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Hans-Hermann Hoppe

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Hans-Hermann Hoppe
Hans-Hermann Hoppe
Born (1949-09-02) September 2, 1949 (age 75)
Peine, West Germany
NationalityGerman American
Academic career
FieldAustrian Economics, Political Philosophy
InstitutionUniversity of Nevada, Las Vegas
School or
tradition		Austrian School
Alma materGoethe University Frankfurt
InfluencesLudwig von Mises
Murray Rothbard
Jürgen Habermas
Karl-Otto Apel
Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk
Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn
ContributionsArgumentation ethics, Analysis of democracy and public goods theory
AwardsThe Frank T. and Harriet Kurzweg Award (2004)
The Gary G. Schlarbaum Prize (2006)
Franz Cuhel Memorial Prize (2009)

Hans-Hermann Hoppe (Template:IPA-de; born September 2, 1949) is a German-born academic who describes himself as an advocate of private law society. He has written several books and his website lists translations of his writing into various foreign languages. He is Professor Emeritus with the College of Business at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and currently resides in Istanbul, Turkey. Hoppe's views have generated controversy among his colleagues.

Career

Hoppe was born in Peine, West Germany, did undergraduate studies at Universität des Saarlandes and received his MA and PhD degrees from Goethe University, Frankfurt. He was a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Michigan, in Ann Arbor, from 1976 to 1978 and earned his habilitation in Foundations of Sociology and Economics from the University of Frankfurt in 1981. In 1986, after a succession of teaching jobs in Europe, he moved from Germany to the United States, where he was associated with Murray Rothbard. until the latter's death in January 1995. Hoppe was a Professor in the School of Business at University of Nevada, Las Vegas, until his retirement in 2008.

Hoppe is a Distinguished Fellow of the Ludwig von Mises Institute, which has published much of his work. He has been editor of various Mises Institute periodicals. In 2006, he founded The Property & Freedom Society.

Argumentation ethics

Main article: Argumentation ethics

Hoppe stated a theory which he named Argumentation ethics in an attempt to establish an a priori and value-neutral justification for libertarian ethics. Hoppe's argument asserts that arguments which in any respect contradict libertarian principles are logically incoherent.

Hoppe stated his view in the publication Liberty in September 1988. In the following issue, the publication carried a number of comments, followed by a response to the comments from Hoppe. In his comment, Murray Rothbard wrote that Hoppe's theory was, "a dazzling breakthrough for political philosophy in general and for libertarianism in particular" and that Hoppe, "has managed to transcend the famous is/ought, fact/value dichotomy that has plagued philosophy since the days of the Scholastics, and that had brought modern libertarianism into a tiresome deadlock".

Democracy: The God That Failed

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Main article: Democracy: The God That Failed

In 2001, Hoppe published Democracy: The God That Failed which examines the failures of modern democracies including unemployment, astronomical public debt and bankrupt social security systems. He blames pressure groups seeking increased government expenditures and regulations. Hoppe proposes alternatives and remedies, including secession, decentralization of government to regions, and "complete freedom of contract, occupation, trade and migration introduced".

While advocating an anarchist or "private law" society as the ideal, Hoppe argues in Democracy that monarchy is preferable to democracy. His view is rooted in the claim that monarchies are closer than democracies to the ideal of a "privately owned" nation, insofar as the monarch retains possession of the kingdom for life and bequeaths it to his or her children upon his or her death. Thus, kings and queens would have a greater incentive than temporarily-elected democratic representatives to "preserve or ... enhance" the value of the nation. Writes Hoppe, "the would systematically restrain himself in his taxing policies, for the lower the degree of taxation, the more productive the subject population will be, and the more productive the population, the higher the value of the" king's nation.

Regarding the "covenant entailed in a libertarian (proprietary) community" which he envisions, Hoppe wrote:

"There can be no tolerance toward democrats and communists in a libertarian social order. They will have to be physically separated and removed from society. Likewise, in a covenant founded for the purpose of protecting family and kin, there can be no tolerance toward those habitually promoting life-styles incompatible with this goal.They – the advocates of alternative, non-family and kin-centred lifestyles such as, for instance, individual hedonism, parasitism, nature-environment worship, homosexuality, or communism – will have to be physically removed from society, too, if one is to maintain a libertarian order."

Commenting on this passage, Martin Snyder of the American Association of University Professors said Hoppe's words will disturb "hose with a better memory than Hoppe for segregation, apartheid, internment facilities and concentration camps, for yellow stars and pink triangles".

Walter Block, a colleague of Hoppe's at the Ludwig Von Mises Institute, wrote that Hoppe's comments calling for "homosexuals and others to be banned from polite society" were "exceedingly difficult to reconcile it with libertarianism" because "the libertarian philosophy would support the rights of both groups to act in such manners." Stephan Kinsella wrote that Hoppe was referring to "private, covenant-based communities—in particular the ones based on more traditional, culturally-conservative heterosexual-family-based norms—who would tend to 'be intolerant of advocates of' ideas incompatible with, or openly hostile to, or 'contrary to the very purpose of' the norms of such a traditionalist covenant."

Views on immigration

Though an anarchist who favors abolishing the nation-state, Hoppe believes that as long as states exist, they should impose some restrictions on immigration. Hoppe has equated free immigration to "forced integration" which violates the rights of native peoples, since if land were privately owned, immigration would not be unhindered but would only occur with the consent of private property owners. Hoppe's Mises Institute colleague Walter Block has characterized Hoppe as an "anti-open immigration activists" who argues that, though all public property is "stolen" by the state from taxpayers, "the state compounds the injustice when it allows immigrants to use property, thus further “invading” the private property rights of the original owners." However, Block rejects Hoppe's views as incompatible with libertarianism. Employing a reductio ad absurdum argument, he argued that Hoppe's logic implies that flagrantly unlibertarian laws such as regulations on prostitution and drug use "could be defended on the basis that many tax-paying property owners would not want such behavior on their own private property".

In terms of specific immigration restrictions, Hoppe argued that an appropriate policy will require immigrants to the United States to display proficiency in English in addition to "superior (above-average) intellectual performance and character structure as well as a compatible system of values". These requirements will, he argued, result in a "systematic pro-European immigration bias". Quoting the latter remark, Jacob Hornberger of the Future of Freedom Foundation argued that "the immigration test advocates to ensure" that immigrants to the United States are those whom Hoppe considers "superior people" would "probably prejudice against Latin American" immigrants, irrespective of their "strong work ethic and ... deep commitment to free enterprise, family values ... religious principles" and other positive qualities Hornberger believes they would bring to the country.

Academic freedom controversy

On March 4, 2004, during a lecture in a course on money and banking at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Hoppe stated that, in part owing to the fact that they are generally childless, homosexuals do not plan for the future to the same extent as heterosexuals. Hoppe said that homosexuals, like the very young and the very old, are more present-oriented with respect to their behavioral patterns, and also suggested that John Maynard Keynes' "spend it now" philosophy was influenced by his homosexuality, claiming that this view of Keynes was supported by many economists. A student later formally accused Hoppe of creating a "hostile classroom environment".

An investigation was conducted and the university's provost, Raymond W. Alden III, issued Hoppe a non-disciplinary letter of instruction on February 9, 2005, with a finding that he had "created a hostile or intimidating educational environment in violation of the University's policies regarding discrimination as to sexual orientation." Alden also instructed Hoppe to "...cease mischaracterizing opinion as objective fact", asserted that Hoppe's opinion was not supported by peer-reviewed academic literature, and remarked that Hoppe had "refus to substantiate in-class statements of fact...."

Hoppe appealed the decision, saying the university had "blatantly violated its contractual obligations" toward him and described the action as "frivolous interference with my right to academic freedom". He was represented by the American Civil Liberties Union. ACLU attorney Allen Lichtenstein said "The charge against professor Hoppe is totally specious and without merit". The Nevada ACLU executive director said "We don't subscribe to Hans' theories and certainly understand why some students find them offensive....But academic freedom means nothing if it doesn't protect the right of professors to present scholarly ideas that are relevant to their curricula, even if they are controversial and rub people the wrong way". Negative publicity over Arden's decision lasted nearly two weeks.

Interim Chancellor (Nevada System of Higher Education) Jim Rogers intervened and UNLV President UNLV Carol Harter acted upon Hoppe's appeal on February 18, 2005. She decided that Hoppe's views, even if non-mainstream or controversial, should not be cause for reprimanding him. She dismissed the discrimination complaint against Hoppe and the non-disciplinary letter was withdrawn from Hoppe's personnel file. She wrote:

UNLV, in accordance with policy adopted by the Board of Regents, understands that the freedom afforded to Professor Hoppe and to all members of the academic community carries a significant corresponding academic responsibility. In the balance between freedoms and responsibilities, and where there may be ambiguity between the two, academic freedom must, in the end, be foremost.

Hoppe later wrote about the incident and the UNLV investigation in an article entitled "My Battle With the Thought Police". Martin Snyder of the American Association of University Professors criticized Hoppe's views on homosexuality but wrote that he should not be "punished for freely expressing his opinions."

The nationwide controversy prompted the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, to hold a conference on academic freedom in October 2005. Four years after the incident was closed, UNLV proposed a new policy that included the encouragement of reporting by people who felt that they had encountered bias, defining “bias incidents” as “'verbal, written, or physical acts of intimidation, coercion, interference, frivolous claims, discrimination, and sexual or other harassment motivated, in whole or in part, by bias” based on characteristics including actual or perceived race, religion, sex (including gender identity or gender expression or a pregnancy-related condition), physical appearance and political affiliation.'" The proposed policy was criticized by the Nevada ACLU and some faculty members as adverse to academic freedom.

Selected works

Books

Articles

References

This article uses bare URLs, which are uninformative and vulnerable to link rot. Please consider converting them to full citations to ensure the article remains verifiable and maintains a consistent citation style. Several templates and tools are available to assist in formatting, such as reFill (documentation) and Citation bot (documentation). (May 2013) (Learn how and when to remove this message)
  1. "The Gary G. Schlarbaum Prize". Mises Institute Awards. Ludwig von Mises Institute.
  2. ^ Wile, Anthony (March 27, 2011). "Dr. Hans-Hermann Hoppe on the Impracticality of One-World Government and the Failure of Western-style Democracy". The Daily Bell.
  3. Block, Walter (1996). "Review of Hans-Hermann Hoppe, The Economics and Ethics of Private Property". Journal des Economistes et des Etudes Humaines. 7 (1). doi:10.2202/1145-6396.1205. These two are truly 'hard acts to follow'. But with the publication of The Economics and Ethics Private Property, Hoppe bids fair to one day claiming the mantle of worthy successor to these two pathbreaking thinkers. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help) link to paper
  4. Translations - (hanshoppe.com)
  5. ^ "UNLV Catalog" (PDF). p. 47. Retrieved 19 April 2013.
  6. Jeff Tucker interviews Hans-Hermann Hoppe (1 October 2011)
  7. "Juan Ramón Rallo interviews Mises Institute scholar Hans-Hermann Hoppe at the Instituto Juan de Mariana's".
  8. The Property & Freedom Society
  9. ^ Symposium: Breakthrough or Buncombe? with comments from Murray Rothbard, David D. Friedman, Leland B. Yeager, David Gordon and Douglas B. Rasmussen and from Hans-Hermann Hoppe.(Liberty, November 1988)
  10. http://mises.org/journals/jls/20_2/20_2_3.pdf "Therefore, concludes that the libertarian view of property rights is the only one that can possibly be defended by rational argument."
  11. R.M. Pearce, Book Review: Democracy: the God That Failed, National Observer (Australia), No. 56, Autumn 2003.
  12. http://mises.org/misesreview_detail.aspx?control=199
  13. http://mises.org/misesreview_detail.aspx?control=199
  14. http://mises.org/misesreview_detail.aspx?control=199
  15. Hans-Hermann Hoppe, Democracy: The God That Failed: The Economics and Politics of Monarchy, Democracy and Natural Order,Transaction Publishers, 2001, pp. 216-218
  16. ^ Snyder, Martin D. (March 1, 2005). "Birds of a Feather?". Academe. American Association of University Professors. Retrieved April 17, 2013, from HighBeam Research. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  17. Walter Block (Loyola University New Orleans), Libertarianism is unique; it belongs neither to the right nor the left: a critique of the views of Long, Holcombe, and Baden on the left, Hoppe, Feser and Paul on the right, undated, published at Ludwig von Mises Institute website, p. 22-23.
  18. Stephan Kinsella Hoppe on Covenant Communities and Advocates of Alternative Lifestyles, LewRockwell.com, 27 May 2010.
  19. On Free Immigration and Forced Integration. Hans Hoppe.
  20. http://mises.org/journals/jls/21_3/21_3_2.pdf
  21. http://mises.org/journals/jls/21_3/21_3_2.pdf
  22. http://www.walterblock.com/wp-content/uploads/publications/block-callahan_right-immigrate-2003.pdf (see page 48)
  23. http://fff.org/explore-freedom/article/lets-stick-traditional-american-values/
  24. http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P3-829841891.html
  25. ^ Richard Lake, UNLV accused of limiting free speech, Las Vegas Review-Journal, February 05, 2005.
  26. Alden, III, Raymond W. (February 9, 2005). "Findings and non-disciplinary letter of instruction" (PDF).
  27. Alden, III, Raymond W. (February 9, 2005). "Findings and non-disciplinary letter of instruction" (PDF).
  28. Justin Chomintra, Professor, ACLU may sue UNLV, The Rebel Yell, February 10, 2005; reprinted by Stephen Kinsella at Mises.org, February 10, 2005.
  29. "Exoneration sought for UNLV professor". Las Vegas Sun. February 21, 2005. Retrieved May 23, 2013.
  30. "Efforts to punish UNLV professor gains exposure". Las Vegas Sun. February 8, 2005. Retrieved May 23, 2013.
  31. "Rogers nixes Hoppe sabbatical". Las Vegas Sun. February 23, 2005. Retrieved May 23, 2013.
  32. Carol Harter (February 18, 2005). "Statement of Dr. Carol Harter, President of UNLV, regarding Professor Hans-Hermann Hoppe" (PDF).
  33. Hans-Hermann Hoppe, "My Battle With the Thought Police", LewRockwell.com, April 12, 2005
  34. "Teachers' tenure on front burner". Las Vegas Sun. October 13, 2005. Retrieved May 23, 2013.
  35. ^ Hsu, Charlotte (April 25, 2009). "ACLU airs free speech concerns on bias policy: Faculty express concern; UNLV official says proposal would encourage expression". Las Vegas Sun. Retrieved May 23, 2013.

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