COWAN@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU (09/24/86)
To: sacc@ATHENA.MIT.EDU
(Part II)
A second, more serious problem with libertarianism (of the Objectivist
flavor) is the notion of "free choice." Certainly, free choice is a
good thing; few would deny that. It is true that eliminating property
taxes, restoring the right to choose not to wear a seatbelt,
motorcycle helmet, etc., increase "freedom." (Especially for the
person who person who owns land or the person who avoids an accident.)
Again, this view assumes the political process is limited to the
popular election of a government that expresses the will of the
people. But it is not only government that limits our free choice.
We live in a political world dominated by economic arrangements among
powerful institutions. Eliminating many government powers might give
us certain new freedoms, but would have no effect, or the wrong
effect, on the limits on free choice imposed upon us by institutions.
The deregulation of the phone company may give the consumer "free
choice" between phone companies, but the imperative of competition
means that consumers have no choice but to shoulder the cost of
intensive advertising wars in the short run ("the Right Choice:
AT&T"). This advertising boom, in conjunction with financial
speculation, produces "economic growth," not by creating anything
productive, but by enlarging the percentage of our economy devoted to
waste. In the near-term the consumer will get cheapter phone service,
because capitalism "works," but unlike small-scale capitalism in which
the fittest survive because of the superior quality of goods and
services produced by one's own hard work and initiative, large scale
capitalism largely thrives on the indoctrination of consumers to make
the "right choice," the access to markets (examples: GE's distribution
network, IBM's monopoly in data processing), and the coercion of
workers to work harder while being paid less. Workers have little
"choice" to improve their position if the company that pays them the
most money is least likely to survive. When competition ultimately
runs its course, the consumer's choice may be limited by monopoly.
Companies frequently bring in innovations designed to induce "economic
growth" by making the consumer dependent on various modern
conveniences. Take toothpaste. (I admit, a rather unusual example.)
A dependency on toothpaste in a pump is being created (by subsidy at
first) so that consumers will ultimately pay for the added cost of the
pump, and in order to better regulate (and speed up) their toothpaste
use. When toothpaste in a tube is removed from the market because
most consumers have been indoctrinated (progress!) to buy it in a
pump, what happens to my "free choice" to buy toothpaste in a tube?
The free market, using the technical apparatus of the media, has
infringed on my freedom.
Now I don't suggest we start a movement to guard the right to buy
toothpaste in a tube, but I do suggest that there is a danger to
freedom posed by economic interests manipulating our needs, given the
level of technical organization and coordination of modern society.
As Herbert Marcuse said, "Under the rule of a repressive whole,
liberty can be made into a powerful instrument of domination. The
range of choice open to the individual is not the decisive factor in
determining the degree of human freedom, but what can be chosen and
what is chosen by the individual. The criterion for free choice can
never be an absolute one, but neither is it entirely relative. free
election of masters does not abolish the masters or the slaves. Free
choice among a wide variety of goods and services does not signify
freedom if these goods and services sustain social controls over a
life of toil and fear -- that is, if they sustain alienation."
For the source of the quote, read "One-dimensional Man," chapter 1
(Beacon Press, 1964). Despite the fact that everything Marcuse writes
is rather obscure, I heartily recommend it, and it is still in print.
-rich
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