David D. Friedman

{{short description|American economist, physicist, legal scholar, author, and libertarian theorist (born 1945)}}

{{Other people||David Friedman (disambiguation){{!}}David Friedman}}{{Third-party|date=January 2024}}

{{Infobox economist

| name = David D. Friedman

| school_tradition = Chicago school of economics{{cite web|url=http://daviddfriedman.com/The_Machinery_of_Freedom_.pdf |title=The Machinery of Freedom |page=124 |access-date=25 November 2012 |quote=Much is made in libertarian circles of the division between 'Austrian' and 'Chicago' schools of economic theory, largely by people who understand neither. I am classified as 'Chicago'. |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131217064037/http://daviddfriedman.com/The_Machinery_of_Freedom_.pdf |archive-date=17 December 2013 }}

| image = David Friedman by Gage Skidmore.jpg

| image_size =

|birth_name=David Director Friedman

| birth_date = {{birth date and age|1945|2|12}}

| birth_place =

| death_date =

| death_place =

| nationality = American

| spouse = Elizabeth Cook

| children = Patri Friedman

| institution = Santa Clara University

| field = Economics, law

| influences = Ronald Coase, Friedrich Hayek, Robert A. Heinlein, Milton Friedman, Rose Friedman, Adam Smith, Richard Timberlake, Alfred Marshall, Murray Rothbard

| contributions = The Machinery of Freedom
Consequentialist libertarianism

| awards =

| signature =

| repec_prefix =e | repec_id = pfr16

| module = {{Listen |embed= yes |filename= Dr_David_D_Friedman_Socialism_Vs_Capitalism.ogg |title= Friedman's voice |type= speech |description= On capitalism vs. socialism }}

|website=[http://www.daviddfriedman.com/ Official website]|education=Harvard University (BA)
University of Chicago (MA, PhD)|image_caption=Friedman in 2016}}

{{Chicago School (economics)}}{{Libertarianism US}}David Director Friedman (born February 12, 1945) is an American economist, physicist, legal scholar, and anarcho-capitalist theorist.{{Third-party inline|date=January 2024}} Although his academic training was in chemistry and physics and not law or economics, he is known for his textbook writings on microeconomics and the libertarian theory of anarcho-capitalism, which is the subject of his most popular book, The Machinery of Freedom.{{cite encyclopedia |last=Caplan|first=Bryan |author-link=Bryan Caplan |editor-first=Ronald |editor-last=Hamowy |editor-link=Ronald Hamowy |encyclopedia=The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism |title=Friedman, David (1945– ) |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=yxNgXs3TkJYC |doi=10.4135/9781412965811.n117 |year=2008 |publisher= Sage; Cato Institute |location= Thousand Oaks, CA |isbn= 978-1412965804 |oclc=750831024| lccn = 2008009151 |pages=194–195 |chapter=Friedman, David (1945–) }} Described by Walter Block as a "free-market anarchist" theorist,{{Cite journal |last=Block |first=Walter E. |date=2011 |title=David Friedman and Libertarianism: A Critique |url=https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/libpa3&div=71&id=&page= |journal=Libertarian Papers |volume=35 |issue=3 |page=22}} Friedman has also authored several other books and articles, including Price Theory: An Intermediate Text (1986), Law's Order: What Economics Has to Do with Law and Why It Matters (2000), Hidden Order: The Economics of Everyday Life (1996), and Future Imperfect (2008).Free Market Mojo. [http://freemarketmojo.com/?p=5539 "An Interview with David D. Friedman"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101122043412/http://freemarketmojo.com/?p=5539 |date=2010-11-22 }}.

Life and work

David Friedman is the son of economists Rose and Milton Friedman. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University in 1965, with a bachelor's degree in chemistry and physics.[http://law.scu.edu/faculty/profile/friedman-david/ Faculty Profile: David Friedman] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140722163211/http://law.scu.edu/faculty/profile/friedman-david/ |date=2014-07-22 }}. Santa Clara Law School He later earned a master's (1967) and a PhD (1971) in theoretical physics from the University of Chicago.{{cite web|url=http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academic/Academic.html|title=My Academic Page|website=www.daviddfriedman.com}} Despite his later career, he never took a class for credit in either economics or law.{{cite news|last1=Athiparambath|first1=Shanu|title=Economist David Friedman Says India Must Go Taller To Make Homes Affordable|url=http://marketurbanism.com/2016/02/14/economist-david-friedman-says-india-must-go-taller-to-make-homes-affordable/|access-date=4 October 2016|work=Market Urbanism|date=14 February 2016}} He was a professor of law at Santa Clara University from 2005 to 2017,{{cite web|url=http://phonebook.scu.edu/?v=pid&i=462|title=Santa Clara University|first=Santa Clara|last=University|website=phonebook.scu.edu}} and a contributing editor for Liberty magazine. He is currently a Professor Emeritus. He is an atheist.Friedman, David D. [http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/2008/01/atheism-and-religion.html "Atheism and Religion"], Ideas. His son, Patri Friedman, has also written about libertarian theory and market anarchism, particularly seasteading.{{Cite news |last=Wainwright |first=Oliver |date=2020-06-24 |title=Seasteading – a vanity project for the rich or the future of humanity? |url=https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jun/24/seasteading-a-vanity-project-for-the-rich-or-the-future-of-humanity |access-date=2025-03-01 |work=The Guardian |language=en-GB |issn=0261-3077}}

=''The Machinery of Freedom''=

In his book The Machinery of Freedom (1973), Friedman sketched a form of anarcho-capitalism where all goods and services including law itself can be produced by the free market. Friedman advocates an incrementalist approach to achieve anarcho-capitalism by gradual privatization of areas that government is involved in, ultimately privatizing the law itself. In the book, he states his opposition to violent anarcho-capitalist revolution.{{cite book|title=The Machinery of Freedom|pages=[https://archive.org/details/machineryoffreed00frie/page/149 149–150]|chapter=Revolution Is the Hell of It|author=Friedman, David D|isbn=0-8126-9069-9|year=1995|publisher=Open Court |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/machineryoffreed00frie/page/149}}

He advocates a consequentialist version of anarcho-capitalism, arguing for it on a cost–benefit analysis of state versus no state.Morris, Christopher. 1992. An Essay on the Modern State. Cambridge University Press. p. 62.{{Cite web |date=July 11, 2019 |title=The World From an Anarchist-Anachronist-Economist's View with Dr. David Friedman |url=https://thewealthstandard.com/the-world-from-an-anarchist-anachronist-economists-view-with-dr-david-friedman/ |access-date=July 5, 2023 |website=The Wealth Standard}} It is contrasted with the natural-rights approach as propounded most notably by economist and libertarian theorist Murray Rothbard.{{Citation needed|date=January 2024}}

Non-academic interests

Friedman is a longtime member of the Society for Creative Anachronism, where he is known as Duke Cariadoc of the Bow. He is known throughout the worldwide society for his articles on the philosophy of recreationism and practical historical recreations, especially those relating to the medieval Middle East.{{cite web|url=http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Medieval/Restructuring.html|title=Friedman, David D. "On Restructuring the SCA"}} His work is compiled in the popular Cariadoc's Miscellany.{{cite web|url=http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/cariadoc/miscellany.html|title=Cariadoc's Miscellany|website=www.pbm.com}} He is sometimes credited with founding the largest and longest-running SCA event, the Pennsic War; as king of the Middle Kingdom he challenged the East Kingdom, and later as king of the East accepted the challenge and lost (to himself).F.L. Watkins (Fólki Þorgilsson). 2005. Herstadr-Saga: An Incomplete History of Pennsic Urbana, Illinois: Folump Enterprises

He was a teenage wargamer who taught his school friend, Jack Radey, founder of People's War Games, how to play such wargames as Tactics II.{{cite web |last1=Serval |first1=Fred |title=Jack Radey part 1 – The Origins of People's War Games |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGuMsL2dlpA | archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211211/wGuMsL2dlpA| archive-date=2021-12-11 | url-status=live|website=Homo Ludens |date=22 March 2020 |publisher=Fred Serval |access-date=11 May 2020}}{{cbignore}} Radey relates how Friedman and himself wrote to Charles S. Roberts claiming that they had found a first turn winning strategy for each of the two sides. Roberts replied that their interpretation of the rules was valid.{{BSN|reason=The current source is insufficiently reliable (WP:NOTRS).|date=January 2024}}

He is a long-time science fiction fan, and has written three novels. Harald (Baen Books, 2006) is set in an invented world drawn from European history.{{cite web

|url=http://daviddfriedman.com/harald/Harald_background_info.html

|title=Harald - Background Information |first=David |last=Freidman |date=2020-03-17}}

Salamander (2011) and its sequel Brothers (2020) are fantasy.

He has spoken in favor of a non-interventionist foreign policy.{{cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TO1xXD1Cws4| archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211211/TO1xXD1Cws4| archive-date=2021-12-11 | url-status=live|title=Dr David Friedman on US Foreign Policy, Syria, Assad, Terrorism, WWII, Hitler, and much more...|last=VoluntaryVirtues0com|date=22 September 2013|via=YouTube}}{{cbignore}}{{Third-party inline|date=January 2024|reason=needed for context and WP:DUEWEIGHT}}

Bibliography

= Nonfiction =

1988. [http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Medieval/Medieval.html Cariadoc's Miscellany].
1990 (2nd ed.; 1st ed.: 1986). [http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academic/Price_Theory/PThy_ToC.html Price Theory: An Intermediate Text]. Southwestern Publishing.
1996. Hidden Order: The Economics of Everyday Life. {{ISBN|0887308856}}.
2000. [http://www.daviddfriedman.com/laws_order/index.shtml Law's Order: What Economics Has to Do with Law and Why It Matters]. Princeton Univ. Press. {{ISBN|0691090092}}
2005. "The Case for Privacy" in Contemporary Debates in Applied Ethics. Wiley-Blackwell. {{ISBN|1405115483}}
2008. [http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Future_Imperfect.html Future Imperfect: Technology and Freedom in an Uncertain World]. {{ISBN|0521877326}}
2015 (3rd ed.; 2nd ed.: 1989; 1st ed.: 1973). The Machinery of Freedom. {{ISBN|978-1507785607}}
2019. [http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Legal%20Systems/LegalSystemsContents.htm Legal Systems Very Different from Ours]. {{ISBN|1793386722}}

= Fiction =

{{cite book |title=Harald |date=2006 |author=David D. Friedman |publisher=Baen Books |ol=OL16070848W |url=https://archive.org/details/harald00frie |isbn=9781416520566}}
Salamander, 2011
Brothers, 2020

References

External links

{{official website|http://www.daviddfriedman.com/}}
{{C-SPAN|44986}}
[https://law.scu.edu/faculty/profile/friedman-david/ Profile] on the website of Santa Clara University
{{ISFDB name}}
[https://web.archive.org/web/20120128162753/http://www.booknotes.org/Watch/74535-1/David+Friedman.aspx Booknotes interview with Friedman on Hidden Order: The Economics of Everyday Life, October 20, 1996.]
{{Google Scholar id|8YoMQggAAAAJ}}