The Non-Aggression Principle

Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Sat, 10 Aug 2002 01:43:16 GMT
by Bill St. Clair
9 August, 2002

I've read a quite lot over my short time as a libertarian about the basic premise of libertarian thought, the Non-Aggression Principle, or NAP. This article is an attempt to explain the NAP and explore a few of its ramifications. It is intended primarily for newcomers to the concept.

The following is my favorite expression of the NAP, scarfed from The Libertarian Enterprise:

"A libertarian is a person who believes that no one has the right, under any circumstances, to initiate force against another human being, or to advocate or delegate its initiation. Those who act consistently with this principle are libertarians, whether they realize it or not. Those who fail to act consistently with it are not libertarians, regardless of what they may claim."

-- L. Neil Smith

We could argue about whether this the best way to express the NAP, and I've read articles that go on at length about just that, but I'm not going to do that here. I just want a short, pithy, phrase that is a good way to remember this simple moral basis for life, and Mr. Smith's three sentences work for me.

Another way to express the NAP, as you might tell to your child, is:

Don't ever hurt another person, except to defend yourself or someone you care about. Don't ever steal another person's stuff. Don't ask someone else to do either for you or tell someone you think it would be OK to do either.
Said that way, it's pretty obvious that most of us are believers, at least individually, in the NAP. For some reason, however, many people believe that the NAP no longer applies when the people you're asking to hurt another person or steal his stuff are elected government representatives or the police.

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