The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to libertarianism:
Libertarianism – political philosophy that upholds liberty as its principal objective. Libertarians seek to maximize autonomy and freedom of choice, emphasizing political freedom, voluntary association and the primacy of individual judgment.
Libertarianism:
SupportsEconomic freedom – the freedom to produce, trade and consume any goods and services acquired without the use of force, fraud or theft.Egalitarianism under the law – the idea that all humans are equal in fundamental worth or social status.Free society – a society in which one has the freedom to obtain the power and resources to fulfill their own potential.Individual responsibility – the idea that a person has moral obligations in some situations.Self-governance – the idea that a people or group are able to exercise all of the necessary functions of power without intervention from any authority which they cannot themselves alter.Self-management – methods, skills, and strategies by which individuals can effectively direct their own activities toward the achievement of objectives, and includes goal setting, decision making, focusing, planning, scheduling, task tracking, self-evaluation, self-intervention, self-development, etc.Self-ownership – the concept of property in one's own person, expressed as the moral or natural right of a person to be the exclusive controller of his own body and life.Voluntary association – a group of individuals who enter into an agreement as volunteers to form a body (or organization) to accomplish a purpose.RejectsAuthoritarianism – a form of social organization characterized by submission to authority.Coercion – the practice of forcing another party to behave in an involuntary manner (whether through action or inaction) by use of threats or intimidation or some other form of pressure or force.Discrimination by the state – a form of collectivism that involves treating people based on the group, class, or category to which that person or thing belongs rather than on individual merit.Imperialism – defined by Dictionary of Human Geography, is "the creation and/or maintenance of an unequal economic, cultural, and territorial relationship, usually between states and often in the form of an empire, based on domination and subordination."DebatesAbortionAnarcho-capitalism and minarchism and libertarian municipalismFree market and laissez-faire vs. socialism and communismBranches and schools of libertarianism
Libertarianism has many overlapping schools of thought, all focused on smaller government and greater individual responsibility. As interpretations of the guiding Non-Aggression Principle vary, some libertarian schools of thought promote the total abolition of government, while others promote a smaller government which does not initiate force. Some seek private ownership of all property and natural resources, others promote communal ownership of all natural resources and varying degrees of private property.
Agorism –Anarcho-capitalism –Austrian School –Autarchism –Bleeding-heart libertarianism –Christian libertarianism –Civil libertarianismCivil societarianism –Classical liberalism –CommunalismConsequentialist libertarianism –Crypto-anarchism –Deontological libertarianism –Free-market anarchism –Geolibertarianism –Green libertarianism –Individualist anarchism –Left-libertarianism –Left-wing market anarchism –Liberism –Libertarian Christianity –Libertarian conservatism –Libertarian municipalism –Libertarian socialism –Market liberalism –Market socialism –Minarchism –Mutualism –Paleolibertarianism –Panarchism –Philosophical anarchism –Propertarianism –Right-libertarianism –Voluntaryism –Age of Enlightenment –Classical liberalism –Individualist anarchism –Jeffersonian democracy –Natural law theory –Libertarian theory and politics
Anarcho-capitalism and minarchismCriticism of libertarianismDebates within libertarianismLibertarian perspectives on intellectual propertyLibertarian perspectives on LGBT rightsLibertarianism in the United StatesLibertarian theories of lawList of libertarian political partiesObjectivism and libertarianismThese are concepts which, although not necessarily exclusive to libertarianism, are significant in historical and modern libertarian circles.
Civil liberties –Co-operative economics –Counter-economics –Decentralization –Dispute resolution organization –Economic freedom –Egalitarianism under the law –Free market –Free society –Free trade –Free will –Freedom of association –Freedom of contract –Homestead principle –Individualism –Laissez-faire – the Age of Enlightenment idea of "live-and-let-live" in economicsLaw of equal liberty –Liberty –Limited government –Methodological individualism –Natural rights –Night watchman state –Non-aggression –Non-interventionism –Non-politics –Non-voting –Participatory economics –Private defense agency –Polycentric law –Property –Self-governance –Self-management –Self-ownership –Spontaneous order – the notion in economics and the social sciences that human beings organize through ordinary action and not by imposed design or coercion. (Also called extended order by F.A. Hayek.)Stateless society –Subjective theory of value –Subsidiarity –Tax resistance –Title-transfer theory of contract –Worker's self management –Voluntary association –Voluntary society –Émile Armand – one of the most influential individualist anarchists of the early 20th centuryMikhail Bakunin – one of the main theorists of collectivist anarchism and a major influence on the development of Left-libertarianismWilliam Godwin – the first modern proponent of anarchism, whose political views are outlined in his book Political JusticeRobert Nozick – philosopher and author of Anarchy, State, and UtopiaPierre-Joseph Proudhon – the first self-described anarchist and founder of mutualismLysander Spooner – notable individualist anarchist and founder of the American Letter Mail CompanyMax Stirner – founder of egoist anarchismBenjamin Tucker – a leading theorist of individualist anarchism in the 19th centuryJosiah Warren – the first known American anarchist and author of the first anarchist periodical The Peaceful RevolutionistFrédéric Bastiat – 19th century creator of the concept of opportunity costMilton Friedman – Nobel Prize-winning monetarist economist, notable for his advocacy of economic deregulation and privatizationRobin Hahnel – modern participatory economics scholar and libertarian socialistFriedrich Hayek – Nobel Prize-winning Austrian School economist, notable for his political work The Road to SerfdomElinor Ostrom – Nobel Prize-winning common pool resource theorist and environmentalistLudwig von Mises – philosopher, Austrian School economist, sociologist, and classical liberalMurray Rothbard – founder of anarcho-capitalism and a leading Austrian school economistE. F. Schumacher – internationally influential British economist and statistician, author of Small Is Beautiful: A Study of Economics as if People MatteredNassim Nicholas Taleb – statistician, philosopher and author of The Black SwanAyn Rand – the creator of the philosophy of ObjectivismLeonard Peikoff – founder of the Ayn Rand Institute and Rand's designated intellectual heirMurray Bookchin – the founder of libertarian municipalism and a leading theorist of the social ecology movementNoam Chomsky – pioneering linguist and social criticKarl Hess – libertarian socialist and tax resistorHans-Hermann Hoppe – developed extensive work on argumentation ethicsDavid Hume – Scottish Enlightenment writer whoseTreatise of Human Nature (Book 3) argued that rules of justice originated from many human actions, not rational calculationRon Paul – politician and 2012 presidential candidateHenry David Thoreau – one of the leading philosophers of American transcendentalism and anarcho-pacifismRobert Anton Wilson – radical author of The Illuminatus! Trilogy