Re: fantastic series/One other question (#48486)
by Chris Matthew Sciabarra on December 10, 2004 at 8:43 AM

Chris,

Thank you very much for your kind words about the series (which concludes today), and thank you also for your interest in reading Total Freedom. I look forward to your critical comments! Also, thanks for the CEPR info.

I can't speak for all libertarians with regard to the U.N. I can tell you that I certainly do appreciate the principle of having a world body where political entities can discuss their differences and attempt to resolve them. There are international courts and organizations that attempt to facilitate this, and there is a need for such organizations, given that the global situation is a kind of "anarchy" in action.

That said, however, there are a number of problems with the U.N., and not simply the "moral" objection of having dictatorships and freer societies sitting side-by-side as if they were equivalent. One of the real problems I have with this organization is that it often provides the institutional mechanisms for the kind of global politico-economic intervention that I've been deriding in this series and in my various writings on foreign policy. There are valuable things the U.N. has done, and can do, but I'm not sure that the institution can be reformed in such a way that strips it of this interventionist dimension; as long as the global political system is predatory, it seems to me that the organization will be used in this manner.

Perhaps there might be a way for another, parallel, institution to emerge that might address the very issues you---and I---find so compelling.