The Molinari Institute (the parent organization of the Center for a Stateless Society) is proud to announce the publication of the first issue of our new interdisciplinary, open-access, libertarian academic journal, the Molinari Review, edited by yours truly, and dedicated to publishing scholarship, sympathetic or critical, in and on the libertarian tradition, very broadly understood. (See our original call for papers.)

You can order a copy here:

It should also be available, now or shortly, on other regional versions of Amazon. And later on it’ll be available from our website as a free PDF download (because copyright restrictions are evil).

So what’s in it?

In “The Right to Privacy Is Tocquevillean, Not Lockean: Why It Matters” Julio Rodman argues that traditional libertarian concerns with non-aggression, property rights, and negative liberty fail to capture the nature of our concern with privacy. Drawing on insights from Tocqueville and Foucault, Rodman suggests that privacy is primarily a matter, not of freedom from interference, but of freedom from observation, particularly accusatory observation.

In “Libertarianism and Privilege,” Billy Christmas charges that right-wing libertarians underestimate the extent and significance of harmful relations of privilege in society (including, but not limited to, class and gender privilege) because they misapply their own principles in focusing on proximate coercion to the exclusion of more indirect forms of coercion; but, he argues, broadening the lens of libertarian inquiry reveals that libertarian principles are more powerful tools for the analysis of privilege than privilege theorists generally suppose.

In “Capitalism, Free Enterprise, and Progress: Partners or Adversaries?,” Darian Nayfeld Worden interrogates traditional narratives of the Industrial Revolution. Distinguishing between capitalism (understood as a separation between labour and ownership/management) and free enterprise, Nayfeld Worden maintains that the rise of capitalism historically was in large part the result of a suppression of free enterprise, and that thanks to state intervention, the working-class benefited far less from industrialisation and technological innovation than they might otherwise have done.

In “Turning the Tables: The Pathologies and Unrealized Promise of Libertarianism,” Gus diZerega contends that libertarians misunderstand and misapply their own key concepts, leading them to embrace an atomistic vision of society, and to overvalue the market while undervaluing empathy and democracy. (Look for a reply or two in our next issue.)

Finally, Nathan Goodman reviews Queering Anarchism: Addressing and Undressing Power and Desire, an anthology edited by C. B. Daring, J. Rogue, Deric Shannon, and Abbey Volcano. Goodman praises the book for its illumination of many aspects of the intersection between anarchist tradition and the LGBTQ community, with particular emphasis on the tension between LGBTQ activists who seek to dismantle oppressive institutions and those who merely seek inclusion within them; but in the area of economics, he finds its authors to be too quick to dismiss the free market or to equate it with the prevailing regime of corporatist privilege.

Want to order a copy? See the ordering information above.

Want to contribute an article to an upcoming issue? Head to the journal’s webpage.

Want to support this project financially? Make a donation to the Molinari Institute General Fund.

This week (May 15 – May 21) is the 4th Annual National Week of Action Against Incarcerating Youth, brought to you by Save the Kids (@STKgroup).

The national event celebrates a different theme each day of the week concerning youth incarceration issues. Today’s theme is dedicated to ending curfews and truancy laws targeting youth. Tomorrow, participants are encouraged to promote alternatives to punitive justice, such as transformative and restorative modes of justice.

You can follow the goings on of the event on social media – #NoYouthInPrison2016 #NWAAIY2016. For more information, contact Anthony Nocella at (315) 657-2911 or by email — noyouthinprison@gmail.com

Save the Kids is a fully-volunteer national grassroots organization dedicated to advancing alternatives to and ending the incarceration of all youth and the school-to-prison pipeline.

This November, don’t vote. As difficult as it may be to accept, you don’t have to, and it isn’t somehow morally wrong not to. Sometimes the single most powerful political statement you can make, your best option for expressing your preferences for the future of our country, is simply to lodge a conscientious objection by abstaining from the voting booth altogether. I know many of you don’t (and won’t) believe me; you just can’t. After all, we have been trained from our intellectual nonage, from our earliest lessons in civic and political life, to cherish the franchise, to worship our “democracy” and its icons, tangible and otherwise. Voting is among these most revered icons, held away from criticism and discussion, a religious rite, deviations from which are thought to be not legitimate political statements but the worst kind of apostasy. Rest assured, dutiful citizen, you can choose anyone you’d like; perhaps it is even permissible in some of the many sects of politics-worship to write in a name that does not appear on the pre-approved list. But never, under any circumstances are you licensed to abstain. To do so is to renounce your faith, to ostracize yourself. It is antisocial and anti-American, a mark of either laziness and apathy or else of the puerile, hopeless attempt to signal rebellion, like the petulance of a teenager challenging his parents’ household rules. With so much of the global population living under tyrannical and undemocratic governments, America’s non-voters are regarded as contemptibly indifferent, ungrateful even, too immature to appreciate the moral weight of the enormous responsibility we’ve been given. But is this really an accurate account of what’s going on with non-voters? Maybe there’s a case for deciding not to vote in this fall’s presidential contest.

Recently, two former presidents of the United States, George H.W. Bush and his son, George W. Bush, announced that they will not vote, that they cannot in good conscience cast a vote for either of the two presumptive candidates, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. That position, as it happens, is the one that many libertarians have articulated and espoused for well over a century, the simple idea that we would rather not vote for “the lesser of two evils,” if that can even be determined. To accept the process and its terms is, in the judgment of many libertarians, to participate in an exercise of moral and intellectual debasement, premised on the falsehoods that we have a meaningful choice and that our vote matters. Indeed, several libertarians throughout American history have even suggested that we have an affirmative duty not to vote, that doing so is itself a violation of our stated principles as friends of freedom and enemies of coercive imposition. For his part, Benjamin R. Tucker, publisher of the outstanding libertarian journal Liberty, contended, “Every man who casts a ballot necessarily uses it in offence against American liberty, it being the chief instrument of American slavery.” Others, notably those in the voluntaryist tradition of libertarians such as Carl Watner, have largely followed Tucker in the belief that voting is “implicitly a coercive act” insofar as it “lends support to a compulsory government.”

But perhaps this commandment, that libertarians as such should never vote, is likewise too strong, setting up a false equivalency between using aggression to violate someone’s rights and simply using whatever tools are within your grasp to influence a coercive, criminal process that will carry on without regard for your vote. It is admittedly a thorny philosophical problem, bound up with countless other issues in political theory that implicate when and how political authority can create duties, when we must obey and why. At the very least, however, it is not at all clear that we must vote, or that not voting is evidence of some deficiency of moral fiber. It may be that it is just one among the many perfectly legitimate political choices we have.

Economic analysis, it turns out, has something to say about voting, too. The concept of opportunity cost is the idea that if you choose to do one thing—say, go out to dinner at a restaurant—you have necessarily given up resources, time and money, that you could have used to do something else. Consciously or not, we use this concept all the time to make better decisions, to more efficiently employ the resources at our disposal. Many libertarians stay home on election day not because they don’t care about ideas, public policy, or the future of the country, but because we believe that our time is better spent engaging in one of many other available activities, going to work, spending time with family or friends, shopping, etc. Moreover, the work of scholars such as economist Bryan Caplan shows that it is completely rational to be ignorant of politics and public policy issues, that, given how little each vote matters, the voter behaves quite rationally in his decision not to “buy” more information by investing more time to learn. The evangelists of the ballot box, those who smugly don “I Voted” stickers and preach of the “civic duty” to vote, are unlikely to find these arguments persuasive; that’s because, for them, voting is sacrosanct, an article of faith, something that’s not really susceptible to reason or scrutiny. Many others, however, have long surmised, in their secret thoughts, that the sacred duty to vote may not be quite as strong as the political priesthood claims. Guilted into silence, they have suspected that a rhetorical sleight of hand is afoot without knowing whether they are justified in relinquishing their right to vote. If I may, they are quite justified. To opt out is not necessarily to be lax in your citizenship, derelict in your duties, but to embrace them in a different, perhaps counterintuitive way, to cast your vote by refusing to vote, which is itself a powerful declaration of your values and priorities. So, come November, if you want to vote, knock yourself out—but if you don’t, you needn’t be cowed by those who insist that you are neglecting your duty.

Peter Van Buren discusses a new documentary on drones.

Noam Chomsky discusses who rules the world.

Dan Sanchez discusses schooling and war.

Sarah Leah Whitson discusses the U.S. backed Saudi war on Yemen.

Noam Chomsky discusses the state of the world.

Roderick T. Long discusses Thucydides and the language of power.

Ivan Eland discusses Trump and foreign policy.

Rupert Stone discusses torture and its effectiveness.

Richard M. Ebeling discusses the history of WW2.

William Astore discusses U.S. foreign policy.

Lucy Steigerwald discusses taking responsibility for war.

Medea Benjamin discusses the similiarties between Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Barrett Brown discusses a book on Henry Kissinger.

Paul R. Pillar discusses the Iranian nuclear agreement.

David Gordon discusses a book on non-interventionism and arguments for it.

Tom Engelhardt discusses the U.S. govt’s addiction to military power.

Bruce Fein discusses Elon Musk as crony capitalist.

Jacob G. Hornberger discusses the atomic bombings and war crimes.

Matthew Harwood discusses a book on the dark net.

Jacob G. Hornberger discusses a controversy over Albright speaking at a college.

Dr. Fuad K. Suleiman discusses a conservative foreign policy. I disagree with much of it, but it has a few decent points.

Paul Street discusses the dropping of the atomic bombs.

Rania Khalek discusses Donald Trump attacking Hilary Clinton on foreign policy.

Ann Wright discusses a chaplain who resigned form the U.S. Army to protest the warfare state’s actions.

Uri Avnery discusses the Israeli statement of independence.

Luciana Bohne discusses American hegemony.

Robert Fantina discusses U.S. govt hypocrisy.

Neera K. Badhwar discusses morality.

Jason Kuznicki discusses the limits of libertarian radicalism.

Ben Norton discusses a new book on the drone wars.

Ron Paul discusses the military draft being extended to women.

Uri Avnery discusses what is necessary for peace to be achieved in Israel-Palestine.

May Jeong discusses the Afghan hospital bombing.

Richard M. Ebeling discusses how he became a libertarian and Austrian economist.

Zaid Jilani and Alex Emmons discusses the boots on the ground in Syria and Iraq.

Stephen Kinzer discusses U.S. policy on Russia.

Dan Sanchez discusses sectarianism and Iraq.

Ivan Eland discusses Trump’s foreign policy views.

Jacob G. Hornberger discusses Iraq.

William Rivers Pitt discusses the renewed war in Iraq.

Ron Jacobs discusses the late Daniel Berrigan.

Seymour Hersh discusses Obama’s foreign policy legacy.

George H. Smith discusses Kant on property rights.

Roderick T. Long discusses liberty in Ancient Greece.

Chip Gibbons discusses the role Bill Clinton has played in U.S. aggression against Iraq.

Matt Ford discusses a lawsuit challenging the legality of the war against ISIS.

Robert Koehler discusses the whitewashing of the attack on the hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan.

Adil E. Shamoo discusses the issue of the ethical code of healthcare workers who work with or in the military.

Jacob G. Hornberger discusses the dinosaur that is NATO (readers should be aware that I don’t embrace his views on the Kennedy assassination)

Joshua Frank discusses the bombing of Afghanistan.

Ramzy Baroud discusses a statue of Mandela erected by Palestine.

Margaret Kimberley discusses Obama and imperialism.

Elizabeth Nolan Brown discusses a dumb occupational licensing scheme.

Jesse Walker discusses Jane Jacobs at 100.

Jacob Sullum discusses the FDA’s new rules on tobacco products.

Nick Ford discusses a book by Scott Crow.

Chris Shaw discusses alternative currencies.

Roderick T. Long discusses left-libertarianism and workplace democracy.

Kevin Carson discusses Reason writing on capitalism.

Logan Glitterbomb discusses Kurdistan and anarchism.

The Center for a Stateless Society has appointed William Gillis as Coordinating Director effective May 1st, replacing James Tuttle.

William Gillis has previously served as designer, developer and sysadmin for the Center’s various web resources, and before that as editor and publisher of physical media.

Gillis was introduced to anarchism by his activist father as a child and has been organizing politically as an anarchist since 1999. He has consistently and diligently worked to highlight the necessity of markets to leftists and radicals since 2003. His conversion started while locking down the Burnside Bridge in Portland, Oregon the day the US invaded Iraq, when he ended up spending a marathon 8 hours debating a right-libertarian counter-protester and then stayed up through the morning reading.

His writing has emphasized the boundless promethean aspirations of anarchism, highlighted the sometimes complex interpersonal and philosophical commitments entailed by liberty, and has sought to bridge the gaps between various discourses on anarchist economics. He has blogged at Human Iterations since 2003, authoring rants, articles, and monographs that have been republished in numerous collections, including Markets Not Capitalism.

As an anarchist he has organized, founded, led, and collaborated in countless struggles, projects, actions, spaces, and organizations. At the same time he is also the author of Organizations Versus Getting Shit Done.

Former Coordinating Director James Tuttle has stepped down, and will stay on as Financial Coordinator, a new position created to decentralize C4SS’s daily work. Tuttle has served as Director of the Center for over four years to wide and continued praise.

Pratrap Chatterjee discusses the drone war.

Jason Kuznicki discusses the reasonableness of radicalism.

David Swanson discusses the war against ISIS and public opinion.

Kevin Carson discusses the Honduran charter cities proposal.

Paul R. Pillar discusses Hilary the hawk.

Laurence M. Vance discusses your home as a safe zone.

Lawrence Davidson discusses the mind of the Israeli prime minister.

Richard Hardigan discusses Israeli demolition of homes in occuipied territory.

Justin Raimondo discusses the Iraq War.

George H. Smith discusses Kant on individual rights and justice.

Michael F. Glennon discusses a book on Obama and the national security state.

Charles Glass discusses a new book on the U.S. war for the Middle East.

Rebecca Gordon discusses torture and those responsible for it.

Dan Sanchez discusses Samantha Power.

Ivan Eland discusses why coddling the Saudi royal family is the wrong approach.

Nicolas J.S. Davies discusses the civilians killed by U.S. forces in Syria and Iraq.

Trevor Timm discusses boots on the ground in Syria.

Jacob G. Hornberger discusses the teetering of the War on Drugs.

Gareth Porter discusses real Saudi-U.S. issues.

Lucy Steigerwald discusses lazy war and drones.

James Peron discusses the regulatory state as an upward redistributor of wealth.

Ted Galen Carpenter discusses unnecessary alliances with autocratic govts.

Lucy Steigerwald discusses why we need to dump the draft rather than expand it to women.

Nathan Goodman discusses how politics empowers remoreless killers.

George H. Smith discusses Kant on the social contract.

David S. D’Amato discusses a book on eminent domain.

Jordan Michael Smith discusses a new book on the war for the Middle East.

Trevor Timm discusses why Trump will not be good on foreign policy.

Jacob G. Hornberger discusses the America First movement and interventionism.

Nick Ford discusses Obama’s renewed war in Iraq.

For Rhode Islanders who value the lives and well-being of animals, the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus should never be welcome in Providence. Don’t let Ringling fool you with its newfound compassion for elephants — it remains an enemy of animals.

Although it may be ending the elephant performances, plenty of other confined and tortured animals will remain as unwilling participants in its shows. Don’t think for a second that the elephants’ retirement has to do with anything other than Ringling’s bottom line. Elephants have been dismissed because they happen to be among the most high-profile circus victims.

This is a convenient public relations move, as disingenuous as SeaWorld’s end to captive whale breeding. There are still so many more Ringling victims in need of liberation.

From C4SS Sr. Fellow Thomas Knapp’s blog, Kn@ppster,

In an essay on “the bathroom wars” published yesterday at Epic Times, Dr. Richard Ebeling writes:

In government accommodations in such places as, say, courthouses, and in spite of the additional taxpayers’ expense, matching toilet facilities for men and women, there also should be “transgender” facilities of some sort. There must be accommodations for taxpaying citizens who would feel uncomfortable in satisfying biological functions in the same limited space with those they define as members of the opposite sex, and at the same time for there to be facilities for those who are indifferent or who consider it “right” for transgender individuals to share such facilities with them.

Interesting perspective. Let me see if I’m understanding him correctly.

I take it Dr. Ebeling supported the “public” (i.e. government-run, although through a contractor) bus line in New York City that made “accommodations” for taxpaying male Orthodox Jews who “would feel uncomfortable” having women ride in the front of the bus with them, by requiring women to board through the back door and remain in the back of the bus, right?

Breathing and drinking water are “biological functions.” Am I entitled to have, just for example, the public courthouse segregated by race if I “would feel uncomfortable” breathing the same air or drinking from the same fountain as African-Americans, Dr. Ebeling?

Just wondering.

[hat tip: Nick Manley]
Read more at http://knappster.blogspot.com/2016/04/a-couple-of-questions-for-dr-richard.html#IREFhlk6MyI51DJb.99

C4SS has teamed up with the Distro of the Libertarian Left. The Distro produces and distribute zines and booklets on anarchism, market anarchist theory, counter-economics, and other movements for liberation. For every copy of Kevin Carson’s “The Desktop Regulatory State” that you purchase through the Distro, C4SS will receive a percentage. Support C4SS with Kevin Carson’s “The Desktop Regulatory State“.

$15.00 for the first copy. $13.00 for every additional copy.

Defenders of the modern state often claim that it’s needed to protect us — from terrorists, invaders, bullies, and rapacious corporations. Economist John Kenneth Galbraith, for instance, famously argued that the state was a source of “countervailing power” that kept other social institutions in check. But what if those “countervailing” institution — corporations, government agencies and domesticated labor unions — in practice collude more than they “countervail” each other? And what if network communications technology and digital platforms now enable us to take on all those dinosaur hierarchies as equals — and more than equals. In The Desktop Regulatory State, Kevin Carson shows how the power of self-regulation, which people engaged in social cooperation have always possessed, has been amplified and intensifed by changes in consciousness — as people have become aware of their own power and of their ability to care for themselves without the state — and in technology — especially information technology. Drawing as usual on a wide array of insights from diverse disciplines, Carson paints an inspiring, challenging, and optimistic portrait of a humane future without the state, and points provocatively toward the steps we need to take in order to achieve it.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE–THE STIGMERGIC REVOLUTION

• Reduced Capital Outlays
• Distributed Infrastructure
• Network Culture
• Stigmergy

CHAPTER TWO–NETWORKS VS. HIERARCHIES

• The Systematic Stupidity of Hierarchies
• Hierarchies vs. Networks
• Networks vs. Hierarchies
• Systems Disruption

CHAPTER THREE–NETWORKS VS. HIERARCHIES: END GAME

• Transition from Hierarchies to Networks
• The Question of Repression
• The Question of Collapse
• Conclusion

CHAPTER FOUR–THE DESKTOP REVOLUTION IN REGULATION

• The Regulatory State: Myth and Reality
• Individual Super-empowerment
• The “Long Tail” in Regulation
• Networked Resistance as an Example of Distributed Infrastructure
• Informational Warfare (or Open-Mouth Sabotage)
• A Narrowcast Model of Open Mouth Sabotage
• Attempts to Suppress or Counter Open Mouth Sabotage
• Who Regulates the Regulators?
• Networked, Distributed Successors to the State: Saint-Simon, Proudhon and “the Administration of Things”
• Monitory Democracy
• “Open Everything”
• Panarchy
• Collective Contracts
• Heather Marsh’s “Proposal for Governance
• Michel Bauwens’ Partner State

CHAPTER FIVE–FUNDAMENTAL INFRASTRUCTURES: NETWORKED SUPPORT PLATFORMS

• Bruce Sterling: Islands in the Net
• Phyles: Neal Stephenson
• Phyles: Las Indias and David de Ugarte
• Bruce Sterling: The Caryatids
• Daniel Suarez
• John Robb: Economies as a Social Software Service
• File Aesir
• Venture Communism
• Medieval Guilds as Predecessors of the Phyle
• Transition Towns and Global Villages
• Modern Networked Labor Unions and Guilds as Examples of Phyles
• Virtual States as Phyles: Hamas, Etc.
• Eugene Holland: Nomad Citizenship
• Producism/Producia
• Emergent Cities
• The Incubator Function
• Mix & Match

CHAPTER SIX–FUNDAMENTAL INFRASTRUCTURES: MONEY

• What Money’s For and What it Isn’t
• The Adoption of Networked Money Systems
• Examples of Networked Money Systems

CHAPTER SEVEN–FUNDAMENTAL INFRASTRUCTURES: EDUCATION AND CREDENTIALING

• Introduction: Whom Do Present-Day Schools Really Serve
• Alternative Models
• Potential Building Blocks for an Open Alternative
• Open Course Materials
• Open Textbooks
• Open Learning Platforms
• Credentialing

CHAPTER EIGHT–THE ASSURANCE COMMONS

• Introduction
• Legibility: Vertical and Horizontal. Graeber, Scott, etc.
• Networked Certification, Reputational and Verification Mechanisms
• Ostrom, Commons Governance and Vernacular Law

CHAPTER NINE–THE OPEN SOURCE LABOR BOARD

• Historic Models
• Networked Labor Struggle
• Open-Mouth Sabotage

CHAPTER TEN–OPEN SOURCE CIVIL LIBERTIES ENFORCEMENT

• Protection Against Non-State Civil Rights Violations
• When the State is the Civil Liberties Violator
• Circumventing the Law
• Circumvention: Privacy vs. Surveillance
• Seeing Like a State, and the Art of Not Being Governed
• Exposure and Embarrassment
• Networked Activism and the Growth of Civil Society

CHAPTER ELEVEN–THE OPEN SOURCE FOURTH ESTATE

• The Industrial Model
• Open Source Journalism

CHAPTER TWELVE–OPEN SOURCE NATIONAL SECURITY

• The State as Cause of the Problem: Blowback
• Meta-Organization
• Active Defense, Counter-Terrorism, and Other Security Measures
• Passive Defense
• The Stateless Society as the Ultimate in Passive Defense
• Disaster Relief

Kevin A. Carson is a contemporary mutualist author and a prolific writer on subjects including free-market anti-cap­it­al­ism, the in­div­idualist anarchist tradition, grassroots technology and radical unionism. He is the author of ”The Iron Fist Behind the Invisible Hand”, Studies in Mutualist Political Economy, Organization Theory: A Libertarian Perspective, The Homebrew Industrial Revolution, and The Desktop Regulatory State. He keeps a blog at mutualist.blogspot.com and frequently publishes short columns and longer research reports for the Center for a Stateless Society (c4ss.org).

Joseph R. Stromberg discusses war and just defense.

Yves Engler discusses Canada’s version of Blackwater.

Uri Avnery discusses soldier A.

Carlos Latuff and Max Blumenthal discusses Bernie Sander’s recent comment on the last Israeli war in Gaza.

Jacob G. Hornberger discusses why libertarians can win.

Jack Hunter discusses why Black Lives Matter doesn’t like Bill Clinton.

Paul R. Pillar discusses a book on humantarian intervention.

Ivan Eland discusses U.S. alliances.

Trevor Timm discusses why Bernie should bring up the Iraq War when discussing Hilary Clinton.

David S. D’Amato discusses a book on the Lochner court decison.

Matt Welch discusses why Trump is not a peacenik.

Jacob Sullum discusses sexual assault done in the name of the War on Drugs.

Lucy Steigerwald discusses John Kerry’s recent comments on Hiroshima.

George H. Smith discusses Kant and the natural law tradition.

Dan Sanchez discusses how to oppose the empire.

William J. Astore discusses words about war.

Uri Avnery discusses a possible way of resolving the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Bonnie Kristian discusses why more troops to fight ISIS is a bad idea.

William Norman Grigg discusses police statism.

David S. D’Amato discusses the birth of the state.

Dan Sanchez discusses the knowledge problem faced by imperialists.

Ivan Eland discusses Ted Cruz on foreign policy.

Michael Brendan Doughtery discusses a new book about U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East.

Sheldon Richman discusses the fallacy of buy American.

Richard M. Ebeling discusses ending government run schooling.

Celeste Ward Gventer discusses a book on the war for the Greater Middle East.

Peter Van Buren discusses Afghanistan.

Sheldon Richman discusses a book on the rationalist and pluralist liberal traditions.

Franklin Spinney discusses the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Marjorie Cohn discusses Hilary vs Bernie on Israel-Palestine.

C4SS Senior Fellow and Trustee Chair Sheldon Richman recently spent some time on Free Association talking with Lucy Steigerwald about his newest book, America’s Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited. Some of the topics discussed include the Federal Convention, the Constitution, the Articles of Confederation, the Federalists, and the Anti-Federalists.

The talk is about an hour in length.

These are the numbers and a few interesting bits on our work in February and March:

February

• 21 articles published.
• 53 pickups or citations (2,52 per article on average).
• The consistently excellent P2P Foundation has been republishing Kevin Carson’s work. They account for many of our pickups in February and March.
• Nick Ford managed to get two of his articles on the Cop Block website.
• The Providence Business News picked up our great editor Chad Nelson’s “Raimondo Puts State’s Revenue Over Citizens’ Health“.
• Sheldon Richman’s “Sanders and Trump: Too Establishment on Syria” managed to crack into the Strategic Culture Foundation Online Journal.

March

• 20 articles published.
• 52 pickups or citations (2,6 per article on average).
• Hugh Crane got us on New York’s Amsterdam News that published his “Nancy Reagan’s Dark Legacy“.
• As it has become usual, Sheldon Richman got us on an unusual outlet. This time, it was the Voice of the Ozarks that published his “On Trade, Sanders and Trump Are Peas in a Rotten Pod“.
• Kevin Carson got into Real Independent News & Film with his “Hillary Clinton Breaks the Irony Meter“.
• Most interestingly, Nick Ford got into two Somali outlets, Sahal News and Jubbaland Media, with his great “If a US Drone Strike Kills 150 People, Does Anyone Care?“.

General comments:

• We had a slight drop in pickups these last two months, dipping below the 3 pickups average I set out to maintain. Mea culpa. I’ve already added 100 new outlets to our list of recipients so I can balance that out!
• We’ve kept with our theme of publishing 20 or more of articles in a month, and that’s awesome!
• Augusta Free Press and NewsLI are still our most consistent partners, picking up most of our content.

This is just a little bit of what we’ve been doing. With your help, we can do even more to spread the word of markets and anarchism. Please donate via PayPal or our several other methods!

Erick Vasconcelos
Media Coordinator

Jacob G. Hornberger discusses the blindness of conservatives.

Doug Bandow discusses Donald Trump and the neoconservatives.

Lucy Steigerwald discusses the folly of war.

Micah Zenko discusses the Libyan war.

Glenn Greenwald discusses double standards on victims of violence.

Barret Brown discusses the authorized biography of Henry Kissinger.

Sheldon Richman discusses what terrorists want.

Dan Sanchez discusses how Muslims are standing up to extremism. ‘

Richard M. Ebeling discusses third way politics.

Stephen Kinzer discusses the situation in Honduras.

Laurence M. Vance discusses whether joining the military is the right thing to do or not.

Lew Rockwell discusses why Bill Buckley conservatism is dead.

Richard M. Ebeling discusses what progressives don’t get about liberty.

Dan Sanchez discusses imperial sacrifice in Yemen.

Jonathan Cook discusses Israeli military culture.

Ivan Eland discusses why more Western meddling in Libya is a bad idea.

Doug Bandow discusses why the U.S. can’t be the world’s nuclear police.

Jacob G. Hornberger discusses the evil of sanctions.

Jacob Sullum discusses the federal ban on pot ads.

Andrew J. Baevich discusses Ted Cruz, foreign policy, and conservatism.

George H. Smith discusses Ayn Rand’s intellectual influence on him.

Roderick T. Long discusses Aristophanes’s comedy.

Uri Avnery discusses Israeli relations with the Arab states.

Laurie Calhoun discusses the Canadian govt acquiring military grade drones.

Andrew J. Bacevich discusses presdential power and war.

Andrew J. Bacevich discusses the unwinnable war for the Middle East.

Dan De Luce and Paul Mcleary discuss Obama’s drone strike policies.

Ramzy Baroud discusses BDS.

Justyn Dillingham discusses a book on Allen Dulles.

America’s Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited

Authored by Sheldon Richman
Foreword by Jeffrey A. Tucker

This book challenges the assumption that the Constitution was a landmark in the struggle for liberty. Instead, Sheldon Richman argues, it was the product of a counter-revolution, a setback for the radicalism represented by America’s break with the British empire. Drawing on careful, credible historical scholarship and contemporary political analysis, Richman suggests that this counter-revolution was the work of conservatives who sought a nation of “power, consequence, and grandeur.” America’s Counter-Revolution makes a persuasive case that the Constitution was a victory not for liberty but for the agendas and interests of a militaristic, aristocratic, privilege-seeking ruling class.

About the author:
Sheldon Richman is a senior fellow of the Center for a Stateless Society (c4ss.org), chair of the Center’s trustees, and a contributing editor at Antiwar.com. He is the author of three other books:Separating School and State: How to Liberate America’s Families (1994); Your Money or Your Life: Why We Must Abolish the Income Tax (1999); and Tethered Citizens: Time to Repeal the Welfare State (2001), published by the Future of Freedom Foundation (fff.org). From 1997 to 2012 he was the editor of The Freeman, published by the Foundation for Economic Education (fee.org), following which he edited Future of Freedom for the Future of Freedom Foundation. Previously he was an editor at the Cato Institute, the Institute for Humane Studies, and Inquiry magazine. Richman’s articles on foreign and economic policy, civil liberties, and American and Middle East history have appeared in Newsweek, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, theChicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times, USA Today, Reason, Forbes, The Independent Review,The American Scholar, The American Conservative, Cato Policy Report, Journal of Economic Development, Journal of Palestine Studies, Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, Middle East Policy, Liberty, and other publications. He is a contributor to the The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics. Richman is a graduate of Temple University in Philadelphia. He blogs at Free Association (sheldonrichman.com).

I’ve been writing at my site Abolish Work for a few years now and I’m really encouraged by all of the support that’s come in so many different shapes in sizes. That support has given me the confidence to reach out to Little Black Cart, an anarchist publisher whose books C4SS has reviewed many times, regarding a proposal for an anti-work anthology.

I’m happy to report not only that Little Black Cart accepted my proposal, but also that my book is fully underway and will likely be published in 2016. Its title, Instead of a Book, by a Man too Lazy to Write One, is inspired by Benjamin Tucker.

I have many articles, blog posts and essays designated for the book, but I’m always interested in more.

If you’d like to contribute to the book, the deadline for submissions is May 1st with a 1000-2000 suggested word-limit. Some categories that’ll be covered include the relationship between individualist anarchism and work, reviews of anti-work media such as books or movies and commentaries on news stories from an anti-work perspective.

For those confused, anti-work doesn’t mean “anti-effort.” By work, all I mean is a type of constrained labor that individuals engage in, not for their own sense of self, but because of some sort of external reward, usually money. Much of work in the current economy is made up of individuals who feel underappreciated, uninvolved and generally uninterested in whatever they’re doing. They do what they do because they need the money but once they get the paycheck they couldn’t be happier to be as far away from whatever they were just doing for most of their day.

These are the sorts of relationships I think should be abolished. Instead, I think we should move towards a world where play is more central and people are better able to express their individuality and do what makes them feel fulfilled.

If these ideas appeal to you then please feel free to reach out to me with submission ideas.

Happy slacking!

C4SS produced some hard-hitting material in March. But then again, that’s nothing new. We always aim to bring you the most radical commentary on world headlines.

Here are just a few of last month’s publications:

Nathan Goodman remarked on the cold-blooded manner in which Washington’s Killing Machine carries out its mayhem. James Wilson and Sheldon Richman both weighed in on the destructive Trump-Sanders bipartisan brand of protectionism.

H.C. opted not to mourn the passing of Nancy Reagan and got some push-back for his “incivility.”

Ryan Calhoun reported from the International Students for Liberty conference, where Ross & Lyn Ulbricht were snubbed by a whole lot of ungrateful “libertarians.”

I celebrated Open Borders Day by echoing a common C4SS theme — calling for the dissolution of all state borders. Kevin Carson opined on the Supreme Court appointment of Merrick Garland, ultimately coming down in favor of permanent Washington gridlock. Nick Ford’s onslaught against America’s heinous prison system continued, with Ford penning several op-eds on the subject in March.

…and speaking of Nick Ford, expect some exciting news about a forthcoming book project that you will read about here in the coming days. Stay tuned.

Thanks again to all of our readers and generous financial supporters. We rely on you to keep us going. If you’re new to C4SS and enjoy our work, please consider making a donation to C4SS via Paypal, Patreon, or any of our other countless giving platforms.

Chad

C4SS Trustee Chair and Senior Fellow Sheldon Richman has some very exciting news regarding his forthcoming book, America’s Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited. Stay tuned to this space in the coming days for more info.

From the book’s description:

This book challenges the assumption that the Constitution was a landmark in the struggle for liberty. Instead, Sheldon Richman argues, it was the product of a counter-revolution, a setback for the radicalism represented by America’s break with the British empire.

Drawing on careful, credible historical scholarship and contemporary political analysis, Richman suggests that this counter-revolution was the work of conservatives who sought a nation of “power, consequence, and grandeur.” America’s Counter-Revolution makes a persuasive case that the Constitution was a victory not for liberty but for the agendas and interests of a militaristic, aristocratic, privilege-seeking ruling class.

Two panels organised by the Center for a Stateless Society are coming up at two different conferences next week, bringing a left-libertarian market-anarchist perspective to international relations and prison reform.

1. The Molinari Society will be holding its annual Pacific Symposium in conjunction with the Pacific Division of the American Philosophical Association in San Francisco, March 30-April 3, 2016. Here’s the schedule info:

Molinari Society symposium:
Author Meets Critics: Gary Chartier’s Radicalizing Rawls: Global Justice and the Foundations of International Law

G6D. Thursday, 31 March 2016, 6:00-8:00 p.m. (or so), Westin St. Francis 335 Powell St., San Francisco CA, Elizabethan C, 2nd floor.

chair:
Roderick T. Long (Auburn University)

critics:
David Reidy (University of Tennessee)
Zooey Sophia Pook (New Mexico State University)

author:
Gary Chartier (La Sierra University)

2. We’ve also organised a panel at the Association of Private Enterprise Education conference in Las Vegas, April 3-5, 2016. Here’s the schedule info:

Prisons: Reform or Abolition?

2.G.8. Monday, 4 April 2016, 4:00-5:15 p.m., Bally’s Hotel and Casino, 3645 Las Vegas Blvd. S., Las Vegas NV, room TBA.

chair:
Roderick T. Long (Auburn University)

panelists:
Daniel J. D’Amico (Brown University)
Gary Chartier (La Sierra University)
Jason Lee Byas (Georgia State University)
Roderick T. Long (Auburn University)

Another C4SS writer, Billy Christmas, will also be speaking at APEE on “Toward Methodological Anarchism,” on Tuesday, 5 April, in a session at at (horribile dictu) 8:00 a.m.

Conor Friedersdorf discusses civilain dead from drone strikes.

Dan Sanchez discusses peace and liberty.

Daniel Larison discusses the U.S. backed Saudi war on Yemen.

Sheldon Richman discusses Trump’s nationalism.

Ted Galen Carptenter discusses civil liberties and liberty during wartime.

Yves Engeler discusses the myth of Canadian govt opposition to the Vietnam War.

Thomas Harrington discusses Zionism and delegitimization.

Lucy Steigerwald discusses FBI attempts to spy on kids to prevent terrorism.

Christopher Preble discusses the possibility of another Libyan intervention.

Ramzy Baroud discusses the BDS movement.

Jacob G. Hornberger discusses why the national security state has got to go.

Richard M. Ebeling discusses liberty and the next presidential election.

Uri Avnery discusses whether Hezbollah is a terrorist organization or not.

Graham E. Fuller reviews a book on humanitarian intervention.

Derek Davison discusses Ted Cruz’s national security team.

Roderick Tracy Long discusses feminist themes in ancient Greek plays.

Laurence M. Vance discusses the welfare-warfare state and the Hertiage Foundation.

Patrick Cockburn discusses Obama and the House of Saud.

Jane Stillwater discusses who AIPAC will suppport for the Democratic Party presidential nomination.

Nile Bowie discusses U.S.- North Korean relations.

Jacob G. Hornberger discusses whether the U.S. should go to war with North Korea over the imprisonment of an American college student.

Dan Sanchez discusses Iran, Cuba, and U.S. imperialism.

Richard M. Ebeling discusses the prospects for liberty in the upcoming presidential election.

Trevor Timm discusses the renewed war in Iraq.

Gareth Porter discusses Obama’s break with the foreign policy establishment.

Kelly Vee discusses why open borders and feminism go together.

Kelly Vee discusses sexual liberation.

Kevin Carson discusses Bernie Sanders and so called free trade agreements.

Jacob G. Hornberger discusses conservative outrage over Obama being photographed in front of a Che picture.

Andrew Levine discusses whether Hilary will be worse than Trump.