Liberty Chronicles

We have the ability to readily appreciate this transition and its impact on overall economic productivity. We live in a vastly richer world than has ever existed before and every one of us above the bare level of subsistence lives incomparably better than kings, emperors, and the wealthiest elites even just a century ago. But in many ways, medieval life was stolen from people during the fledgling days of Early Modernity, and libertarians—rather than wholesale ignoring or rejecting this legacy—should learn to reconcile with it, that we might avoid similar calamities.

Thomas’s Morton’s New English Canaan, “Original of the Natives”

Snelgrave’s A New Account of Some Parts of Guinea and the Slave Trade (1734)

Law, Robin. The Slave Coast of West Africa, 1550-1750: The Impact of the Atlantic Slave Trade on an African Society. Oxford: Clarendon Press. 1991.

Rediker & Linebaugh. Many-Headed Hydra: The Hidden History of the Revolutionary Atlantic. Boston: Beacon Press. 2000.

Taylor, Alan. American Colonies: The Settling of North America. New York: Penguin Books. 2001.

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When you change your perspective on past events by changing the sources of information, the facts of your narrative change as well. We have some decent tools to guide our exploration of the past, so let’s start digging.

The First Charter of Virginia; April 10, 1606

Charters to Columbus and Walter Raleigh

The Dutch Path from Explorers to Monopolists

Rediker & Linebaugh. Many-Headed Hydra: The Hidden History of the Revolutionary Atlantic. Boston: Beacon Press. 2000.

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History is the grand catalog of human action in the past. At its broadest, it encompasses everything that everyone everywhere has ever done.If all history is about individual actions, and all individual actions are based on some sort of perceived self-interest on the part of the actor, one may conclude that chronicles of an historical actor’s life would reveal patterns about how they expected to fulfill those interests.

Further Readings/References:
Rothbard, “The Conspiracy Theory of History, Revisited,” Reason (April 1977).

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Methodological individualism is the principle that only individuals act—only individuals consciously apply means toward the fulfilment of ends. whenever we investigate society we must do so through the experiences and actions of the individuals which compose it.

Mises, Theory and History: An Interpretation of Social and Economic Evolution. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund. 2005.

George H. Smith & Marilyn Moore, eds. Individualism: A Reader. Washington, D.C.: The Cato Institute. 2015.

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We overview Marxism and classical liberalism so we can get a very full picture of what produces, change over time.

Further Readings/References:

On Marxism, see: Marx, Karl. “A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy” (1859) from Lewis S. Feuer, ed. Marx and Engels: Basic Writings on Politics and Philosophy (Garden City, NY: Anchor. 1959)

On Classical Liberalism: The collected works of William Leggett are available here:

https://archive.org/details/collectionofpoliwla01legg

https://archive.org/details/collectionofpolilg02legg

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By studying history, though, we empower ourselves to challenge received wisdom and create knowledge of our own. Sometimes doing history from below (rather than above) is as simple as broadening the scope of your evidence beyond the relatively controllable published record. It might mean deep dives into personal diaries, letters, newspapers, pop and material culture, archeological evidence, or the introduction of a variety of methodological approaches to oft-studied subjects.

Bertolt Brecht

Leonard Read’s “I, Pencil,” 

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Welcome to the first installment of Liberty Chronicles!

Everything you were taught about why the world is the way it is was planted in your mind. What does the development of the bathtub have to do with how we think about history? On first glance, it might seem to contribute very little. It is, after all, only a mundane and humble tub.

Further Reading:

For a history of the history of the bathtub, see:  Wendy McElroy, “The Bathtub, Mencken, and War” https://fee.org/articles/the-bathtub-mencken-and-war/

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Join host Dr. Anthony Comegna on a series of libertarian explorations into the past. Liberty Chronicles combines innovative libertarian thinking about history with specialist interviews, primary and secondary sources, and answers to listener questions. At its most useful, studying history is a sort of purgative process through which we can better understand past actors’ motivations and mistakes; we then use this wisdom to refine our own behavior as individuals. By approaching humanity’s past ‘from below’ and treating subjects as individuals and historical agents, Liberty Chronicles will help you navigate the present and future.

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