Minarchism Is Statism Lite

It may be true that lovers of liberty, originally steeped in society’s preferred form of social democracy, must travel along the spectrum of the state via small (“minimal”) before reaching the conclusion that the state must go. But logically, this is not the case. To cure cancer, it is not necessary to reduce the size of a tumor bit by bit. The cure is to remove it. Similarly, if a rock upsets the flow of a stream, the solution is not to change the size or shape of the rock, to make it more streamlined, but to simply remove it.

This logic seems impossible to recognize for those who have already adopted the minarchist position. Usually hiding behind questions like “but how would it work,” minarchists cannot get their heads around the meaning of anarchism. To them, as to any statist, without the state, society would immediately degenerate into a Hobbesian bellum omnium contra omnes (“war of all against all”). The assumption, which cannot be questioned, is that some form of control or supervised order is necessary for people to get along, solve problems, or coordinate their actions.

Two issues in particular stir minarchists’ ire and they are equally illustrative of the statism that burdens minarchists. One is the alternative of anarchism or statelessness and the other is intellectual property.

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