My article, “Read Hoppe, Then Nothing Is the Same,” discussing my upcoming Mises Academy course, “The Social Theory of Hoppe” (Mondays, July 11-Aug. 21, 2011) was published on Mises Daily last Friday, June 10 2011. The article has also been translated into Spanish: Tras leer a Hoppe, nada es lo mismo.
Combining Misesian praxeology with Rothbardian insights, Hoppe has developed a magnificent, integrated edifice of rational thought.
From today’s Mises Daily:
Mises Daily: Monday, May 23, 2011 by Stephan Kinsella
Professor Hans-Hermann Hoppe burst onto the Austrolibertarian scene in the late 1980s, when he moved to the United States to study under and work with his mentor Murray Rothbard. Since his arrival, Professor Hoppe has produced a steady stream of pioneering contributions to economic and libertarian theory. A key contribution of Professor Hoppe is his provocative “argumentation-ethics” defense of libertarian rights.
The Social Theory of Hoppe: A Mises Academy Course taught by Stephan Kinsella, July 11-Aug. 21, 2011
Interesting article on LewRockwell.com:
The Biblical Nature of Hoppean Monarchism
by Ryan Bassett
Hans Hermann Hoppe has been widely recognized for stating the advantages of a traditional monarchy over that of what is essentially mob rule, that is, Democracy. While it is true that Hans Hoppe is not a monarchist but rather an anarcho-capitalist his insights into the frailties and destructive nature of Democracy are thorough and convincing. His brilliant work, Democracy: The God That Failed, is to date probably his best scholarly work on the subject.
However, the very idea of monarchism is completely antithetical to modern sensibilities in the West. This is particularly true in the United States where a traditional European-style monarchy has not existed since the founding of the nation during the late 18th century. Having been founded upon republican principles, supposedly the official gateway to liberty, Americans possess a natural inclination to dismiss the very idea of monarchy out of hand, branding it as being contrary to a liberty-based and economically prosperous civilization. While it is true that monarchies fail to provide the libertarian panacea many naturally crave it is also an intellectual mistake to envision a republican or democratic form of government as the ideal for liberty. Christians, despite their monarchist past, are just as adamant in their protestations toward any form of civilization outside the mainstream view of republicanism and democracy, erroneously viewing it, like their secular counterparts, as the height of human civilization. Is this actually the case however?
Professor Hoppe’s article, “Of Private, Common, and Public Property and the Rationale for Total Privatization”, Libertarian Papers 3, 1 (2011) (published as “The Rationale for Total Privatization,” Mises Daily (Mar. 14, 2011)), has been published in Portugese at Mises Brasil: “O fundamento lógico para a privatização total” (May 6, 2011).
From the Mises Blog:
In the history of social and political thought, myriad proposals have been offered as solutions to the problem of social order. Many believe that the search for a single “correct” solution is futile and illusory. Yet a correct solution does exist. The solution is the idea of private property.
FULL ARTICLE by Hans-Hermann Hoppe
(Video of the speech may be found at Hoppe in Brasil on the State versus the Private Law Society.)
As I noted here, Professor Hoppe recently delivered the speech “State or Private Law Society?” in April 2011 at the 2nd Austrian School Conference, Mises Institute Brasil, in Porto Alegre.
His second talk delivered at the same conference, “Economic Crises: How to Cause Them and How to Make Them Worse by ‘Curing’ Them,” is now also available. [Youtube videos of the talk may be found here.]
Below is the video of a talk Professor Hans-Hermann Hoppe gave in April 2011 at the 2nd Austrian School Conference, Mises Institute Brasil, in Porto Alegre, entitled “State or Private Law Society?” (pictures from the event). (Update: text of the speech published: State or Private-Law Society.) It’s a truly masterful presentation of the Austro-libertarian defense of what Hoppe calls the “private law society.” For example, Hoppe here brilliantly and succinctly argues that there is but one correct answer to the problem of social order–the libertarian-Lockean rule (see 7:49- of Part 1). At 8:32-9:04, Part 1, he explains why the only answer to the question of who owns your body, is you–who else would own it? And that all other competing rules are either incoherent, contradictory, or obviously unfair. And (at 9:25-10:04, Part 1) that when you appropriate an unowned resource, who else would have a better claim to it than the person who had it first?
Fernando Chiocca, of Mises Brasil, told me that the audience was riveted and loved it; he got standing ovations,
and one reaction in particular was pretty interesting. We have only a couple of Austrian professors in Brasil, and one of them wasn’t acquainted with Hoppe’s work. (He is what we used to call “old school Austrian,” whose ideas were shaped in the era before the modern Mises Institute website, and mainly influenced by Hayek.) In a matter of seconds after Hoppe’s speech, he was in our bookstore buying all Hoppe’s books that we had for sale, requesting autographs from Dr. Hoppe, repeating how marvelous Hoppe was, and declaring to everyone his instantaneous conversion to “Hoppeanism”.
I am reminded here of what Lew Rockwell wrote of Hoppe in his festschrift:
This same Hoppean effect—that sense of having been profoundly enlightened by a completely new way of understanding something—has happened many times over the years. He has made contributions to ethics, to international political economy, to the theory of the origin of the state, to comparative systems, to culture and its economic relation, to anthropology and the theory and practice of war. Even on a subject that everyone thinks about but no one really seems to understand—the system of democracy—he clarified matters in a way that helps you see the functioning of the world in a completely new light.There aren’t that many thinkers who have this kind of effect. Mises was one. Rothbard is another. Hoppe certainly fits in that line. He is the kind of thinker who reminds you that ideas are real things that shape how we understand the world around us. … Often times when you first hear a point he makes, you resist it. I recall when he spoke at a conference we held on American history, and gave a paper on the U.S. Constitution. You might not think that a German economist could add anything to our knowledge on this topic. He argued that it represented a vast increase in government power and that this was its true purpose. It created a powerful central government, with the cover of liberty as an excuse. He used it as a case in point, and went further to argue that all constitutions are of the same type. In the name of limiting government—which they purportedly do—they invariably appear in times of history when the elites are regrouping to emerge from what they consider to be near anarchy. The Constitution, then, represents the assertion of power.
When he finished, you could hear a pin drop. I’m not sure that anyone was instantly persuaded. He had challenged everything we thought we knew about ourselves. The applause was polite, but not enthusiastic. Yet his points stuck. Over time, I think all of us there travelled some intellectual distance. The Constitution was preceded by the Articles of Confederation, which Rothbard had variously described as near anarchist in effect. Who were these guys who cobbled together this Constitution? They were the leftovers from the war: military leaders, financiers, and other mucky mucks—a very different crew from the people who signed the Declaration of Independence. Jefferson was out of the country when the Constitution was passed. And what was the effect of the Constitution? To restrain government? No. It was precisely the opposite, just as Hoppe said. It created a new and more powerful government that not only failed to restrain itself (what government has ever done that?), but grew and grew into the monstrosity we have today. It required a wholesale rethinking of the history, but what Hoppe had said that shocked everyone turns out to be precisely right—and this is only one example among many.
[Youtube videos of the talk may be found here.]
Mises Brasil has published Uma vida de ideias – Hans-Hermann Hoppe no Brasil, a Portuguese translation of Lew Rockwell’s “A Life of Ideas,” the opening chapter in Property, Freedom, and Society: Essays in Honor of Hans-Hermann Hoppe.
Pictures from Hoppe’s participation in the Austrian economics seminar at Mises Institute Brasil are below.
Rodrigo Betancur has translated into Spanish Hans-Hermann Hoppe’s interview (2011) for Philosophie Magazine, a French monthly publicaction.
For more Spanish translations, click here.
10 de marzo de 2011.
Hace unos meses, un periodista francés, el Sr. Nicolas Cori, se me acercó con la solicitud de una entrevista sobre el tema de los impuestos, para ser publicada en la revista francesa mensual Philosophie Magazine, en el contexto del debate que actualmente tiene lugar sobre la «reforma fiscal» en Francia.
Estuve de acuerdo con la entrevista, que se llevó a cabo por correo electrónico en inglés; el Sr. Cori produjo una traducción al francés, que mi amigo el Dr. Nikolay Gertchev revisó y corrigió, y entonces envié la traducción, autorizada, al Sr. Cori. Desde entonces, hace ya más de un mes, y a pesar de intentos repetidos, nada he oído del Sr. Cori. Sólo puedo especular sobre las razones de su silencio. Lo más probable es que no obtuvo el permiso de sus superiores para publicar la entrevista, y no ha tenido la cortesía ni la valentía de decírmelo.
De todas maneras, aquí está la entrevista original. [continue reading…]
Professor Hoppe’s provocative, radical and wide-ranging interview with The Daily Bell, “Dr. Hans-Hermann Hoppe on the Impracticality of One-World Government and the Failure of Western-style Democracy,” published just 3 days ago, has already been translated into Portugese by the Mises Institute Brazil, in two parts: Democracia, estado, ouro, liberdade, direitos autorais, bancos e governo mundial (Parte 1), and Democracia, estado, ouro, liberdade, direitos autorais, bancos e governo mundial (Final).
Professor Hoppe participated in a wide-ranging interview for The Daily Bell, with Anthony Wille, covering a variety of topics, including anarchy and intellectual property. The interview is: “Dr. Hans-Hermann Hoppe on the Impracticality of One-World Government and the Failure of Western-style Democracy,” The Daily Bell (Mar. 27, 2011) (LRC version, Mar. 28, 2011) (discussed on the Mises Blog in Hoppe: best interview ever?; and at C4SIF in Hoppe Interview on Anarchy and Intellectual Property).
The logo of the Mises Institute Sweden features depictions of Mises and Professor Hoppe.
“Impostos, moralidade e ética,” Mises Instite Brazil (Mar. 14, 2011), was just published. This is a Portugese translation of the original version of the Philosophie Magazine Interview on Taxation (2011).
“Hans-Hermann Hoppe im Gespräch” (pdf), a German-language interview on the topic of democracy and private law society, with the Swiss monthly Schweizer Monatshefte (Dec. 2010).
[This is the original French version of the Philosophie Magazine Interview on Taxation (2011)]
Les impôts sont-ils compatibles avec la liberté individuelle et les droits de propriété ? Y a-t-il un taux de prélèvement à partir duquel il n’y a plus de compatibilité ?
Non. Quel que soit le taux de prélèvement, les impôts ne sont jamais compatibles avec la liberté individuelle et les droits de propriété. Les impôts sont un vol. Naturellement, l’Etat, ainsi que ses agents et alliés tentent de leur mieux de dissimuler ce fait, mais cela ne peut pas être dissimulé. A l’évidence, les impôts sont tout le contraire de paiements ordinaires et volontaires en échange de biens et services: vous n’êtes pas autorisé à mettre fin à ces paiements si vous n’êtes plus satisfait du produit. Alors que vous n’êtes pas puni si vous arrêtez d’acheter des Renault ou du parfum Chanel, vous êtes envoyé en prison si vous arrêtez de payer pour les écoles ou universités publiques aussi bien que pour le faste de Monsieur Sarkozy. De même, il est impossible de considérer les impôts comme un simple loyer, à la manière de ce qu’un locataire verse à son propriétaire, parce que l’Etat français n’est pas le propriétaire de toute la France ou de tous les Français. Pour devenir le propriétaire, l’Etat français devrait être en mesure de prouver deux choses: que lui, et lui seul, possède tout centimètre carré du pays, et qu’il détient un contrat de location avec chacun des Français quant à l’usage, ainsi que le prix d’usage, de cette propriété. Aucun Etat -pas plus l’Etat français que l’Etat allemand ou l’Etat américain- ne peut prouver cela. Ils n’ont aucun document à cet effet et ils ne peuvent présenter aucun contrat de location. Il n’y a donc qu’une seule conclusion: la fiscalité, c’est le vol et le brigandage par lesquels une partie de la population, à savoir la classe dirigeante, s’enrichit aux détriments du reste de la population, à savoir les gouvernés. [continue reading…]
A few months ago, a French journalist, Mr. Nicolas Cori, approached me with the request for an interview on the subject of taxation, to be published in the French monthly “Philosophie Magazine,” in the context of current “tax reform” debates in France.
I agreed to the interview, it was conducted by email in English, Mr. Cori produced a French translation, my friend Dr. Nikolay Gertchev checked and corrected his translation, and I then sent the authorized translation to Mr. Cori. Since then, more than a month ago, and despite repeated promptings, I have not heard from Mr. Cori. I can only speculate as for the reasons of his silence. Most likely, he did not get permission from his superiors to publish the interview, and he does not possess the courtesy and courage to tell me.
In any case, here is the original interview. The authorized French version is available on the translations-page of my website, www.hanshoppe.com, here.
NC: Are taxes consistent with individual freedom and property rights? Is there a level of taxation where it is no more consistent?
Hoppe:
No. Taxes are never, at no level of taxation, consistent with individual freedom and property rights. Taxes are theft. The thieves – the state and its agents and allies – try their very best to conceal this fact, of course, but there is simply no way around it. Obviously, taxes are not normal, voluntary payments for goods and services, because you are not allowed to stop such payments if you are not satisfied with the product. You are not punished if you do no longer buy Renault cars or Chanel perfume, but you are thrown into jail if you stop paying for government schools or universities or for Mr. Sarkozy and his pomp. Nor is it possible to construe taxes as normal rent-payments, as they are made by a renter to his landlord. Because the French state is not the landlord of all of France and all Frenchmen. To be the landlord, the French state would have to be able to prove two things: first, that the state, and no one else, owns every inch of France, and second, that it has a rental contract with every single Frenchman concerning the use, and the price for this use, of its property. No state – not the French, not the German, not the US-American or any other state – can prove this. They have no documents to this effect and they cannot present any rental contract. Thus, there is only one conclusion: taxation is theft and robbery by which one segment of the population, the ruling class, enriches itself at the expense of another, the ruled. [continue reading…]
From an email announcement by Dr Washington Sanchez: Professor Hoppe will speak at the Australian Mises Seminar, to be held from the 25-26th of November this year.
Published today in Libertarian Papers:
by Hans-Hermann Hoppe 
Abstract: In this paper, first, I want to clarify the nature and function of private property. Second, I want to clarify the distinction between “common” goods and property and “public” goods and property, and explain the construction error inherent in the institution of public goods and property. Third, I want to explain the rationale and principle of privatization.
