Many libertarians claim that morality is an objective, universal code that dictates right from wrong. They believe objective morality exists as a universal principle that applies regardless of personal beliefs, people’s cultures, or historical context. This view asserts that morality is fixed, binding on all people universally. In contrast, subjective morality argues that moral values are shaped by unique experiences, cultural norms, and human reasoning varying across time and space. I believe objective morality is contrary to libertarianism.
Morality evolves with society. This is demonstrated by the various social mores across cultures and time which have certainly not been universal. For example, animal sacrifices, capital punishment, and polygamy are all practices that have been deemed morally acceptable in some societies and condemned in others. Societies that once upheld norms such as slavery, the cruel treatment of animals, and the sexual abuse of women and children evolved because their values changed.
This shift reflects evolution in human understanding, empathy, and experience. Humans have developed cognitive tools like memory, imagination, and language that allow us to better understand our feelings and give them meaning. We don’t just experience suffering like other creatures; we use our cognitive superiority to develop a narrative. Injustice, betrayal, and grief are how we understand our suffering. Morality is the conscious recognition of this suffering, a framework shaped by our human ability to assign meaning and choose how to act in relation to others. Morality requires conscious minds to experience and interpret emotions such as pain and pleasure, because these emotions give morality its meaning and purpose. Independent of minds, human frameworks cannot be objective in the way mathematics is.
Some libertarians have stated absurd propositions like, “Absent God, it is impossible to arrive at morality.” I assert that this is not the true libertarian position. Morality is rooted in individualism; not in some divine edict, but the intrinsic autonomy and value of the individual.
Morality is a product of current societal norms, which are shaped by experiences and cultural arrangements. These experiences build upon each other, which allow cultural arrangements to evolve over time. Furthermore, all unique experiences such as one’s upbringing, relationships, and personal struggles shape every unique moral compass. This creates the human condition’s paradox, where individuals with personal moral codes live in social frameworks that influence morality, but don’t always match their own. When societies enforce moral codes, they regulate things such as speech or drug use. When objective morality clashes with social norms, it risks becoming just another tool for regulation rather than a universal truth.
Morality that ignores individual autonomy becomes authoritarian by nature. This is the opposite of voluntary moral reasoning and bottom up ethics, which libertarianism requires. Libertarianism is built on the principle that each individual owns themselves, their body, their mind, their labor, and their choices. This decentralization of authority is fundamentally at odds with any moral framework that claims to be objective and binding on all people, regardless of consent. If moral claims are objective, it opens the door for authorities to punish dissent in the name of morality, including through institutions like churches which define “truth” and impose it. History demonstrates repeatedly that slavery, persecution of non-conformists, censorship, and many other examples were justified by appeals to objective morality.
Opponents may assert that subjective morality leads to relativism. But I’d argue, as economist Ludwig von Mises did in Human Action regarding economic goods, that value is subjective, rooted in people’s preferences and marginal utility. Just as people have prioritized economic goods, they rank moral actions based on personal goals and situations. In a free economy, people’s preferences and marginal utility set prices and boost prosperity. Voluntary agreements like respecting each other’s autonomy through the non-aggression principle form the bedrock of ethics because they reflect what works for free people.
Libertarianism has no need for a universal moral code that defines right or wrong because it is anchored in the practical, utilitarian outcome of individual freedom. Right and wrong arise from the consequences of voluntary actions, judged by their ability to enhance satisfaction or utility. The rightness of actions is not moral but pragmatic, just as voluntary transactions are right because they produce better outcomes. Happiness, as a form of marginal utility, is the central factor in understanding right and wrong. This decentralized process, free from the authoritarian grip of imposed moral absolutes, lets norms evolve as human understanding does, much like markets adapt to new demands. A free moral market, rooted in individual sovereignty, delivers an ethical world as dynamic and resilient as capitalism’s wealth, without the shackles of enforced “truth.” There’s no correct moral hierarchy, just as there is no universal economic value for a good.
I assert that subjective morality is essential to the libertarian view of self ownership and individual sovereignty. We are not all morally identical. Forcing everyone to live under one moral code, however noble it may seem, denies human difference. Subjective morality allows for disagreement, pluralism, and freedom of conscience, opening the possibility for a society where people can live according to their own values without infringing on others. Moral claims must remain subjective and rooted in individual values because no one should have the authority to define morality on your behalf. When libertarians push objective morality, they risk echoing the collectivism they oppose.
