electorate given the high levels of taxation we have now?

There doesn't appear to be any major appetite among Libertarians to form a party or even to organise in any real way. I was going to say Liberal Ireland seem to be some sort of organisation, but their website is down now and they haven't updated social media in a long time! https://www.facebook.com/LiberalIreland

Would be interested in any thoughts

BoJack Horseman

Dave! wrote: »

I was wondering what do ye think is the likelihood of a Libertarian party ever forming in Ireland, and would they have any chance of getting into government, even as a junior coalition party?

I know there have been old threads on this before.

But in a nutshell..... Zero.

There is zero chance of a libertarian party being desired, accepted or elected.
Paddy loves big government.

Would a Libertarian low tax message resonate with the electorate given the high levels of taxation we have now?

Hold onto your pants, but Ireland isn't a high taxed economy..... Only now is it approaching the average for a developed economy, after a generation of being relatively low taxed.

Irish people want the best if everything, but cost nothing...... That is fantasy & not libertarian.

There doesn't appear to be any major appetite among Libertarians to form a party or even to organise in any real way.

There is no appetite among the larger public.
All the parties are big state parties.
There is none keen on paring that back...... The left want the opposite.

Permabear

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Dave!

BoJack Horseman wrote: »

I know there have been old threads on this before.

But in a nutshell..... Zero.

There is zero chance of a libertarian party being desired, accepted or elected.
Paddy loves big government.


Hold onto your pants, but Ireland isn't a high taxed economy..... Only now is it approaching the average for a developed economy, after a generation of being relatively low taxed.

Irish people want the best if everything, but cost nothing...... That is fantasy & not libertarian.


There is no appetite among the larger public.
All the parties are big state parties.
There is none keen on paring that back...... The left want the opposite.

Whether it's average levels of taxation or not, there's certainly the perception that 52% is pretty high for someone earning the average industrial wage. The recent marches were in part about the feeling that citizens are paying too much in tax. Ignoring the realities of the situation, wouldn't a party calling for much lower rates of personal taxation be able to capitalise on this sentiment? I guess though once it emerges that further cuts would have to be made, the voters might not be so keen. I'm not sure that fiscal conservatism plays too well these days – reducing the budget deficit is what the current government say they're doing; the opposition say that they're imposing austerity, which is not too popular.

I'd say certain social policies would play well, certainly among younger voters anyway. Is nanny statism something that the electorate want?

There's certainly a move away from the establishment parties, so surely there's an opportunity there? I know lots are happy to do so, but not everybody is mad keen to vote for your choice of far left Independents and Sinn Féin. Certainly none of my peers have any time for those choices, nor are they committed to establishment parties.

Valmont

At the very least you would have to say there is a large PD shaped hole in the Irish political landscape - I'm starting to think it is going to stay that way however. Many of those who might vote for a change of tack have emigrated I suppose.

Duffy the Vampire Slayer

Keith Redmond, celebrity dentist.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VR-dJdnJT8k

20Cent

There is no chance of an Irish libertarian party. Not because "Paddy" loves big government or is conditioned to statism. It's not because all the brave/smart/freedom loving people emigrated. It is because of the same reason libertarianism hasn't taken off anywhere in the world ever. Five minutes of research shows it to be unworkable nonsense.

Closest thing might be Lucinda Creiton with some PD type party but they will be very socially conservative. Would libertarians sacrifice their socially liberal policies for less tax? In a heartbeat imo.

El_Duderino 09

Forgive me if this is a stupid question but I'm going to ask it anyway.

Is the kind of policy Libertarians are interested in the same kind of ones which led to the banking crisis? Getting rid of regulation and pesky government involvement is great until we have a banking crisis caused, in part, by lack of regulation and pesky government involvement.

It strikes me that governments make regulations to regulate the rainy days as well as the sunny days. When the sun's shining, and it appears there is too much regulation, then the libertarians can say 'we should get rid of all this nonsense red tape' even though we need regulation to make sure things don't go mad like they did back in the mid 2000s

Permabear

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El_Duderino 09

Permabear wrote: »

This post had been deleted.

I don't know enough to agree or disagree with the first paragraph.

However the second paragraph is confusing. My understanding of libertarianism is that if they were not happy with the regulation in the 2000s it's because they would have gone further in the wrong direction.

Maybe I totally misunderstand the situation but I thought it was a lack of regulation in the financial industry that contributed to the collapse and libertarians are all for minimising government regulation.I don't think the government of the 2000s was clever but I would say they took a libertarian approach to the financial sector and that didn't work out well.

Personally I think everyone is annoyed with the job FF did and is looking for an alternative. That's fine in itself but people have started pretending alternative ideologies are flawless like sinn fein or independents or libertarianism.

Libertarianism is a good direction if your government is in the habit of over regulating. I don't think that's the problem in Ireland.

Libertarianism sounds great for making hay while the but it would be aiming for exactly the circumstances which lead to the

qt3.14

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

However the second paragraph is confusing. My understanding of libertarianism is that if they were not happy with the regulation in the 2000s it's because they would have gone further in the wrong direction.
Maybe I totally misunderstand the situation but I thought it was a lack of regulation in the financial industry that contributed to the collapse and libertarians are all for minimising government regulation.I don't think the government of the 2000s was clever but I would say they took a libertarian approach to the financial sector and that didn't work out well.
Personally I think everyone is annoyed with the job FF did and is looking for an alternative. That's fine in itself but people have started pretending alternative ideologies are flawless like sinn fein or independents or libertarianism.
Libertarianism is a good direction if your government is in the habit of over regulating. I don't think that's the problem in Ireland.
Libertarianism sounds great for making hay while the but it would be aiming for exactly the circumstances which lead to the

Deregulation of controls is a libertarian policy sure but it wasn't twinned with, what for most libertarians would be a key policy, the removal of government backing of private businesses.

What we ended up with was probably the worst of both worlds. Very low oversight of the financial sector combined with assumed (initially) and later explicitly stated guarantees that governments would step in in the event of a collapse.

Arguably, if when financial controls were reduced the sector was also told there would be categorically no bailouts or state assistance, the sector would have acted differently. The global financial sector was basically handed a ticket saying make as much money as you can and if things go wrong the taxpayers will step in. That's a massive moral hazard and almost certainly a signifigant behavioural influence.

Permabear

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Voltex

In my opinion there are as many versions of libertarianism as there is socialism. But there are a few principles which make up the "neo-libertarian" and these principles can be traced back to the work of the "Austrians"- Carl Menger, Bohm-Bawerk and probably most importantly von Mises.

johnnyskeleton

Dave! wrote: »

Whether it's average levels of taxation or not, there's certainly the perception that 52% is pretty high for someone earning the average industrial wage. The recent marches were in part about the feeling that citizens are paying too much in tax.

At the risk of come off as snooty, i wonder how many of the protesters were actually complaining about the high rate 52-55% income tax, the increases in vat to 23% etc ie those taxes that hit middle to high income earners and non hospitality service suppliers, and how many were protesting at the water charges because up to that point they had never been asked to pay very much in tax?

Someone earning 50k a year doesnt really care about water charges because its just an extra few hundred quid on top of c. 12-15k in income tax, prsi etc.

I'd say certain social policies would play well, certainly among younger voters anyway. Is nanny statism something that the electorate want?

I dont think anyone wants a nany state, but it is also the case that very few people believe that you can just wave a magic anti state wand and live in a paradise. In reality, its easy to point to specific examples where something bad happened and the state was involved and say the state must be a problem, but in the absence of a state, a welfare state in particular, most people would feel much worse off.

On the other hand, it would be nice if people felt a bit more resposibility towards the state rather than seeing it as a limitless money hole.

mollymosfet

Last thing we need. People living in a privileged bubble dishing out "Freedom" that exploits that working class and minorities even further. I'm sure I'll get called ignorant for this remark by a bunch of privileged white guys who've no idea what life is like at the bottom, though.

mollymosfet

Voltex wrote: »

In my opinion there are as many versions of libertarianism as there is socialism. But there are a few principles which make up the "neo-libertarian" and these principles can be traced back to the work of the "Austrians"- Carl Menger, Bohm-Bawerk and probably most importantly von Mises.

Actual libertarianism that focuses on actual liberty, and distincts negative and positive forms of liberty, is good in concept.

The modern US Libertarianism which is rich white people libertarianism is just morally repulsive on every level. It's classist, sexist, racist, and basically everything else-ist since it refuses to deal with the inequalities in society in any meaningful way.

jank

Molly, you seem to awfully focused on 'white males'. You can't help but mention them in almost every post.

Iwasfrozen

mollymosfet wrote: »

Last thing we need. People living in a privileged bubble dishing out "Freedom" that exploits that working class and minorities even further. I'm sure I'll get called ignorant for this remark by a bunch of privileged white guys who've no idea what life is like at the bottom, though.

Check your privileges!!

mollymosfet

jank wrote: »

Molly, you seem to awfully focused on 'white males'. You can't help but mention them in almost every post.

because of the strong right wing bent of the forum. people need to realise that that they have limited perspective and knock off the "more enlightened than those filthy leftists" act.

in particular i work with asylum seekers and roma so i see the lack of privileges that non-whites have in "White" countries.

Karl Stein

mollymosfet wrote: »

modern US Libertarianism ... refuses to deal with the inequalities in society in any meaningful way.

Indeed. It's more concerned with maximising 'liberty' for private power and those with the the most property. It basically calls for more concentration of power in the hands of those where wealth is already concentrated. So the logical conclusion of pseudo-libertarianism is that we'd end up with more wealth and more power in fewer hands.

mollymosfet

Yeah, traditional libertarianism was a leftist position, close to Anarchism. More Noam Chomsky than Ayn Rand. I'd consider myself a left libertarian to a degree, but not a full on Anarchist.

Permabear

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johnnyskeleton

mollymosfet wrote: »

because of the strong right wing bent of the forum. people need to realise that that they have limited perspective and knock off the "more enlightened than those filthy leftists" act.

in particular i work with asylum seekers and roma so i see the lack of privileges that non-whites have in "White" countries.

On a side note, can you explain what you mean by "White"? I mean, Roma are caucasians so I dont see why you could say that they lack privileges because hey are "non-whites".

Karl Stein

mollymosfet wrote: »

I'd consider myself a left libertarian

There's a 'political compass test' that places a large majority of the people who took the test in the left-lib zone. Here it is.

mollymosfet

Clearly there's a disconnection between people doing that test and the large number of people that mob you on this board whenever you express an opinion that leans to the left. Look at the number of likes post get on this forum - at the very least, the right are more organised here.

marienbad

mollymosfet wrote: »

Clearly there's a disconnection between people doing that test and the large number of people that mob you on this board whenever you express an opinion that leans to the left. Look at the number of likes post get on this forum - at the very least, the right are more organised here.

Molly it is not the just the big business 'privileged white males' that are the problem in this country .

people forget even before we had the financial meltdown we were heading for our very own home grown financial crisis . Quite simply our expenditure levels were unsustainable .

Here we are now coming out of the crisis, or so we are told , and who has weathered the storm the best ?

Permabear

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Karl Stein

mollymosfet wrote: »

the right are more organised here.

If the political compass test is anything to go by the right know they have to be very organised. Perhaps that's why people like the Koch's in the US spend an awful lot of money doing stuff like this:

The [Koch] brothers have mainly contributed to libertarian and conservative thinktanks and campaigns. They actively fund and support organizations that contribute significantly to Republican candidates, and that lobby against universal health care and climate change legislation.

Wiki

Charles Lewis, the founder of the Center for Public Integrity, a nonpartisan watchdog group, said, "The Kochs are on a whole different level. There’s no one else who has spent this much money. The sheer dimension of it is what sets them apart. They have a pattern of lawbreaking, political manipulation, and obfuscation. I’ve been in Washington since Watergate, and I’ve never seen anything like it. They are the Standard Oil of our times.

newyorker.com

mollymosfet

Yeah, at the end of the day US Libertarianism is funded by and favours rich white men. It has little to do with helping the poor or middle class, it's full of empty promises.

mollymosfet

johnnyskeleton wrote: »

On a side note, can you explain what you mean by "White"? I mean, Roma are caucasians so I dont see why you could say that they lack privileges because hey are "non-whites".

Okay wow, no, Rromani for the most part are not white, they are of Indian origin - in particular Rejistani some of whom can be quite dark. They are considered people of colour. Most of them are mixed with native Europeans to a degree - but mostly with Slavic peoples, some of whom have atypical "white" features to begin with(look at someone like Tatiana Maslany).

Europeans, Arabians and East Indians are what is called "Caucasoid". However, that doesn't mean they're "white". Most Roma are brown, and look Indian, middle eastern or at the very least, Mediterranean/Dark Slav. The Romanichals tend to be (generally) white passing but still retain slightly darker skin and more Asiatic features.

It's really really offensive for a number of reasons to claim that the Rromani are white because they do not get treated as white. They are easily the most discriminated against ethnic group in europe I can think of so to try and swing it so they don't experience "racism" is disingenuous at best.

"White" is largely a social construct. It generally tends to refer to those of European origin - most generally north western Europeans. It's not simply to do with the colour of one's skin either - there are pale skinned east asians(as well as some Romani) and at one point the Irish were not considered "white" in the same way the British were(despite being genetically quite similar). White is generally a distinction created to exclude - to have a group that is looked down upon, a subservient.

BoJack Horseman

mollymosfet wrote: »

Yeah, at the end of the day US Libertarianism is funded by and favours rich white men. It has little to do with helping the poor or middle class, it's full of empty promises.

Can you post without the deliberate race baiting?

johnnyskeleton

Without getting off topic any further, surely using the term "white" to describe a person being a member of the racial/ethnic ascendant class or those responsible for discriminating against minorities without regard to their actual skin colour is, in itself, a racial pejorative?

mollymosfet

No, it isn't.

White people aren't oppressed. The distinction of "White" identifies the ruling class/ethnicity. I'm really not in the business of educating people that have such a fundamental lack of understanding of the subject or dealing with anyone who uses terms like "Race-baiting" unironically.

Roma people take offence when they're called "White" because they are not treated white. Roma people are not white. This should be enough. If this isn't your area of expertise/research or you're not Roma then please don't speak for this issue.

Bootros Bootros

mollymosfet wrote: »

No, it isn't.

White people aren't oppressed. The distinction of "White" identifies the ruling class/ethnicity. I'm really not in the business of educating people that have such a fundamental lack of understanding of the subject or dealing with anyone who uses terms like "Race-baiting" unironically.

Roma people take offence when they're called "White" because they are not treated white. Roma people are not white. This should be enough. If this isn't your area of expertise/research or you're not Roma then please don't speak for this issue.

Terms like "white privilege" are American identity politics **** used to hide the greatest hegemonic cultural power of the day -- America itself -- and to remove class and Nationality from the mix.

All Americans are privileged. Including POCs and women and other suppose groups.

mollymosfet

There are different forums of privilege. You are handwaving it away literally without understanding what it means.

Also, you don't get to use "Identity politics". It's a social justice term and it describes an important concept. This is not how it is used.

Transgender women of colour, for example, living in the US are far from "privileged".

BoJack Horseman

mollymosfet wrote: »

Also, you don't get to use "Identity politics".

Just you then?

Tip for the new fish:
You won't win friends & influence opinion with every second post being an attack on caucasians.

ezra_pound

qt3.14 wrote: »

Deregulation of controls is a libertarian policy sure but it wasn't twinned with, what for most libertarians would be a key policy, the removal of government backing of private businesses.

What we ended up with was probably the worst of both worlds. Very low oversight of the financial sector combined with assumed (initially) and later explicitly stated guarantees that governments would step in in the event of a collapse.

Arguably, if when financial controls were reduced the sector was also told there would be categorically no bailouts or state assistance, the sector would have acted differently. The global financial sector was basically handed a ticket saying make as much money as you can and if things go wrong the taxpayers will step in. That's a massive moral hazard and almost certainly a signifigant behavioural influence.

I don't think you realise that you can't just let your entire banking system collapse. It's not a political option or a policy option or a paradigm. It's life support for society and economy.

The libertarian problem is that when the libertarian dream becomes a libertarian nightmare and the unregulated economy is in free fall, there is no libertarian antidote.

It's really bizarre that these arguments are being made in this country only 6 years after the collapse of the global financial system and our own economy because of liberal economics.

johnnyskeleton

mollymosfet wrote: »

White people aren't oppressed. The distinction of "White" identifies the ruling class/ethnicity. I'm really not in the business of educating people that have such a fundamental lack of understanding of the subject or dealing with anyone who uses terms like "Race-baiting" unironically.

Are there any online resources or books you could recommend to me about his definition of "white" not being a reference to skin colour but a reference to the ruling class/ethnicity? So the Hutu tribe are white and the Tutsi are non-white? And is a person while unyil they become oppressed i.e. Polish Slavs were white until the German invasion in 1939 and then became non white until the Societ Union came and imposed a different kind of oppression on the same people, but for reasons other than race. Is that the definition of white?

EDIT: Mods, sorry for going off topic again but there is an interesting discussion on what white and privilege mean as they obviously have some kind of sociological or political meaning that is different to the literal meanings of same

ezra_pound

johnnyskeleton wrote: »

Are there any online resources or books you could recommend to me about his definition of "white" not being a reference to skin colour but a reference to the ruling class/ethnicity? So the Hutu tribe are white and the Tutsi are non-white? And is a person while unyil they become oppressed i.e. Polish Slavs were white until the German invasion in 1939 and then became non white until the Societ Union came and imposed a different kind of oppression on the same people, but for reasons other than race. Is that the definition of white?

EDIT: Mods, sorry for going off topic again but there is an interesting discussion on what white and privilege mean as they obviously have some kind of sociological or political meaning that is different to the literal meanings of same

Read the commitments by Roddy Doyle.

It's the authority on the subject.

ezra_pound

mollymosfet wrote: »

No, it isn't.

White people aren't oppressed. The distinction of "White" identifies the ruling class/ethnicity. I'm really not in the business of educating people that have such a fundamental lack of understanding of the subject or dealing with anyone who uses terms like "Race-baiting" unironically.

Roma people take offence when they're called "White" because they are not treated white. Roma people are not white. This should be enough. If this isn't your area of expertise/research or you're not Roma then please don't speak for this issue.

Maybe they take offence because they're not white, rather than they're not treated "white". If someone called me a pygmy I'd be annoyed because I'm not a pygmy, not because people don't treat me like one.

qt3.14

ezra_pound wrote: »

I don't think you realise that you can't just let your entire banking system collapse. It's not a political option or a policy option or a paradigm. It's life support for society and economy.

The libertarian problem is that when the libertarian dream becomes a libertarian nightmare and the unregulated economy is in free fall, there is no libertarian antidote.

It's really bizarre that these arguments are being made in this country only 6 years after the collapse of the global financial system and our own economy because of liberal economics.

You're looking at things in too short a term. It's not bizarre that were talking about this 6 years after 08, it's bizarre that we're talking about this after forty years of a demonstrably failed model where laissez-faire regulation is combined with government guarantees on private risk.
That's what's dysfunctional. I'd be happy to try another model, libertarian or command, because the mishmash we're currently using just doesn't work.

ezra_pound

qt3.14 wrote: »

You're looking at things in too short a term. It's not bizarre that were talking about this 6 years after 08, it's bizarre that we're talking about this after forty years of a demonstrably failed model where laissez-faire regulation is combined with government guarantees on private risk.
That's what's dysfunctional. I'd be happy to try another model, libertarian or command, because the mishmash we're currently using just doesn't work.

What government guarantees?

marienbad

qt3.14 wrote: »

You're looking at things in too short a term. It's not bizarre that were talking about this 6 years after 08, it's bizarre that we're talking about this after forty years of a demonstrably failed model where laissez-faire regulation is combined with government guarantees on private risk.
That's what's dysfunctional. I'd be happy to try another model, libertarian or command, because the mishmash we're currently using just doesn't work.

Of course it works ! not as well as we would like and definitely not as well as it should ,but even after all this implosion we are still better of than we were 10/15 years ago.

jank

johnnyskeleton wrote: »

Without getting off topic any further, surely using the term "white" to describe a person being a member of the racial/ethnic ascendant class or those responsible for discriminating against minorities without regard to their actual skin colour is, in itself, a racial pejorative?

Similarly, blaming white males for perceived injustice in Irish/Western institutions is a sexist extension on that. After all in Ireland, the Attorney General, the minister for Justice and the Gardai Commissioner are all male, aren't they

Permabear

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Dannyboy83

Dave! wrote: »

I was wondering what do ye think is the likelihood of a Libertarian party ever forming in Ireland, and would they have any chance of getting into government, even as a junior coalition party?

Would a Libertarian low tax message resonate with the electorate given the high levels of taxation we have now?

Would be interested in any thoughts

A few years ago, there was definitely an increase of interest in Libertarianism.
I thought it might take off in Ireland at one stage.

I don't think that will happen now, the impression I get is that many of the people who favour Libertarian principles unfortunately tend to emigrate, while those who are less self-sufficient do not.

It's somewhat similar to what happened in Poland when many of the young people began emigrating after EU accession:
the younger people who tended to be liberal & were required to balance out the system had emigrated, which meant the social conservatives were unusually strong and Kaczynski came to power with the Law & Justice party, and protectionist policies and anti-gay policies etc..

alaimacerc

jank wrote: »

Similarly, blaming white males for perceived injustice in Irish/Western institutions is a sexist extension on that.

By which you mean, "plainly largely true on the bare facts of the matter"?

The subtler question is of course whether had some more of those individual decision-makers been different-hued or different-gendered things would have been materially different in many respects.

After all in Ireland, the Attorney General, the minister for Justice and the Gardai Commissioner are all male, aren't they

Cases in point. Dworkinite Womanland doesn't seem to have set in just yet.

The other obvious difficulty with the rhetoric of "privilege" is that in practice it often degenerates into "because shut up, that's why!" I'm historically oppressed, therefore I'm right; you're historically benefited, you're wrong. We can skip any consideration of any actual facts.

alaimacerc

Dannyboy83 wrote: »

I don't think that will happen now, the impression I get is that many of the people who favour Libertarian principles unfortunately tend to emigrate, while those who are less self-sufficient do not.

I think there's a correlation between self-perceived self-sufficiency and self-diagnosed libertarianism. Not sure about any more objective data...

I think the basic issue is much simpler. There's a social conservative and a more free-market "wing" to FG. There's almost exactly the same thing in FF. There's very little impetus for "realignment" that would make the largely redundant rightwing parties shut up shop and abolish themselves in favour of more ideologically coherent alternatives. Much easier to keep re-fighting the civil war, and who screwed up in government the worse, the more recently.

Plus the whole "that was the PDs, wasn't it?" elephant in the room.

Waestrel

Dannyboy83 wrote: »

A few years ago, there was definitely an increase of interest in Libertarianism.
I thought it might take off in Ireland at one stage.

I don't think that will happen now, the impression I get is that many of the people who favour Libertarian principles unfortunately tend to emigrate, while those who are less self-sufficient do not.

It's somewhat similar to what happened in Poland when many of the young people began emigrating after EU accession:
the younger people who tended to be liberal & were required to balance out the system had emigrated, which meant the social conservatives were unusually strong and Kaczynski came to power with the Law & Justice party, and protectionist policies and anti-gay policies etc..

I am not so sure. I think we will only see a rise in interest in Libertarianism in the west going forward. A few simple reasons why, the rise of the internet, with youtube to watch videos of Milton et al , the abundance of blogs and forum threads devoted to the topic and the ease to obtain ebooks for kindle etc will expose orders of magnitude more people to what was traditionally a little heard political stance. I never heard of Libertarianism till I got online, and the magic of the internet allowed me to delve as deeply into the subject as I wanted. This would not have been possible 10 or even 5 years ago. The internet should never be underestimated as a means to plant seeds of thought in minds far and wide. If one in 10 of those seeds grows into something larger - well, the you could have a small movement on your hands. Lets not forget the Tea Party in the US, although later hijacked by crazier elements, came essentially out of nowhere in the late 2000's, mainly due to the self organising and self educating power of the internet. The very same can be said of the "Occupy" movement .

Second, the growing movement of Mens Rights/MGTOW/Anti feminism (if you are aware of such things) although hardly overtly political leads quite naturally to a small government point of view. Given that the "manosphere" is a growing trend online and amongst young men in particular, the resentment this group will feel towards government meddling in the private lives of citizens for vote buying purposes will send more people to the ranks of Mises, Hayek et al. This for example has strong libertarian undertones: http://www.singularity2050.com/2010/01/the-misandry-bubble.html

Welfare statism may have made sense in the post war, monolithic, centralised world, what Toffer called "the second wave" of human civilisation. Now that we are living in a world more exposed to the powers of decentralisation of information and production and unlimited access to information, the "third Wave" , Libertarianism may natural arise in peoples minds, as the government becomes more of hindrance than help to the majority. If multiple people indulge in varied revenue streams at any one time, such as driving a taxi via uber, renting a room on AirBnB and buying and selling on ebay, more people will become aware of government meddling in their economic self interest. This could easily lead to a distaste for government involvement in economic affairs, which is a cornerstone of Libertarianism.

I see less government being a natural progression of democracy, and any state that adopts it will gain competitive advantages over those that don't.

Well_H0ly_God

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Forgive me if this is a stupid question but I'm going to ask it anyway.

Is the kind of policy Libertarians are interested in the same kind of ones which led to the banking crisis? Getting rid of regulation and pesky government involvement is great until we have a banking crisis caused, in part, by lack of regulation and pesky government involvement.

It strikes me that governments make regulations to regulate the rainy days as well as the sunny days. When the sun's shining, and it appears there is too much regulation, then the libertarians can say 'we should get rid of all this nonsense red tape' even though we need regulation to make sure things don't go mad like they did back in the mid 2000s

It was actually regulation that led to the banking crisis.

You'd want to give Basel II a read.

If you're a financial institution in 2007 you have a doctrine of "private profit, public debt". There is a case for moral hazard. Risk management goes out the window and when the shiit hits the fan you can't loan money to invest when you're running around like a headless chicken desperately trying to reach the 8% capital threshold.

"Oh, but would someone please think of the children...what would we do without regulation?"

Do what Scotland did from the late 1700's to the mid-1800's - free banking. And what did they do to double down on risk management? 25% buffer. No government was needed to tell them that. They did it themselves because they knew it was do or die and they would be in the gutter, personally.

Free banking = Industrial revolution.

20Cent

My post seems to have been deleted.

Anyway say one decides to be a libertarian in Ireland what can I do?
Is there a party, group or some structure one can join?
Who would be the leading libertarians in Ireland?