Why Nozick?
Nozick Consulting is named after Robert Nozick (1938–2002), an American philosopher who wrote about what a state may and may not demand of people.
Who was Robert Nozick?
Robert Nozick was born in Brooklyn, New York, and was a professor of philosophy at Harvard University for many years. His best-known book, Anarchy, State, and Utopia (1974), won the National Book Award in 1975 and is regarded as one of the most important works of twentieth-century political philosophy.
He wrote it in answer to the question whether a state is justified at all and, if so, how far it may go. Later in his career he moved away from parts of his strictly libertarian position, but it is that first book that made him world-famous.
"Individuals have rights, and there are things no person or group may do to them (without violating their rights)."
Robert Nozick, Anarchy, State, and Utopia (1974), opening sentence
His core ideas
Rights as a boundary
People have rights that no one may violate, the government included. These rights work as "side constraints": they set limits on what you may do to others, and on what others may do to you.
The minimal state
According to Nozick, only a state that stays limited to protection against force, theft and fraud, and to enforcing agreements, is justified. A state that does more violates people's rights.
Just holdings
What you have acquired justly and received rightfully from someone else is yours. What decides whether something is fair is not the end result of a distribution but how it came about. His example of the basketball player Wilt Chamberlain, with which he explains this, became famous.
Taxation and labour
He wrote that taxation of earnings from labour is on a par with forced labour. That is a firm and contested idea, on which philosophers still disagree today.
What this means for us
The name refers to that tradition: the starting point that people are entitled to the fruits of their work, and that this places limits on the power of the state.
In our work this translates into advising within the law. We help entrepreneurs and wealthy private individuals reduce their tax burden legally and protect their assets, and we do not give advice that breaks the law.
Further reading
- Robert Nozick, Anarchy, State, and Utopia (1974)
- Robert Nozick, The Examined Life (1989)
- Robert Nozick in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
- Robert Nozick on Wikipedia
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