Do libertarians have an answer for epidemics?
I’ve been thinking a lot this weekend about Texas Governor Ricky Perry’s promise that he wants to “make government as inconsequential to your lives as possible” if elected president next year.
It is, in a lot of ways, an appealing idea. Americans, myself included, like the idea of independence, of self-reliance — and the simple appeal of not being messed with is hard to deny.
Many of us are instinctive, knee-jerk libertarians. But a couple of experiences this weekend sent me back to the drawing board, to ponder the underlying romanticism of my thinking.
The first was watching “Contagion” the brilliant Steven Soderbergh film about an outbreak of virulent H1N1-type virus that proceeds to kill 18 million people.
It’s not a sci-fi movie. It is, rather, a fictional-but-mostly-accurate exploration of how epidemics work and how governments respond.
That is to say, clumsily, inadequately…and essentially.
Arguably, government-directed public health and sanitation efforts have done more to reduce human death and misery on earth — and here in the US — than any other single societal innovation.
Whether it’s preventing chronic cholera outbreaks by requiring proper sewage systems, requiring that food be properly handled so we don’t die of botulism, or intervening when viruses like H1N1 threaten to go hot-zone, there simply is no other human institution waiting in the wings to do this work.
The second big nudge to my mental conversation has been reading excerpts of Steven Pinker’s new book, “The Better Angels of Our Nature.”
Pinker, one of the country’s most interesting writers and intellectuals, chronicles the fact that world has been growing more and more peaceful over the centuries, so that “we may be living in the most peaceable era in our species’ existence.”
Whether talking about war, crime, or government-sanctioned violence (such as capital punishment), we live in a mostly unheralded golden age where far fewer people are viticimized than ever before.
This from Slate’s review of Pinker’s book:
Pinker calls this two-decade period the New Peace. Annual war deaths have fallen over the past 60 years by more than an order of magnitude, from about 500,000 to 30,000 per year, according to one estimate. As for terrorism, you are more likely to be killed by lightning than by a terrorist.
I mention Pinker’s book in this context because he ascribes much of the improvement in this post-violence era to — you guessed it — big government. Again from Slate:
At the top of the list is the rise of the modern state, which suppresses the violence of citizens and adjudicates disputes by means of police and courts. What is more, democracies rarely if ever fight against each other; over the past century the percentage of humanity living under democratic regimes has surged from 12 to over 60 percent.
So what do you think? Is libertarianism the last gasp of a romantic ideal, one we can indulge in because governments more or less keep our world safe while we gripe about it?
Or would you really rather go it alone?
This is one of those “it depends” questions. Rick Perry is not a libertarian. He is a Christian/social conservative who doesn’t like government, but he does like “Christian values” type control. He is opposed to secularism, but he might well like some Christian equivalent of Sharia Law.
Most of us have something we don’t like the government telling us to do or don’t do. But I think your last point – that the world has become so safe that people can indulge in wacky ideas – like being opposed to vaccinations – is a good thought.
In answer to your headline question, if the libertarian solution (I don’t know what libertarians think about vaccinations, and actually, didn’t Rick Perry require them in Texas for HPV?) is no required vaccinations, then no.
Some things never change. I was watching Prohibition on PBS last night and the experience was almost like watching a current events news program.
The good people thought outlawing all alcoholic drinks would result in a perfect world. Of course these were people who are opposed to big government unless it suits their Christian principles. Now it’s not booze. It’s drugs, cigarettes and abortion. But the arguments and methods are the same.
Everyone wants smaller government unless they want to clobber the other person on the head. Of course, as always, it’s for their own good.
Ron Paul (a libertarian) is opposed to mandatory vaccinations, and he is opposed to government food inspections/regulations etc. He is running for (republican) president, and has somehow managed to rationalize being a libertarian and making abortions illegal though.
The solution to climate change is to lower emissions. The best way to lower emissions is to have fewer people to emit. The best way to do that is to short-change medical research and oppose vaccinations. Maybe some of these folks are closet environmentalists? They are trying to fix global warming and don’t even know it!
The Libertarian approach to an epidemic would be to let ’em die– each person takes responsibility for their own health, end of story.
On the bright side, that approach could substantially reduce world population, and all the problems that come with overpopulation.
Seems to me that the real challenge for Libertarians is to rationalize Libertarianism with Christianity.
The problem with the “let em die” approach is that 1. its parents stupidly letting their kids die, and 2) it puts others at risk – people whose immunity has declined over time, or people who haven’t yet been vaccinated or are too sick to get the vaccine etc. Its somewhat similar to saying its ok for people to drink and drive since they are just putting their own lives at risk.
Let’em drink and drive? Sounds like another way for libertarians to fight climate change. More guns would be a big help too. Fuel oil too expensive? Freeze baby, freeze! The list of ways libertarians can be closet environmentalists is endless.
The silly season strikes the In Box comments. We live is a society. In that society we are interdependent, like it or not. If you want to be a total libertarian go off into the wilds somewhere and make it on your own. If you want the advantages of society some agency, in a democracy that’s us, has to mediate the terms of interdependence. We can’t each set our own rules.
If Rick Perry is elected president, I certainly hope government is rendered irrelevant to our lives. But I know theocrats like Perry, Rick Santorum and Michelle Bachmann are the biggest big-government advocates around.
Libertarian thinking does not get rid of government in fact in libertarian thought a set of rules providing the playing field and a mechanism to monitor and enforce those rules are critical. Libertarianism is not Somalia, its not an idea of every person taking what they can grab from society and their neighbor.
There are numerous things that the private market will not provide that are important starting with our constitution and rule of law as a society.
But yeah vaccinations, roads, the common defense etc. are all acceptable under a Libertarian view. Most libertarians I have known are not Christians most are atheist or agnostic, you can’t have the let them die view and believe in the sanctity of human life.
Well, that depends on the brand of Libertarianism you ascribe to. Check out Wikipedia’s discussion at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism which asserts that “According to the The U.S. Libertarian party, libertarianism is the advocacy of a government that is funded voluntarily and limited to protecting individuals from coercion and violence.”
There is also a lengthy article on the U.S. Libertarian Party, at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarian_Party_%28United_States%29
The word “health” does not appear.
Brian M said “Americans, myself included, like the idea of independence, of self-reliance…”
Of course, that is a fictional idea of how our society was founded.
The world is not a John Wayne movie. Even John Wayne wasn’t John Wayne, he was Marion. Apparently he wasn’t tough enough to keep his real name.
The real history of the US is a history of people relying on each other or dying. There’s a lot of lying and killing too. Self-reliance is a very rare story and one mostly about people with mental health or legal issues.
“Self-reliance is a very rare story and one mostly about people with mental health or legal issues.”
Knuck, this is a sad comment. You and I live in two different Americas.
The problem with trying to talk about Libertarianism is that it means different things to different people who claim to be such. And this is true for just about every label you can imagine.
You shouldn’t make the assumption that the only way to accomplish a goal is to have it done via some political party. You can make the assumption but republican, democrat, libertarian, whatever, chances are you will be disappointed.
OK, Paul, here’s a scenario for you: we’ve just elected a true Libertarian President, and a new strain of avian flue breaks out, and it looks to by a bad one. The President says “Don’t look to the government– government is not the solution.
So, how, exactly, do we the people deal with the problem on our own?
Walker – in the past we locked everyone up who was infected in a house outside town, and maybe we burned down the house with everyone infected in it.
Sounds like a perfectly good Libertarian solution! After all, if they’d taken personal responsibility, they wouldn’t have gotten sick.
Paul: “You and I live in two different Americas.”
No Paul, it’s the same America. You just have to open your eyes and see.
I love this country, but I am aware that it isn’t perfect and I’m willing to see the truth.