Libertarian Movement (Italy)

Movimento Libertario
Leader	Leonardo Facco
Coordinator	Giorgio Fidenato
Founded	September 24, 2005 (launched as cultural movement) September 2007 (founded as political movement-party) (September 24, 2005 (launched as cultural movement) September 2007 (founded as political movement-party))
Headquarters	Via Lino Zanussi 3, 33170 Pordenone
Newspaper	Enclave, I Fogli di Enclave
Ideology	agorism, anarcho-capitalism, anti-federalism, anti-statism, classical liberalism, euroscepticism, free market, Individualism, laissez-faire, liberism, libertarianism, minarchism, non-interventionism, non-violence, non-voting, objectivism, voluntaryism
European affiliation	None
International affiliation	International Alliance of Libertarian Parties, Interlibertarians
Colors	Yellow or gold
Website
http://www.movimentolibertario.com/
Politics of Italy Political parties Elections

The Libertarian Movement (Italian: Movimento Libertario, ML) is a political party in Italy. It espouses a typically libertarian platform: minimal regulation of society, liberism of the markets, strong defense of natural rights of liberty and property, non-interventionism in foreign policy, and laissez-faire freedom of trade and travel to all foreign countries. Its leaders are Leonardo Facco and Giorgio Fidenato. The party has as its symbol a round disk with a yellow-gold background in reference to the gold standard and also to its membership in the anarcho-capitalist movement.

ML was started as a cultural association on 24 September 2005 in Treviglio with the writing of the Manifesto and Constitution of the Libertarian Movement by Leonardo Facco. Two years after, ML was transformed into a party by Leonardo Facco, Giorgio Fidenato and Marcello Mazzilli. The party's goal is to defend life, liberty and property of each individual within a strong free market system.^[1] The party has its registered office in the Municipality of Pordenone.

The party supports both the Padanian and the Venetian independence movements.^[2][3] Among other things, Facco is editor of the pro-independence and libertarian online newspaper L'Indipendenza.^[4] Both Facco, who has been a leader of the libertarian faction within Lega Nord in the 1990s, and Fidenato have participated in events and demonstrations organized by separatist parties as the Padanian Union,^[5] the Alpine Padanian Union,^[6] Veneto State.^[7][8]

In November 2011 Facco proposed the creation of an Independentist Libertarian Movement (MLI), which would support all the separatist movements and parties active around Italy.^[9] In the run-up of a conference of free independentists organized by L'Indipendenza,^[10] Fidenato, who had been long in favour of the dissolution of Italy, endorsed the proposal.^[11][12]

Ideology

ML takes inspiration from the classical liberalism of John Locke and the Founding Fathers of the United States conjugated to the 19th-century American individualist anarchist strand of Benjamin Tucker, Henry David Thoreau and Lysander Spooner.^[13] On the economy ML takes inspiration from the Austrian School and the theoretic formulation of philosopher and economist Murray N. Rothbard. The actions in favor of tax resistance, free entrepreneurship and political non-voting also recall the agorist reflections by Samuel Edward Konkin III although ML does not officially identify itself in programmatic positions and spectrum of the American left-libertarians. ML also includes some aspects from the American model of liberty theorized by Robert Nozick (minarchism) and the Objectivism philosophy described in novels by Ayn Rand. ML refers to freedom of association of the anarchic federalism, anarcho-capitalist free market society and to the Jeffersonian limited government of classical liberalism.

ML holds an anti-federalist stance on European integration. It is against the transformation of the European Union into a federation, preferring the voluntary accession and the unanimity of a confederation. The term "federalism", as it is used by ML, means decentralization and fiscal federalism, as opposed to the Italian highly centralized state. Party icons include Ferdinando Galiani, Cesare Beccaria, Filippo Mazzei, Emerico Amari, Carlo Cattaneo, Gaetano Mosca, Vilfredo Pareto, Luigi Einaudi, Bruno Leoni, and Gianfranco Miglio. Despite being officially a party, ML has spoken in favor of non-voting.^[14] A party slogan says: "Neither right nor left, nor centrist. Simply free is better".

Principles

In its party's constitution ML acknowledges the following libertarian principles:

• Freedom, understood as the absence of constraint is a natural right of the individual, which nobody (private or public organization) must threaten;
• The Government, in its various variants, forces people to obey blindly and accept legislation invasive and oppressive monopoly;
• Everyone has the right to seek their own happiness and that of his loved ones, taking responsibility for their actions;
• Each individual is entitled organize in freedom themselves to protect their lives and their belongings, particularly given the enormous difficulties posed by the power of politicians at all levels;
• The need to eliminate and reduce the state, politicians and bureaucracies in the everyday life, increasingly recognizing the dignity of all people working really, producing their own resources and possessions.
• Property is a natural and inalienable right of man, is primarily the property of themselves, of the own bodies and of one's life.

Political actions

Against the withholding tax

Battle to sow GMO maize

Giorgio Fidenato and ML favor the free cultivation and commercialization of GMO seeds and food. They support no limits to GMOs in Italy, consumer freedom to choose their own products, and freedom of private scientific research as long as it respect the natural human rights and it does not use public money.

In this respect, Fidenato and his "Federated Farmers" were subjected to threats and acts of violent vandalism in their headquarters by an anti-globalization and environmentalist group for their position on GMO maize.^{[15][16][17][18]} The Italian Radicals referred in Parliament on the issue.^[19]

Cultural association

ML, as cultural association, aims at promoting libertarianism in Italy. The association's motto is "Everyone is free to do what he thinks is right for himself, without attacking anyone, and without attacking the property rights of others". As such the group organizes meetings, debates and conferences, and issues publications.

Publications

Leonardo Facco, through his Leonardo Facco Editore publishing house, issues two magazines: Enclave and I Fogli di Enclave. The Scientific Committee of Enclave includes: Walter Block, David D. Friedman, Hans Hermann Hoppe, John Hospers, Antonio Martino, Pierre Lemieux, Tibor R. Machan, Jan Narveson, Wendy McElroy, Ralph Raico, Robert Sirico, Thomas S. Szasz.^[20]

References

External links

• Official website