6 comments

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  Bret Swanson

  1 year ago

  Tim,
  
  As you'll see, I was in the middle of posting a reply to your original comment when I saw your expanded post.
  
  Just one additional point to my comment below: Lessig often seems to take a libertarian-ish view on a topic, only to contradict himself or at least contradict what one thought he meant. For example, in this new National Review interview of Lessig (http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NDNhMzdlZD...), which I just happened across this morning by coincidence, he advocates abolishing the FCC. Hooray! But then he turns around and suggests it's mostly for the reason that Congress would do a better job of regulating communicaitons without the downside of regulatory capture. Earlier in the interview he says we should have gone with Al Gore's proposal in the 90s that we basically deregulate the whole Internet, but Lessig has been a huge proponent of intrusive, anti-profit, anti-property Net Neutrality regulation. Now he's moved on to all sorts of public-election-financing and other "progressive" causes.
  
  Thanks again for distinguishing between Free Culture, the book, and Free Culture the worldview. As mentioned, the point was my own distinction between Free! -- the model of economic abundance -- and Free Culture -- the "progressive" worldview.
  
  Best,
  
  Bret
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  Tim Lee

  1 year ago

  Bret,
  
  Thanks for the reply. I appreciate the clarification. I would respectfully suggest, however, that "free culture" is not a good shorthand for Lessig's worldview. It refers specifically to Lessig's ideas about the ways that overly-broad copyright laws restrict freedom of expression and stifle the growth of a participatory, many-to-many culture. While certainly many advocates of free culture are also in favor of government regulation of the Internet, there's no necessary connection between the two, and in fact there are a ton of libertarians who support a free culture, myself included.
  
  For example, I don't see anything un-libertarian in the manifesto of Students for Free Culture. Similarly, if you look at the activities of Lessig's organization, Creative Commons, I don't think you'd find any of its activities objectionable from a libertarian point of view.
  
  In my opinion, the fundamental error of left-of-center folks is that they're too quick to assume that there needs to be a government program for every worthwhile goal. The best way to change their minds is not to denigrate their goals, but to help them to see that government coercion is often not an effective way to accomplish those goals. The goals of the free culture movement is fundamentally private and non-coercive. Therefore, our focus as libertarians should be not on attacking the concept of a free culture, but in encouraging them to pursue those goals through non-coercive means. Given that most of what the free culture movement is seeking is a reduction of government coercion, this will not prove to be a tough sell.
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  Mike Linksvayer

  1 year ago

  Tim is right. People from across the political spectrum are involved in the free culture and related movements, but whatever their beliefs about the role of the state, they're doing the work of libertarian activists -- making production less amenable to regulation and taxation -- and moving the understanding of democracy and equality away from the tyranny of the majority and coercive redistribution and toward openness to participation and access to nonrivalrous goods. This largely explains why I, a libertarian for around 20 years, have been involved in some way in these movements for around 15 and have worked for Creative Commons for nearly 5.
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• 

  eee_eff

  1 year ago

  Just one additional point to my comment below: Lessig often seems to take a libertarian-ish view on a topic, only to contradict himself or at least contradict what one thought he meant.
  
  Perhaps that's because Lessig isn't living in an ideological straitjacket called libertarianism--he just believes in straight forward principles like individual freedom. Thus, if individual freedoms are destroyed by a government or a large corporation, he is equally concerned. It seems impossible for Libertarians to even conceptualize that individual freedom could be at risk from a corporation.
  
  That's why I object when those at TLF claim that von Hayek would be a libertarian, for example. He was passionately concerned with freedom, and, had he lived to see the possibilities of corporate oppression of individual liberties that now exist, I hazard he would be very far from libertarianism.
  
  In my opinion, the fundamental error of left-of-center folks is that they're too quick to assume that there needs to be a government program for every worthwhile goal.
  
  That may have been with the left of center folks circa 1990, but that's not where progressives are today. Although I will say that they see the need for government action in several areas, as noted here.
  
  A very interesting perspective is seen in J. Bradford DeLong's post here, where he sees new regulationism building upon and deepen Friedman's legacy, rather than obliterating it completely.
  
  The work of Dani Rodick is also relevant to this development.
  
  Libertarianism makes too many informational exclusions for anyone who is truly concerned about human freedom to espouse it.
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  Berin Szoka

  1 year ago

  That's why I object when those at TLF claim that von Hayek would be a libertarian, for example. He was passionately concerned with freedom, and, had he lived to see the possibilities of corporate oppression of individual liberties that now exist, I hazard he would be very far from libertarianism.
  

  
  

  
  Of course, many libertarians would agree with you that Hayek was, at most, a market-oriented neo-liberal who was all too willing to accept state intervention.

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  Marcvs

  1 year ago

  It seems impossible for Libertarians to even conceptualize that individual freedom could be at risk from a corporation.
  
  Yeah, if you're arguing with those "Libertarians" living in your head. Actual libertarians also have a much more nuanced view of corporations, you just have to ask them.
  reply