As an anti-statist, free market capitalist libertarian, I am often ‘accused’ of being on the political right. Yet as so many libertarians will tell you, many of my ilk refuse to accept the statist left/right axis as having any relevance to us. One only has to listen to a pro-immigration libertarian such as myself and then listen to most Tories in the UK/Republicans in the USA to see an issue which shows the differences.
We often find that neo-conservatives agree with libertarian antipathy to Marxist and Keynesian state centred economics and the wealth & liberty destroying regulatory state. Yet to think that advocating laissez-faire makes us ‘right wing’ is to misunderstand just how large the cultural and philosophical gulf is between most true (i.e. capitalist) libertarians and most conservatives. Conservatives are about conserving, they are about continuity above all else… however libertarians are about liberty, conserving it where it can be found but also tearing down whatever impeeds it, regardless of whose sacred cows get gored in the process. We may wish to conserve what is objectively good but otherwise we are as Promethean as the Marxist left.
In the Daily Telegraph article Britain risks huge influx of east Europe migrants by Philip Johnston, Home Affairs Editor, we see loaded language even in the title: ‘risk’. How about calling the article:
‘Britain opens doors to those formerly oppressed by Communism’
or maybe:
‘Britain steals a march on Continental Europe in grab for east European labour’
But no. The thrust of the article is that only the wonderful Tories want to ‘protect us’ from the Eastern Hordes.
Ministers said that allowing migrant workers from these countries into Britain at the earliest opportunity would help the economy. But Oliver Letwin, the shadow home secretary, challenged the Government to explain why it had not made use of the transitional arrangements. “We live in a small and crowded island,” he said. “Why does the Government consider it appropriate not to have transitional controls when other EU countries have imposed them.”
Well it just so happens that the Telegraph article I am quoting from actually links to an article here on Samizdata.net from the Telegraph external links sidebar (cheers, guys!) called Why do people think that Britain is overcrowded? It really is not overcrowded and the idea we are somehow not going to be able to assimilate other Europeans is laughable. Oliver Letwin does not really care about providing the British economy with high initiative eastern European workers and entrepreneurs, he is just concerned with playing politics and attacking anything the dismal Blair government does, even when it is entirely correct.
The thing about the “This country is crowded and can’t take any more people” argument, is that people who use it sound exactly the same in Hong Kong, Britain, The United States, and in Australia (as well as many more places). In Australia, my response is approximately “Hey guys, it’s a continent” but it is remarkable how much you hear the argument even there. This makes me rather sceptical wherever I hear the argument, even in places more crowded than Australia.
That’s probably just the australian idea of “crowded”: “you can see your neighbor with a telescope on a clear day”
conservative means different thhings in different places…
conservative in north america does not, solely, define stick in the muds that want continuity…
real conservatives want massive, rapid change, to wipe out the vile socialist state that has encumbered evrything…
it’s only in the uk and europe where the vast majority of conservatives are actually about stasis… of course we do haev our own paleo-cons…
but combine with the neocons fight for lberty.. don’t help elect liberals (or rather reds)
Just for the record: Greece, Denmark, Sweden and the Netherlands are allowing entry straight away as well.
If the totty from Riga or Tallinn are anything to go by, this has to be a plus.
“Oliver Letwin does not really care about providing the British economy with high initiative eastern European workers and entrepreneurs, he is just concerned with playing politics and attacking anything the dismal Blair government does, even when it is entirely correct.”
You’ve gotta be kidding me. Letwin is a model of restraint and courtesy, very often attacked by the right for being too nice to Labour.
Anyway, how well do you think the present number of immigrants in this country have assimilated, bearing in mind both the Asians who cheer on England in the World Cup and those who go out to learn karate to “tear out the guts of the unbeliever”? Even before this announcement, Britain was expecting two million immigrants over the next ten years. What affect do you think all this will have on employment, on our culture, on national unity? Do you even care, or is any immigration control automatically wrong – whatever the circumstances – if it creates a barrier to the liberty to travel and move around freely?
I do agree with you that issues like this do show a radical difference between pure libertarian and conservative perspectives, though.
libertarian uber alles: So-called conservatives in the U.S. are very frequently in favor of trade and immigration barriers and subsidization of certain kinds of business. Some are in favor of overall government spending reduction, but “fiscal conservatives” like Ronald Reagan and George Bush, Jr. have shown that what they really mean is tax reductions and huge increases in governmental spending. They may not be in favor of the status quo, per se, but they are certainly opposed to liberty.
Great point by Mr Chaston. The more lovelies from eastern Europe, the better.
More seriously, I find it kind of interesting that Mr Letwin, given his ancestry, should make such a point about immigration. And Letwin is actually one of the few Tories I have much time for.
As for the question of Britain being a crowded island, if we had a truly libertarian approach to citizenship, then citizenship would be a tradeable commodity, so in places like the UK it would be effing expensive to buy a passport, while cheap as chips in a sparsely-populated place like Oz. Imagine this – a world where citizenship could be traded like wheat futures in Chicago!
Peter Cuthbertson: And how many Slovaks, Czechs, Poles and Hungarians do you expect to want to “tear out the guts of the unbeliever” when they come to Britain? THESE ARE EUROPEAN CHRISTIANS FOR CHRIST’S SAKE!
To hold up the lack of assimilation of some Islamic immigrants in the UK as having any relevence to the ability of EUROPEANS to assimilate is truly bizarre. When did you last see a guy walking down a London street wearing a Huguenot Pride tee-shirt?
It is views like yours and Letwin’s when it comes to this issue that makes me think that the ‘restraint and courtesy’ of so many Tories is just an attempt to put a civil face on bigotry and xenophobia.
Well, smart, ambitious 20 year olds from Tallin are going to finish their degrees and head straight for London. Certainly a good thing for Britain.