Minarchism

Minarchism is a libertarian view about the proper size of government. Minarchists argue that a state is needed to protect individual rights, but that it should do nothing more. Its legitimate tasks are to keep order through police, settle disputes through courts, enforce contracts and defend the country through a military. Education, health care, pensions, welfare and most economic regulation, they argue, should be left to markets, families, charities and voluntary associations. The name combines the words minimal and archy, meaning rule. It is also known as the night-watchman state.

The idea of a strictly limited state draws on classical liberal thought. Wilhelm von Humboldt, in The Limits of State Action, written in 1792, argued that the state should concern itself only with security. Frédéric Bastiat, in The Law (1850), argued that the law should only protect persons and property. Herbert Spencer defended a narrow role for government in the 1800s. The phrase night-watchman state was first used by the German socialist Ferdinand Lassalle in 1862 as a criticism, but the label was later adopted by supporters. The most influential modern defense is Robert Nozick's Anarchy, State, and Utopia (1974), which argued that a minimal state could arise without violating anyone's rights and that any more extensive state would violate them. Ayn Rand and Ludwig von Mises also supported a limited state rather than no state.

Strict minarchists limit the state to police, courts and the military. Moderate minarchists also accept a few public goods, such as roads or basic infrastructure. Some ground their view in natural rights, as Nozick did, while others defend it on economic or practical grounds. Minarchists differ from anarcho-capitalists, who think even security and courts can be provided privately, and from classical liberals, who usually accept a somewhat wider range of state activities.

Critics on the left argue that a minimal state would leave the poor, sick and elderly without reliable support and would allow large inequalities to grow. Mainstream economists argue that some goods, such as clean air or public health, are hard to provide privately and need broader government action. From the other direction, anarcho-capitalists argue that minarchism is inconsistent, since even a minimal state collects taxes without consent and holds a monopoly on force. Some conservatives argue that it neglects the shared institutions that hold a society together.

No modern state fits the minarchist model. Some historians describe parts of nineteenth century Britain and the early United States as closer to a limited state than today's governments, with low taxes and few social programs. Minarchist ideas continue to influence libertarian parties, think tanks and debates about cutting government spending, privatizing services and reducing regulation.