Logan Ferre discusses the origins of libertarianism, comes up with another “map” of views (the axes being Statism vs Anarchy, & Collectivism vs Individualism), & asks “so where are we?”

IMO, the proper question is more “where are we going?”

Personally I’ve come to see libertarianism as not a specific point on such a map, but a constant line going in the general direction of the anarchist end. Some of us have a different timetable for “arrival”, but overall the idea is to end up with a literal “self-governing society” eventually.

As for collectivism: provided that it is COMPLETELY voluntary, one can actually be both an individualist AND a collectivist, since the decision to pool resources is a willing one. If you want to form a group of some sort, completely made of willing members, then there is nothing to libertarianism that prevents you from doing so. The key variable — I’d say the ONLY variable, even — is the State. The further away we can get from it, the better, though we have to have the will to replace it with ourselves to make the transition work.

Though, to be honest, I think “anarchy” is a misnomer, if only for how people have come to interpret it. The average Joe out there hears “anarchy” he thinks of people running the streets blowing stuff up & kicking babies, basically doing anything & everything no matter how cruel and/or idiotic simply because The Man isn’t dishing out beatings. This misconception implies, unknown to the person holding it, an indictment of humanity itself: if all we understand is violence, and without being forced to not harm each other we’re guaranteed to do so, are we ever truly civilized?

In some sense of the term, there will always be some kind of order, even in a post-state society, the issue is how that order is to be arrived at. Authoritarian types of all stripes answer that question with “we will impose it with our boots to your face!”, while we reject force as a tool for maintaining a society, it is as simple as that. Whether you want to call the end result of our views “anarchy” or not is up to you, I personally don’t care, long as we get there.