Weekendens spørgsmål

Ed Crane, den tidligere præsident for Cato Institute, holdt en præsentation på George Mason University i går. Han stillede et fundamentalt spørgsmål (hattip: Cafe Hayek), som jeg synes alle danskere burde overveje. Her er spørgsmålet for Punditokraternes læsere:

 There are two types of human beings: people who want to interfere in the way other people live their lives, and people who are content to mind their own business.  Which type of people do you think go in to politics?

1 thought on “Weekendens spørgsmål

  1. Niels A Nielsen

    Det behøver man vist ikke en hel weekend til at finde svar på 🙂

    Men problemet er vel ikke så meget, at folk med ønske om at blande sig i andre folks liv har mere lyst til at gå ind i politik, hvis bare det er de andre, der blev stemt ind ved valget.

    Er det ikke et langt større problem, at ikke bare politikere, men langt de fleste intellektuelle, journalister, kulturfolk osv er af den type der mener, at vi må kunne organisere samfundet “rationelt”, så det bliver retfærdigt, godt og lykkeligt? Og at disse grupper opretholder en politisk korrekthed, som får selv borgerligt indstillede til at ville være på “englenes side” og sky “djævelens side” som pesten.

    Nu hattip kom fra Café Hayek, så kom jeg i tanke om, at Hayek har en forklaring på miséren:

    “In general, the more intelligent an educated person is, the more likely he or she now is not only to be a rationalist, but also to hold socialist views (regardless of whether he or she is sufficiently doctrinal to attach to his or her views any label, including ‘socialist’). The higher we climb up the ladder of intelligence, the more we talk with intellectuals, the more likely we are to encounter socialist convictions. Rationalists tend to be intelligent and intellectual; and intelligent intellectuals tend to be socialists.

    One’s initial surprise at finding that intelligent people tend to be socialists diminishes when one realises that, of course, intelligent people will tend to overvalue intelligence, and to suppose that we must owe all the advantages and opportunities that our civilisation offers to deliberate design rather than to follow traditional rules, and likewise to suppose that we can, by excercising our reason, eliminate any remaining undesired features by still more intelligent reflection, and still more appropriate design and ‘rational coordination’ of our undertakings. This leads one to be favourably disposed to the central economic planning and control that lie at the heart of socialism. Of course intellectuals will demand explanations for everything they are expected to do, and will be reluctant to accept practices just because they happen to govern the communities into which they happen to have been born; and this will lead them into conflict with, or at least to a low opinion of, those who quietly accept prevailing rules of conduct”

    [F. A. Hayek, The Fatal Conceit, 1988]

    Ak ja, hvis det problem, at folk med ønske om at blande sig i andre folks liv har mere lyst til at gå ind i politik bare var det mest fundamentale. Jeg vil gerne anbefale bogen, som vist var en af det sidste, Hayek skrev.

    Svar

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