Freedom Book of the Month for November 2000:
Escape from Leviathan: Liberty, Welfare and Anarchy Reconciled
by J.C. Lester
St. Martin's Press, 2000, 246 pp.

J.C. Lester sets a tall order for himself in "Escape from Leviathan:" he wants to establish that "economic rationality, interpersonal liberty, human welfare and private-property anarchy do not conflict." He makes his case admirably and elegantly.

Exclusive of notes and index, the book is only 204 pages. That's an awfully short book in which to reach conclusions on the nature of rationality, liberty, welfare and anarchy, let alone to reconcile them into a coherent whole, but Lester doesn't flinch from his task. In straightforward terms, he addresses the pantheon of free-market economists, philosophers and political theorists.

Lester's methodology is critical rationalism, the theory of knowledge propounded by Karl Popper and W.W. Bartley. This method holds that all knowledge is conjectural -- that the best we can hope to accomplish is an approximation of truth. Theories are set up and knocked down. Theories can only be tested, not justified. They can be disproven, but not proven, and thus the function of testing is to knock down the false and narrow the focus to what is possibly true.

In "Escape from Leviathan," Lester applies critical rationalism to everything from Austrian economics a la Mises and Kirzner to the theoretical libertarianism of Robert Nozick and Murray Rothbard, with interesting results. Other subjects of analysis include the work of Tibor Machan (a sound choice, as his work is more open to analysis than the simplified polemic of Ayn Rand, whose ideas Machan has himself adopted, analyzed and expanded upon) and David Friedman.

For obvious reasons, not everyone will agree with Lester's conclusions -- if, indeed, we can call them conclusions. Since he operates in a critical rationalist context, Lester will be the first to admit that his ideas are as subject to falsification as anyone else's. All in all, though, I think that "Escape from Leviathan" will stand the test of time along with many of the works it considers. This is a valiant, and arguably successful, attempt to defend the anarchist position against accusations of incompatibility with liberty, welfare and reason.

Order "Escape from Leviathan" from Laissez Faire Books for $29.95

October 2000: The Art of Political War by David Horowitz

September 2000: An Enemy of the State by Justin Raimondo

August 2000: The Triumph of Liberty by Jim Powell

July 2000: A Generation Divided by Rebecca Klatch

June 2000: Law's Order by David Friedman

May 2000: Forge of the Elders by L. Neil Smith

April 2000: Reciprocia by Richard G. Rieben

March 2000: The Art of Fiction: A Guide for Writers and Readers by Ayn Rand

February 2000: Addiction is a Choice by Jeffrey A. Schaler

January 2000: Revolutionary Language by David C. Calderwood

Special December 1999 Feature: The Freedom Book of the Year: Send in the Waco Killers: Essays on the Freedom Movement, 1993-1998 by Vin Suprynowicz

November 1999: Conquests and Cultures by Thomas Sowell

October 1999: A Way To Be Free by Robert LeFevre, edited by Wendy McElroy

September 1999: Assassins (Left Behind) by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins

August 1999: Don't Shoot the Bastards (Yet): 101 More Ways to Salvage Freedom by Claire Wolfe

July 1999: The Mitzvah by L. Neil Smith and Aaron Zelman

June 1999: The Incredible Bread Machine by R.W. Grant

May 1999: Send in the Waco Killers by Vin Suprynowicz

April 1999: It Still Begins with Ayn Rand by Jerome Tuccille

March 1999: The Dictionary of Free-Market Economics by Fred Foldvary

February 1999: Feminist Interpretations of Ayn Rand edited by Mimi Reisel Gladstein and Chris Matthew Sciabarra