Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical

by Sciabarra, Chris

1. Rand (December 1961), “America’s persecuted minority: Big business,” in Unknown Ideal,

  2. Rand (24 June 1962), “War and peace,” in Column, 8.

  3. Rand (September 1964), “‘Extremism,’ or the art of smearing,” in Unknown Ideal, 180–81.

  4. Rand (18 June 1946), “From Ayn Rand’s notes for Atlas Shrugged,” in Schwartz 6.1.6.

  5. Rand (April 1963), “The money-making personality,” in Binswanger 4.1.1–2.

  6. Nock ([1935] 1977) distinguishes between the economic and political means of acquiring wealth. Paterson ([1943] 1993) distinguishes between the moral and political means, “producers” and “non-producers.” Mises ([1949] 1963) distinguishes between the principles of market exchange and those of central planning. These distinctions are fully within the classical liberal tradition, which championed the society of contract over the society of status.

  7. Rand (26 March 1961), “The intellectual bankruptcy of our age,” in Voice of Reason, 91.

  8. Rand (22 July 1962), “‘The cold civil war,’” in Column, 23.

  9. Rand (December 1961), “America’s persecuted minority: Big business,” in Unknown Ideal, 48.

  10. Hessen (April, November 1962), “The effects of the industrial revolution on women and children,” in Unknown Ideal, 112–13. In the current study, I do not examine the Objectivist response to such issues as “comparable worth.” See Schwartz (1 September 1981), “The wages of sex,” in Schwartz 2.9.

  11. Greenspan (September 1961), “Antitrust,” in Unknown Ideal, 68. Greenspan deals with the ALCOA antitrust suit and distinguishes between “coercive” and “non-coercive” monopolies. The coercive type depends upon legally enforced closed entry, the noncoercive type can emerge in isolated fields, such as the mining of certain minerals. The noncoercive “monopolist,” however, does not reap monopoly profits since he must price his minerals competitively. He remains in fierce competition with producers of other, complementary materials. See also N. Branden (June 1962), “Common fallacies about capitalism: Monopolies,” in Unknown Ideal 75; Rand [1964] 1993aT.

  12. N. Branden (June 1962), “Common fallacies about capitalism: Monopolies,” in Unknown Ideal, 73; Greenspan (August 1963), “The assault on integrity,” in Unknown Ideal, 118; Mises [1949] 1963, 357–97; Rothbard [1970] 1977, 41–82. In Rand ([1946] 1959), “Notes on the history of American free enterprise,” in Unknown Ideal, and (17 December 1961), “America’s persecuted minority: Big business,” in Unknown Ideal, Rand focuses especially on the history of American railroads in her analysis of monopolistic distortions. On wage and price controls as a form of “socialism for big business,” see Rand (8 November 1971), “The moratorium on brains, part two,” in Ayn Rand Letter 1:11. On immigration restrictions, see Rand 1973T.

  13. Rand (March 1961), “The intellectual bankruptcy of our age,” in Voice of Reason, 96.

  14. Rand (May–June 1965), “The new fascism: Rule by consensus,” in Unknown Ideal, 213–14.

  15. Ibid., 218; Rand 1962.

  16. Rand (8 May 1972), “The establishing of an establishment,” in Philosophy, 205.

  17. Rand ([1946] 1959), “Notes on the history of American free enterprise,” in Unknown Ideal, 108.

  18. Rand (May–June 1965), “The new fascism: Rule by consensus,” in Unknown Ideal, 216.

  19. Rand (February 1962), “Antitrust: The rule of unreason,” in Voice of Reason, 254.

  20. Rand (17 December 1961), “America’s persecuted minority: Big business,” in Unknown Ideal, 49.

  21. Kolko 1963; Weinstein 1968. For an Objectivist view of the crisis in U.S. medical care, see Peikoff (14 April 1985), “Medicine: The death of a profession,” in Voice of Reason. Also see Peikoff 1993 and Reisman 1994.

  22. Rothbard pioneered an even more explicit synthesis of Austrian theory and New Left revisionism. See Radosh and Rothbard 1972, which provides a useful bibliography of revisionist works. Childs ([1974] 1977) integrates Objectivist, Austrian, and New Left arguments.

  23. Rand (3 June–1 July 1974), “Egalitarianism and inflation,” in Philosophy, 160. See Mises [1912] 1971, and [1949] 1963; Hayek [1929] 1966, and [1931] 1967; and Rothbard [1963] 1975, 1970, [1970] 1977, and 1978.

  24. Marx, Capital 3:493. Marxism and Austrian economics have had an illustrious adversarial history, beginning in the nineteenth century with Boehm-Bawerk’s critique of Marx’s labor theory of value. See essays by Boehm-Bawerk and Hilferding in Sweezy [1949] 1975. Vorhies (1989) provides an interesting comparative analysis of Marxian and Austrian theories of money and credit.

  25. Marx [1859] 1970, 119, 148, and Capital 3:362, 490.

  26. Rand (3 June–1 July 1974), “Egalitarianism and inflation,” in Philosophy, 161–62.

  27. Rand (22 November 1971), “Don’t let it go,” in Philosophy, 260–61.

  28. Rand (14 August 1972), “A preview, part two,” in Ayn Rand Letter 1:99–100. Rand’s critique mirrors the analysis of Piven and Cloward (1971).

  29. Rand (8 May 1972), “The establishing of an establishment,” in Philosophy, 207.

  30. Rand (8 November 1971), “‘The moratorium on brains,’ part two,” in Ayn Rand Letter 1:10. See Hayek [1944] 1976, 107.

  31. Rand (June 1962), “Check your premises: ‘The national interest, c’est moi,’” in Objectivist Newsletter 1:22.

  32. Rand (14 August 1972), “A preview, part two,” in Ayn Rand Letter 1:100; N. Branden (November 1963), “Common fallacies about capitalism: The role of labor unions,” in Unknown Ideal, 83, 86.

  33. Rand (8 November 1971), “‘The moratorium on brains,’ part two,” in Ayn Rand Letter 1:10.

  34. This section is expanded from the first edition of this book, integrating some material from Sciabarra 2003b, which also features a critique of several “Objectivist” perspectives on the Iraq war and post-9/11 foreign policy.

  35. N. Branden (August 1962), “Common fallacies about capitalism: Depressions,” in Unknown Ideal, 83.

  36. Rand (June 1966), “The roots of war,” in Unknown Ideal, 37, 39–40.

  37. Rand (June 1966), “The roots of war,” in Unknown Ideal, 39.

  38. Rand (June 1966), “The roots of war,” in Unknown Ideal, 41.

  39. Rand (September 1964), “‘Extremism,’ or the art of smearing,” in Unknown Ideal, 175.

  40. Rand (June 1966), “The roots of war,” in Unknown Ideal, 226; (May 1975), “The lessons of Vietnam,” in Voice of Reason. During the Vietnam war, Rand urged those who opposed the draft in principle “to consult a good lawyer” (Rand [April–May 1967], “The wreckage of the consensus,” in Unknown Ideal, 235). But Rand also opposed a blanket amnesty for all draft dodgers, since some may have been motivated by “sympathy with the enemy” (Rand [30 May 1973], letter to Doris Gordon, in Rand 1995, 657–58).

  41. Rand (June 1966), “The roots of war,” in Unknown Ideal, 41–42.

  42. B. Branden (December 1962), “Books,” in Objectivist Newsletter 1:54.

  43. Rand (27 March 1972), “The Shanghai gesture, part I,” in Ayn Rand Letter 1:57.

  44. Rand (21 October 1962), “Britain’s ‘National Socialism,’” in Column, 74.

  45. Rand (26 August 1974), “The lessons of Vietnam,” in Voice of Reason, 142.

  46. For example, see “Communism and HUAC,” in Rand 1997, especially 371–81. See also the complementary views of one of Rand’s mentors, Isabel Paterson, as discussed in Cox 2004, 237–43.

  47. Rand in Peikoff 1976T, Lecture 6; see also Rand 2005, 83.

  48. Rand (June 1970), “The chickens’ homecoming,” in New Left, 111.

  49. Rand (June 1970), “The chickens’ homecoming,” in New Left, 112. Rand advocated a U.S. withdrawal from the United Nations. See Rand 1964b, 14. Moreover, Rand saw the U.N. as an agency designed to promote “tribal racism” ([4 November 1962], “Nationalism vs. internationalism,” in Column, 78).

  50. Rand (23 September 1974), “From my ‘future file’,” in Ayn Rand Letter 3: 371.

  51. Rand (24 April 19
74), “The Shanghai gesture, part III,” in Ayn Rand Letter 1: 66.

  52. Rand (26 August 1974), “The lessons of Vietnam,” in Voice of Reason, 140.

  53. In her opposition to the Vietnam war, for instance, Rand, in (April–May 1967), “The wreckage of the consensus,” in Unknown Ideal, argued that it was against U.S. interests to participate in the conflict, but she stopped short of any structural analysis of the war’s effects. Rand’s anticommunism was absorbed by many of her followers, who often sided with “authoritarian” nations in any U.S. conflict with the former Soviet Union. Schwartz, for instance, endorsed the neoconservative’s distinction, popularized by Jeane Kirkpatrick in 1980, between “authoritarianism” and “totalitarianism.” Schwartz argues: “There is nothing America need apologize for in associating with authoritarian countries, provided we denounce their tyranny and offer moral support to any budding freedom movements in those countries” (29 April 1986), “Foreign policy and the morality of self-interest, part two,” in Schwartz 4.6.5. For a critique of Schwartz 2004, see a series of essays written by me, “Peter Schwartz and the Abandonment of Rand’s Radical Legacy,” for the Liberty and Power Group Blog of the History News Network at http://hnn.us/blogs/4.html, indexed at my Notablog: http://www.nyu.edu/projects/sciabarra/notablog/archives/000168.html.

  54. Rand (6 March 1974), “Philosophy: Who needs it,” in Philosophy, 10.

  55. Rand 1976, 3.

  56. Rand (26 August 1974), “The lessons of Vietnam,” in Voice of Reason, 142. See also Rand 1977T.

  57. Unfortunately, many commentators sympathetic to Rand have advocated post-9/11 policies that dispense entirely with her insights into the historical and structural dynamics of U.S. foreign policy. See Sciabarra 2003b. But even Peikoff, who, in the wake of 9/11, advocated an attack on state sponsors of terrorism, recognized that historically, U.S. containment policies with regard to the Soviet Union put “the U.S. wholesale into the business of creating terrorists.” In Afghanistan, for example, the U.S. arming of the Mujahideen to oppose the Soviets caused a blowback effect. “Most of them,” says Peikoff, “regarded fighting the Soviets as only the beginning; our turn soon came.” See Peikoff’s essay, “End states who sponsor terrorism,” http://www.peikoff.com/essays_and_articles/end-states-who-sponsor-terrorism/.

  58. Rand (24 April 1972), “The Shanghai gesture, part III,” in Ayn Rand Letter 1:68.

  59. Rand (April–May 1967), “The wreckage of the consensus,” in Unknown Ideal, 226.

  60. Rand (May–June 1965), “The new fascism: Rule by consensus,” in Unknown Ideal, 216.

  61. Rand (3 June–1 July 1974), “Egalitarianism and inflation,” in Philosophy, 162.

  62. Rand 1962bT.

  63. Rand 1962bT.

  64. Rand 1962bT.

  65. Rand (September 1962), “The pull peddlers,” in Unknown Ideal, 168.

  66. Rand (8 November 1971), “The moratorium on brains, part II,” in Ayn Rand Letter 1:11. Rand also cites approvingly the critique of John F. Kennedy’s “fascist new frontier” by New Leftist Charles A. Reich. See Rand 1962, 10.

  67. Rand 1974cT.

  68. Rand (24 April 1972), “The Shanghai gesture, part III,” in Ayn Rand Letter 1:68.

  69. Rand 1962, 12.

  70. See especially, Alan Greenspan (July 1966), “Gold and economic freedom,” in Unknown Ideal, 96–101. On the tension between the Randian Greenspan and his later position as Chairman of the Federal Reserve, see Sechrest 2005. On the economic collapse of 2008, see my Notablog essay, “A Crisis of Political Economy,” http://www.nyu.edu/projects/sciabarra/notablog/archives/001540.html

  71. Rand (September 1962), “The pull peddlers,” in Unknown Ideal, 170.

  72. Rand (August 1962), “The ‘conflicts’ of men’s interests,” in Virtue of Selfishness, 56.

  73. This point was suggested by Riggenbach 1982, 58. In the novel, Rand’s characters employ the tactics of civil disobedience against this militarist system; one of them (Ragnar Danneskjöld) engages in the piracy of foreign aid freighters.

  74. Rand (14 October 1962), “Our alleged competitor,” in Column, 72; Binswanger (December 1986–February 1987), “Science under slavery,” in Binswanger 7.6 to 8.1. In the wake of 9/11, and the run-up to the war in Iraq, much debate ensued over the issue of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). On WMDs, Rand had some provocative things to say. She was once hired as a screenwriter by producer Hal Wallis for a film project entitled “Top Secret,” about the development of the atomic bomb. In her fascinating notes on the stillborn project (in Rand 1997, 311–44), Rand considers the development of nuclear weapons in the relatively free United States and their potentially destructive deployment by statist regimes. For Rand, however, the problem of nuclear proliferation obscures the fundamental issue at hand. She once remarked that “there is something obscene in the attitude of those who regard horror as a matter of numbers.” Indeed, “it makes no difference to a man whether he is killed by a nuclear bomb or a dynamite bomb or an old-fashioned club. Nor does the number of other victims or the scale of the destruction make any difference to him.… If nuclear weapons are a dreadful threat and mankind cannot afford war any longer, then mankind cannot afford statism any longer.… [I]f war is ever to be outlawed, it is the use of force that has to be outlawed” (Rand [June 1966], “The roots of war,” in Unknown Ideal, 43). Rand emphasizes further that a military battle of any scope is akin to a “political battle”—“merely a skirmish fought with muskets”; for Rand, “a philosophical battle is a nuclear war”—and only rational ideas will ultimately win it (Rand [3 January 1972], “‘What can one do?,’” in Philosophy, 246).

  75. Rand (October 1962), “To young scientists,” in Voice of Reason, 13; (4 June 1973), “Selfishness without a self,” in Philosophy, 62; Peikoff 1991b, 442–43.

  76. Rand (October 1975), “From the horse’s mouth,” in Philosophy, 96; Rand 1972T.

  77. Rand (January–February 1971), “The anti-industrial revolution,” in New Left, 131, 142, 146; Schwartz 1990T. This emphasis on the unexpected consequences of technological innovation suggests a further convergence of Randian and Hayekian views.

  78. Rand (January–February 1971), “The anti-industrial revolution,” in New Left, 145–46. Rand’s opposition to wage and price controls was based on the same epistemological criterion, since no one could possibly predict the effects of an edict controlling the price of a single item within an interrelated network of production. See Rand (16 July 1973), “… and the principles,” in Ayn Rand Letter 2:221.

  79. Rand (January 1963), “Collectivized ethics,” in Virtue of Selfishness, 84; (September 1969), “Apollo 11,” in Voice of Reason, 169.

  80. N. Branden (June 1963), “Common fallacies about capitalism: Public education,” in Unknown Ideal, 89; Rand (13 March 1972), “Tax credits for education,” in Voice of Reason, 250–51; (8 May 1972), “The establishing of an establishment,” in Philosophy, 201–4. Compare Paterson ([1943] 1993, 251–61), who is critical of “progressive” education.

  81. Rand (22 July 1962), “‘The cold civil war,’” in Column, 23.

  82. Marx, Surplus Value, 3:507.

  83. Rand (22 July 1962), “‘The cold civil war,’” in Column, 23–25.

  84. Rand (August 1962), “The ‘conflicts’ of men’s interests,” in Virtue of Selfishness, 56.

  85. Rand (August 1969), “Books: Shirley Scheibla’s Poverty Is Where the Money Is,” in Objectivist, 8:699.

  86. Rand (25 September 1972), “How to read (and not to write),” in Voice of Reason, 133–34.

  87. Rand (July–August 1971), “The age of envy,” in New Left, 166. For another, sometimes complementary, view of the fragmenting effects of U.S. political processes, see Roelofs 1976.

  88. Rand (May–June 1965), “The new fascism: Rule by consensus,” in Unknown Ideal, 206–7.

  89. Rand (16 July 1973), “… and the principles,” in Ayn Rand Letter 2:221.

  90. Rand (July 1963), “Check your premises: Vast quicksan
ds,” in Objectivist Newsletter 2:25.

  91. Rand (September 1962), “The pull peddlers,” in Unknown Ideal, 168–70.

  92. Rand (1 July 1962), “Progress or sacrifice,” in Column, 11–12. This contention is echoed by others in the modern libertarian tradition, especially Paterson ([1943] 1993). There are other libertarians who accept the contention of intragroup conflict, even as they develop a more structured class analysis, based on an integration of Austrian theory and revisionist history: Rothbard 1983; Grinder 1975; Grinder and Hagel 1975, 1977; Sciabarra 2000, chapter 7.

  93. This particular thesis was advanced by Childs ([1974] 1977). Childs integrates Branden’s theory of neurosis with a neo-Objectivist, libertarian critique of statism.

  94. Rand (23 September 1962), “Blind chaos,” in Column, 61.

  95. Rand (16 July 1973), “… and the principles,” in Ayn Rand Letter 2:221; (July–August 1971), “The age of envy,” in New Left, 175.

  96. Rand (September 1963), “Racism,” in Virtue of Selfishness, 126–28.

  97. Rand (8 April 1974), “Moral inflation, part three,” in Ayn Rand Letter 3:309.

  98. Rand (7–21 May 1973), “The missing link,” in Philosophy, 50–51. In the current study, I do not examine every manifestation of the anti-conceptual mentality. For instance, in Rand (4 June 1973), “Selfishness without a self,” in Philosophy, 56–57, 60, Rand argues: “All tribalists are anti-conceptual in various degrees, but not all anti-conceptual mentalities are tribalists.” She identifies the “tribal lone wolf” as another distinct type of anti-conceptual mentality. The lone wolf is an amoralist who is rejected by the tribe. He avoids commitment to anything, or anyone, and disassociates his “self” “from his actions, his work, his pursuits, his ideas.”

  99. Rand (10 April 1977), “Global balkanization,” in Voice of Reason, 117.

  100. Peikoff (July 1992), “Some notes about tomorrow, part one,” in Schwartz 6.4.4; Schwartz (24 March 1986), “Foreign policy and the morality of self-interest, part one,” in Schwartz 4.5.5. It is on these grounds that Binswanger has argued against all forms of protectionism. In Binswanger (April 1987), “‘Buy American’ is un-American,” in Binswanger 8.2.2, he condemns the protectionist “buy-American” campaign as a form of economic nationalism, collectivism, and tribalism.