The article examines the libertarian ideal of liberty, which emphasizes minimal interference in personal actions. It critiques libertarianism’s stance on charity and welfare, arguing that the liberty of the poor, to meet their basic needs by taking from the rich, is morally preferable to the rich’s liberty to use surplus resources for luxury. By applying the “ought implies can” principle, the article asserts that requiring the rich to sacrifice some luxury for the poor’s basic needs is reasonable, while the poor should not be forced to sacrifice their right to welfare. Ultimately, the article aligns libertarianism with welfare liberalism.
Introduction: The Libertarian Ideal of Liberty
Thus, suppose we interpret the ideal of liberty in the manner favoured by libertarians. So understood, liberty is the absence of interference by other people from doing what one wants or is able to do. Interpreting their ideal in this way, libertarians claim to derive a number of more specific requirements, in particular a right to life, a right to freedom of speech, press and assembly, and a right to property. Here it is important to observe that the libertarian’s right to life is not a right to receive from others the goods and resources necessary for preserving one’s life; it is simply a right not to be killed unjustly. Correspondingly, the libertarian’s right to property is not a right to receive from others the goods and resources necessary for one’s welfare, but rather a right to acquire goods and resources either by initial acquisition or by voluntary agreement.
Libertarians’ View on Charity and Welfare
Of course, libertarians would allow that it would be nice of the rich to share their surplus resources with the poor. Nevertheless, according to libertarians, such acts of charity should not be coercively required. For this reason, libertarians are opposed to coercively supported welfare programs.
Conflict Between the Rich and the Poor
Now, in order to see why libertarians are mistaken about what their ideal requires, consider a typical conflict situation between the rich and the poor. In this conflict situation, the rich, of course, have more than enough resources to satisfy their basic needs. By contrast, the poor lack the resources to meet their most basic needs even though they have tried all the means available to them that libertarians regard as legitimate for acquiring such resources. Under circumstances like these, libertarians usually maintain that the rich should have the liberty to use their resources to satisfy their luxury needs if they so wish. Libertarians recognize that this liberty might well be enjoyed at the expense of the satisfaction of the most basic needs of the poor: they just think that liberty always has priority over other political ideals, and since they assume that the liberty of the poor is not at stake in such conflict situations, it is easy for them to conclude that the rich should not be required to sacrifice their liberty so that the basic needs of the poor may be met.
The Liberty of the Poor: A Conflict of Liberties
In fact, however, the liberty of the poor is at stake in such conflict situations. What is at stake is the liberty of the poor not to be interfered with in taking from the surplus possessions of the rich what is necessary to satisfy their basic needs. When libertarians are brought to see that this is the case, they are genuinely surprised, one might even say rudely awakened, for they had not previously seen the conflict between the rich and the poor as a conflict of liberties.
Choosing Between the Liberties of the Rich and the Poor
When the conflict between the rich and the poor is viewed as a conflict of liberties, we can either say that the rich should have the liberty not to be interfered with in using their surplus resources for luxury purposes, or we can say that the poor should have the liberty not to be interfered with in taking from the rich what they require to meet their basic needs. If we choose one liberty, we must reject the other. What needs to be determined, therefore, is which liberty is morally preferable—the liberty of the rich or the liberty of the poor.
Morality and the “Ought Implies Can” Principle
I submit that the liberty of the poor, which is the liberty not to be interfered with in taking from the surplus resources of others what is required to meet one’s basic needs, is morally preferable to the liberty of the rich, which is the liberty not to be interfered with in using one’s surplus resources for luxury purposes. To see that this is the case, we need only appeal to one of the most fundamental principles of morality, one that is common to all social and political perspectives, namely the “ought” implies “can” principle. According to this principle, people are not morally required to do what they lack the power to do or what would involve so great a sacrifice that it would be unreasonable to ask, and/or in cases of severe conflict of interest, unreasonable to require them to abide by.
Applying the “Ought Implies Can” Principle
For example, suppose I promised to attend a departmental meeting on Friday, but on Thursday I am involved in a serious car accident which puts me into a coma. Surely it is no longer the case that I ought to attend the meeting now that I lack the power to do so. Or suppose instead that on Thursday I develop a severe case of pneumonia for which I am hospitalized. Surely I could legitimately claim that I cannot attend the meeting on the grounds that the risk to my health involved in attending is a sacrifice that it would be unreasonable to ask me to bear. Or suppose the risk to my health from having pneumonia is not so serious that it would be unreasonable to ask me to attend the meeting (a supererogatory request); it might still be serious enough to be unreasonable to require my attendance at the meeting (a demand that is backed up by blame or coercion).
The Morality of Sacrifice
What is distinctive about this formulation of the “ought” implies “can” principle is that it claims that the requirements of morality cannot, all things considered, be unreasonable to ask, and/or in cases of severe conflict of interest, unreasonable to require people to abide by. The principle claims that reason and morality must be linked in an appropriate way, especially if we are going to be able to justifiably use blame or coercion to get people to abide by the requirements of morality.
Applying the Principle to the Poor and the Rich
Applying the “ought” implies “can” principle to the case at hand, it seems clear that the poor have it within their power willingly to relinquish such an important liberty as the liberty to take from the rich what they require to meet their basic needs. Nevertheless, it would be unreasonable to ask or require them to make so great a sacrifice. In the extreme case, it would involve asking or requiring the poor to sit back and starve to death. Of course, the poor may have no real alternative to relinquishing this liberty. To do anything else may involve worse consequences for themselves and their loved ones and may invite a painful death.
The Sacrifice of the Rich vs. the Poor
By contrast, it would not be unreasonable to ask and require the rich to sacrifice the liberty to meet some of their luxury needs so that the poor can have the liberty to meet their basic needs. Naturally, we might expect that the rich, for reasons of self-interest and past contributions, might be disinclined to make such a sacrifice. We might even suppose that the past contribution of the rich provides a good reason for not sacrificing their liberty to use their surplus for luxury purposes. Yet, unlike the poor, the rich could not claim that relinquishing such a liberty involved so great a sacrifice that it would be unreasonable to ask and require them to make it; unlike the poor, the rich could be morally blameworthy for failing to make such a sacrifice.
Libertarianism and Welfare Rights
Consequently, if we assume that however else we specify the requirements of morality, they cannot violate the “ought” implies “can” principle, it follows that, despite what libertarians claim, the right to liberty endorsed by them actually favors the liberty of the poor over the liberty of the rich.
Libertarians’ Objections to the Conclusion
Yet couldn’t libertarians object to this conclusion, claiming that it would be unreasonable to ask the rich to sacrifice the liberty to meet some of their luxury needs so that the poor could have the liberty to meet their basic needs? As I have outlined, libertarians don’t usually see the situation as a conflict of liberties, but suppose they did. How plausible would such an objection be? Not very plausible at all, I think.
The Injustice of Liberty for the Poor
For consider: what are libertarians going to say about the poor? Isn’t it clearly unreasonable to require the poor to sacrifice the liberty to meet their basic needs so that the rich can have the liberty to meet their luxury needs? Isn’t it clearly unreasonable to require the poor to sit back and starve to death? If it is, then, there is no resolution of this conflict that would be reasonable to require both the rich and the poor to accept.
Libertarians and Moral Ideals
But that would mean that libertarians could not be putting forth a moral ideal, because a moral ideal resolves severe conflicts of interest in ways that it would be reasonable to ask and require everyone affected to accept. Therefore, as long as libertarians think of themselves as putting forth a moral ideal, they cannot allow that it would be unreasonable in cases of severe conflict of interest both to require the rich to sacrifice the liberty to meet some of their luxury needs in order to benefit the poor, and to require the poor to sacrifice the liberty to meet their basic needs in order to benefit the rich.
The Libertarian Ideal of Liberty and Welfare
In brief, I have argued that a libertarian ideal of liberty can be seen to support a right to welfare through an application of the “ought” implies “can” principle to conflicts between the rich and the poor. In the interpretation I have used, the principle supports such rights by favoring the liberty of the poor over the liberty of the rich. In another interpretation (developed elsewhere), the principle supports such rights by favoring a conditional right to property over an unconditional right to property. In either interpretation, what is crucial to the derivation of these rights is the claim that it would be unreasonable to require the poor to deny their basic needs and accept anything less than these rights as the condition for their willing cooperation.
Criticism from Tibor Machan
In his article, “Individuals and their Rights,” Tibor Machan criticizes my argument that a libertarian ideal of liberty leads to welfare rights, accepting its theoretical thrust but denying its practical significance. He appreciates the force of the argument enough to grant that if the type of conflict cases I describe between the rich and the poor actually obtained, the poor would have welfare rights. But he denies that such cases—in which the poor have done all that they legitimately can to satisfy their basic needs in a libertarian society—actually obtain.
Concessions from Machan
But this response virtually concedes everything that defenders of welfare rights had hoped to establish. For the poor’s right to welfare is not unconditional. It is conditional principally upon the poor doing all that they legitimately can to meet their own basic needs. So it is only when the poor lack sufficient opportunity to satisfy their own basic needs that a right to welfare has moral force. Accordingly, on libertarian grounds, Machan has conceded the legitimacy of just the kind of right to welfare that defenders of welfare had hoped to establish.
The Right to Welfare and Equal Opportunity
It is possible that libertarians convinced to some extent by the above arguments might want to accept a right to welfare but deny that there is a right to equal opportunity. Such a stance, however, is only plausible if we unjustifiably restrict the class of morally legitimate claimants to those within a given (affluent) society, for only then would a right to equal opportunity require something different from a right not to be discriminated against in filling roles and positions in society that follows from a right to welfare.
Global Justice and the Right to Welfare
At present there is probably a sufficient worldwide supply of goods and resources to meet the normal costs of satisfying the basic nutritional needs of all existing persons. According to former US Secretary of Agriculture, Bob Bergland, “For the past 20 years, if the available world food supply had been evenly divided and distributed, each person would have received more than the minimum number of calories.” Other authorities have made similar assessments of the available world food supply.
Resource Distribution and Welfare
Accordingly, the adoption of a policy of supporting a right to welfare for all existing persons would necessitate significant changes, especially in developed countries. For example, the large percentage of the US population whose food consumption clearly exceeds even an adequately adjusted poverty index might have to alter their eating habits substantially.
Sustainability and Future Generations
Furthermore, once the basic nutritional needs of future generations are also taken into account, the satisfaction of the non-basic needs of the more advantaged in developed countries would have to be further restricted, in order to preserve the fertility of cropland and other food-related natural resources for the use of future generations.
The Necessity of Equal Opportunity for All
The form of equal opportunity that John Rawls defends in A Theory of Justice requires that persons who have the same natural assets and the same willingness to use them have an equal chance to occupy roles and positions in society commensurate with their natural assets.
Reconciliation of Welfare and Equal Opportunity
Accordingly, my practical reconciliation argument fails to guarantee a right to equal opportunity that provides the greatest benefits to the talented, enabling them directly to meet non-basic as well as basic needs. But this failure is no objection to my argument, given that having this sort of equal opportunity is incompatible with the more fundamental requirement of meeting everyone’s basic needs.
Libertarianism and Welfare Liberalism
What these arguments show, therefore, is that libertarianism or a libertarian conception of justice supports the same practical requirements as welfare liberalism or a welfare liberal conception of justice: both favor a right to welfare and a right to equal opportunity.
Refuting Objections to the Right to Welfare
One might want to press Machan’s objection to this argument from liberty to equality, which is that the argument has no practical significance because “persons do not lack the opportunities and resources to satisfy their basic needs.” However, this objection is particularly easy to refute once the libertarian ideal is seen to ground a universal right to welfare.
Practical Implications of the Right to Welfare
It might also be objected that this argument falls victim to its own success. If a universal right to welfare requires an equal sharing of resources, wouldn’t talented people simply lack the incentive to produce according to their ability when such a right is enforced? But what sort of incentive is needed?
Conclusion: Liberty and Equality
In brief, a libertarian conception of justice supports the same rights to welfare and equal opportunity as those endorsed by a welfare liberal conception of justice. In this way, it is possible to argue from liberty to equality.