How would a libertarian like Nozick view poverty in the United States? How plaus

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How would a libertarian like Nozick view poverty in the United States? How plausible do you find the libertarians preference for private charity over public assistance? (400 word reply). Please don't provide the answer in an image format, I want to be able to copy paste the answer. Thank you

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The libertarian approach

Whereas utilitarians associate justice with social utility, philosophers who endorse what is called libertarianism identify justice with an ideal of liberty. For them, liberty is the prime value, and justice consists in permitting each person to live as he or she pleases, free from the interference of others. accordingly, one libertarian asserts: “We are con- cerned with the condition of men in which coercion of some by others is reduced as much as possible in society.”57 another maintains that libertarianism is “a philosophy of personal liberty—the liberty of each person to live according to his own choices, pro- vided he does not attempt to coerce others and thus prevent them from living according to their choices.”58 Such views show clearly the libertarian’s association of justice with liberty and of liberty itself with the absence of interference by other persons.

Libertarians firmly reject utilitarianism’s concern for total social well-being. Utilitarians are willing to restrict the liberty of some, to interfere with their choices, if doing so will promote greater net happiness than not doing so. Libertarians cannot stomach that approach. as long as you are not doing something that interferes with any- one else’s liberty, then no person, group, or government should disturb you in living the life you choose—not even if its doing so would maximize social happiness.

although individual liberty is something that all of us value, it may not be the only thing we value. For the libertarian, however, liberty takes priority over other moral con- cerns. In particular, justice consists solely of respect for individual liberty. a libertarian world, with a complete commitment to individual liberty, would be a very different world from the one we now live in. consider the following: the government registers young men for military service and can, if it chooses, draft them; laws prevent adults from viewing certain kinds of pornography and from ingesting substances that the legis- lature deems harmful or immoral (such as marijuana and cocaine); and the state imposes taxes on our income to—among many other things—support needy citizens, provide loans to college students, and fund various projects for the common good. From a liber- tarian perspective, none of these policies is just.

Given the assumption that liberty means “noninterference,” libertarians gener- ally agree that liberty allows only a minimal or “night-watchman” state. Such a state is limited to the narrow functions of protecting its citizens against force, theft, and fraud; enforcing contracts; and performing other such basic maintenance functions. In this view, a more extensive state—in particular, one that taxes its better-off citizens to support the less fortunate ones—violates the liberty of individuals by forcing them to support projects, policies, or persons they have not freely chosen to support.

Nozick’s theory of Justice

Although libertarians differ in how they formulate their theory, the late Harvard professor Robert Nnozick’s Anarchy, State, and Utopia is a very influential statement of the libertarian case. Nozick’s challenging and powerful advocacy of libertarianism has stimulated much debate, obliging philosophers of all political persuasions to take the libertarian theory seriously. His views are thus worth presenting in detail.

nozick begins from the premise that people have certain basic moral rights, which he calls Lockean rights. By alluding to the political philosophy of John Locke (1632–1704), nozick wishes to underscore that these rights are both negative and natural. they are negative because they require only that people forbear from acting in certain ways—in particular, that we refrain from interfering with others. Beyond this, we are not obliged to do anything positive for anyone else, nor is anyone required to do anything posi- tive for us. We have no right, for example, to be provided with satisfying work or with any material goods that we might need. these negative rights, according to nozick, are natural in the sense that we possess them independently of any social or political institutions.

these individual rights impose firm, nearly absolute restrictions (or, in nozick’s phrase, “side constraints”) on how we may act. We cannot morally infringe on someone’s rights for any purpose. not only are we forbidden to interfere with a person’s liberty in order to promote the general good, we are prohibited from doing so even if violating that individual’s rights would somehow prevent other individuals’ rights from being violated. each individual is autonomous and responsible and should be left to fashion his or her own life free from the interference of others—as long as doing so is compatible with the rights of others to do the same. Only an acknowledgment of this almost absolute right to be free from coercion, nozick argues, fully respects the distinctiveness of individuals, each with a unique life to lead.

a belief in these rights shapes nozick’s theory of economic justice, which he calls the entitlement theory. essentially, nozick maintains that people are entitled to their holdings (that is, goods, money, and property) as long as they have acquired them fairly. Stated another way, if you have obtained your possessions without violating other people’s Lockean rights, then you are entitled to them and may dispose of them as you choose. no one else has a legitimate claim on them. If you have secured a vast fortune without injuring other people, defrauding them, or otherwise violating their rights, then you are morally permitted to do with your fortune whatever you wish—bequeath it to a relative, endow a university, or squander it in riotous living. even though other people may be going hungry, justice imposes no obligation on you to help them.

the first principle of Nozick’s entitlement theory concerns the original acquisition of holdings—that is, the appropriation of unheld goods or the creation of new goods. If a person acquires a holding in accordance with this principle, then he or she is entitled to it. If, for example, you discover and remove minerals from the wilderness or make something out of materials you already legitimately possess, then you have justly acquired this new holding. nozick does not spell out this principle or specify fully what constitutes a just original acquisition, but the basic idea is clear and reflects the thinking of John Locke.

Property is a moral right, said Locke, because individuals are morally entitled to the products of their labor. When they mix their labor with the natural world, they are entitled to the resulting product. Thus, if a man works the land, then he is entitled to the land and its products because through his labor he has put something of himself into them. this investment of self through labor is the moral basis of ownership, Locke wrote, but he acknowledged limits to this right:

In the beginning . . . men had a right to appropriate, by their labour, each one of himself, as much of the things of nature, as he could use. . . . Whatsoever he tilled and reaped, laid up and made use of, before it spoiled, that was his peculiar right; whatsoever he enclosed, and could feed, and make use of, the cattle and product was also his. But if either the grass of his inclosure rotted on the ground, or the fruit of his planting perished without gathering, and laying up, this part of the earth . . . was still to be looked on as waste, and might be the possession of any other.60

In this early state of nature (the phrase is Locke’s) prior to the formation of govern- ment, property rights were limited not only by the requirement that one not waste what one claimed, but also by the restriction that “enough and as good” be left for others— that is, that one’s appropriation not make others worse off. Later, however, with the introduction of money, Locke thought that both these restrictions were overcome. You can pile up money beyond your needs without its spoiling; and if your property is used productively and the proceeds are offered for sale, then your appropriation leaves others no worse off than before.

Nozick’s second principle concerns transfers of already-owned goods from one person to another: how people may legitimately transfer holdings to others and how they may legitimately get holdings from others. If a person possesses a holding because of a legiti- mate transfer, then he or she is entitled to it. again, nozick does not work out the details, but it is clear that acquiring something by purchase, as a gift, or through exchange would constitute a legitimate acquisition. Gaining something through theft, force, or fraud would violate the principle of justice in transfer.

Nozick’s third and final principle states that one can justly acquire a holding only in accord with the two principles previously discussed. If you come by a holding in some other way, you are not entitled to it.

nozick sums up his theory this way:

1. a person who acquires a holding in accordance with the principle of justice in acquisition is entitled to that holding.

2. a person who acquires a holding in accordance with the principle of justice in transfer, from someone else entitled to the holding, is entitled to the holding.

3.         no one is entitled to a holding except by (repeated) applications of principles 1 and 2.

In short, the distribution of goods in a society is just if and only if all are entitled to the holdings they possess. nozick calls his entitlement theory “historical” because what matters is how people come to have what they have. If people are entitled to their pos- sessions, then the distribution of economic holdings is just, regardless of what the actual distribution happens to look like (for instance, how far people are above or below the average income) or what its consequences are.

Nozick’s Wilt chamberlain example

nozick argues that respect for liberty inescapably leads one to repudiate other concep- tions of economic justice in favor of his entitlement approach. One of his most ingenious examples features Wilt chamberlain, the late basketball star.

Suppose, nozick says, that things are distributed according to your favorite non- entitlement theory, whatever it is. (he calls this distribution D1.) now imagine that Wilt chamberlain signs a contract with a team that guarantees him $5 from the price of each ticket. Whenever people buy a ticket to a game, they drop $5 into a special box with chamberlain’s name on it. to them, seeing him play is worth $5. Imagine then that in the course of a season, 1 million people attend his games, and chamberlain ends up with far more than the average income—far more, indeed, than anyone else in the society earns. this result (D2) upsets the initial distributional pattern (D1). can the proponent of D1 complain? nozick thinks not:

Is [chamberlain] entitled to this income? Is this new distribution, D2, unjust? If so, why? there is no question about whether each of the people was entitled to the control over the resources they held in D1; because that was the distribution (your favorite) that (for the purposes of the argument) we assumed was acceptable. each of these persons chose to give [$5] of their money to chamberlain. . . . If D1 was a just distribution, and people voluntarily moved from it to D2, transferring parts of their shares they were given under D1 . . . isn’t D2 also just? If the people were entitled to dispose of the resources to which they were entitled (under D1), didn’t this include their being entitled to give it to, or exchange it with, Wilt chamberlain? can anyone else complain on grounds of justice?61

having defended the legitimacy of chamberlain’s new wealth, nozick pushes his case further, arguing that any effort to maintain some initial distributional arrangement like D1 will interfere with people’s liberty to use their resources as they wish. to preserve this original distribution, he writes, society would have to “forbid capitalist acts between consenting adults”:

the general point illustrated by the Wilt chamberlain example . . . is that no [non- entitlement] principle of justice can be continuously realized without continuous interference with people’s lives. any favored pattern would be transformed into one unfavored by the principle, by people choosing to act in various ways; for example, by people exchanging goods and services with other people, or giving things to other people. . . . to maintain a pattern one must either continually interfere to stop people from transferring resources as they wish to, or continually (or periodically) interfere to take from some persons resources that others for some reason chose to transfer to them.62

The libertarian view of liberty

Libertarianism clearly involves a commitment to leaving market relations—buying, selling, and other exchanges—totally unrestricted.* Force and fraud are forbidden, of course, but there should be no meddling with the uncoerced exchanges of consenting individuals. not only is the market morally legitimate, but any attempt to interfere with voluntary and nonfraudulent transactions between adults will be unacceptable, even unjust. thus, libertarians are for economic laissez faire and against any governmental economic activity that interferes with the marketplace, even if the point of the interfer- ence is to enhance the performance of the economy.

Imagine, for example, that having purchased the forest in which I occasionally stroll, the new owner bars my access to it. It would seem that my freedom has been reduced because I can no longer ramble where I wish. But libertarians deny that this is a restric- tion of my liberty. My liberty is restricted if and only if someone violates my Lockean rights, which no one has done. Suppose that I go for a hike in the forest anyway. If the sheriff ’s deputies arrest me, they prevent me from doing what I want to do. But accord- ing to libertarianism, they do not restrict my liberty, nor do they coerce me. Why not? Because my hiking in the forest violates the landowner’s rights.

here libertarians seem driven to an unusual use of familiar terminology, but they have no choice. they cannot admit that abridging the landowner’s freedom to do as he wants with his property would expand my freedom. If they did, then their theory would be in jeopardy. they would have to acknowledge that restricting the liberty or property rights of some could enhance the liberty of others. In other words, if their theory com- mitted them simply to promoting as much as possible the goal of people doing what they want to do, then libertarians would be in the position of balancing the freedom of some against the freedom of others. But this sort of balancing and trading off is exactly what libertarians dislike about utilitarianism.

If liberty means being free to do what you want, it’s not true that libertarians value it above everything else. What they value are Lockean property rights, which then set the parameters of liberty. Libertarians frequently contend that (1) private property is necessary for freedom and (2) any society that doesn’t respect private property rights is coercive. But libertarianism makes 1 true by definition, and 2 is incorrect. any system of property (whether Lockean, socialist, or something in between) necessarily puts restric- tions on people’s conduct; its rules are coercive. What one system of property permits, another forbids. Society X prevents me from hiking in your woods, whereas society Y prevents you from stopping me. Both systems of rules are coercive. Both grant some freedoms and withhold others.

It is important to emphasize that libertarianism’s enthusiasm for the market rests on this commitment to liberty. By contrast, utilitarians who defend an unregulated market do so on the ground that it works better than either a planned, socialist economy or the sort of regulated capitalism with some welfare benefits that we in fact have in the United States. If a utilitarian defends laissez faire, he or she does so because of its consequences. If we convinced a utilitarian that some other form of economic organization would bet- ter promote human well-being, the utilitarian would advocate that instead. With liber- tarians this is definitely not the case. as a matter of fact, libertarians typically agree with adam Smith that unregulated capitalist behavior best promotes everyone’s interests. But even if, hypothetically, someone like nozick were convinced that some sort of socialism or welfare capitalism would outperform laissez-faire capitalism economically—leading, say, to greater productivity, a shorter workday, and a higher standard of living—he or she would still reject this alternative as morally unacceptable. to tinker with the market, however beneficial it might be, would involve violating someone’s liberty.

Libertarians say that their commitment to an unrestricted free market reflects the priority of liberty over other values. however, libertarians do not value liberty in the mundane sense of people’s freedom to do what they want to do. rather, libertarians understand freedom in terms of their theory of rights, thus building a commitment to private property into their concept of liberty. according to them, being able to do what you want does not automatically represent an increase in your liberty. It does so only if you remain within the boundaries set by the Lockean rights of others. Likewise, one is unfree or coerced only when one’s rights are infringed.

Explanation / Answer

Nozick feels that anyone is free to do anything in this world until and unless there is no harm to others.

The something which you do should be legal enough and should not come under fraud transactions, theft or any illegal or violent activities.

Nozick follows three principles which are as follows:

1. If a person has a property which he gained himself by working hard then he will be entitled to that property

2. If a person has a property and wants to transfer it to some other person without any force on him then the receiver can be entitled for the property- provided the person who transfers the property is whole heartedly willing to give and is doing as per the law

3. If the property is gained or acquired by any other means other than mentioned above two, then it is not a legitimate entitlement

Libertarian believes that one can live his life as per his choice without any other's force on that person. If a person is not doing any illegal activities nor dong any harm to the society then there are no restrictions for his life.

They feel that the government should play vital role in the situation where needed by the people and should be limited. Government should involve in protecting the people, national defense, education, charities, economic etc.

Libertarian would like the Nozick view for poverty as nozick's words almost reflect how the libertarians feel. They both feel that we are not supposed to harassed nor forced by someone to do the charity or help someone.

A person can help the other as per his wish. If someone is forcing to do charity then it violates the law. One can done something as per their wish. It can range from $1 to any amount, however, there should be any force.

To decrease the poverty, not necessarily government should only help them by providing amount for the daily needs. As per Nozick, poor people neither has any right to ask any help on demand. They can only request. If someone is really willing to help them, then the poor can be entitled for that amount.

Also, there should be any pressure on the person who donates something. He can give whatever and how much ever he wish to.

Libertarians preference for private charity over public assistance:

Private charity is the organization which is categorized under 501 (c) (3) which denotes that the organization is working for a social cause.

These organizations work with the help of funds donated by the public assistance in the form of funds. These organizations do not demand people to help them and take whatever provided by anyone of them.

Hence, libertarians preference for private charity over public assistance is justified.

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