Last week, I finished reading Hans-Hermann Hoppe’s “Democracy: The God that Failed,” which is probably the most famous and controversial book he’s ever written. It was also my first Hoppe book ever, so it was beyond interesting to read.
For those of you who aren’t familiar, Hoppe is essentially the successor of the great Murray Rothbard (for which I am named), just as Rothbard was to Ludwig von Mises. Hoppe is German-born and came to America to study under Rothbard. He has a handful of other books in English, including one that was just released this year titled, “The Great Fiction,” which I am yet to read.
Though it was dense, and I certainly wouldn’t recommend it to the average beginner in Austrian economics and libertarian philosophy, I found it an intriguing book and would suggest it to anyone with a fundamental understanding of the subject already.
I don’t know what to think about parts of the book. Hoppe certainly has a different tone than a lot of the other Austro-libertarian thinkers. I’m not quite sure how to describe it. Still, a lot of it resonated with me. That being said, I’m going to briefly discuss four points Hoppe made in the book that I think you might find interesting.
I’m not definitively taking every position as my own. Rather, I intend to lay out the very basics of each of the following points he makes. I may comment on them a little bit, but I’m mostly trying to reiterate, as far as I understand, what he was getting at.
Keep in mind, I didn’t physically “read” this book. I listened to it on audiobook. I assure you. Drunk Rothbard is a very busy man. The convenience of being able to read on my way to work (and not drive my car into a tree) is critical. The only downside is that I don’t have the actual book to go back and read, salvage for quotes and reference to chapters.
Also, these are just my initial thoughts on the book. I’m not claiming to be Hoppe’s voice. I only read the book once. I’m just as susceptible to misinterpretation as anyone else.
Lastly, these four points are not even close to being the full scope of the book. So don’t take this to be a complete summary. For a more complete overview, I suggest listening to the three episodes about the book on Jeff Deist’s Human Action Podcast, starting with this one or, of course, reading the book yourself, which you can find here.
Democracy Sucks. So Does Monarchy… Only Less
The major controversy surrounding the book, as I’m sure you noticed by its title, is its negative view about Democracy. I’ve seen critics of the book try to act like Hoppe, instead, is an advocate for Monarchy.
That’s simply not the case. Hoppe is an advocate for anarcho-capitalism. To him, myself, Rothbard (the sober one) and others alike, any form of the State is morally illegitimate. Monarchy, Hoppe contends, is simply less immoral than Democracy.
Why is this the case?
Hoppe claims that Democracy can be thought of as publicly owned government, whereas monarchy is privately owned.
Because monarchy is privately owned, it’s “owner,” i.e., the monarch, would have a vested interest in the preservation of his subjects, over generations even. The king likely still wants his kingdom to be there in good condition when his heir takes the throne.
The rulers in a Democracy, on the other hand, are simply ruling on the public’s behalf. Since they’re only in power for a limited time, they have more of an incentive to loot their subjects for as much as possible. They have no vested interest in making it easier for future rulers. Hoppe suggests this is the reason why Democracies have been capable of accruing much more public debt than was imaginable under monarchical rule.
Democracy is also a magnet for immoral people. Because the State is in the business of producing “bads,” i.e., theft, extortion and murder, competition does nothing to prevent malpractice. In other words, people who make good politicians are bad people. They are skilled demagogues whose talent is dishonesty.
There is at least a chance, under Monarchy, that the prince born into the royal family is a good person. This may not, and wasn’t, true all the time, but as we can see, there is a clear attraction for bad people under Democracy.
Monarchy tends to be smaller as well. Democracies are drastically more involved in the everyday lives of their subjects (as we’ve seen first-hand with the Democracies of today). Hoppe contends that hundreds of thousands of small monarchical kingdoms would be invariably better than one massive global Democracy.
Syndicalist Principles as a Means to Privatize Public Property. (If All Else Fails)
Us anarcho-capitalists like to speculate about what a private-property society would look like or argue about why it’s morally preferable to its alternatives, but how do we get there? Leave even the question of strategy behind and say we somehow got everyone that had once been a diehard statist on board. We’ve convinced them that all compulsory government is illegitimate.
This does not automatically put the government property (that had been forcibly seized from the private sector) into private hands. Where would this property go?
Of course, the ideal solution is to return the property to its original owners. Say I was a factory owner ten years ago and the government nationalized my industry, i.e., coerced me away from my property. Of course, then, I’m owed my factory back. There’s no doubt about it.
But it’s not always that simple. More often, private property is seized by means of taxation and inflation. Also, some civilizations have suffered more than others. The more a government takes and spends, and the longer they’ve been doing it, the harder it is to return property to its rightful owner.
Hoppe offers a solution for what to do with government property if we can’t return it to its proper owner that, to me, sounded odd coming from the Austro-libertarian camp. He advocates for a syndicalist approach – transferring the government property to those who work in related industries.
For example, the schools would go to the teachers, the factories to the factory workers and farms to the farmers.
This is weird because syndicalism, in particular anarcho-syndicalism, is generally associated with left-wing ideas, such as those of Noam Chomsky. According to Rothbard, “Of the three major proposals for running an advanced industrial society — socialism, syndicalism, and free-market capitalism — syndicalism is the most blatantly unworkable and most rapidly disastrous.”
I doubt there is much room for reconciliation between true syndicalist ideas and Hoppe’s. Hoppe’s use of syndicalism is purely for the privatization of government property. After all government property is privatized, of course, the society would operate under private law.
This was an interesting topic and I’m not quite sure what to think about it. I frankly haven’t thought about it all that much before now. Luckily, (but also unluckily) that decision won’t have to be made any time soon.
Declaration of Independence > Constitution
The biggest Democratic experiment in world history has undoubtedly been the United States. However, despite Hoppe’s unapologetic disdain for the system, he actually admires the U.S.
He admires it, mainly, for its founding in a secessionist movement. Hoppe encourages us to support most, if not all, secessions simply because they lead to decentralization. They lead us away from one-world government, not closer to it.
And the Declaration of Independence was a profound act of secession. It was a formal separation of the American colonies from the British Empire, and it was filled with sentiments about natural law and self-determination.
These sentiments didn’t carry on after the war, however. Eventually, the founding fathers came together to negotiate the parameters of a new government. First came the Articles of Confederation, which gave little authority to the central government. Instead, the States were treated as sovereign countries conjoined in a “loose confederation.”
But apparently the folks in charge didn’t like that too much. In 1789, they replaced the Articles of Confederation with the Constitution. And it's the Constitution that Hoppe marks as America’s fatal mistake.
This isn’t due to the parts that recognize certain rights of the people. It’s quite the contrary. Hoppe’s disapproval of the Constitution lies in the parts that grant power to the State, which is ultimately contradictory of the “immutable” rights mentioned in the Declaration of Independence.
And what have we seen in the 230 plus years since its ratification? Complete and utter expansion. The very government that was intended to be the premier limited government has now become the single largest empire in world history.
So, I certainly get Hoppe’s point here. Had we, instead, a document that honored the absolute right of self-determination (and consequently one’s right to secede down to the individual level), we would be a lot better off than we are today.
Insurance Discounts for Firearms? Awesome.
This was one of the smaller points that Hoppe made that might’ve been overlooked by some readers. I believe it was near the end of the book. Nevertheless, when I was listening to it, I thought one thing: Badass.
Hoppe essentially contended that private insurance/defense agencies (in the private law society, of course) would have a clear incentive for people to own firearms, contrary to compulsory states who (as we’ve seen) are incentivized to disarm its civilians.
The result, Hoppe claims, will be that these private agencies give their customers discounts for owning weapons, especially if they are living in an area close to a compulsory state’s border.
That way, if the State starts to think it may want some more taxpayers to extort, they might think twice.
Hoppe’s “Democracy: The God That Failed” was certainly one of the most unique books I’ve read in a while and it’s worth looking into if you’re in for a book that’s somewhat dense on the econ and philosophy stuff.
But even if that’s not exactly your idea of entertainment, you can check out those podcast episodes I linked above. Jeff does an amazing job elaborating on the ideas in not just this book, but many others in the Austro-libertarian camp.
Read it and let me know what you think either on Twitter, Instagram or the comments. As always, get the word out and shoot me a retweet or like if you feel inclined.