by Benjamin Marks, Economics.org.au editor-in-chief

So now we find ourselves in a similar position to where those who formed the Workers Party found themselves: just as we have heard Hoppe, so they had read Rothbard. And then the question they had, which is the question we now have: how to act on those ideas?

Professor Hoppe’s insights can leave you wondering how best to act on them. But as Hoppe has said, one thing you can do immediately is stop using the term limited government. Gillard and Gittins do not support unlimited government, so when you say you support limited government you are not saying much. Yet that is precisely what the CIS, the IPA, Andrew Bolt, etc, do.

It is generally thought that there are two ways of judging the Workers Party: one is by how many members and votes it attracted; the other is by how effective its education program was. But what experience teaches us is that the ideas of the Workers Party failed to attract popular support, not because the Workers Party campaigners were outsmarted by others, but because they were outstupided. They threw pearls before swine, and that is all they could have done.

But there is a third way of judging the Workers Party: and that is that they knew the truth, and communicated it in a clear, fun and largely uncompromising manner. In that sense, they were a brilliant success and the high-point of free-market advocacy in Australia. The CIS, the IPA, Andrew Bolt, etc, are all pinkos in comparison, who have gone out of their way to ignore this passage from the Workers Party Platform:

Taxation is theft. Taxation (which is legalised coercion and robbery by government) is no less immoral than coercion and robbery committed by private individuals.

With Economics.org.au Neville Kennard has been shoving libertarian arguments at many of you for over a year now, and most of you have refused to engage with his arguments. So if you want to know why the Workers Party failed, you only need to ask yourselves for why you don’t engage with libertarian arguments.

Lastly, I want to make one comment on various judgements of the Workers Party. Just because we are able to say that certain aspects of the Workers Party failed, it does not necessarily mean we know how to do it better. For example, in our eyes the Libertarian Party might seem a better and more straightforward name, but most voters consider libertarianism to be libertinism, so it is by no means a sure success.

Even when Lang Hancock is as rich as can be, and demands that he be allowed to be even richer, and everyone perceives him as greedy. Even that, I do not believe is bad for libertarian advocacy, since it means criticism of capitalists as lazy can be put to rest. And that is very significant. Why Workers Party activists did not employ that line of argument I do not know; it would have allowed them to be on the attack rather than apologising for having such rich supporters, which is a bad look.

And even when Lang Hancock talks about how mining is the most important industry, describing his philosophy using the German term mining uber alles [mining above all else], with all the WW2 baggage that entails, even that I am not convinced is bad for libertaran advocacy. Hancock should have exaggerated his eccentricities even more, he should have been more charismatic. Hancock was often on the defensive, when he should have been on the attack. For example, repeatedly saying that he is not an academic and that he does not wish his enemies on other people as a reason not to join the Workers Party. Anyone who is serious about their beliefs wishes their enemies on everyone.

Now on the Workers Party panel here, we have a ghostwriter for Lang Hancock. It is true that Lang Hancock is dead, but that hasn’t stopped me from calling him a staff member of Economics.org.au, because I employ his work, so I am interested to know what I would need to do to become Hancock’s ghostwriter today, and write his great magnum opus. I have a good title in mind for it, and when you hear it, you will see how Hancock could have transcended his disadvantageous eccentricities and turned them into positive ones by showing no shame or hesitancy whatsoever. The title of my proposed upcoming book by Lang Hancock on how Australia will be the world’s quarry is also German sounding. My proposed title is: Mine Camp.

I have done some research in the panel members and I have put up nearly 100 items featuring the Workers Party at www.WorkersParty.info. According to my research, according to a 1976 anonymous article in freeEnterprise magazine:

David Hart is 18 years old. David not only is the youngest libertarian member of the Workers Party, he is also one of the most well-read, knowledgeable and intelligent libertarians in Australia. He has an impressive command of libertarian philosophy, and will be intimately involved in the informal education group at present being set up in N.S.W.

Viv Forbes is 37 years old. A business analyst and geologist with Mt. Isa Mines, Viv Forbes got the Party going in Queensland. He is a quiet, retiring man, devoid of ego problems, who has quietly devoted large amounts of time, energy and his own money to the Queensland branch of the W.P. His official position is that of provisional Secretary of the Party in Qld. He is a libertarian.

But this is enough from me, and maybe to start us off, each of the panel members can introduce themselves, say what their various roles and titles were in the Workers Party and maybe share an anecdote or two. This will all be quite informal and other Workers Party veterans especially are invited to participate and demand a microphone.