Chris,

the text was restrained yet engaging, and it was well worth reading.

in your opinion do you see too much convergance of isms in debates?

there of course needs to be a convergance of isms at points - needing to unify (as you rightly point out) the gulf between self/national interest and that of international/moral responsibility.

another quick Q in an australian context. what in your opinion is the moral commonground? Further, what effect does this have on social function in this country?

regards

You can add to your list the world private central banking system.They too must go.

Individual countries can raise their own capital.When Govts borrow from the Central banks,they conjure the money from cyber space and loan it at interest back to Govts.Let individual Govts raise their own money since the market will naturally devalue their currency if they print more money than their ability to produce.

We don't need to be party to such banking systems that enslave people in debt.

Matt Keyter
"The economics and political philosophy in Australia and the west generally (genesis point 50's-60's) - has been the Austrian School through the political philosophy of neo-liberalism (in all guises) and it is needless to say it has been predominant to the point of absolute."

Matt, you haven't read any original sources of Austrian School economics or political philosophy, have you? Please answer.

If so, what were they? because you certainly haven’t understood the first thing about what you read.

You can access it here: www.mises.org

If Austrian School principles had been 'predominant to the point of absolute' there would be:
- no government policies of 'economic management' causing economic chaos, poverty, disadvantage, legal corruption and dependence on the state at every turn
- no government's self-interested manipulation of the money supply with the resulting booms and busts
- no WTO, IMF or World Bank
- no taking money from Australian citizens and handing it out to corrupt third world governments
- no legal tender laws: a free market in the supply of money
- no handouts for corporations
- no privileges for lobby groups
- no subsidies for industry
- little or no taxation
- little or no government lands
- no government departments whose function is forcible re-distribution of property
- no compulsory, state-sponsored, state-dictated indoctrination centres for political correctness aka government schools
- no restrictions on trade with other countries
- no military adventures overseas in the service of the American empire
- no criminalising of consensual private acts between adults under the name of industrial relations, occupational licensing, or consumer protection
- no race-based laws and policies.

The result would be a small state charged with protecting society from internal and external thugs, to maximize peaceable social co-operation, to minimize the use of aggression as the basis of social co-operation, a steadily rising standard of living, and steadily falling prices: in short, peace, freedom and prosperity

What this means is that perhaps 90 to 95 percent of Australia's current political and economic landscape does *not* comply with the principle of liberty (you should be free to do what you want, so long as you are not aggressing against others). It also does not comply with the philosophy of the Austrian school.

It is laughably ignorant to suggest that the Austrian School world-view is is the predominant political philosophy in Australia. The predominant philosophy is of state-managed capitalism for purposes of national socialism, in other words fascism, in which the powers of government are presumed to be rightfully unlimited, as witness virtually all the discussion of government in the mass media and on this website.

We Australians have forgotten what it is like to live in a free country, where every part of our existence is not checked, registered, taxed and regulated by government as if we were cattle. We have come to accept the slave philosophy that the state rightly exercises significant overriding rights of ownership over us from cradle to grave, in exchange for our whining dependence. The predominant creed is that our freedom is and should be whatever is left over after the state takes and does whatever it wants, subject only to the need for politicians to bribe as many people as seems expedient for them to get back into office and repeat the same lies and thefts next time around.

Matt Keyter,

As far as isms are concerned, they will alwys be around. Different nations, depending on their wealth and stability, will lead many commentators to gravitate towards certain concepts that suit their circumstances. while we in the West view liberalism as dominant, some in poorer nations view the world through structural marxist terms.

As for Australia, though I remain supportive of liberalism as the concept most capable of balancing national and international aspirations, I am worried about just how our policy makers will respond in the future. will they pander to certain interest groups or key demographics to enhance electoral prospects?

how we respond in the future will be key to effective Western leadership for world? If we do not ensure that reform is fair and still progressive (although latter is subjective0, then heaven help us if china and India rise much further to force our society to be that much more competitive. Democracies now face an immense test.

Wing Ah Ling,

I agree with what you 100%. And regret not qualifying what I wrote.

I posted a comment on the article ‘The freemarket bad for the economy but good for schools’ below is an excerpt from that, that will address part of your query:

I kindly suggest to Kevin Rudd (if he hasn’t) to read The Great Transformation (Polanyi) and The Road to Serfdom by (Hayek) [who in my opinion may I say is grossly misrepresented by the rotting neo-liberal fruit - in the sense that in what the ‘Hayekians’ parlay as his, is no way an adequate or respectful positioning of his philosophies] before boring us with any more essays.

I would like to establish and for you to accept my use of the Austrian School as a philosophical base from which economic policy has been originated from and been motivated by in recent decades. The poilitcal philosophy that best suits today is that of Rawls based on a Kantian-liberalism and reinforced through the likes of Dworkin and Ackerman who put forth theoretical points of view (not grasping the reality of humanity) and that political philosophy is the application to the constitution of the state, and to that a constructed moral view point that is somewhat baseless in human history. Absolute is the fact that no modern society is wholly governed by principles of the Austrian School. Our systems are compromises with disparate aspects from philosophies taken and used as tools of governance, control, and in cases servitude. the thrust of 'predominant to the point of absolute' is the use of the Austrian School as the basis for discussion in the ‘public’ sphere of what governmental economic agendas have been i.e. most recently Kevin Rudd in The Monthly lambasting Thatcher, Reagan, & Howard (Howard of all people - mindfully forgetting Keating & Hawke) and painting them with the brush of evil doer equals ‘economic rationalist’. I conclude with my agreeing with your second post when you state the functional reality of what is actually occurring in this state.

Daviy once I’m allowed I’ll respond.

regard