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Social Welfare, Interventionism, and Indeterminacy: In Defense of Rothbard

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dc.contributor.author Wysocki, Igor
dc.contributor.author Dominiak, Łukasz
dc.date.accessioned 2024-11-21T07:42:51Z
dc.date.available 2024-11-21T07:42:51Z
dc.date.issued 2024-11-21
dc.identifier.uri http://repozytorium.umk.pl/handle/item/7077
dc.description This research was funded in whole or in part by the National Science Centre, Poland, grant number 2020/39/B/HS5/00610. For the purpose of Open Access, the author has applied a CC-BY public copyright licence to any Author Accepted Manuscript (AAM) version arising from this submission.
dc.description.abstract The present paper argues that Rothbard’s economic case against the state is more robust than suggested by his critics. The charge that it might be anemic is based on the suggestion that we can say literally nothing about the way governmental acts bear on social utility. Contra this supposition we submit that Rothbard’s critics missed the fact that the effects of governmental interventions might be actually indeterminate in two ways: weakly or strongly. If the indeterminacy involved in his welfare theory is weak, then his economic criticism of the state is more robust than envisaged by these authors. To the effect that this indeterminacy is indeed weak we advance the following reasons: Rothbard’s understanding of the Unanimity Rule; the avoidance of the contradiction allegedly committed by Rothbard over one and the same page of his famous essay; his economic criticism of interventionism being better aligned with his overall ethical anti-governmental stance; the principle of charitable reading, which cuts across all of the previously stated reasons. If our arguments count for something, then we are warranted in claiming that Rothbard is indeed able to say something about social utility under interventionism. And if so, then his criticism of interventionism should be viewed as robust rather than anemic.
dc.description.sponsorship National Science Centre/Narodowe Centrum Nauki This research was funded in whole or in part by the National Science Centre, Poland, grant number 2020/39/B/HS5/00610. For the purpose of Open Access, the author has applied a CC-BY public copyright licence to any Author Accepted Manuscript (AAM) version arising from this submission.
dc.language.iso eng
dc.rights Attribution 4.0 Poland
dc.rights.uri https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/deed.pl
dc.subject indeterminacy
dc.subject interventionism
dc.subject social welfare
dc.subject Rothbard
dc.subject coercion
dc.title Social Welfare, Interventionism, and Indeterminacy: In Defense of Rothbard
dc.type info:eu-repo/semantics/article


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