Over at Open Market, Brad Walters has a great post on libertarian communalism:
there are those who accuse libertarians of hating community and society. But families are the essence of communalism. They are often authoritarian and communistic, yet libertarians love their families as much as anyone else. Likewise, I had a great time this weekend, and had no problem ceding some authority to my friend (the owner of the house) and to the collective.
The distinction between classical liberals and contemporary liberals does not center on disdaining or appreciating communalism. Any sane person recognizes that there are benefits to association. It’s a question of scale and it’s a question of voluntary versus compulsory association. The State is horrible at the idea of community because a) the association is involuntary, and b) the scale is far too massive for the personal connection inherent in smaller groups, like families and travel buddies.
In June I argued that free software is one example of the sort of voluntary communalism Walters identifies here.
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