LadyJasmine said: I think reading this, I have concluded that libertarian socialism is a massive oxymoron. Anyone who has defended the notion has mostly directly or indirectly has can back to the idea of government of enforcing those socialist values on to a society.
Its rather simple, if a progresive governmnet wants me to have public healthcare for the bettr of all, I cannot for example seek private health care in Canada on my own... If a society wants to put a cap on CEO pay to close the wage gap and be more equal, it is not being libertarian. Pretty much I think its time to call a spade a spade. |
Sure, if you assume "libertarian socialists" like big states, then the term is indeed an oxymoron given an baseless assumption. Which matters vey little.
As an example, Proudhon, the first one to pubiclaly call himself "anarchist" on a book and using definitions compatible with those of the anarchist movement, did so in a book titled "What is Property? An inquiry into the principle of right and of government", in which he in a single stroke conflates property (private and of the means of producion, in particular) with theft and denounces all forms of government. That (but not necessarily only that) has been called libertarian socialism, for reasons which should be obvious and are self-consistent.
Also, this all doens't only exist in the realms of theory. There are many people who organise themselves according to these principles in a smaller scale (as in, not an entire country), as well as have been some experiences in which large-scale anarchism, or something trying to approach it, has been brought into practice, even nowadays. Be that as it may, it's a fact that many people advocate for these ideas and practices, and that "libertarian socialist" is a meaningfull, descriptive term for those people, regardless of wether they're right or wrong or on the actual applicability or feasibility you or anyone else ascribe to their beliefs.
The discussion here is wether the term makes sense, not wether the philosophies described by such term could come to fruition with good results in this or that context.