“PLOS One” has published a major study on the psychology of
libertarians, by Ravi Iyer, Spasenna Koleva, Jesse Graham, Peter Ditto, and
Jonathan Haidt, “Understanding Libertarian Morality: The Psychological Dispositions
of Self-Identified Libertarians, link.
Libertarians, it says, tend to be more individualistic. They tend to be less interested in involuntary
connections to other people, either vertically (as demanded by conservative
morality) or horizontally, empathizing with people in various intersectional
oppressed groups, as in leftist liberalism.
They believe that personal well-being should be proportional to effort, but
not necessarily equal (in the sense of remedying inherited inequality). They
tend to believe people should have the freedom to use what they already have
without interference from others, but not to feel entitled to take from others
who have more because of privilege.
Righteous mind, in a link shared by James Damore on Twitter
today, summarizes the paper here. Libertarians place more emphasis on logical
consistency than on emotion. It ends to
be associated with cis masculinity (as among gay libertarians).
I would also read Yuval Levin’s “Taking the Long Way: Disciplines
of the Soul Are the Basis of a Liberal Society” (link) from Oct. 2014 where Levin notes the limits that
libertarianism can accept on remedying past oppression while letting people use
what they have. David Brooks picked up on this essay with a
recent piece “The Elites Still Don’t Get It”, where society is not reproducing
individuals who can accept covenant with others or even accept needed
connections across gulf, driving the less well-off into tribalism and resentment
politics.
No comments:
Post a Comment