The Daily Caller published a rather longish opinion piece of mine today on “Seven Reasons Progressives Should Be More Libertarian.”  It’s a followup to a piece I did for them about a month ago on “How Libertarianism Helps the Poor,” and prelude to a piece I’m currently writing on why libertarians should be more progressive (a necessary second half to any true BHL manifesto, I think).

The piece illustrates my methodological approach to thinking about and defending libertarian political and economic institutions.  I’ve described that approach elsewhere  as “Overlapping Consensus Libertarianism” (see also here and here).  The idea is that rather than trying to defend libertarian conclusions from a single set of foundational principles, we defend them instead by appealing to a wide set of principles that are part of an overlapping consensus of reasonable views.  Whether deontology or hedonistic utilitarianism is the correct approach to thinking about morality is an interesting theoretical question, but we don’t need to answer it, I think, in order to defend the idea that, for example, individual liberty and rising standards of well-being matter.

The piece is far from comprehensive in any respect.  The seven reasons certainly aren’t adequately defended in it, and probably aren’t even adequately explained.  And while the list represents the principles that have been the most influential in my own thinking about the defense of libertarianism, I’m sure that I’ve left off some that other libertarians think are crucially important.  If that includes you, then please do leave a comment here and let me know what I missed.  This is an area I’m still actively thinking and learning about, and so I would definitely appreciate your shared insight.