Property and Freedom Podcast, Episode 152.
This talk is from the 2016 meeting of the Property and Freedom Society. Daniel Model (Liechtenstein; Model Holding), On the Hardship of Doing Business (in Switzerland).
Uncompromising Intellectual Radicalism
As noted here, PFS 20, the 2025 Annual Meeting of the Property and Freedom Society, will be held from Thursday, September 18, 2025 to Tuesday, September 23, 2025, in Bodrum, Turkey, at the Hotel Karia Princess.
Those interested in attending should contact Dr. Hoppe or Mr. Thomas Jacob (jacob@pfs-zurich.ch) (Administrative Secretary/Membership),
Speakers and topics for previous Annual Meetings may be found here.
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“Property does not exist because there are laws, but laws exist because there is property.” — Frédéric Bastiat
“Because the concept of property, for instance, is so basic that everyone seems to have some immediate understanding of it, most people never think about it carefully and can, as a consequence, produce at best a very vague definition. But starting from imprecisely stated or assumed definitions and building a complex network of thought upon them can lead only to intellectual disaster. For the original imprecisions and loopholes will then pervade and distort everything derived from them. To avoid this, the concept of property must first be clarified.” —Hans-Hermann Hoppe, TSC, ch. 2
The Property and Freedom Society (PFS; Facebook) stands for an uncompromising intellectual radicalism: for justly acquired private property, freedom of contract, freedom of association—which logically implies the right to not associate with, or to discriminate against—anyone in one's personal and business relations—and unconditional free trade. It condemns imperialism and militarism and their fomenters, and champions peace. It rejects positivism, relativism, and egalitarianism in any form, whether of "outcome" or "opportunity," and it has an outspoken distaste for politics and politicians. As such it seeks to avoid any association with the policies and proponents of interventionism, which Ludwig von Mises identified in 1946 as the fatal flaw in the plan of the many earlier and contemporary attempts by intellectuals alarmed by the rising tide of socialism and totalitarianism to found an anti-socialist ideological movement. Mises wrote: "What these frightened intellectuals did not comprehend was that all those measures of government interference with business which they advocated are abortive. ... There is no middle way. Either the consumers are supreme or the government."
(A more complete statement of our Principles can be found here.)
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