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The virtue of humility is found in recognizing our limits—and that humility ought to make us libertarians.
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In this essay, Nathan Goodman (Center for a Stateless Society) discusses how the Knowledge Problems facing elites, “experts” or “representatives” recur not only in economics, but also in cultural conflicts over gender, disability, and other systems of structural social privilege. The danger of trying to make decisions for others, when cut off from the dispersed, tacit or local knowledge that they have, show how Hayekian limits on what we can know also apply to the the struggles and the challenges of other oppressed and marginalized people.
“IN HIS CLASSIC ESSAY, “THE USE OF KNOWLEDGE IN SOCIETY,” F. A. Hayek explains the concept of distributed knowledge. Every individual has unique knowledge shaped by their experiences and preferences, knowledge that may not be accessible to others, no matter how well educated they may be. But Hayek’s point about distributed knowledge applies to more than just economic issues. It also applies to social issues. . . .
“JUST AS WITH ECONOMICS, THESE SOCIAL PROBLEMS of epistemological hubris become bigger when government gets involved. By definition, politicians do not have the knowledge of everyone their policies will impact. But often, when marginalized groups are impacted, politicians become extra prone to ignore those from an affected population. . . .
“ULTIMATELY CALLS FOR PEOPLE TO CHECK THEIR PRIVILEGE are not an attempt to silence. Rather, they are an attempt to get people to recognize the limits of their knowledge. Libertarians should have the humility to check our privilege, to listen to oppressed people who discuss their experiences, and to respect oppressed peoples’ rights to direct their own struggles for liberation. . . .”
Nathan Goodman is a writer and activist living in Salt Lake City, Utah. He has been involved in LGBT, feminist, anti-war, and prisoner solidarity organizing. He writes frequent commentaries for the Center for a Stateless Society (c4ss.org) and keeps a blog, Dissenting Leftist (dissentingleftist.blogspot.com).
Support C4SS with Nathan Goodman’s “The Knowledge Problem of Privilege”
If it's difficult to make choices for ourselves, it must be an enormous burden to make choices for others.
Diffuse information can best be used by decentralized processes, such as the market. Markets can fail to produce good outcomes; however, just because markets sometimes fail it does not follow that government will always succeed. There are circumstances under which information problems are difficult to solve.
Arnold Kling, Unchecked and Unbalanced, pg. 116
How do prices convey dispersed knowledge?
I suppose we shouldn’t be surprised that most of the people who believe governments can and ought to manage economies also happen to believe that multiple governmental and nongovernmental bodies can and ought to manage the planet’s climate. All ideals aside, you’d think that the disastrous results of the former would dissuade climate alarmists from advocating the latter, if for no other reason than the logistical nightmare of such a grandiose project. I’m not sure which is more utopian, the belief in humans subduing the climate or the belief that the largest and most corrupt bureaucracies on the planet can cooperate, in the public interest no less!
In his classic essay, “The Use of Knowledge in Society,” F.A. Hayek explains the concept of distributed knowledge. Every individual has unique knowledge shaped by their experiences and preferences, knowledge that may not be accessible to others, no matter how well educated they may be. Hayek writes:
“Today it is almost heresy to suggest that scientific knowledge is not the sum of all knowledge. But a little reflection will show that there is beyond question a body of very important but unorganized knowledge which cannot possibly be called scientific in the sense of knowledge of general rules: the knowledge of the particular circumstances of time and place. It is with respect to this that practically every individual has some advantage over all others because he possesses unique information of which beneficial use might be made, but of which use can be made only if the decisions depending on it are left to him or are made with his active cooperation.”
Hayek then discusses examples of this knowledge as it applies in an economic context. Producers, consumers, and other individuals cooperating in a market all possess unique knowledge that only they can use, knowledge that is utterly inaccessible to any bureaucratic central planner.
But Hayek’s point about distributed knowledge applies to more than just economic issues. It also applies to social issues. ...
In this essay, Nathan Goodman (Center for a Stateless Society) discusses how the Knowledge Problems facing elites, “experts” or “representatives” recur not only in economics, but also in cultural conflicts over gender, disability, and other systems of structural social privilege. The danger of trying to make decisions for others, when cut off from the dispersed, tacit or local knowledge that they have, show how Hayekian limits on what we can know also apply to the the struggles and the challenges of other oppressed and marginalized people.
“IN HIS CLASSIC ESSAY, “THE USE OF KNOWLEDGE IN SOCIETY,” F. A. Hayek explains the concept of distributed knowledge. Every individual has unique knowledge shaped by their experiences and preferences, knowledge that may not be accessible to others, no matter how well educated they may be. But Hayek’s point about distributed knowledge applies to more than just economic issues. It also applies to social issues. . . .
“JUST AS WITH ECONOMICS, THESE SOCIAL PROBLEMS of epistemological hubris become bigger when government gets involved. By definition, politicians do not have the knowledge of everyone their policies will impact. But often, when marginalized groups are impacted, politicians become extra prone to ignore those from an affected population. . . .
“ULTIMATELY CALLS FOR PEOPLE TO CHECK THEIR PRIVILEGE are not an attempt to silence. Rather, they are an attempt to get people to recognize the limits of their knowledge. Libertarians should have the humility to check our privilege, to listen to oppressed people who discuss their experiences, and to respect oppressed peoples’ rights to direct their own struggles for liberation. . . .”
Nathan Goodman is a writer and activist living in Salt Lake City, Utah. He has been involved in LGBT, feminist, anti-war, and prisoner solidarity organizing. He writes frequent commentaries for the Center for a Stateless Society (c4ss.org) and keeps a blog, Dissenting Leftist (dissentingleftist.blogspot.com).
Support C4SS with Nathan Goodman’s “The Knowledge Problem of Privilege”
