How can Rand and Nozick be used as Conservative thinkers?

Ayn Rand and Robert Nozick aren’t your typical ‘cookie cutter’ conservatives, and so their inclusion in the Edexcel spec as New Right thinkers is a bit of a curveball. That being said, they are useful to help you hit your AO2 requirements as they have differing views to other, more traditional conservatives.

Both Rand and Nozick can be considered Libertarians – but their ideas have inspired some New Right Conservatives due to their focus on capitalism, freedom and the role of the state.

Ayn Rand:

Rand was most famous for her book ‘Atlas Shrugged.’ She was born in the USSR, lived through the Russian Revolution of 1917 and studied there before moving to the USA. These experiences greatly shaped her view of capitalism, as her family lost land during the revolution. She therefore became a champion of laissez-faire capitalism, believing that state regulation led to corruption. She condemned taxation for this purpose.

She is most famous for her ideas of Objectivism – the idea that reason and rationality are the only absolutes in human life. This led her to reject religion (a central part of traditional conservative ideology)  and emphasise the importance of a small state – only minimal government could be permitted to allow for mans self interest, completely unrestricted by others. She stated ‘there is nothing to take a mans freedom away from him, save other men.’

 Robert Nozick:

Nozick shared Rand’s views in many ways, and is an equally difficult thinker to include! He was best known for his work Anarchy, State and Utopia, and the main ideas that he shares with Conservatives are mostly around the state and property.

Nozick was highly critical of state regulation. He believed that the only permissible state was a minarchy – also known as a nightwatchman state – where the governments role was strictly limited to law and order. He strongly criticised taxation, proclaiming that ‘taxation was a form of slavery’ as it implies that society has an entitlement to an individuals labour.

His views on tax are echoed in his ideas of property – that the state has no right to them if they are acquired justly. His ideas are often considered to be a stark contrast to John Rawls, and build upon some of Locke’s ideas.

So how do you include them in a Conservativism essay?

It’s vital to use both thinkers to demonstrate the way that the New Right has transformed traditional conservative ideology. They share ideas about small government with both Traditional and One Nation strands, but both are much more liberal in their ideas on the economy. They would both contrast significantly with One Nation ideas on the economy, for example, which emphasises state intervention.

The key is to consider the main ideas of conservatism when you are planning an essay, and then work out where the thinkers fit, not the other way round.

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