In the 1980s and 90s, I wrote a number of longish pamphlets for the Libertarian Alliance and other organisations. They were all published in hard copy and had various effects. Needless to say, they had far less effect than Free Life Commentary, which is published directly on the Internet, and reaches tens of thousands of readers: these never reached more than a few hundred readers.

Here, you will find a complete set of the pamphlets. If you want to comment on any of them, do feel free to write to me. But be warned that I am a poor correspondent. You may need to wait months for an answer, and that is if you ever get one!

A pamphlet about the decline of civil liberties in this country since the Conservatives were returned in May 1979. I wrote this in May 1989, and it was published by the Libertarian Alliance to commemorate 10 glorious years of Margaret Thatcher. It is a moderately significant piece of writing, so far as it is the first sustained critique made from the political "right" of the British Government's record on civil liberties. At the time, I was seen as something of a crank by many other libertarians, who were still able in a pseudo-Marxist way to believe that the only thing that matters is the economic "base", and that, this being shaped by our ideas, the "superstructure" could be ignored. Nearly a decade later - and after repeated further violations of right that make my earlier complaints almost mild - I am seen as a sort of guru in the British libertarian movement. It is an eminence that I truly wish had never been made possible. Length - 31k.

A pamphlet analysing the first 500 days of the Blair Government.  I was paid to write this, and part of the deal was that I should be quite optimistic about things.  However, the truth comes through. Length - 55k.

A pamphlet arguing for a Bill of Rights for the European Union. I supply a draft Bill, together with a long introduction and commentary. I was pleased with this when I wrote it back in October 1990. Sadly, it was soon overtaken by events. The fall of Margaret Thatcher, just a few weeks later, entirely transformed the debate on Europe. Even without this calamity, though, I suspect the pamphlet would have fallen "dead-born from the press." To be sure, the Intergovernmental Conference that eventually met at Maastricht to discuss closer European union ignored completely ignored me. Length - 117k. 

A pamphlet about the Challenge of Islam. I wrote this in January 1990, before the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and before the collapse of Yugoslavia. Though I was wrong to trust newspaper reports, and though I had not yet developed my full hatred and distrust of war, I am rather proud of my ability to see the emergence of a problem before most other people did.

A pamphlet about press freedom. This was the Libertarian Alliance's submission to the 1989 Calcutt Committee on privacy and press freedom. I have written better things, but this is not so very bad. My suggestion, that people should be given a copyright in their appearances, and so should be able to use the courts to stop the more lurid press invasions of their privacy, was discussed at some length in the final Government Report. Length - 57k.

A pamphlet about the right of advertisers to say anything they like, without being harassed by the State. I wrote this in 1991, and am sorry that it was never published, as I am rather proud of it. Length - 77k.

A pamphlet stating a conservative case for the right to produce and use pornography. It might be of interest to young Mr Howard. Length - 77k.

Market Behaviour in the Ancient World: An Overview of the Debate - This is the text of a speech given to the Third Conference of the Property and Freedom Society held in Bodrum, Turkey, in May 2008. It looks at the Polanyi/Finley case that there were no markets in the ancient world of a kind that we might recognise.
 

A pamphlet about the growth and decline of English liberty, written in 1992. As ever, this could be longer and show more learning. In particular, I could rely more explicitly on the public choice theory of which I was shamefully ignorant until 1995. But I am very proud of this pamphlet even as it it. I say in it that the restoration and preservation of English liberty between about 1640 and 1870 had almost nothing to do with English liberal ideology. It derived instead from an extreme conservatism. While this conservatism was hostile to what most of us would consider desirable reforms - ie, the simplification and softening of the law, the establishment of full religious toleration, and so forth, it also resisted the growth of a strong centralised power that would have made reforms at the price of the liberties actually enjoyed by Englishmen. When the conservative opposition to reform crumbled after about 1820, the foundations of liberty were fatally undermined; and it is almost a miracle that we still live in a reasonably free country 180 years later. Length - 64k

Another pamphlet on the same theme, written in May 1998. This is a greatly revised and expanded version of the above. I hope it is an improvement. Length - 165k

A Pamphlet about Anglo-German relations in the 20th century, written in 1990. This begins by discussing the fears about German reunification that emerged after the breaking of the Berlin Wall. I say that a strong Germany is no danger whatever to British interests in the present. I then go on to argue that the long duel between Britain and Germany that began around 1900 and finished in May 1945 was equally unnecessary, and was a disaster for my country and the whole world. The two great wars opened the way to moderate socialist despotism at home and the most ghastly horrors abroad. Without those wars, there might still be a British Empire and an open world trading order centred on London. There might even be colonies on Mars and fiercely independent prospectors mining the asteroids and setting up their own versions of the good society. Instead, we have the "New World Order", which may be even worse than the chaos that preceded its imposition. 

Isolationism is a powerful force in American politics, but is almost unknown in England. Its logic, however, applies just as well to an island nation as to a continental. I wrote this before John Charmley's revisionist case became widely known, and before it entered popular discussion via Alan Clarke's claim that we should have made peace with Germany in 1941. If I were to revise the piece, I should make it much longer and draw on a much wider range of sources. But I am far too lazy to touch it again. Even so, here is is. Length - 80k.

Three short biographies published in The Freeman - one of Thomas Erskine, one of Henry Vane, the other of Voltaire.

A pamphlet about the Opium Wars fought between Britain and China in the 19th century.

A pamphlet against identity cards written in 1995. This is a shortened version of a book that I give in the next link. Briefly explained, I argue that there is no law and order benefit in identity cards, but that they will allow the establishment of a totalitarian police state - far softer than most that have previously existed, but also far more effective because of the information technology that will soon make every control freak's dreams come true. Length - 33k.

Here is the book about identity cards. This is long, but contains tons of notes for anyone who wants to use it as a quarry. It was widely publicised in late 1994, following the British Home Secretary's endorsement of identity cards at the Conservative Party Conference; and I like to think that it was one of the reasons why this endorsement has so far come to nothing. Length - 180k.

A pamphlet explaining the British money laundering regulations. This started life as a lecture for my students, but I soon realised it would easily make another rant about the Horrors of Our Age. Length - 23k.

A pamphlet about aids that I wrote in 1989. In that year, it was still fashionable to predict countless millions of deaths, plus the collapse of civilisation, some time before the end of the century. I disagreed, pointing out that the AIDS epidemic, though a disaster for its victims, was and would remain of no general significance. I said that, unlike with the great scourges of the past, we knew roughly how this disease was transmitted, and how it could be avoided - ie, condoms and clean needles. I denied any need for special government action, except to do the decent thing and legalise all drugs and stop the remaining legal persecution of homosexuals. I notice I made a stupid mistake about the Criminal Law Amendment Act 1885. Other than this, though, I remain rather proud of the pamphlet. I am told that an undergraduate in a British university plagiarised it for her dissertation and got a first. Various emotions competed in my mind when I heard this, but I think pride came out on top. Length - 87k.

A pamphlet about the celebrated Spanner Case, written by my very good friend Anthony Furlong - ie, me - in 1991. Briefly stated, the history of this case is this: In the late 1980s, a group of middle-aged men were in the habit of meeting in private to engage in consensual sado-masochistic homosexual acts. Some of these session were filmed on videotape for the later pleasure of the participants. One of the videotapes fell into the hands of the Police who allege they thought they had at last found a "snuff" movie - that is, a film in which the performers actually are tortured and killed: NB, no such film has ever been produced in support of the claims made in the past 50 years that they surely exist and must be legislated against!

The police investigation led to the arrest of several dozen men, and 15 of them stood trial at the Old Bailey in London in December 1990. The charges were mostly under the Offences Against the Person Act 1861, and involved various kinds of assault. The Defendants claimed that the legal definition of assault must go beyond the mere doing of harm to another person and must include the lack of that person's consent. The Judge, however, ruled that consent is no defence to a criminal assault. The men pleaded guilty, and some were sent to prison. One of them, indeed, was charged with and convicted of "aiding and abetting an assault on himself"! Appeals were made before the Court of Appeal and the House of Lords, and these were rejected. Eventually, in February 1997, an appeal reached the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. This also was rejected. So now we have it on the very highest authority - a civilised society has the right to follow us even into the bedroom to make sure that we too are being civilised. For some reason, many conservatives were pleased by the failure of the European appeal. They do not seem to have noticed that a State that is allowed to do this will one day turn on them and their "religious brainwashing" of their children. Sometimes, I really despair! Length - 38k.

Noted Added November 2002 I was recently contacted by one of the men convicted in this case. He pointed out that, while my pamphlet was comforting at the time, and even of some use in spreading word of the injustice done to him and his friends, it was now twelve years since the first trial, and he felt that it was no longer helpful for me to keep all the names of the fifteen men written in full in the pamphlet. He asked if I could change the names to initials. I have done this, and so the pamphlet as uploaded here is slightly different from any hardcopy versions that may still be circulating.

An essay on Epicurus (341-270 BC) who was, with Plato and Aristotle, one of the three great philosophers of the ancient world. He developed an integrated system of ethics and natural philosophy that, he claimed and many accepted, showed everyone the way to a life of the greatest happiness. The school that he founded remained open for 798 years after his death. While it lost place during the last 200 of these years, his philosophy held until then a wide and often decisive hold on the ancient mind.

A Pamphlet about the British National Lottery. I wrote this for money in 1993, and argue that the proceeds of the Lottery should go so far as possible to the good causes that it was set up to fund, rather than largely to the Treasury. Some hope! However, the piece has a certain value as an attack on arts subsidies. It demolishes one of the standard argument in favour, that the earnings for musicians, actors and so forth can only increase if the State subsidises the arts - otherwise, ticket prices must rise out of everyone else's reach. It also has a certain biographical value for those who want to know what music I most enjoy listening to. Length - 110k. 

A Pamphlet about Socialism and Healthcare ghosted by me in the assumed clothing of a socialist who has come to the conclusion that real socialism comes via the market. I was hoping that some Labour MPs would take notice and amend their opinions.  In the event, they have all sold out to the corporatist special interest groups. Silly of me ever to think they would do otherwise. Length - 62k.

Another pamphlet about getting private money into the National Health Service.  I'm not sure if this was ever published by the organisation that commissiioned it, but if it was published, I doubt if it looked at all as I wrote it. Length -80k.

A Pamphlet about Long Term Care for the Elderly.  This was written in 1996, and it discusses the various unpleasant options for dealing with an ageing population unless we find a means of extending the natural term of human life and health.  Length -35k.

A pamphlet about the attack on the motor car. This was written in 1994 as the draft of a report that was never finally made. Because it contains some good material relevant to tracking the progress of the greens and health fascists in their war against industrial civilisation, I publish it here exactly as I completed it. Length - 62k.