Foreign Policy, Defense, and War

Many classical liberals believe in the need for a minimal, “nightwatchman” state to provide protection against internal and external threats. From this perspective, a muscular and centralized national-security state is necessary for a free and liberal society. At the same time, classical liberals tend to be highly skeptical of large-scale, top-down government programs. This skepticism is grounded in an appreciation of epistemic and incentive constraints, the possibility of perverse unintended consequences, and the costs of highly-concentrated political power for individual freedom. This chapter explores some aspects of this tension. After discussing the standard logic for state provisions—Hobbesian anarchy and the assumption that defense is a “public good”—we discuss four challenges to the state-provision of defense. These include: (1) the planner’s problem related to state control of economic resources, (2) the political economy problem related to the frictions in democratic politics, (3) the “bads” problem whereby government activities generate harms, and (4) the constitutional-authoritarian problem whereby the activities of the national-security state contribute to expansions in political power at the expense of individual liberty and freedom. Appreciating these issues can inform discussions of national security and foreign intervention.