The Making of an Ideal Society

The question of whether societies should adopt libertarian or liberal system is far from being solved. However, nations have tried to strike a balance between the two systems in a bid to come up with something acceptable. This has not been easy considering that one system always tends to overpower the other. It is worth noting that libertarian system presents a better deal for our democratic society. However, it risks introducing a state of anarchy in the world because they will be no penalties for inhuman or antisocial behavior. These are the factors that led to inhuman treatment against African Americans that necessitated civil rights movements to swing into action. This paper investigates the advantages of the libertarian system and the benefits of realistically integrating it with liberal system (Bevir, 2010).

Peaceful Coexistence

Proponents of liberal system argue that the world risks sliding into anarchy if people are allowed to act the way they want. They maintain that some level of control should be placed so as to ensure that people live in harmony. Indeed, this is the only way the world can remain peaceful and secure. Imagine a situation where Al Qaeda is given the free will to bomb whichever part of the world they want. This would bring total chaos to the stable society that people are accustomed to. It only makes sense that some level of control should be put in place to check people’s relationships with one another. However, it should be noted that governments can also take advantage of these limitations to curtail people’s freedoms. This is why checks should be placed within distinct and agreed upon framework. A typical example is the justice system that forms part of the government. The fact that any justice system is supposed to have legally defined limits to people’s conduct makes it impossible to manipulate. It basically treats the common citizens and their leaders equally by providing the right channels to alter any of its sections. This essentially ensures that people’s conducts are checked and also that political leaders do not manipulate the justice system to harm the common citizens. It goes without saying that a blend of the two systems will certainly serve the world better. For instance, a liberal system prohibits people from killing another person. Thus, if one is found to have committed such an act, he or she will have to face the justice system, where there is a laid down procedure for dealing with the case. This would certainly provide a solution to the problem between the two parties. In a libertarian system, the response to arbitrary murder would be quite different. For instance, the victims of murder may decide to kill the murderer as well as a form of revenge. In this case, there will not be any mechanisms to stop them from seeking revenge because the society allows people to do what they want. As a result, there will be a series of murders and revenge murders that will eventually leave the world empty (Wempe, 2004).

Avoid Authoritarian Leadership

Political experience has shown that politicians cannot be trusted with absolute power over the people. The minute political leaders feel that they control every aspect of people’s lives; they introduce dictatorial tendencies that will end up harming the society. Indeed, this is how slavery and slave trade emerged. With immense freedom and autonomy, farm owners felt that they could ship slaves from overseas to work in their farms. In addition, they decided they will not pay their slaves, but instead subject them to inhuman treatment. It is worth noting that they would not have done this if there was a system to check their actions. This proves the fact that liberalism cannot work in a society where people have all kinds of evil thoughts. It can only work in an ideal world where every human has a conscience. It should be noted that civil rights champions like Martin Luther King Jnr. had to do a lot of activism to bring sense to Americans. It was a hard task to convincing the American people that racial segregation was evil and should have never been there. The fact that proponents dismissed his activities point to the fact that conscience can be an elusive word if people are given a free will to do whatever they wish. It is clear that given a choice choose anything; humans will always choose bad things. This is because it is relatively easier to choose wrong things. In the case of slavery, Americans could not resist the temptation because the slaves could provide all the labor they needed in the plantation. It basically means that humans should never be given the free will to choose. Essentially, liberalism is just impractical in our society (Wempe, 2004).

Social Responsibility

It is highly probable that no one will leave the comfort of their homes to go and work if people were given free will to choose if they will provide for their families or not. In countries that tried libertarian system, people who are energetic enough to work thronged the streets to become beggars. In their opinion, there is nothing wrong going to beg when you can work because no one will rebuke you. In addition, many people will choose jobs that are less strenuous yet less demanding. Eventually, there will be more sex workers selling their bodies for easy cash because they have freewill. In addition, the use of public utilities like roads will be impossible as no laws will be there to regulate how they are used. In the given example of bicycle riding in China, it was obvious that laws would have been broken given that there was no punishment for traffic offences. It basically explains why most people did not consider having a car viable because the trouble of driving on a lawless road supersedes the joy of owning a car. It goes without saying that human behavior has to be restrained in order to have an orderly society. However, these regulations should be properly structured such that they are fair to all sections of the society. This stems from the fact that people may decide to ignore regulations that they feel are unrealistic or unnecessarily infringing on their rights (Bevir, 2010).

In conclusion, libertarian system presents a better deal for our democratic society. However, it risks introducing a state of anarchy in the world because they will be no penalties for inhuman or antisocial behavior. These are the factors that led to inhuman treatment against African Americans that necessitated civil rights movements to swing into action. Human experience has shown that politicians cannot be trusted with absolute power over the people as they can introduce dictatorial tendencies that will end up harming the society. Indeed, this is how slavery and slave trade emerged eventually causing wanton suffering to people. In addition, it is highly probable that people will become lazy and stop working if they were given free will to choose if they will provide for their families or not. It goes without saying that human behavior has to be restrained in order to have an orderly society that people will live to be proud of.