What a Takedown

Libertarianism doesn’t often attract attention from The Atlantic, but a recent article, “The Information Revolution’s Dark Turn,” features philosopher Alistair Duff who attacks libertarianism in general, and Murray Rothbard specifically. Unfortunately, the article misrepresents libertarianism but does so in a superficially plausible way. Many critics of libertarianism, I suspect, view it in the same way the article does.

The article is an interview of Alistair Duff, who teaches information society and policy at Edinburgh Napier University. Duff is interested in the information revolution in Silicon Valley, and he thinks that people who work there are too anti-statist.

Duff says of libertarianism, “I think it’s a mistaken philosophy.”

Duff’s Odd Notions of Justice

There is another questionable claim in Duff’s interview. In a statement I have already quoted, he says that “public life should incorporate a great deal of freedom … but you cannot trump justice with liberty in the way Tim Cook is doing.” He is talking about Cook’s refusal to obey the FBI’s demand that Apple engineer software to help unlock the iPhone of one of the San Bernardino shooters. Duff is adamant on this matter. He says, “I’m with the state on that, absolutely. I think Tim Cook is out of his mind. It’s a clear case where the state’s rights prevail over the right of individual privacy, and I say that as an advocate of privacy. We’ve got to get common sense on privacy, not fanaticism.”

It is difficult to see why Duff regards Cook’s position as one that unduly prefers liberty to justice. Rawls’s theory, which Duff favors, doesn’t directly address conflicts of this sort between liberty and national security. Why, then, does Duff take what is at stake to be a conflict between liberty and justice? Perhaps Duff would appeal to Rawls’s discussion of conscription (A Theory of Justice, 1st edition, pp. 380ff.), but in the absence of a fuller account by him, his claim is baffling.

Duff says about a libertarian theory that he has “read it all,” but he has not done so very carefully and thoughtfully.

Note: The views expressed on Mises.org are not necessarily those of the Mises Institute.

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