EKIP– Expert Club for Economics and Politics A Different Opinion
I did it, finally traveling the miles to attend one of the largest gatherings of libertarians in the world. It was the International Students For Liberty Conference 2015, held from February 13 to 15 at the enormous Marriott Wardman Park, the largest hotel in Washington, D.C. The event of the year brought together more than 1,000 young libertarians from around the world for three days of lectures, seminars, trainings, debates, and parties.
It is difficult to give a unified view of an event like ISFLC – the largest annual event of the organization Students For Liberty, to whose European branch I belong. The thing is gigantic – at times, the program reaches 9 (nine) break-out sessions. That is, in the depths of Wardman Park, 9 separate lectures are held on topics from all corners of libertarianism – David Friedman says why we should eliminate the state’s monopoly on criminal law, Students For Sensible Drug Policy tells us what sensible drug policies are, FIRE talks about their fight for free speech in American universities, Randists from The Atlas Society debunk myths about objectivism, while at the same time several other organizations do training on activism and finding a job.
Depending on which lectures, events and parties you go to – ISFLC can be a totally different, personal experience [1]. Whether you listen to bleeding heart libertarians about their feminism, spend time with the aspiring politicians from Young Americans For Liberty, hang out with some drunken guru like Tom Palmer or Jeffrey Tucker... or eat at Chipotle with Europeans wearing suits worth 1000 euros minimum, it is entirely your choice.
Ron Paul and Edward Snowden
But whatever you decide to do, you can't afford to miss the conference's big presence - the living legend of the libertarian movement - Ron Paul. Yes, in the packed main hall of the hotel, along with Judge Andrew Napolitano and moderated by Nick Gellespie of Reason, Ron Paul talked about the Federal Reserve, the wars of the American government, how Democrats and Republicans do each other favors to spend more. How Wall Street and the crown corporations profit from the monopoly of the central bank and from the taxpayers' money they gobble up in subsidies and bailouts.
Unfortunately, Paul's strange positions on the subject of the war in Ukraine had seriously affected the enthusiasm I had always had for him - I deliberately did not stand in line for a photo, although I had wanted to for years. However, the interesting moment came when the former congressman was asked by a Russian in the publik why he condemned only American imperialism, but somehow forgot and even justified Russian imperialism. Paul was worried, he had not expected such a question, perhaps he did not even know that there are many European libertarians who actively criticize his views and comments on Ukraine. His answer was a step back from the insane justification of the Kremlin regime - he said that Americans, the EU and the Russians should leave Donbas.
Unlike most visitors, I spent a significant amount of time in various fundraising trainings (after all, our movement also needs interesting events, books, articles, flyers), but I managed to attend Ron Bailey's lecture, called The End of Doom, where he breaks down all Malthusian scenarios for the end of the world, demonstrating with statistics how much more food we produce on less land, how much more we reforest and protect nature, and how quickly green energy technologies are developing (despite the negative impact of green subsidies). I caught Nick Gillespie 's interactive lecture, full of great short videos, in which he demonstrated to us the polylibertarianization of American society with unique humor and optimism for the development of the movement. One of the main figures at the Cato Institute, David Boaz, not only signed his new book for me (which I brought to Sofia ), but also mentioned the regional conference of European Students For Liberty, which we organized in October, in his speech.
The inclusion of Edward Snowden, however, was the cherry on top of all the lectures and presentations. On the huge screens in the hotel ballroom, we all managed to see Snowden, who unequivocally and to the applause of the entire hall identified himself with the ideas of libertarianism. At the same time, he extremely modestly stated that “there are no heroes, only heroic acts”, which even made the CNN journalist sitting next to me think. And it was actually sad when, during the recording of the Stossel Show [2], one of the libertarian-leaning congressmen (Justin Amash) stated that Snowden had “broken the law” and should be held accountable for it.
Outside of lectures and the official part
Of course, while important, the lectures and seminars cannot fully capture the spirit of the conference. It is more clearly felt in the conversations between Australian and Honduran libertarians about how to fight university Marxists, in the huge hall full of exhibitors where I gave my Libertarian Party email in exchange for a T-shirt that said Libertarian, or met a fellow IEA intern who now works for the British think tank and distributes the institute's publications, in the French who are sipping California wine and are so happy to see each other because until recently they had perceived themselves as the only French libertarians.
The most important message of the event, however, can be found in the words of an astonished American tourist who shared in the elevator (while the conference badge was under my coat) that “the hotel is full of libertarians.” And in fact, not only the hotel, our movement has never been bigger and, most importantly, better organized. That is why Students For Liberty had gathered us to declare that we are coming, whether the corporate cronies, the soft-spoken socialists or the political class are ready.
[1] Bloomberg, for example, saw it this way: http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/features/2015-02-17/bow-ties-and-slam-poetry-this-is-libertarianism-in-2015
[2] Traditionally, one episode is filmed at ISFLC
