Libertarianism and the Individual in The Golden Age
The Golden Transcendence arrived yesterday allowing me to finish reading the three book series. I’m quite taken by these books. They are entertaining, imaginative, and thoughtful. The action is good, and the dialogue is clever and funny.
In far future speculative fiction like this you often get a good deal of sociopolitical commentary as the author builds his societies. The civilization of the Golden Oecumene is a utopia with a free market, quite unusual in speculative fiction. Capitalism, free markets, and rugged individualism are elevated while collectivism is regarded as untenable and even distasteful. In a chapter entitled The Falsehoods, the main protaganists engage in a discussion regardind their own society and that of their enemies. From that, we learn of their philosophy. No society can exist without currency. When that currency is power, freedom is eroded and people are enslaved. When that currency is determined by a free market, liberty and choice endures. Moral relativism destroys conviction, and with convinction gone, freedom is feared and tyranny welcomed. Categorically refusing to use force against force is wrong.
Interesting reading.
