Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Herbert Spencer "The Man Versus the State"

British philosopher Herbert Spencer warned that increased government regulation would lead to socialism and slavery

"every evil can be removed: the truth being that with the existing defects of human nature, many evils can only be thrust out of one place or form into another place or form"

Criticism on regulative policy
  • it becomes a growth of officialism and increasing power for officials and organization
  • strengthens the "tacit assumption that it is the duty of the State to deal with all evils and secure all benefits"
  • "All socialism involves slavery"
  • regulations will lead to state ownership of land and dwellings and comunications
Criticizes the idealistic view of this
  • "impressed with the miseries existing under our present social arrangements and not regarding thses miseries as caused by the ill working of a human nature but partially adapted tothe social state, they imagine them to be forthwith curable by this or that rearrangement"
"for no form of cooperation, small or great, can be carried on without regulation"

"even if so, each member of the community as an individual would be a slave to the community as a whole"
criticizes the socialist system that he thinks regulation moves society towards


No comments:

Post a Comment