“The philosophy commonly called individualism is a philosophy of social cooperation and the progressive intensification of the social nexus.” –Ludwig Von Mises
In 2024, we will have another election year, and Libertarians of California and the National Libertarian Party will put forth their selected candidates for local, state, and national elections. Year after year, election after election, we make incremental gains as the third largest political party in the United States. Yet, we tend to fall short compared to the two-headed beast of Democrats and Republicans.
Our shortfallings have not been because our ideas are not good. In fact, most of our core ideas are blatantly far superior to that of the current coercive political machine. Our ideas include individual liberty, freedom, peace, respect for life, true property rights, economic prosperity, choices, personal development, progress, charity and love, honesty, integrity, and more. Most people would benefit from the values and ideals of Libertarianism, and I believe the vast majority of Americans are at their core liberty-minded.
So, why are Libertarians not winning as much as we know we could with our better ideas and solutions?
It comes down to coordinated efforts. When we look at politics, history, and philosophy, those who win and make significant changes do so by coordinating their efforts across regions, platforms, and political aisles. They do so by having leaders who inspire others to accomplish great things in the face of difficulty and have a coordinated network of other leaders that attest to those victories and affirm their leadership. No matter if those goals were for good or evil, we can see that the winners tend to be those that have best demonstrated the ability to lead with coordinated efforts.
Ron Paul and Gary Johnson had great prior experience as a representative and as a governor, respectively, demonstrating their capacity to lead coordinated efforts and work with those across the political aisle. Jo Jorgensen has also been active in the Liberty Movement since the early 1990s, establishing a vast network of teams dedicated to liberty. However, the candidates that they ran against were even more experienced and tied to deeper networks on national levels, although cronyistic, that displayed their capacity to get their objectives accomplished.
If we want to start winning local and state elections, we must better coordinate local efforts and expand outward. We need to show people in our local communities the actual solutions we have, implement them with success, and use those efforts to work with state, regional, and national campaigns. This begins with being involved with local Libertarian chapter meetings and seriously working on projects together, not simply using these as social clubs or status outlets.
Find ways of solving issues at the local level, county level, state level, regional level, and national level, but start small. These small wins add up to exponentially larger wins. These incremental steps demonstrate our capacity to lead and bring confidence to the masses that our solutions can work and that we can get things done.
Consider the local, state, and regional issues that could use a Libertarian solution.
To solve a problem, use the following 5 steps:
● Define the specific problem and its cause
● Define the focused solution and goal
● Develop an action plan
● Execute the action plan
● Continuously evaluate and improve
Be sure to utilize social media and other media outlets along the way to keep the public informed of those efforts and wins while consistently garnering more memberships to the local, state, and national party.
By getting others involved, and giving them a title and a duty, we empower a growing community of liberty-minded individuals to make an effort toward solving the problems at hand. It’s going to take more than drum beating and complaining, it takes serious work and action- human action. Do not let skepticism and fear of losing get in the way of making effort and taking actionable steps, these steps are crucial to building those networks and incremental wins in both the short and long run. I can assure you that the cronies, the statists, and those with evil intentions are not stopping their efforts, and things will not get any easier by waiting to take action.
The more action we as individuals take for coordinated efforts between now and 2024, and beyond, the greater opportunity we have for getting our ideas out, persuading others, and sharing with the world our real solutions to real problems- and we will get some wins along the way.
Originally Published: Libertarian Party of California – “The Beacon”
