Intellectual Influences
The first political thinker to attract my attention was Ayn
Rand . For several years I was absolutely fascinated by her ideas,
and for a while I was convinced that Rand's system of philosophy was absolutely
intellectually watertight. However, as I began reading other thinkers,
I came to recognize that there were many logical flaws bedeviling capital-O
"Objectivism." One flaw in Rand's ideas I saw was her rather facile dismissal
of the concept of multiple or competing governments outlined by thinkers
like Murray Rothbard and David Friedman. An excellent analyst of Rand's
philosophy and its strengths and weaknesses is Chris Matthew Sciabarra
"Anarcho-capitalism" or multiple governments
(whereby in each country there are several government-like entities that
compete to attract customers and which provide services like police protection)
was the focus of my attention for a number of years. To learn more about
this idea, read David Friedman's Machinery
of Freedom . As my political ideas have moved more towards the political
centre, I have by no means abandoned the idea of multiple-governments.
In fact, I have become more convinced that such a system would be desirable.
With the proliferation of sub-cultures and greater ethnic diversity, the
need for multiple governments grows greater; our "one-government-fits-all"
system is particularily problematic when one considers countries where
territorially-mixed ethnic groups results in ethnic conflicts. If there
was a multiple-government system in place in Canada today, I would elect
to be a customer of a government that provided a greater degree of "social
programmes"than most other people who are interested in multiple governments.
However, there would nothing to stop libertarians, socialists, or advocates
of theocracy for setting up there own governments.
I realize that a system of multiple governments would have to be developed
slowly rather than being implemented suddenly. A "procedural
conservative" (to use Jerry Z. Muller's
terminology) I am aware of the inadvisability of rapid change or over-reliance
on abstract, ahistorical systems of political philosophy. I am a great
admirer of Edmund Burke, David Hume, and F.A. Von Hayek
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