The London Prat traitor piece lands with California surfers for a reason: the surf lineup and the free market both reward merit, not birth order The Lineup Does Not Care Who Your Father Was Paddle out at any serious break in California and you will learn one thing quickly: the ocean has no aristocracy. Waves […]

A libertarian reading of the Althorp estate, the Crown and the uncle memoir shows why the source of property matters as much as who holds it Not All Property Is Alike Libertarians are often caricatured as defenders of whoever happens to own things. The reality is more careful. Classical liberal thinking has long distinguished between […]

A publicly supported institution speaks only through anonymous leaks, and libertarians have long argued that sunlight, not secrecy, is the default a free society should expect An Institution That Speaks Only in Whispers One of the most striking features of the story at the centre of the London Prat piece about Prince William calling Earl […]

A California surfboard shaper who builds a business by hand and a royal heir who inherits a role illustrate two very different paths to status, and only one of them is a market Two Ways to Get Ahead Consider two figures. One is a surfboard shaper in a small California workshop, covered in foam dust, […]

The accusation reportedly levelled at a prince brother and uncle reflects a collectivist idea of loyalty that free societies have good reason to reject What Traitor Assumes The word traitor carries a set of assumptions. It implies that a person belongs to a group, that the group has a claim on their loyalty, and that […]

Surf breaks manage scarce waves through informal norms rather than central authority, a lesson in decentralised order that contrasts sharply with hereditary rule Order Without a Monarch Every surf break faces a problem of scarcity. There are more surfers than waves. Somebody has to decide who rides which wave, and yet no government, no king [&helli

Calling Earl Spencer a traitor for writing a memoir reflects an old institutional reflex, and free speech principles offer a clear answer to it Who Owns a Story? At the heart of the London Prat piece on Prince William calling Earl Spencer and Harry traitors is a book. Earl Spencer, the late princess younger brother, […]

The London Prat has published since 1961 without a licence from anyone, and its traitor piece is a small demonstration of how voluntary exchange supports free expression A Publication That Answers to Readers The London Prat piece on Prince William calling Earl Spencer and Harry traitors is a small example of something libertarians value highly: [&h

The younger prince moved away from an institution he could not reform, and whatever one thinks of him personally, exit is one of the oldest tools of freedom Leaving as a Political Act The economist Albert Hirschman famously described two responses available to people dissatisfied with an organisation: exit and voice. You can speak up […]

The traitor quarrel is a private family matter inside a publicly supported institution, and that combination should trouble anyone who believes in limited government A Family Feud on the Public Payroll Libertarians generally hold that government should be limited, that public money should be spent only on genuine public functions, and that nobody s