Matt Zwolinski is professor of philosophy at the University of San Diego and the founder and director of USD’s Center for Ethics, Economics, and Public Policy. Zwolinski is the co-editor of The Routledge Companion to Libertarianism, and he is the co-author, with John Tomasi, of The Individualists: Radicals, Reactionaries, and the Struggle for the Soul of Libertarianism (available April 4 and available for preorder).
This is the Self in Society Podcast #30.
This episode also is available via YouTube.
TIME MARKERS
00 Intro
0:54 Murray Rothbard, paleo-libertarianism, the “Mises Caucus,” and the meaning of libertarianism
4:06 The “family resemblance” among strains of libertarianism
6:22 Would Mises be in the “Mises Caucus”? Mises’s liberalism
12:57 Baggage with the libertarian label
16:46 Locke’s views of property rights
23:24 Henry George’s objections to Locke
26:23 Property rights as the central conundrum of libertarianism
30:18 Limits to Georgism; resources and production
38:45 More on resources and production
44:29 House values, NIMBYism, and rent-seeking
49:35 Strategies to solve “Lockean proviso” problems
52:07 Existing property rights as historically problematic
58:15 Addressing the U.S. Black/white wealth gap
1:00:15 Property generally as making the world a better place
1:05:01 Would reparations solve past injustices better than a basic income?
1:10:00 Systemic racism: criminal justice and education
1:13:49 Libertarian individualism and structural racism
1:15:42 Housing policy and structural racism
1:17:48 Methodological individualism and social justice
1:25:20 Emergent racism
1:28:27 The importance of more open immigration; implications for a basic income
1:33:15 A basic income as better than the existing welfare state
1:41:17 Matt’s forthcoming books on the basic income and exploitation
1:42:36 wrap-up
Zwolinski’s professional page offers links to his various books, including The Individualists, which comes out April 4 (available for preorder).
A couple of Zwolinski’s essays on the basic income are available online: “A Moral Case for Universal Basic Income” and “Property Rights, Coercion,and the Welfare State.”
The Routledge Companion to Libertarianism contains the essay mentioned by Zwolinski, “Self-Ownership,” by Daniel C. Russell.
April 4 Update: I published my review of the book.
Music by Jordan Smith.
Matt Zwolinski on Libertarianism