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Milton Friedman on Concentrated power and tyranny

Political freedom means the absence of coercion of a man by his fellow men. The fundamental threat to freedom is power to coerce, be it in the hands of a monarch, a dictator, an oligarchy, or a momentary majority. The preservation of freedom requires the elimination of such concentration of power to the fullest possible extent and the dispersal and distribution of whatever power cannot be eliminated — a system of checks and balances.
Capitalism and Freedom
Book, 1962, Ch. 1 The Relation Between Economic Freedom and Political Freedom, p. 15
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  1. We want the kind of world in which greedy people can do the least harm to their fellow men. That’s the kind of world in which power is widely dispersed and each of us has as many alternatives as possible.
    Interview with Milton Friedman
    Interview, 1973, Playboy
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  2. A liberal is fundamentally fearful of concentrated power. His objective is to preserve the maximum degree of freedom for each individual separately that is compatible with one man's freedom not interfering with other men's freedom. He believes that this objective requires that power be dispersed. He is suspicious of assigning to government any functions that can be performed through the market, both because this substitutes coercion for voluntary co-operation in the area in question and because, by giving government an increased role, it threatens freedom in other areas.
    Capitalism and Freedom
    Book, 1962, Ch. 3 The Control of Money, p. 39
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  3. The fault is not with the people who run the system, but with the system itself. More fundamentally, the fault is with those of us who are responsible for replacing the economic market with the political market.
    Gammon’s “Black Holes”
    Column, 1977, Newsweek (1977); reprinted in the Congressional Record, Extensions of Remarks, November 30, 1977, p. 38195, introduced by Representative John Ashbrook of Ohio as “Mr. Friedman’s article on Gammon’s theory of bureaucratic displacement as it appeared in Newsweek.” The reprint gives no issue date, Congressional Record, November 30, 1977, p. 38195
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