One of the great failures of the modern Republican/Conservative movement has been their inability to convey the collective benefits of celebrating the individual. It is easy for Democrats to paint Republicans as representing the interests of the rich to the detriment of everyone else. Many Democrat voters think Republicans are selfish because Republicans do not explain how their policies of protecting and elevating the rights of the individual benefit us all collectively.
Respecting the natural rights of each individual has the simple appeal of being in sync with the Golden Rule or the Ten Commandments, the bedrock definitions of what is right. Additionally, though, libertarianism and capitalism have the benefit of making people generally better off than they would otherwise be. Celebrating the individual lifts the collective.
How do we know that to be true? If we look at GDP per capita indexed by the extent of political and economic freedom the results are pretty telling. Here is a small sample of the rankings compiled by the World Bank and the Heritage Foundation last year.
Well, it looks like if you don’t discover oil your best bet for making everyone in your society better off is freedom. And I would suspect that the distribution of incomes in places like the UAE and Saudi Arabia are a little more top-heavy than in others.
Why are leftists so suspicious of liberty? Why are they so certain that larger forces overwhelm the agency of the individual? When we dispense with the notion of personal responsibility, how do we view the actions of a shoplifter, a turnstile jumper, a plagiarist, …or a terrorist?
Perhaps the most important question is “Why does freedom seem to lead inevitably to more prosperity?”
Freedom is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it incentivizes us to act to make ourselves better off because we believe that the fruits of that effort are safe. Those things we do to make ourselves better off generally involve providing something of value to other members of our community. Thus starts the flywheel of productivity.
On the other hand, governments that protect freedom also hold those accountable who interfere with the freedom of others. The control of bad actors is just as important as the incentives for good actors in creating a just and sustainable society.
There is one intriguing question that arises from looking at that list. Isn’t Singapore a dictatorship? How can it be among the most free countries on earth? Well, folks, as we have seen with the Democrats in this country who do not hesitate to infringe on our liberties when they believe they are doing so for the good, electing your leaders does not guarantee that you get freedom as part of the bargain. Argentina just had an election - and it appears that despite that freedom to choose their leader, Argentines are not terribly free.
The problem with the collectivist, larger-forces, world view is that it undermines both sides of the freedom virtuous circle. Those who succeed do not necessarily deserve to have done so - remember Obama’s “You didn’t build that” line. So why shouldn’t the fruits of those labors be redistributed? And those who act badly are not responsible for their bad acts because they are seen as systematically victimized. Where is the line in a society without accountability? Why would you open a CVS store to serve a community that needs a drug store if your city does not enforce shoplifting as a crime? Why would Israel think they can make peace with their neighbors if their neighbors pay people to rape and kill Israelis (and the greater world justifies those atrocities in the name of perceived systematic grievances)?
As we approach the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday in the US on Monday, I am reminded of the stark difference between Dr. King’s vision of a colorblind society and the twisted goals of the DEI crowd. MLK was a libertarian of the highest order, asking for each person to have the same opportunities. DEI is a collectivist, grievance-driven merry-go-round that never ends. DEI says we need to take the liberty and property of others to make up for the transgressions of the past. One of the most appealing aspect of asking for a fair process, is that we can probably measure that fairly accurately, How can we ever know when the accounts of the past have been squared and we have arrived at a fair result?
Think also of the difference between the gay rights and trans rights movements. Part of the reason that the gay rights movement has been so successful is because it is truly liberal. The movement asked for the same opportunities afforded to the straight world. No more, no less. The trans movement on the other hand infringes on the natural rights of others when biological males invade the restroom or the boxing ring previously reserved for females.
The post-October 7th world represents the best opportunity the civilized world will get to hang on to our values. Minimize individual freedom if you like, but get ready to inhabit the second division of the prosperity league tables.