Libertarianism (traditionally) is on the bottom of the vertical (authority) axis on a traditional political compass, if you want to use that. It is neither left nor right. It can be either. The people who have taken the name are on the right. They’re anarchy-capitalists who don’t want to be ruled by government but want to be ruled by capitalists. Anarchists, for example, are libertarian leftists, using the terms properly.
The political Compass is a joke. It’s more accurate than just left or right. But libertarian isn’t a state that spans from left to right at the bottom. Libertarianism as it was designed is strictly a left ideology. Oriented about social Freedom Above All Else. Economic liberalism. Is an ideology predicated on complete economic freedom. Economic Liberals are not libertarians. Never have been. Never will be. They have diametrically opposed ideologies.
The problem with economic liberalism is that it puts the cart before the horse. You cannot have a free economy without a free society. Economic liberalism doesn’t care about Society in general. Just the free market. And they figure that magically a free Society will somehow follow. It never has but that’s the magical thinking involved.
Libertarianism (traditionally) is on the bottom of the vertical (authority) axis on a traditional political compass, if you want to use that. It is neither left nor right. It can be either. The people who have taken the name are on the right. They’re anarchy-capitalists who don’t want to be ruled by government but want to be ruled by capitalists. Anarchists, for example, are libertarian leftists, using the terms properly.
The political Compass is a joke. It’s more accurate than just left or right. But libertarian isn’t a state that spans from left to right at the bottom. Libertarianism as it was designed is strictly a left ideology. Oriented about social Freedom Above All Else. Economic liberalism. Is an ideology predicated on complete economic freedom. Economic Liberals are not libertarians. Never have been. Never will be. They have diametrically opposed ideologies.
The problem with economic liberalism is that it puts the cart before the horse. You cannot have a free economy without a free society. Economic liberalism doesn’t care about Society in general. Just the free market. And they figure that magically a free Society will somehow follow. It never has but that’s the magical thinking involved.