Talk:Anarchy, State, and Utopia

first try

This is my first try at this wiki thing... I know it's not much, but I figured this book deserved a mention.

minimal state leads to minimal state?

The article states, "To support the idea of the minimal state, Nozick posits an ultraminimal state as a thought experiment and attempts to show how it will lead to a minimal state." Is this really what he does? Why would you support the idea of the minimal state by showing how an ultraminmimal state would lead to a minimal state? Zensufi 14:20, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

This is what he does...the point being to demonstrate that a less-than-minimal state will evolve into a minimal state necessarily (re: the point about the book being an argument against anarcho-capitalism, etc.) Christopher Parham (talk) 10:45, 2005 May 23 (UTC)

Christopher Parham is correct, here's a part from the introduction which explains what Nozick is trying to prove:

"Our main conclusions about the state are that a minimal state, limited to the narrow functions of protection against force, theft, fraud, enforcement of contracts, and so on, is justified; that any more extensive state will violate persons' rights not to be forced to do certain things, and is unjustified; and that the minimal state is inspiring as well as right. Two noteworthy implications are that the state may not use its coercive apparatus for the purpose of getting some citizens to aid others, or in order to prohibit activities to people for their own good or protection."

In his book Nozick also wants to show how a minimal state could evolve from state of nature (=anarchy) without coercion. "Ultraminimal state" is one step from anarchy and protective associations to the actual minimal state.

Needs much more disscussion of Criticisms

This article is decent right now, but given the unpopularity of Nozick's positions much more should be said about his critics. In particular the responses of John Rawls and Michael Walzer should be mentioned, as well as Susan Okin's criticisms. I could maybe start on this at some point, but anyone familiar with the literature on all this should jump in. Snowboardpunk 21:51, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

This article is pretty good indeed and does justice to the book; regarding the critics, i've been working a bit on "Anarchy" for my PhD thesis and there is ... an entire library of articles hacking at some point or another of Nozick's theory, coming from basically all sides of the philosophical and political spectrum. So, a proper treatment or even listing of the different critics might bring you to an article whose length is close to that of a book -:(

More specifically, Rawls answer to libertarianism and in particular to Nozick's undermining of the bases of "A theory of justice" is rudimentary, to say the least. While Rawls spend most of his career after the publication of TJ to answer criticism of the book and re-elaborate his original theory in the light of those critics, the ONLY line of attack he never considered seriously is the libertarian one. Actually, it is more like he refused to do so because a consistent derivation from his own meta-ethical foundations can only lead to libertarianism, as was pointed out not only by Nozick but also by Sandel and by Lomasky. Rawls, being a convinced social-democrat, refused for ideological reasons to accept the full results of the ethical individualism from which he deduces his first principle of justice and his critic of utilitarianism. So, whereas he integrates the communitarian position to some extent in "Political Liberalism", he contends himself with a simple brushing away of the libertarian view, a treatment that boils down to an assertion that: "there is only one possible vision of justice or the right, and it is mine" - not fairly convincing nor properly worked out!

This being said, i'm in a tight spot for the moment but i'll have a look at this and try to post something here in a week or two. Cheers, M-

what abut cricsisem form the anti globalzation crwoed ? or erick mack and the tibor mahcahn foks since its more new then rothblad and have devloped his ideas better thoerys what abut exampeklf of a fail nozaick expermient in russia and in east europe ?is not just like marx that made a insperation for soviet and east europe but failed as a system the same did maybe nozaiack ?did they not try his ideas in argentian and brazil too? xxxboy82.147.38.2 (talk) 16:08, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Anybody have thoughts on this Leff guy who's described? After 16 years in political philosophy, I've never heard of him. But perhaps he's big with legal theorists?

John Rawls

Why is nothing mentioned of the Difference Principle, the Original Position? Tourskin (talk) 22:12, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Theory

The paragraph was very well written and captures the heart of Nozick's argument, however the last sentence was misleading. The language employed the word "unsustainable." The implication of this last sentence is that anarchy fails or somehow leads to chaos and disorder or something which is a complete break from a state of anarchy. I don't think that captures the essence of Nozick's argument. Better understood, Nozick's theory is that a state of anarchy will always lead to a single, dominant, protective agency...a minimalist state. Because anarchy will ALWAYS lead to this minimalist state, its misleading to say that its unsustainable. The system does in fact sustain itself. It wins out; it outcompetes and dominates all others. What emerges is not chaotic or a break from anarchy, its an ordered entity which emerges from anarchy. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.18.100.210 (talk) 04:15, 28 January 2009 (UTC)