Murray Rothbard on the Terrifying Idea of a Unitary World “Democratic” Government

But the inner logic of that mystique, and the basic logic of minarchist political theory, is at once simple and terrifying: unitary world “democratic” government. The minarchist argument against anarcho-capitalist libertarians is that there must be a single, overriding government agency with a monopoly force to settle disputes by coercion. OK, but in that case and by the very same logic shouldn't nation-states be replaced by a one-world monopoly government? Shouldn't unitary world government replace what has been properly termed our existing “international anarchy?”

Minarchist libertarians and conservatives balk at the inner logic of world government for obvious reasons: for they fear correctly that world taxation and world socialization would totally and irreversibly suppress the liberty and property of Americans. But they remain trapped in the logic of their own position. Left-liberals, on the other hand, are happy to embrace this logic precisely because of this expected outcome. Even the democratic Establishment, however, hesitates at embracing the ultimate logical end of a single world democratic state, at least until they can be assured of controlling that monstrous entity.


—Murray N. Rothbard, “The Nationalities Question,” in The Irrepressible Rothbard: The Rothbard-Rockwell Report; Essays of Murray N. Rothbard, ed. Llewellyn H. Rockwell Jr. (Burlingame, CA: The Center for Libertarian Studies, 2000), 229-230.