Carl Watner

Who is Carl Watner?

Carl Watner is an American author and historian of libertarian studies, and a voluntaryist. He has written articles for Reason magazine, The Libertarian Forum, and The Journal of Libertarian Studies.

He publishes and edits The Voluntaryist newsletter since 1982. The Voluntaryist promotes libertarian economics, abstention from voting, nonviolence, and abolition of the state through conscious non-cooperation. The libertarian philosophy of the late Robert LeFevre, of whom he was a student, was influential in Watner's intellectual development. In addition to writing articles for The Voluntaryist, Watner researches and writes about historical libertarian texts. Murray Rothbard credited Watner for "uncovering an unknown work by the great Lysander Spooner, one that managed to escape the editor of Spooner's Collected Works" entitled "Vices are not Crimes." His work has been discussed and cited by Roderick Long, David Gordon of the Ludwig von Mises Institute, and other scholars.