Libertarian Anarchy—Against the State

This text is a primer on anarchism. Casey (philosophy, U. College Dublin) argues that all states, not just the obviously oppressive, are criminal states. He is not strictly opposed to capitalism, and even admits "the term 'anarcho-capitalism' is used by some to name the position I am defending here," but maintains a distinction between that and what he calls 'libertarian anarchy.' He considers the origins of the state, the history of anarchist accounts of the state and its problems, how taxation is theft, what liberty means in the context of libertarianism, libertarian traditions that favor property rights, where the law comes from, examples of stateless societies both ancient and present, arguments against anarchism, and the contradictions of representative democracy. This text is more concerned with the state than the criticisms of the market that many anarchists see as equally important, though Casey does mention the tension. He does not deal with class struggle issues or give much attention to the social-anarchist tradition. He is unsurprisingly a scholar at the Ludwig Von Mises Institute, known for its pro-market hostility to socialism. Annotation c2013 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Gerard Casey is Associate Professor of Philosophy at University College Dublin, Ireland, Adjunct Professor at the Maryvale Institute, Birmingham, UK, and Adjunct Scholar at the Ludwig von Mises Institute, Alabama, USA.