Ever Heard Anarcho-Capitalism?

The presidential victory of Javier Milei in Argentina puts at the head of state the first self-proclaimed "anarcho-capitalist" in modern history or probably the first person ever to win an election at this level to identify with that term. But what this is? So here is the explanation as Jeffrey A. Tucker understands it.

- Jeffrey A. Tucker

Central to the idea is that society does not require an entrenched entity of legalized compulsion and coercion called the state in order to enjoy the enforcement of property rights, contracts, defense, and commercial society generally. The fusing of the terms anarchism and capitalism is not a plan for the social order but rather a prediction of what would happen in a civilized community in the absence of the state.

Myth one: it is not "right-wing," contrary to the New York Times, the Guardian, and a thousand other venues. The "right" in Prussia was for the unity of church, state, and business. The "right" in France was for the divine right of the monarchy to rule. The "right" in America is all over the place in U.S. history but hardly consistent for liberty as a first principle of socio-political life. The notion of "anarcho-capitalism" is outside the left-right binary.

Myth two: the "anarcho" part has nothing to do with Antifa or chaos. The use of the term anarchism here means only the abolition the state and its replacement with property relationships, voluntary action, private law, and contract enforcement as provided by free enterprise. It does not mean lawless; it means law as an extension of human volition and social evolution rather than imposition from above. Order is the daughter of liberty, not the mother, said Proudhon, and anarchocapitalists would agree.