Austro-Anarchist Libertarian Legal Theory

I appeared on the Gene Basler Show (May 30, 2010), discussing a variety of anarcho-libertarian matters–environmentalism, nuclear power, state propaganda in government schools, class action lawsuits, reparations, how to achieve an anarcho-libertarian society, animal rights, positive rights and obligations, forced heirship, and so on (an edited transcript to appear as a chapter in Gene Basler, Environmental Non-Policy: Interviews on Environment, War and Liberty, forthcoming August 2011).

Transcript:

Gene: I’m pleased to welcome as my guest Stephan Kinsella. Are you there, Stephan?

Stephan Kinsella: I’m here. Glad to be here, Gene.

Gene: Thanks for coming on. Let me read Stephan’s profile on Wikipedia: “Kinsella is General Counsel of Applied Opto-Electronics, Incorporated, of Sugar Land, Texas. A practicing intellectual property attorney and former adjunct professor of law at South Texas College of Law, where he taught computer law, Kinsella is actively involved with libertarian legal and political theory, and is adjunct scholar of the Mises Institute, as well as the former Book Review Editor for the Institute’s Journal of Libertarian Studies. He is also a contributor to the news and opinion blog at LewRockwell.com and is the creator of Libertarian Papers, a peer-reviewed online journal published under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. He writes that, after college, he “began to put more emphasis on Austrian economics and paleo-libertarian insights of Rothbard, Hans-Hermann Hoppe and Rockwell”.

“Kinsella’s legal publications include books and articles about patent law, contract law, e-commerce law, international law and other topics. Kinsella has also published and lectured on a variety of libertarian topics, often combining libertarian and legal analysis. Kinsella’s views on contract theory, causation and the law, intellectual property, and rights theory (in particular his Estoppel Theory) are his main contributions to libertarian theory.

“In contract theory, he extends Murray Rothbard’s and Williamson Evers’ title transfer theory of contract, linking it with inalienability theory while also attempting to clarify that theory. Title transfer theory of contract: Kinsella sets forth a theory of causation that attempts to explain why remote actors can be liable under libertarian theory. He gives non-utilitarian arguments for intellectual property being incompatible with libertarian property rights principles. He advances the discourse ethics argument for the justification of individual rights, using an extension of the concept of Estoppel.”

Welcome to the show, Stephan.

Stephan Kinsella: Thanks very much, Gene.

Gene: Okay. Here at Anarcho-Environmentalism, we, namely I, argue that there are indeed real environmental concerns out there. We argue that air pollution, water pollution, etc., are indeed real environmental concerns, that Global Climate Change ain’t one of ‘em, and that market and voluntary solutions are preferable to government or policy-based solutions. I guess my first question for you is, as an expert in patent law, do you think the existence of patent law is really nothing more than just one more way government runs block for favored and well-connected market participants by protecting environmentally irresponsible means and methods of production? And if so, does this not logically follow that patent law harms the environment? [click to continue…]