Political Libertarianism Is Not Corporatism

Libertarianism of a Christian and secular variety reduces down to one primary goal: disallowing governments from having any power derived from unjust or needless laws by eliminating those laws.  Some misrepresentations of this basic fact exist both inside and outside of libertarian circles, such as the idea held by some conservatives or liberals that libertarianism is equivalent to anarchy.  Another false description holds that libertarianism is rooted in selfishness (as opposed to the human rights of each individual).  Yet another holds that a libertarian government would only punish people for directly inflicting unjust physical or financial harm on others.  One of the most popular misconceptions, however, insists that libertarianism is an excuse to let large companies take control of communities.

Denouncing "big government" only to want enormous businesses to control everyone's daily lives is utterly hypocritical, and thus no genuine, consistent libertarian of the Christian or secular kind would ever embrace corporatism!  At that point, businesses would be the government, and a very large government at that.  Corporatism is therefore contrary to true libertarianism.  It is literally the opposite!  Small government is not sought after in order to make room for a corporate empire the same size as the big governments that came before.  Anything else leaps into blatant hypocrisy!  Only thinking about the concepts without making assumptions is necessary to prove this.

The lack of big government does not logically necessitate that powerful businesses will swoop in to replace whatever previous government stood in place.  Moreover, businesses can only sustain their financial power if someone supplies them with funding or other capital, and thus, short of receiving resources from some unlikely means, consumers have the ability to temporarily or permanently hurt a business if they consistently boycott abusive or domineering companies.  It is not as if consumers are forever powerless to bring major companies to their knees in all circumstances.

Of course, it is always easier for non-rationalists to misrepresent ideas they do not understand than it is to remain silent or contemplate without making assumptions.  By virtue of being a minority position as it is, libertarianism has fewer proponents to clarify what exactly it does and does not entail, and so easily avoidable misconceptions are perpetuated by people too illogical to sidestep fallaciously conceiving of libertarianism and not affiliated with actual libertarians who could correct them.  Since many are too philosophically inept to avoid misrepresenting political, moral, or other abstract concepts on their own, straw man fallacies abound.

Libertarianism is not corporatism, just as libertarianism is not anarchy, and therefore support for libertarianism is not the endorsement of a world where mega-corporations with no legal oversight reign over powerless consumers.  This straw man does not reveal some glaring flaw in political libertarianism, but it does bring to light how conceptually ignorant the advocates of this misconception are.  Political straw man fallacies might be espoused with heightened zeal around elections every four years, but they are just as false and pathetic now as they were during every previous election cycle.