Der Minimalstaat

Robert Nozick’s ‘Anarchy, State and Utopia’ is one of the most important contributions to social contract theory in the 20th century. Nozick defends the idea of a minimal state—designed to protect individual rights and private property—against both theories on the welfare state and anarchist positions. His radical position has attracted interest from political philosophy and its related fields. The essays in this collection critically reflect on and reconstruct Nozick’s arguments. In addition, they compare his theory of the (minimal) state to other contractarian, libertarian, ordoliberal and paternalistic concepts of the state. A modern conception of the state must consider that societies in the 21st century are more individualistic and more heterogeneous than ever before. The minimal state provides answers to these challenges and demonstrates the limited scope of state-organised coordination and cooperation if individual rights are taken seriously. With contributions by Hartmut Kliemt, Hardy Bouillon, Bodo Knoll, Andreas Koenig, Fabian Wendt, Rolf W. Puster, Jörg A. Winter, Walter Reese-Schäfer, Dagmar Schulze Heuling, Jan Schnellenbach