quinta-feira, março 18, 2004
Remapping the "Road to Serfdom"
James A. Dorn do Cato Institute escreve sobre a herança de Hayek e do seu livro "The Road to Serfdom".
Attempts to plan economic life and achieve "social justice" wreaked havoc in the 20th century. The Soviet Union, the People's Republic of China, East Germany and other totalitarian states learned the hard way Marx was wrong and Hayek was right. However Hayek's message that "political freedom is meaningless without economic freedom" needs more emphasis.
When private property rights are violated and economic freedom is attenuated by various forms of government intervention, our other freedoms are threatened. The Jews in Nazi Germany first saw their economic liberties violated. The rest of the horrors followed.
Any infringement of economic liberty must be nipped in the bud. Constant vigilance is necessary to prevent erosion of the principles of a market-liberal order.
As Nobel Laureate economist James Buchanan has written: "Liberals should not lean back and say, 'Our work is done.' The organization and the intellectual bankruptcy of socialism in our time have not removed the relevance of a renewed and continuing discourse in political philosophy. We need discourse to preserve, save and recreate that which we may, properly, call the soul of classical liberalism."
Many emerging market countries still have a long way to go before they reach the level of economic and personal freedom envisioned by Hayek. Many developed countries, including the United States, have expanded the welfare state without recognizing the danger it poses to the future of freedom.
The political challenge for the 21st century is to hold on to and strengthen economic freedom and limited government while creating new constitutional democracies that support, rather than erode, liberal principles.
posted by Miguel Noronha 7:21 da tarde
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