Should I Be More Cynical

The very kind Tyler Cowen writes that this new site "will continue to offer my favorite TV and NBA reviews on the web, along with his regular incisive-but-I-wish-he-were-more-cynical-about-government-and-more-sanguine-about-the-transformational-power-of-economic-growth Democratic political analysis." Cowen's a libertarian, so I expect we won't see eye-to-eye on this, but I actually think I am pretty cynical about government. I've learned a lot from my various libertarian friends, from my seminar with Robert Nozick, from libertarian blogs, etc. and I think public choice economics is a very important perspective. The upshot of this is that, as a general matter, I'm considerably less enthusiastic about regulatory solutions to policy problems than are most liberals.

Sadly, though, the upshot of my libertarian-infused cynicism has mostly been to push me left of where I used to be on domestic policy issues. It's cynicism about government and the political process that, for example, has made me much more enthusiastic about labor unions and much more hostile to means-testing entitlements than I used to be. If I believed that the deliberative democracy people weren't naive fools, I'd be much more sanguine about various "third way" approaches to things.

Comments

So what do you think about Bob Smither? Will he be the first Libertarian Party congressional member, or will the GOP try to screw up his race and put the Democrat in office, bringing Pelosi ever-so-closer to speakership?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Smither#2006_Campaign

Posted by Mr. Econotarian | August 31, 2006 11:44 AM

If adequately balanced with the proper proportions of failed romanticism and frustrated idealism, there is no limit to the amount of cynicism one can at least profess. The goal is to be as nasty as possible while gathering a reputation as "an old softy." Role models abound:Twain, Mencken, Oscars Wilde and Levant. Dorothy Parker demonstrates the gender-free nature of the curmudgeon style.

Posted by bob mcmanus | August 31, 2006 12:50 PM

The libertarian retort is that if you are cynical about the political process, you shouldn't be fighting for unions, but rather for less government power that could be corrupted.

Posted by Isaac | August 31, 2006 2:31 PM

Ah, but Isaac, some people aren't convinced that large agglomerations of non-governmental power (e.g. big business) are entirely benign either.

Posted by DaveL | August 31, 2006 3:30 PM

Strange. I just finished watching "Meet John Doe" followed by an advertisement for "The Incredible Shrinking Man" -- two parables for our time.

Antonio

Posted by Antonio Manetti | August 31, 2006 4:35 PM

But, the libertarian would go on, large agglomerations of non-governmental power are only not benign because they operate through government. Additionally, in the long run, those agglomerations are contestable, and thus they can't be abused too much.

Posted by Isaac | August 31, 2006 4:41 PM

It is amazing what you can say when you don't have to empirically prove it.

Posted by matt | August 31, 2006 5:23 PM

Libertarianism is a disease common at about age fourteen from which some people unfortunately never recover.

Posted by Old Fogey | August 31, 2006 10:47 PM

"In the long run" we’re all dead anyway (Keynes), which doesn’t leave much room for the vaunted contestability to make a difference. In the meantime, “agglomerations” in the form of the large modern corporation can do a lot of damage (e.g to the environment, manipulation of weak third-world governments, Scaif-Murdoch-like control of the media, etc. etc.).

Unfortunately, the era of unions acting as a major counterforce to corporate power is fading away with the decline of union membership and the rise of "corporate unionism", although there is some positive pressure remaining from some unions. Ultimately, the regulatory power of the state remains the main recourse for effective influence on outcomes. That’s why politics still matters.

Posted by Jim Dandy | August 31, 2006 11:24 PM

Or, Isaac and Dave L., I could point out that a union is also a large agglomeration of non-governmental power, of which I'm also skeptical. I think unions and large businesses can both be very dangerous, especially when they harness the power of government against their (perceived or real) competition. Thus I'm not terribly bothered by unions in themselves, but am somewhat bothered by certain types of regulation that unfortunately increase unions' powers. Thankfully, many of these regulations are dying out in one form or another. A lot of unions die with them, but the ones that operate well without those regulations are the ones we ought to be having.

Now if we could also die-out corporate welfare...

Posted by Jadagul | September 1, 2006 12:04 AM

But, the libertarian would go on, large agglomerations of non-governmental power are only not benign because they operate through government.

Because a corporation acting on its own in a pure, free market would have absolutely no incentive to abuse its power to serve its own interests.

Posted by Christmas | September 1, 2006 12:18 AM

Because a corporation acting on its own in a pure, free market would have absolutely no incentive to abuse its power to serve its own interests.

It's not that it wouldn't have an incentive to abuse its power but that, absent state support, it just wouldn't have that much power to abuse (relative to consumers and workers).

The distortions of the free market perpetrated by the state are vastly skewed in favor of capital and against labor. Any principled libertarian who actually wants freer markets (as distinct from supporters of state capitalism who pretend at libertarianism for rhetorical reasons) must realize that the place to start is at the top: reduce the power of corporations (which may sometimes means wielding state power on the behalf of workers and consumers) and we'll be on our way.

Posted by tps12 | September 1, 2006 11:52 AM

“A pure, free market” is an illusionary concept found only in elementary textbooks on economics. Once the student gets to the advanced classes, the “real world” begins to creep in from behind the curtains.

In the real world, competition is a struggle for market power. Anything which aids that power is a useful weapon for corporations engaged in the competitive struggle. State power can and does serve that interest. Hence, the state itself becomes an arena of struggle over forms of control (legislative and regulatory). How the state wields that power, and for whom, becomes a matter of politics.

In the 20th century, it proved an uphill political struggle to shift the balance in exercise of state power from corporations to consumers and workers. It remains to be seen how things will turn out in this century.

Posted by Jim Dandy | September 1, 2006 12:30 PM

Thanks to Jim for injecting some reality into the thread.

Get it straight: unopposed corporations will try to annex the power of the state and the legal system to serve their own interests. That is why a counterbalancing organized political force such as unions is helpful. If unions were unopposed, they would be dangerous too, but in a capitalist society they will never be unopposed.

Posted by MQ | September 2, 2006 5:51 PM

Matt Yglesias, you write "Sadly, though, the upshot of my libertarian-infused cynicism has mostly been to push me left of where I used to be on domestic policy issues."

Is there any change in your level of cynicism toward government that that would push you away from leftism? I mean, it seems to me that you can either become less cynical or more cynical about government. You tell us that an increase in your cynicism has pushed you left. Would a decrease in your cynicism toward government push you in a more e.g. libertarian direction, or would both of these push you to the left?

Posted by James | September 2, 2006 8:49 PM

Jim Dandy:

In what what way would greater union power serve to counterbalance corporate power in ways that would affect the examples you give: "e.g to the environment, manipulation of weak third-world governments, Scaif-Murdoch-like control of the media, etc. etc."

Perhaps on manipulation of weak third world governments where those manipulations lead to greater competition from third world workers (although not when the manipulation encourages the creation of valuable complementary resources), but how is it inherently in the unions best interest to protect the environment?

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