For the acclaim it received at the time, Friedrich A. Hayek’s small book owed nothing to style and everything to its intensity of feeling and the immediacy of the subject matter. It was written to make the British shudder. FULL ARTICLE by Garet Garrett
Source link: http://archive.mises.org/11506/hayek-on-individualism/
Hayek on Individualism
Previous post: Hyperinflation, Money Demand, and the Crack-up Boom
Next post: The Profit of Reform
{ 8 comments }
Those who can relate to Hayek at this level will also enjoy Alfred Jay Nock’s Our Enemy, The State.
It’s amazing how few people understand and appreciate Hayek, no matter if they are “for” or “against” him. Garrett, fortunately, is one who understands him thoroughly, and probably contributed a lot to Hayek’s popularity in this country, through the Reader’s Digest, etc.
I just read and reprinted in my local blog a commentary on the Haiti situation by a distinguished journalist in Jamaica, who blames the “disaster capitalism” promoted by “Freedman, Hayek, and Greenspan” for Haiti’s plight pre-earthquake, and for the continuing “Katrina Redux” response to it. Everything he said was good – especially the history of Haiti back a hundred years or more, with U.S. invasions, occupations, the arrest, kidnapping, and “extraordinary rendition” of Aristide, U.S. support for the Duvaliers, deforestation for the benefit of foreign corporations, etc.
But how or where could he possibly have associated Hayek with this history? Perhaps the very word, “Serfdom”, in his most popular work, is taken as an endorsement of serfdom rather than a very powerful statement against it. Or the fact that the Thatcher regime, for a time, lionized Hayek, believing him to be some sort of corrupt Tory.
I’ll keep this essay at hand to forward to any and all people who continue to abuse this great humanist and public benefactor’s legacy.
Unfortunately, in trying to prove that Hayek had nothing to do with Naomi Klein’s “shock doctrine”, I found the following information on Wikipedia. And in the same article, the founder of Wikipedia, Mr. Wales, credits Hayek’s thinking with inspiring the design of Wikipedia. (I had heard, before, that the founders were also influenced by Ayn Rand’s work).
“Hayek visited Chile several times in the 1970s and 1980s during the reign of dictator Augusto Pinochet. Commenting on dictatorships to a Chilean interviewer, Hayek stated: “Personally I prefer a liberal dictator to democratic government lacking liberalism. My personal impression — and this is valid for South America – is that in Chile, for example, we will witness a transition from a dictatorial government to a liberal government.”[34][35] Hayek’s words and actions concerning Chile under the Pinochet regime have drawn criticism from historian of modern Latin America Greg Grandin, who claims that “Hayek glimpsed in Pinochet an avatar of true freedom, who would rule as a dictator only for a ‘transitional period’”, while also noting that “in a letter to the London Times he defended the junta, reporting that he had ‘not been able to find a single person in much-maligned Chile who did not agree that personal freedom was much greater under Pinochet than it had been under Allende.’ “of course,” writes Grandin, “the thousands executed and tens of thousands tortured by Pinochet’s regime weren’t talking.”[36] Hayek recommended economic reforms similar to Chile’s under Pinochet for the Keynesian economy in the United Kingdom to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.[37]”
[The reference #37 is to Klein's "Shock Docrine."]
“Hayek stated: “Personally I prefer a liberal dictator to democratic government lacking liberalism. My personal impression — and this is valid for South America – is that in Chile, for example, we will witness a transition from a dictatorial government to a liberal government.”"
I completely agree with Hayek here. The point in this statement is not that the murders committed by Pinochet is not important or justified or supported by Hayek or some one who agrees with him like me.
He says he prefers Pinochet between the two alternatives of Allende and Pinochet.
For this statement to be criticized, it should be proven than under Allende, less murder would have taken place.
Of course Hayek would prefer a much more liberal person than Pinochet but those were the choices.
And as a general rule I prefer a liberal dictator, a person who dictates liberal laws to be enforced, to a democracy where there is a mob rule.
Garet Garrett is incredible.
I bought and read The Driver for Christmas, and I must say it was wonderful stuff.
Kerem,
As for Pinochet, I believe that there were 3000 or more people killed outright in the coup, and thousands more tortured, driven into exile, etc. One killed was even an American correspondent for the Wall Street Journal (fictionalized in the film, “Missing”, with Jack Lemon and Sissy Spacek.)
Of course, we know now that the whole operation was planned by the CIA, Henry Kissinger, and some Vietnam War veterans – Special Forces, etc., at the behest of ITT, Anaconda and Kennecott Copper companies, and other corporations whose assets were being nationalized by the Allende government (democratically elected, and in no sense “totalitarian” or violating human rights).
It was a shock to me to see that Hayek was involved in justifying the Pinochet regime. We’ve all heard how some of Milton Friedman’s students went there, and advised the new dictatorship on “free market economics.” And we knew that Margaret Thatcher was a friend of Pinochet, and defended his regime later on.
It was Thatcher who named Hayek to the Queen’s List – supposedly, he had wanted a Baronetcy, but was happy to receive the honor he received. Hayek always claimed to be a Whig, but he seems to have been fond of monarchies, as well. I heard one anecdote long ago about his being introduced to the Hapsburg Emperor of Austria as a young man.
In his autobiographical “Hayek on Hayek,” there is nothing about visiting or supporting the Pinochet regime, and this is an episode which most people who defend Hayek’s work would probably wish had never happened. It might have been that he was set up by an interviewer, or simply being cautious and polite while in the power of the Pinochet Regime.
Paul Stephens wrote:
“Of course, we know now that the whole operation was planned by the CIA, Henry Kissinger, and some Vietnam War veterans – Special Forces, etc., at the behest of ITT, Anaconda and Kennecott Copper companies, and other corporations whose assets were being nationalized by the Allende government (democratically elected, and in no sense “totalitarian” or violating human rights).”
Gee, I’d say that if private assets were being nationalized by Allende’s gov’t, then human rights *were* being violated. Whether or not the Allende gov’t was democratically elected is irrelevant, in tha respect.
Hayek was absolutely right in supporting Pinochet vs Allende because Pinochet’s public policies led to a free Chile while Allende’s proclaimed objective was to impose a Cuban-type communist dictatorship in Chile. What is astonishing is that he had the courage to say so in a world that prefers ambiguity and rewards cowardice. My admiration for Hayek has increased after this knowledge.
Comments on this entry are closed.