Do Freedom and Equality Ever Go Together in Practice?

One of the more interesting notions that most of us seem to accept at one or another point in our lives is the notion that freedom and equality are incompatible. 

I have heard that notion advanced in this manner: Jones has many marketable talents, while Smith has few marketable talents.  Thus, if Jones is free to make as much money as he can, he will make more money than Smith.  So, for Jones and Smith to be financially equal, something must done to limit Jones' earnings.  But anything you do to limit Jones' earnings deprives Jones of his freedom. Consequently, you cannot have both freedom and equality at the same time.

Now, it seems to me the notion you cannot have both freedom and equality at the same time is one of those notions that has just enough truth to it to hoodwink many of us into generalizing from such examples as "Smith and Jones" above to whole societies.  However, the more one examines the notion, the less warranted that sort of generalization might seem.

The problem is history.

The rarest complex societies in history have been those in which most people were more or less free.  But those rare, relatively free societies have also tended at the same time to be more egalitarian.

Tocqueville, for instance, noticed that white males living in the America of the 1830s were both freer and more equal than white males living in either the England or France of the same period.  Again, both male and female citizens of the Roman Republic seem to have been both freer and more equal than their counterparts living in the Roman Empire.

So the notion that freedom and equality are incompatible, while perhaps seeming to have some reason and logic on its side, does not always pan out in practice.  But if that is indeed the case, then why is it the case?

I think the reason freedom and equality often go together in practice -- if not so often in theory -- is ultimately because of human nature.  Plutarch observed 2000 years ago that no republic had ever long withstood a large gap between rich and poor.  It seems that whenever such a gap is allowed to exist, some of the rich inevitably use their wealth to gather to themselves the reins of power.  And, because they are far richer than most anyone else, there are few if any people who can effectively oppose them. Thus, they subjugate the rest of us.

If all of that is true enough, then it follows that equality is not the enemy of freedom -- at least not in practice -- but rather its companion.  For, if there is a relatively small gap between rich and poor, then comparatively more people will be in a position to effectively oppose the usurping of power by another group of people.

At least, that's my guess why history seems to show that freedom and equality often enough go together in practice.  What's your guess?

Help! I am Being Assailed by a Bizarre and Shocking Notion Involved in a Theory of History!

Few things can shock the worldly epistemologist. Even those folks who insist the Red Herring is not a proper fallacy of logic must fail to scandalize the man or woman who has seen it all.

Seen the careless confusion of analytic and synthetic propositions. Seen operational definitions rise and fall in faddish favor.  Seen whole and entire epistemologies come and go.

No, the most experienced epistemologists are very much like old sailors who have been to nearly every major port: Not many sights are left to shock either one of those old hands.

Yet, I must confess to being horrified by Hans-Hermann Hoppe's notions of historical truth.  Horrified!

• Hoppe begins his argument by asserting that history "reveals nothing about causes and effects" since "each sequence of empirical events is compatible with any number of rival, mutually incompatible interpretations." 
• He then goes on, "To make a decision regarding such incompatible interpretations, we need a theory. By theory I mean a proposition whose validity does not depend on further experience but can be established a priori."
• And then he follows up his strange argument by reasserting that, "Experience may thus illustrate a theory. But historical experience can neither establish a theorem nor refute it."

If you're like me, you must now -- despite your worldliness -- feel significantly more shocked than if someone were to suggest to you that you might someday wake up with a hang-over in a South China Sea whorehouse to find yourself in bed with a grinning orangutang -- and not a truth-table in sight!  That's to say, Hoppe has suggested a notion of history no less bizarre! 

So, let's put Hoppe's notion in perspective.  Every science in one way or another makes use of experience to test and collaborate its hypotheses. But Hoppe is insisting that experience cannot be used to test and collaborate hypotheses in history.  Why?

Well, Hoppe argues that any sequence of historical events is open to multiple, mutually exclusive interpretations, and that historical experience cannot provide a way to chose between those interpretations.

Now, if that is true -- genuinely true -- then history can tell us nothing beyond mere fact. "In the centuries following Columbus' arrival, many native Americans died from diseases of Old World origin."  Presumably, Hoppe would allow that history could establish the die-off as fact.

But suppose we had an hypothesis: "The presence of Europeans in the Americas brought about a flourishing of native American well-being."  According to Hoppe, no set of facts -- no matter how great their number, nor how relevant their meaning -- could ever establish that hypothesis or refute it.

That's because, for Hoppe, historical facts are always compatible with mutually exclusive interpretations of them.  In other words, for his notion to be more than mere noise, Hoppe must argue that the die-off of native Americans is a fact that is just as compatible with the hypothesis, "The presence of Europeans in the Americas brought about a flourishing of native American well-being", as it is compatible with the competing hypothesis, "The presence of Europeans in the Americas brought about a decrease in native American well-being."

If he cannot show the fact of the die-off is just as compatible with the one hypothesis as it is with the other, then he cannot logically demonstrate his notion that historical experience is unable to provide a means to choose between mutually exclusive interpretations.

For that, and for other reasons, I submit that Hoppe's bizarre notion of history is mere noise.

Yet, why, if it is mere noise, does Hoppe advance his notion of history in the first place?  I am largely speculating here, but I suspect Hoppe does it in order to support his political, social, and economic theories.

You see, Hoppe wants to argue that the "natural order" of humanity is a stateless society of private property owners.  But what we know of history renders that notion absurd -- even more bizarre than the notion we've just discussed.  So -- and here is my speculation -- Hoppe decided to redefine how hypotheses are tested in history, rather than admit his "natural order" is a joke.

Bottom Line: Regardless of his motives for them, Hoppe's ideas are bad enough that, like McDonald's "hamburgers" and Ayn Rand's "philosophy", they are bound to become popular.