American Libertarians

In the United States, libertarianism is a political philosophy promoting individual liberty. According to common meanings of conservatism and liberalism in the United States, libertarianism has been described as ''conservative'' on economic issues (economic liberalism) and '' liberal'' on personal freedom (civil libertarianism),Boaz, David; Kirby, David (October 18, 2006). ''The Libertarian Vote''. Cato Institute. often associated with a foreign policy of non-interventionism.Olsen, Edward A. (2002). ''US National Defense for the Twenty-First Century: The Grand Exit Strategy''. Taylor & Francis
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. . Broadly, there are four principal traditions within libertarianism, namely the libertarianism that developed in the mid-20th century out of the revival tradition of classical liberalism in the United States after liberalism associated with the New Deal; the libertarianism developed in the 1950s by anarcho-capitalist author Murray Rothbard, who based it on the anti-New Deal Old Right and 19th-century libertarianism and American individualist anarchists such as Benjamin Tucker and Lysander Spooner while rejecting the labor theory of value in favor of Austrian School economics and the subjective theory of value; the libertarianism developed in the 1970s by Robert Nozick and founded in American and European classical liberal traditions; and the libertarianism associated with the Libertarian Party, which was founded in 1971, including politicians such as David Nolan and Ron Paul.

The right-libertarianism associated with people such as Murray Rothbard and Robert Nozick,Marshall, Peter (2008). '' Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism''. London: Harper Perennial. p. 565. "The problem with the term 'libertarian' is that it is now also used by the Right. ..In its moderate form, right libertarianism embraces ''laissez-faire'' liberals like Robert Nozick who call for a minimal State, and in its extreme form, anarcho-capitalists like Murray Rothbard and David Friedman who entirely repudiate the role of the State and look to the market as a means of ensuring social order". whose book '' Anarchy, State, and Utopia'' received significant attention in academia according to David Lewis Schaefer, is the dominant form of libertarianism in the United States, compared to that of left-libertarianism.Carlson, Jennifer D. (2012). "Libertarianism". In Miller, Wilburn R., ed. ''The Social History of Crime and Punishment in America''. London: Sage Publications
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. The latter is associated with the left-wing of the modern libertarian movementLong, Riderick T. "Anarchism". In Gaus, Gerald F.; D'Agostino, Fred, eds. (2012). ''The Routledge Companion to Social and Political Philosophy''. p. 227. and more recently to the political positions associated with academic philosophers Hillel Steiner, Philippe Van Parijs and Peter Vallentyne that combine self-ownership with an egalitarian approach to natural resources. Kymlicka, Will (2005). "libertarianism, left-". In Honderich, Ted. ''The Oxford Companion to Philosophy''. New York City: Oxford University Press. p. 516. . "'Left-libertarianism' is a new term for an old conception of justice, dating back to Grotius. It combines the libertarian assumption that each person possesses a natural right of self-ownership over his person with the egalitarian premise that natural resources should be shared equally. Right-wing libertarians argue that the right of self-ownership entails the right to appropriate unequal parts of the external world, such as unequal amounts of land. According to left-libertarians, however, the world's natural resources were initially unowned, or belonged equally to all, and it is illegitimate for anyone to claim exclusive private ownership of these resources to the detriment of others. Such private appropriation is legitimate only if everyone can appropriate an equal amount, or if those who appropriate more are taxed to compensate those who are thereby excluded from what was once common property. Historic proponents of this view include Thomas Paine, Herbert Spencer, and Henry George. Recent exponents include Philippe Van Parijs and Hillel Steiner." It is also related to anti-capitalist, free-market anarchist strands such as left-wing market anarchism,Chartier, Gary; Johnson, Charles W. (2011). ''Markets Not Capitalism: Individualist Anarchism Against Bosses, Inequality, Corporate Power, and Structural Poverty''. Brooklyn: Minor Compositions/Autonomedia. pp. 1–16. referred to as market-oriented left-libertarianism to distinguish itself from other forms of libertarianism.Sheldon Richman (February 3, 2011)
"Libertarian Left: Free-market anti-capitalism, the unknown ideal"
''The American Conservative''. . Retrieved November 18, 2019. Libertarianism includes anarchist and libertarian socialist tendencies, although they are not as widespread as in other countries. Murray Bookchin, a libertarian within this socialist tradition, argued that anarchists, libertarian socialists and the left should reclaim ''libertarian'' as a term, suggesting these other self-declared ''libertarians'' to rename themselves '' propertarians'' instead. Although all libertarians oppose government intervention, there is a division between those anarchist or socialist libertarians as well as anarcho-capitalists such as Rothbard and David D. Friedman who adhere to the anti-state position, viewing the state as an unnecessary evil; minarchists such as Nozick who recognize the necessary need for a minimal state, often referred to as