[svlug] Re: A little on Open Source Philosophy... (fwd)

[Seth David Schoen]

George Bonser writes:

> On Fri, 13 Nov 1998, Marilyn Davis wrote:
> 
> > And yes, Linux is socialistic, or communal, or whatever you name
> > endeavors done for social good rather than personal gain.
> 
> I find it more Libertarian than Socialistic. In a socialistic model, all
> people would run the same version with the same capabilities. Nobody would
> have a more capable or less capable piece of code than anyone else. What
> version people should have would be dictated by a central authority.

Well, there are non-authoritarian schools of socialist thought, including
some anarchist schools (e.g. the so-called "libertarian socialism").  (There
are arguments back and forth about whether socialism can be
anti-authoritarian and, in return, whether capitalism can be
anti-authoritarian; but you shouldn't conclude that every socialist supports
authoritarianism.)

There are even socialist economic theories which are not specifically
egalitarian, although they are not, as far as I've seen, widely believed
outside of egalitarian socialist movements.  (The nearest example which is at
all widespread is Henry George's single tax, which is usually based on a
theory of social ownership of land, but which is supported within parts of the
libertarian movement, where it's thought to fix a particular isolated defect
in individualist capitalism.)
 
> Linux is different. I can choose to add my own patches, distribute them if
> I please, I can pick and choose from patches to add to my kernel. I do not
> tell my neighbor how to run his computer and he does not dictate his
> preferences on me.

I'm sure that libertarian socialists would claim that this is highly
compatible with their model, too.

> Linux is the closest thing to true Libertarianism that I have ever found. 
> 
> Note to the political un-savvy out there, a Libertarian is NOT a Liberal.

The use of "liberalism" which is being applied to libertarian thought is
not "modern liberalism" (which is usually associated with something like
the welfare state or Social Democracy, though not so much with the radical
left).  Instead, it's "classical liberalism".  For the most part, before
this century, and even today around the world, "liberalism" was used to
refer to a political philosophy emphasizing ideas like individual rights,
limited government, civil society, and the rule of law (generally
something like today's libertarian movement).

By a complicated series of events (which also involves no small amount of
controversy), the word "liberal" in America came to be applied to moderate
statist leftists, especially progressives.

"Neoliberalism", considered a major threat by the radical left, is the
ideological revival of classical liberal ideas applied to the world today.
In my opinion, many things identified as "neoliberal" are not particularly
consistent with liberal philosophy, and many of those identified as
"neoliberals" are not (and would not claim to be) believers in classical
liberal political philosophies.  In general, I think that word refers to
present-day believers in such philosophies (which directly contradict the
economic theories of the radical left).

If it's any evidence of the degree to which self-identified liberals (in
the libertarian sense) don't feel threatened by Linux, I have a story:

When I introduced the libertarian economist David Friedman at UC Berkeley on
Election Day, I was wearing a Linux t-shirt.  Friedman saw my shirt, and
admired it, and we started chatting about Linux.  He told me he was very
interested in Linux and its progress, and admired the efforts of the Linux
developers.  He wondered whether Linux could displace Windows, something he
didn't see as impossible (or unfortunate).  Now, bear in mind that Professor
Friedman is the son of Milton Friedman (famed "neoliberal" himself), and
perhaps the most prominent advocate in the world today of the proposal to
privatize every last aspect and function of the State.  The subtitle of
his most famous book, _The Machinery of Freedom_, is "Guide to a Radical
Capitalism".  And Professor Friedman, than whom it would be difficult to be
more neoliberal on this Earth, found Linux encouraging and worthwhile, not
threatening.

All of which is to say that the positions of the most serious libertarians
and otherwise classical liberal types are more subtle than they might at
first appear, and, if Linux does not support them, it at least does not
obviously defeat them.

There are periodic arguments on Slashdot about this very point, with ESR
as the most famous libertarian in the Linux crowd.  The consensus, as far
as one exists at all, is generally that Linux is anti-authoritarian; you
can then extrapolate based on your favorite political philosophy to figure
out what Linux is or is not like. :-)

-- 
   Seth David Schoen L&S '01 (undeclared) / schoen at uclink4.berkeley.edu
He said, "This is what the king who will reign over you will do."  And they
said, "Nay, but we will have a king over us, that we also may be like all the
nations." (1 Sam 8)  http://ishmael.geecs.org/~sigma/   http://www.loyalty.org/

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