Freedom, Justice, and Economics

Since the Iraq Study Group released its report on December 6, 2006, many of its recommendations have come under fire from the Bush Administration. Prominently among the attacked recommendations, the report recommended revoking the blank check that’s been extended to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and replacing it with promises that continuing support will be contingent on measurable progress. Put differently, the Iraq Study Group (led by James Baker and Lee Hamilton) advocated creating incentives for the Iraqi political leadership to solve the problems they face. These incentives have been decried by the Bush Administration.
Economists and conservatives generally believe that people respond to incentives. Following this line in many other cases, the Bush Administration has advocated sharp reductions in social welfare programs and spending. For example, in simplified form, the main argument for Social Security privatization is that private accounts would increase incentives for private saving. Opposition to welfare also emerged from the logic that entitling the poor to perpetual government support problematically removed incentives for them to figure out how to make it on their own.
As I see it, we have here a question for economists and a potential opportunity for Democrats: Is there good reason to oppose tough incentives for Iraqi politcians while advocating incentives for America’s poor, or is the Bush Administration being hypocritical?

No, I’m not advocating resurrecting fascism– but I do advocate resurrecting “fascism” as an incredibly useful straw man to combat. It sounds so much nastier and more threatening than “conservatism” or even “archconservatism,” and may strike a resonanance with the worst excesses of the unitary executive philosophy.

Many of the ideas advocated by liberals, progressives, and Democrats in America today derive from the one, true, positive, unmentioned progressive virtue: Justice.

The intimate understanding that many people in our communities work ferociously hard and are poorly compensated makes us feel that they deserve more. When we as individuals and as communities share our prosperity with them, we thereby pursue Justice.

Society’s awareness that the prosperity of some, like Ken Lay, sometimes comes at the expense of others heightens our concern with unmitigated greed. When we demand that riches be accumulated fairly, we thereby pursue Justice.

We recall the 50s with favor because people then lived up to others’ expectations of them. When we honor our commitments, we thereby pursue Justice.

Freedom is the virtue of the Right; Justice is the virtue of the Left. Both are positive virtues, and neither is inherently superior to the other. Volumes can be written about how these virtues play out in political discourse… and volumes (at least of the Weekly Standard and the National Review) have indeed been written about Freedom. Since 1968’s two great tragedies, in America Justice has had no standard-bearer.

I hope progressive champions will emerge to remind people how service to each other and to the community enhance Justice. I hope these champions will teach that wealth enhances Justice insofar as we all share in the benefits of its acquisition and use. I hope these champions of Justice take heed of the religious leaders who haven’t forgotten.

And I think the wisest champions of Justice will celebrate it as a positive virtue, mindful that Freedom is a positive virtue, too.