I think the way we can make governments better is the same way we make other organizations that we do business with better: by switching to a better one and letting the invisible hand of the market do its work. Currently 96% stick to the government they were born under, which is an abysmally low level of competition compared to any other market I can think of, and to me this seems likely to be the main reason that people live under such bad governments.
To put it differently, if the cost of moving from one country to another were low, competition would force governments to improve. In the limiting case they are only landlords. Unfortunately it isn't low, although it may be becoming lower, due partly to the increasing importance of activities online, partly to English becoming something close to a world language.
I think the macrotrend toward increased mobility over time is clear, so, given that this continues, that should lead to increased competition between governments. I just hope that this will take the form of governments making their countries more attractive to new residents, such as Spain's Beckham law that offers lower taxes to immigrants, rather than the form of making it more costly for existing residents to leave, such as the Berlin Wall.
This has some overlap with your comment on artistic works, but from a different angle, perhaps: For decades now, the Libertarian Futurist Society has been giving annual awards for works in the fantastic genres with a pro-liberty perspective. With the recent death of Vernor Vinge, nearly all of the first generation of libertarian SF writers are no longer with us, but we've been seeing the emergence of a new generation, including Travis Corcoran, Karl Gallagher, Sarah Hoyt, and Dani and Eytan Kollin, and we've heard from many of them that winning the Prometheus Award, or even being nominated for it, has helped them find a larger audience and sell more books. It helps that we've gotten a reputation for emphasizing literary quality, favoring books that nonlibertarians can read; a corollary to your point about not offering bad arguments for libertarianism is that putting forward ideological potboilers that, in Sturgeon's phrase, "sell their birthright for a pot of message," is not a service to libertarianism even as propaganda.
The most important element for a more libertarian society are firms that effectively displace the state from some activity. The Machinery of freedom is full of entrepreneurial suggestions. The “insurance+police” and the private courts were among the best. I don’t know if they fail by reasons of public intervention or because they are not really that good in practice. Robin Hanson “pay for health, not healthcare” also looks very intelligent.
I’m not sure I understand what a libertarian or a classical liberal really stands for. In the last few months, I have been binge reading books by Dr. Thomas Sowell. I’ve read about 20 of his books, and I have another 10 or so on my bookshelf ready for me to read. As I am sure you know, he’s very free market and individual liberty oriented. Would he be considered a libertarian or does a libertarian go beyond what Sowell talks about?
I majored in economics in college, so some amount of economic jargon is very easy for me to follow. Sowell has no math and virtually no charts or graphs in most of his writing. I think he’s easy to read with lots of concrete examples. I think his book “Applied Economics: Thinking Beyond Stage One” is the kind of book that I think more people should read. He takes some common economic interventions, such as rent control, and shows what happens with them over time.
His books on economics, race and discrimination, housing, decision-making and visions on how the world works, have changed my views on many things. In fact, he’s been the most influential writer I’ve ever read.
If you consider Sowell is a libertarian, I think his approach of not labeling himself and simply talking about ideas and their consequences in the real world is the way to go.
Forty years ago, even thirty, legal marijuana and same-sex marriage were fringe positions, and the Libertarian Party was one of the few groups actively advocating for both. Now they are almost totally accepted by Democrats and even by many, perhaps most, Republicans. So that looks like a success for the Socialist Party strategy.
Looks like, but maybe isn't. It would be worthwhile for some sober minded libertarian to analyze what actually happened to change people's views on those issues, both to avoid post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacies and to find out what lessons might apply to other efforts to move politics in a more libertarian direction. I suspect that the applicability will sadly prove limited.
I met your son recently, and I like his approach of working to help people build charter cities. New places with radically different governmental institutions can show people that liberty really does still work, not just in theory, but in practice. We can't change the federal government, or even state governments, without massive buy in from cities across the country. The only way to do *that* is to build cities that work, and show cities that don't how they can emulate those things that work. This will automatically steer the country in the right direction over decades. I don't think there's a faster way to steer such a big ship.
The libertarian movement, way to far to the left. Me any more I'm finding I lean to the right of your Anarcho-capitalism David. Your boy Patri's seasteading is interesting (What happened to Chad Elwartowski and Supranee Thepdet?) Still, that and other, insteadings might be viable.
I suspect the strongest influence we have on the the State of the indigNation is voting with our dollar. However, these days that's severely limited as 'they' define and delimit the market. Don't like LEDs? Wanna buy an incandescent? Sorry, forbidden! Want a car without explosives in your steering wheel to push out an airbag? Sorry, forbidden! Howabout a shower head that passes enough water to shower or a toilet that doesn't take 3 flushes to flush? Sorry, forbidden!
None the less there are ways around and workarounds: Maybe vote with one ounce silver rounds instead of fiat paper or plastic bucks. Might be time to bring back the Yankee Trader (smuggler), "Hey neighbor, I've 3 100 watt bulbs, can let cha have them for 2 rounds each." Perhaps legal chop shops; "Why pay a quarter million for a new Ford? Our rebuilt and refurbished 1970 Rams, sans computers, sans airbags, sans little air pressure sensors in each tire will get you up the hill and back for a quarter of that price!"
Seasteads and other 'steads; Notice on yacht club boards; "BYOB Party June through September, see you at the Sargasso Sea, raft up, pup!" Airstream Trailers bulletin; "Tom's Traveling Trading Post will be at FL Glades get together October, Upper Peninsula Michigan, July."
Milei seems to be a major departure from the general tendency of net failure of libertarianism. But it's probably hard to create good-looking, charismatic and popular figures that are also principled (at least, somewhat).
The empirical criticism of the idea that it's not rational to vote is that people vote. The empirical criticism of the idea that it is not rational to inform oneself expensively in order to vote properly is that people read newspapers.
The second is the relevant claim — people cheer at football games too. People read newspapers for entertainment, not actionable information. They make little attempt to get a balanced view of whatever the current issues are. Very few partisans of one side can give an accurate account of the other side's arguments.
I suspect promoting liberty is the surest way to save the world, but not in the way you imagine. The greatest dangers to the world are man-made or natural disasters. Promoting worldwide liberty can result in world peace, thus avoiding global thermonuclear war. Besides, freedom results in prosperity and the advancement of science and technology, which can enable us to avoid some natural disasters, such as a pandemic or an asteroid strike. Other examples could be given.
Of the various ways to promote liberty you mention, the one I judge to be the most effective is to influence public opinion either directly, as Ayn Rand did, or indirectly by influencing other influential people. I suspect you are doing both.
The advancement of science and technology also makes possible some disasters. It's at least arguable, clearly possible, that the recent pandemic was the result of improvements in biotech. Thermonuclear war only became possible due to the advancement of science and technology.
It's common knowledge that science and technology can be misused, but I believe you favor their advancement anyway because their benefits exceed their costs, so I'm unsure of the reason for your objection. I'll proceed on the assumption you just want to see some reply.
The last sentence in my first paragraph was “Other examples could be given”, which I thought might inspire you to think of other ways the advancement of science and technology could save the world. I'll assume “the world” is confined to life on Earth, since life can be destroyed but the material composition of the planet cannot, and we can't seem to have much effect on the rest of the universe.
Here's an example of how science and technology could be used to prevent the extinction of all terrestrial life. Within 7.5 billion years the expansion of the Sun is expected to destroy all life on earth. I doubt that it's physically possible to move the Earth farther from the Sun, but it should be possible to create a fleet of “ark” spacecraft to move terrestrial life forms to a safe place, perhaps ultimately to a planet in another star system. The more science and technology advances, the more life can be saved. Without that advancement, all terrestrial life is doomed.
Misuse is not confined to science and technology. Virtually anything can be misused. Take oxygen and water, which are necessary for life. An arsonist depends on the presence of oxygen to cause destructive fires. A person can be intentionally drowned in water. Surely, like oxygen and water, we are better off with science and technology than without it. It's estimated that the human population was about 3 million just before the Agricultural Revolution, which raised the population to as much as 10 million. The population increased to about 1 billion until the start of the Industrial Revolution in about 1800. Now it's said there are over 7 billion humans. Without advances in science and technology, most of us would not exist because the world would support only a much smaller population.
Granted science and technology can be used to create things capable of killing many people, such as engineered viruses and nuclear weapons. However, in my scenario advances in science and technology would be preceded by advances in liberty. I maintain that justice is consistent with liberty but not with tyranny. (I can defend that claim in another post if you wish, but I'll just assume it for now.) I regard creating a virus capable of killing millions of people and exposing them to extraordinary risk as an injustice. Similarly, indiscriminately killing perhaps 100,000 people with a nuclear weapon is unjust. Such injustices are the works of governments. That is, they are associated with the absence of liberty. If COVID was engineered as you suggest, it was done in an authoritarian country with the aid of tax dollars. I doubt that many people would voluntarily pay to create a virus capable of killing millions including themselves. Nuclear weapons can't be uninvented. But in the absence of governments, they would probably not have been invented in the first place. And free people would be disinclined to pay for the invention of even more terrible weapons.
To summarize, the benefits of advances in science and technology outweigh the costs—especially in a world whose inhabitants enjoy liberty and justice.
You don't dispute my claim that liberty is likely to lead to advances in science and technology. However, despite what I've said above you could still maintain that the costs of such advances exceed the benefits. If so, you should immediately stop arguing for liberty and start making the case for tyranny.
“The missing ingredient in the liberty movement is women.” This raises many questions. I suggest a new libertarian, modeled after the new Jew. Here is Gordis on this topic: “It was time for a new Jewish worldview, a new Jewish physique, a new Jewish home, and new Hebrew names. It was time for a ‘new Jew,’ a Jewish people re-born, a people who would flock to the shores of their ancestral homeland and reconstitute themselves as a people. No intellectual mind-experiment, European Zionism was a rugged political movement designed to wrest Palestine from the Ottomans (and later the British) and create a state that Jews from around the world would build together, redeeming not only themselves but the Jewish world from which they hailed.” That is from page 46 of *We Stand Divided.*
Less of an intellectual movement and more of a physical/hands-on/DIY-community movement. Slightly cultish, yet always truth seeking. Less time in front of the computer, more time outside, in the sun, building and growing community. More campfires. More cooking. More family activities. Creating our own music with good lyrics. Better dress. Better food. Better schools. Better writing. The low hanging intellectual fruit has been picked. Intellectual proselytizing is maxed out. Let’s diversify our activities with an eye for enjoyment and community. If you build it, they will come. The women that is.
I'm probably going to offer two responses, because I think I want to address two different topics.
I run tabletop roleplaying games, and have since the 1970s; and I write books for them, and have since the turn of the century. This is a hobby that's very strongly gendered: Game rooms at conventions are full of men, and the discussion groups at Steve Jackson Games attract far more men than women, for example. Nonetheless, over the years, I've had large numbers of women players in my campaigns. I'm currently playing in one campaign, where the GM is a woman, and two of the six players are women; I'm running two, one with four women, one with three women and two men as players.
So how did I get this statistically unusual population of players? Part of it is simply asking: I was always prepared to invite a woman to play if she seemed interested. Part of it is word of mouth: years and years ago, when I suggested to one woman (who has become one of my best players) that she'd be welcome, another woman, whom we were both visiting, assured her that I was "a good GM for women." Part of it may well have been that there were already numbers of women among my players, which was perhaps credible unspoken testimony that I really did have whatever qualities might appeal to such players, and which also meant that my male players faced the critical judgment of multiple women on how they conducted themselves. (Indeed, I allowed any of my players to say they didn't want to play with any other player, and over the years two of my players earned such downvotes from so many other players that I couldn't fit them into a campaign—both of the two male.) And it probably helped that I did my best to be scrupulously fair and to maintain decorum. Some of these may transfer over to gaining women members for groups with other interests, at least small groups.
With gaming, at least, there's also a question of running campaigns that suit the intended market. I've characteristically run one campaign with a focus on adventure, physical action, and combat, and one with a focus on social interaction, relationships, and culture (if I ran a third, it was an experiment of some sort). I had one woman player who was very attracted to action and combat and who commonly ran combat monsters; but running campaigns with more of a social emphasis (for example, my current campaign, a telenovela set in the future Mars of an alternate timeline where a near-anarchocapitalist Brazilian Empire is one of the great world powers, in which a prosperous family are trying to advance their fortunes by building a luxury hotel in a new wing of their city) may have been a selling point. Are there libertarian issues that are of more concern to women than to men?
In a small election, say one for a local office, voting for a libertarian may result in getting an elected official. At the national election level, there is near zero chance that a vote for a libertarian will result in getting one elected since the number of Democrats and Republicans will swamp the voting numbers. The end result is voting libertarian will not elect one. Libertarians might change the result of an election by changing the winner of a state. So, it’s my contention that you aren’t really voting for an electable candidate, but casting a protest vote. You’re much better off voting for the Democrat or Republican that best represents your agenda, if you want your vote to count for something…
Up until 2020, I lived in California. It didn't matter which party I voted for for most offices, and especially for president and senator: California was going to elect the Democrat. Now I live in Kansas, partly because California is unaffordable and partly because its legislative and regulatory climate is actively malevolent. I'm fairly sure that no matter how I vote, Kansas will go for Republican presidents and senators.
In California, at least, the chance of the state's going for a Republican statewide in a federal election is small enough to be negligibly different from zero. You can calculate tiny probabilities if you like, but when they get small enough the expected payoff doesn't justify any effort.
You could do worse than look across the Atlantic at Nigel Farage's success, first with UKIP and now a possible repeat with the Reform party. UKIP won no UK Parliamentary elections other than one - though they did win a significant number of seats in the pointless European Parliament - and only ever had one MP but they provided the driver for Brexit and did much of that driving while they had no members elected in either Europe or the UK.
UKIP was of course a very single issue party, but the single issue is not unadjacent to the interests of libertarians, and it attracted support from people who were of libertarian bent such as the bloggers at samizdata.net (and me FWIW).
Reform seems to be trying to do the same thing on a slightly broader level. Maybe it will work. It won't be a one election and done thing, but they are likely to help drive the Tories into deserved meltdown at the next general election (any time now) which ought to concentrate minds.
I discuss both UKIP and the Liberal Democrats as of interest to libertarians, both as examples of new parties and as having some libertarian elements, in one of the chapter drafts on my web site:
The LibDims are not, IMHO, really a libertarian party and they don't really try to claim they are because the claim wouldn't pass the sniff test. Of course, originally part of them was the original liberal party that was indeed not unadjacent to libertarians in terms free trade, speech and the like but those days are past and the LibDims are just another big-state loving party, indeed they are very very pro EU and want the UK to undo Brexit (at least I think they still do).
[See also the FDP in Germany]
You should probably look closer at the Reform party. I haven't paid much attention to it but it looks like it could be a decent libertarian-ish party
I think the way we can make governments better is the same way we make other organizations that we do business with better: by switching to a better one and letting the invisible hand of the market do its work. Currently 96% stick to the government they were born under, which is an abysmally low level of competition compared to any other market I can think of, and to me this seems likely to be the main reason that people live under such bad governments.
To put it differently, if the cost of moving from one country to another were low, competition would force governments to improve. In the limiting case they are only landlords. Unfortunately it isn't low, although it may be becoming lower, due partly to the increasing importance of activities online, partly to English becoming something close to a world language.
I think the macrotrend toward increased mobility over time is clear, so, given that this continues, that should lead to increased competition between governments. I just hope that this will take the form of governments making their countries more attractive to new residents, such as Spain's Beckham law that offers lower taxes to immigrants, rather than the form of making it more costly for existing residents to leave, such as the Berlin Wall.
Someone should simply launch a competing methodology and run it in parallel.
This has some overlap with your comment on artistic works, but from a different angle, perhaps: For decades now, the Libertarian Futurist Society has been giving annual awards for works in the fantastic genres with a pro-liberty perspective. With the recent death of Vernor Vinge, nearly all of the first generation of libertarian SF writers are no longer with us, but we've been seeing the emergence of a new generation, including Travis Corcoran, Karl Gallagher, Sarah Hoyt, and Dani and Eytan Kollin, and we've heard from many of them that winning the Prometheus Award, or even being nominated for it, has helped them find a larger audience and sell more books. It helps that we've gotten a reputation for emphasizing literary quality, favoring books that nonlibertarians can read; a corollary to your point about not offering bad arguments for libertarianism is that putting forward ideological potboilers that, in Sturgeon's phrase, "sell their birthright for a pot of message," is not a service to libertarianism even as propaganda.
The most important element for a more libertarian society are firms that effectively displace the state from some activity. The Machinery of freedom is full of entrepreneurial suggestions. The “insurance+police” and the private courts were among the best. I don’t know if they fail by reasons of public intervention or because they are not really that good in practice. Robin Hanson “pay for health, not healthcare” also looks very intelligent.
I’m not sure I understand what a libertarian or a classical liberal really stands for. In the last few months, I have been binge reading books by Dr. Thomas Sowell. I’ve read about 20 of his books, and I have another 10 or so on my bookshelf ready for me to read. As I am sure you know, he’s very free market and individual liberty oriented. Would he be considered a libertarian or does a libertarian go beyond what Sowell talks about?
I majored in economics in college, so some amount of economic jargon is very easy for me to follow. Sowell has no math and virtually no charts or graphs in most of his writing. I think he’s easy to read with lots of concrete examples. I think his book “Applied Economics: Thinking Beyond Stage One” is the kind of book that I think more people should read. He takes some common economic interventions, such as rent control, and shows what happens with them over time.
His books on economics, race and discrimination, housing, decision-making and visions on how the world works, have changed my views on many things. In fact, he’s been the most influential writer I’ve ever read.
If you consider Sowell is a libertarian, I think his approach of not labeling himself and simply talking about ideas and their consequences in the real world is the way to go.
Forty years ago, even thirty, legal marijuana and same-sex marriage were fringe positions, and the Libertarian Party was one of the few groups actively advocating for both. Now they are almost totally accepted by Democrats and even by many, perhaps most, Republicans. So that looks like a success for the Socialist Party strategy.
Looks like, but maybe isn't. It would be worthwhile for some sober minded libertarian to analyze what actually happened to change people's views on those issues, both to avoid post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacies and to find out what lessons might apply to other efforts to move politics in a more libertarian direction. I suspect that the applicability will sadly prove limited.
I met your son recently, and I like his approach of working to help people build charter cities. New places with radically different governmental institutions can show people that liberty really does still work, not just in theory, but in practice. We can't change the federal government, or even state governments, without massive buy in from cities across the country. The only way to do *that* is to build cities that work, and show cities that don't how they can emulate those things that work. This will automatically steer the country in the right direction over decades. I don't think there's a faster way to steer such a big ship.
The libertarian movement, way to far to the left. Me any more I'm finding I lean to the right of your Anarcho-capitalism David. Your boy Patri's seasteading is interesting (What happened to Chad Elwartowski and Supranee Thepdet?) Still, that and other, insteadings might be viable.
I suspect the strongest influence we have on the the State of the indigNation is voting with our dollar. However, these days that's severely limited as 'they' define and delimit the market. Don't like LEDs? Wanna buy an incandescent? Sorry, forbidden! Want a car without explosives in your steering wheel to push out an airbag? Sorry, forbidden! Howabout a shower head that passes enough water to shower or a toilet that doesn't take 3 flushes to flush? Sorry, forbidden!
None the less there are ways around and workarounds: Maybe vote with one ounce silver rounds instead of fiat paper or plastic bucks. Might be time to bring back the Yankee Trader (smuggler), "Hey neighbor, I've 3 100 watt bulbs, can let cha have them for 2 rounds each." Perhaps legal chop shops; "Why pay a quarter million for a new Ford? Our rebuilt and refurbished 1970 Rams, sans computers, sans airbags, sans little air pressure sensors in each tire will get you up the hill and back for a quarter of that price!"
Seasteads and other 'steads; Notice on yacht club boards; "BYOB Party June through September, see you at the Sargasso Sea, raft up, pup!" Airstream Trailers bulletin; "Tom's Traveling Trading Post will be at FL Glades get together October, Upper Peninsula Michigan, July."
Milei seems to be a major departure from the general tendency of net failure of libertarianism. But it's probably hard to create good-looking, charismatic and popular figures that are also principled (at least, somewhat).
I don't think we know yet if Millei is principled.
The empirical criticism of the idea that it's not rational to vote is that people vote. The empirical criticism of the idea that it is not rational to inform oneself expensively in order to vote properly is that people read newspapers.
The second is the relevant claim — people cheer at football games too. People read newspapers for entertainment, not actionable information. They make little attempt to get a balanced view of whatever the current issues are. Very few partisans of one side can give an accurate account of the other side's arguments.
I suspect promoting liberty is the surest way to save the world, but not in the way you imagine. The greatest dangers to the world are man-made or natural disasters. Promoting worldwide liberty can result in world peace, thus avoiding global thermonuclear war. Besides, freedom results in prosperity and the advancement of science and technology, which can enable us to avoid some natural disasters, such as a pandemic or an asteroid strike. Other examples could be given.
Of the various ways to promote liberty you mention, the one I judge to be the most effective is to influence public opinion either directly, as Ayn Rand did, or indirectly by influencing other influential people. I suspect you are doing both.
The advancement of science and technology also makes possible some disasters. It's at least arguable, clearly possible, that the recent pandemic was the result of improvements in biotech. Thermonuclear war only became possible due to the advancement of science and technology.
It's common knowledge that science and technology can be misused, but I believe you favor their advancement anyway because their benefits exceed their costs, so I'm unsure of the reason for your objection. I'll proceed on the assumption you just want to see some reply.
The last sentence in my first paragraph was “Other examples could be given”, which I thought might inspire you to think of other ways the advancement of science and technology could save the world. I'll assume “the world” is confined to life on Earth, since life can be destroyed but the material composition of the planet cannot, and we can't seem to have much effect on the rest of the universe.
Here's an example of how science and technology could be used to prevent the extinction of all terrestrial life. Within 7.5 billion years the expansion of the Sun is expected to destroy all life on earth. I doubt that it's physically possible to move the Earth farther from the Sun, but it should be possible to create a fleet of “ark” spacecraft to move terrestrial life forms to a safe place, perhaps ultimately to a planet in another star system. The more science and technology advances, the more life can be saved. Without that advancement, all terrestrial life is doomed.
Misuse is not confined to science and technology. Virtually anything can be misused. Take oxygen and water, which are necessary for life. An arsonist depends on the presence of oxygen to cause destructive fires. A person can be intentionally drowned in water. Surely, like oxygen and water, we are better off with science and technology than without it. It's estimated that the human population was about 3 million just before the Agricultural Revolution, which raised the population to as much as 10 million. The population increased to about 1 billion until the start of the Industrial Revolution in about 1800. Now it's said there are over 7 billion humans. Without advances in science and technology, most of us would not exist because the world would support only a much smaller population.
Granted science and technology can be used to create things capable of killing many people, such as engineered viruses and nuclear weapons. However, in my scenario advances in science and technology would be preceded by advances in liberty. I maintain that justice is consistent with liberty but not with tyranny. (I can defend that claim in another post if you wish, but I'll just assume it for now.) I regard creating a virus capable of killing millions of people and exposing them to extraordinary risk as an injustice. Similarly, indiscriminately killing perhaps 100,000 people with a nuclear weapon is unjust. Such injustices are the works of governments. That is, they are associated with the absence of liberty. If COVID was engineered as you suggest, it was done in an authoritarian country with the aid of tax dollars. I doubt that many people would voluntarily pay to create a virus capable of killing millions including themselves. Nuclear weapons can't be uninvented. But in the absence of governments, they would probably not have been invented in the first place. And free people would be disinclined to pay for the invention of even more terrible weapons.
To summarize, the benefits of advances in science and technology outweigh the costs—especially in a world whose inhabitants enjoy liberty and justice.
You don't dispute my claim that liberty is likely to lead to advances in science and technology. However, despite what I've said above you could still maintain that the costs of such advances exceed the benefits. If so, you should immediately stop arguing for liberty and start making the case for tyranny.
I agree that scientific advance is more likely to make the world better. My point was only that it could have the opposite effect.
Thanks for responding.
“The missing ingredient in the liberty movement is women.” This raises many questions. I suggest a new libertarian, modeled after the new Jew. Here is Gordis on this topic: “It was time for a new Jewish worldview, a new Jewish physique, a new Jewish home, and new Hebrew names. It was time for a ‘new Jew,’ a Jewish people re-born, a people who would flock to the shores of their ancestral homeland and reconstitute themselves as a people. No intellectual mind-experiment, European Zionism was a rugged political movement designed to wrest Palestine from the Ottomans (and later the British) and create a state that Jews from around the world would build together, redeeming not only themselves but the Jewish world from which they hailed.” That is from page 46 of *We Stand Divided.*
Less of an intellectual movement and more of a physical/hands-on/DIY-community movement. Slightly cultish, yet always truth seeking. Less time in front of the computer, more time outside, in the sun, building and growing community. More campfires. More cooking. More family activities. Creating our own music with good lyrics. Better dress. Better food. Better schools. Better writing. The low hanging intellectual fruit has been picked. Intellectual proselytizing is maxed out. Let’s diversify our activities with an eye for enjoyment and community. If you build it, they will come. The women that is.
I'm probably going to offer two responses, because I think I want to address two different topics.
I run tabletop roleplaying games, and have since the 1970s; and I write books for them, and have since the turn of the century. This is a hobby that's very strongly gendered: Game rooms at conventions are full of men, and the discussion groups at Steve Jackson Games attract far more men than women, for example. Nonetheless, over the years, I've had large numbers of women players in my campaigns. I'm currently playing in one campaign, where the GM is a woman, and two of the six players are women; I'm running two, one with four women, one with three women and two men as players.
So how did I get this statistically unusual population of players? Part of it is simply asking: I was always prepared to invite a woman to play if she seemed interested. Part of it is word of mouth: years and years ago, when I suggested to one woman (who has become one of my best players) that she'd be welcome, another woman, whom we were both visiting, assured her that I was "a good GM for women." Part of it may well have been that there were already numbers of women among my players, which was perhaps credible unspoken testimony that I really did have whatever qualities might appeal to such players, and which also meant that my male players faced the critical judgment of multiple women on how they conducted themselves. (Indeed, I allowed any of my players to say they didn't want to play with any other player, and over the years two of my players earned such downvotes from so many other players that I couldn't fit them into a campaign—both of the two male.) And it probably helped that I did my best to be scrupulously fair and to maintain decorum. Some of these may transfer over to gaining women members for groups with other interests, at least small groups.
With gaming, at least, there's also a question of running campaigns that suit the intended market. I've characteristically run one campaign with a focus on adventure, physical action, and combat, and one with a focus on social interaction, relationships, and culture (if I ran a third, it was an experiment of some sort). I had one woman player who was very attracted to action and combat and who commonly ran combat monsters; but running campaigns with more of a social emphasis (for example, my current campaign, a telenovela set in the future Mars of an alternate timeline where a near-anarchocapitalist Brazilian Empire is one of the great world powers, in which a prosperous family are trying to advance their fortunes by building a luxury hotel in a new wing of their city) may have been a selling point. Are there libertarian issues that are of more concern to women than to men?
Like it or not, the US Presidential election is digital…
I do not understand what you mean.
In a small election, say one for a local office, voting for a libertarian may result in getting an elected official. At the national election level, there is near zero chance that a vote for a libertarian will result in getting one elected since the number of Democrats and Republicans will swamp the voting numbers. The end result is voting libertarian will not elect one. Libertarians might change the result of an election by changing the winner of a state. So, it’s my contention that you aren’t really voting for an electable candidate, but casting a protest vote. You’re much better off voting for the Democrat or Republican that best represents your agenda, if you want your vote to count for something…
Up until 2020, I lived in California. It didn't matter which party I voted for for most offices, and especially for president and senator: California was going to elect the Democrat. Now I live in Kansas, partly because California is unaffordable and partly because its legislative and regulatory climate is actively malevolent. I'm fairly sure that no matter how I vote, Kansas will go for Republican presidents and senators.
Pretty sure meaning there’s a chance if you vote D or R. No chance if you vote L…
In California, at least, the chance of the state's going for a Republican statewide in a federal election is small enough to be negligibly different from zero. You can calculate tiny probabilities if you like, but when they get small enough the expected payoff doesn't justify any effort.
Why does Georgia have so many woman libertarians?
I don't know.
You could do worse than look across the Atlantic at Nigel Farage's success, first with UKIP and now a possible repeat with the Reform party. UKIP won no UK Parliamentary elections other than one - though they did win a significant number of seats in the pointless European Parliament - and only ever had one MP but they provided the driver for Brexit and did much of that driving while they had no members elected in either Europe or the UK.
UKIP was of course a very single issue party, but the single issue is not unadjacent to the interests of libertarians, and it attracted support from people who were of libertarian bent such as the bloggers at samizdata.net (and me FWIW).
Reform seems to be trying to do the same thing on a slightly broader level. Maybe it will work. It won't be a one election and done thing, but they are likely to help drive the Tories into deserved meltdown at the next general election (any time now) which ought to concentrate minds.
I discuss both UKIP and the Liberal Democrats as of interest to libertarians, both as examples of new parties and as having some libertarian elements, in one of the chapter drafts on my web site:
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Ideas%20I/Libertarianism/The%20Rest%20of%20the%20World.pdf
The LibDims are not, IMHO, really a libertarian party and they don't really try to claim they are because the claim wouldn't pass the sniff test. Of course, originally part of them was the original liberal party that was indeed not unadjacent to libertarians in terms free trade, speech and the like but those days are past and the LibDims are just another big-state loving party, indeed they are very very pro EU and want the UK to undo Brexit (at least I think they still do).
[See also the FDP in Germany]
You should probably look closer at the Reform party. I haven't paid much attention to it but it looks like it could be a decent libertarian-ish party
Indeed, I seriously doubt that the American Revolution would have succeeded if the women had been against it.