Scholars generally agree that libertarianism refers to the group of political philosophies which emphasize freedom, individual liberty and voluntary association.
[13] As a result, the term was co-opted in the mid-20th century to instead advocate laissez-faire capitalism and strong private property rights such as in land, infrastructure and natural resources.
Nonetheless, most American libertarians, whether pro-choice or pro-life, agree the federal government should play no role in prohibiting, protecting, or facilitating abortion and oppose the Supreme Court conclusion in Roe v. Wade that abortion is a fundamental right if performed during the first trimester of pregnancy by virtue of an implicit constitutional right to privacy.
Those opposing it generally see it as an excessive abuse of state power which is by its very nature irreversible, with American libertarians possibly seeing it also in conflict with the Bill of Rights ban on "cruel and unusual punishment".
Deontological libertarians have the view that natural rights exist and from there argue that initiation of force and fraud should never take place.
However, some right-libertarians, particularly Hoppean anarcho-capitalists who propose the full privatization of land and natural resources, contend that a policy of open borders amounts to legalized trespassing.
Following political economist and social reformer Henry George's philosophy of classical liberalism known as Georgism and the single-tax movement of activists who supported it (see also the single tax), some free-market centrists and non-socialist left-libertarians known as geolibertarians argue that because land is not the product of human labor and it is inelastic in supply and essential for life and wealth creation, the market rental value of land should properly be considered commons.
In order to promote freedom and minimize waste, they argue that absent improvements individuals should surrender the rental value of the land to which they hold legal title to the community as a subscription fee for the privilege to exclude others from the site.
Since geolibertarians wish to limit the influence of government, they would have this revenue fund a universal basic income or citizen's dividend which would also function as a social safety net to replace the existing welfare system.
[40] Market anarchists counter that having defense and courts controlled by the state is both immoral and an inefficient means of achieving both justice and security.
Others support mandatory vaccination, arguing that libertarian principles prohibit reckless behaviour that puts other people at risk.
"[44] Right-libertarians such as free-market environmentalists and Objectivists believe that environmental damage is more often than not a result of state ownership and mismanagement of natural resources, for example by the military-industrial complex.
[41] They generally support the free market and are not opposed to any concentration of power (monopolies), provided it is brought about through non-coercive means.
[46][47][48][49] Non-propertarian libertarian philosophies hold that liberty is the absence of hierarchy and demands the leveling of systemically coercive and exploitative power structures.
On this libertarian socialist view, a society based on freedom and equality can be achieved through abolishing authoritarian institutions that control certain means of production and subordinate the majority to an owning class or political and economic elite.
[46][47][48][49] Libertarian socialism is a group of political philosophies that promote a non-hierarchical, non-bureaucratic, stateless society without private property in the means of production.
[56][57][58] Most of these libertarians believe that the drive for profit in the marketplace will diminish or eliminate the effects of racism, which they tend to consider to be inherently collectivist.
Other libertarians support low taxes of various kinds, arguing that a society with no taxation would have difficulty providing public goods such as crime prevention and a consistent, unified legal system to punish rights violators.
While the former proposals are normally considered necessary evils or strategic compromises, geolibertarians in particular argue that a single tax on the rental value of land, typically in conjunction with Pigovian pollution and severance fees to internalize negative externalities and curb natural resource depletion, is not only non-distortionary and politically sustainable but also more ethically attractive than zero taxation and even required for justice in property rights.
[60] However, certain right-libertarians dispute the Lockean claim that some rights are inalienable and maintain that even permanent voluntary slavery is possible and contractually binding.
Thomas Szasz argued that involuntary psychiatry is incompatible with libertarianism and that Bertrand Russell, Robert Nozick, John Stuart Mill, Ayn Rand, the American Civil Liberties Union, and Friedrich von Hayek among others "went wrong" by their omission, ambiguity, or direct support.
If an action is objectively non-invasive, then it should be legal regardless of the benevolent or malicious intentions of the actor” (Rothbard 1982, p. 121).Most libertarians interpret voting even for a suboptimal candidate or policy as an act of political self-defense aimed at minimizing rights violations.
However, some libertarians (such as agorists) employ non-voting as a political tactic; following 19th-century individualist anarchists like Lysander Spooner and Benjamin Tucker, they consider voting an immoral concession to state legitimacy[citation needed].
However, a growing number of right-libertarians, inspired by the Founding Fathers of the United States, believe in revolution as a justified means to counter what they see as a corrupt government.