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Advocates for Self-Government

Non-profit, non-partisan libertarian educational organization

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Advocates for Self-Government is a non-profit, non-partisan libertarian educational organization. It was founded in 1985 by Marshall Fritz, who died on 4 November 2008. As of 2017, Michael Sertic heads the organization as its president, and Brett Bittner is the executive director. Chris Rufer is the chairman of the board of directors.

Address

Sacramento, California

Mission

About The Advocates - The Advocates for Self-Government

To equip people to understand, embrace, and advocate the values of self-government ...

Understanding Self-Government
Good government is no substitute for self-government. – Mohandas K. Gandhi ...
Embracing Self-Government
The qualifications for self-government in society are not innate. They are the result of habit and long training. – Thomas Jefferson ...
Advocating Self-Government
That government is best which governs not at all; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have. – Henry David Thoreau ...

Staff and Associates

Joseph BastBoard of Advisors

David BerglandBoard of Advisors

Ken BissonFounding member, past Chairman, current Board of Directors member

Walter BlockBoard of Advisors

Neal BoortzBoard of Advisors

R. W. BradfordBoard of Advisors

Barbara BrandenBoard of Advisors

Harry BrowneBoard of Advisors

Steve BucksteinBoard of Advisors

Doug CaseyBoard of Advisors

Ed ClarkBoard of Advisors

Michael CloudBoard of Advisors

Marshall FritzFounder, Board Member Emeritus

Joseph FuhrigBoard of Directors member, 1985-2003

John FundBoard of Advisors

Sharon HarrisPresident, May 1995-May 2015

John HospersBoard of Advisors

Hubert JongenBoard of Advisors

Jim LarkBoard of Directors Member, October 2003- ; Chair of the Board of Directors, May 2009-

Tibor MachanBoard of Advisors

Richard J. MayburyBoard of Advisors

Wendy McElroyBoard of Advisors

Russell MeansBoard of Advisors

Vince MillerBoard of Advisors

Tonie NathanBoard of Advisors

David NolanBoard of Advisors

Ron PaulBoard of Advisors

Robert W. Poole, Jr.Board of Advisors

Carole Ann RandPresident, 1990-1995; Chair of the Board of Directors

Andrea RichBoard of Advisors

Sheldon RichmanBoard of Advisors

Mary RuwartBoard of Advisors

Fred L. SmithBoard of Advisors

David J. TherouxBoard of Advisors

Clifford F. ThiesBoard of Advisors

Richard TimberlakeBoard of Advisors

Jarret WollsteinBoard of Advisors

Websites

TheAdvocates.org - The Advocates for Self-Government
Website includes the World's Smallest Political Quiz, Human Respect Tests, surveys on various issues, libertarian FAQ, libertarian movement information and advocacy programs (such as Operation Politically Homeless)

Web Pages

David F. Nolan - The Advocates for Self-Government
Profile page: includes photo, biography and the essay "Nolan: Innovator for Liberty" by James W. Harris

Dave played with the concept until he designed what would later be known as "the Nolan Chart"—the famous two-axis political grid that is embodied in the Advocates' Diamond Chart today ... That obscurity ended abruptly when Advocates Founder Marshall Fritz—searching for new, effective ways to communicate libertarian ideas—became excited by the chart's possibilities in the early 1980's ... [Dave is] a strong supporter of the Advocates and serves on the informal advisory board that reviews significant proposed changes to the Quiz ... In 1989, the Advocates gave Dave a plaque honoring his pathbreaking insight.

Web Pages

The Advocates for Self-Government - YouTube
YouTube channel of the Advocates for Self-Government

Libertarianism 101
Includes introductory video by Marshall Fritz, summary of libertarian principles, goals and whether libertarians are conservative or liberal

Libertarians believe that this combination of personal and economic liberty produces abundance, peace, harmony, creativity, order and safety. Indeed, that is one of the central lessons of world history. Virtually all the progress the human race has enjoyed during the past few centuries is due to the increasing acceptance of these principles ... Libertarians believe that, on every issue, you have the right to decide for yourself what's best for you and to act on that belief as long as you respect the right of other people to do the same and deal with them peacefully and honestly.

Articles

David Nolan: A leading 20th Century thinker?, Libertarian Party News, Aug 1999
News article about Nolan's inclusion in the book 2000 Outstanding Intellectuals of the 20th Century, his reaction and his choices of who would he include in such a list

Although the IBC [International Biographical Centre] did not explain their selection criteria to Nolan, he speculated his inclusion was due to the so-called Nolan Chart ... "I'm pretty sure it's because of my two-axis 'map' of the political universe," he said. "It's appeared in countless textbooks by now, and Sharon Harris at the Advocates for Self-Government told me their online Political Quiz [based on the Nolan Chart] is one of the most linked-to sites on the Web, with over 3,000 links. That's actually pretty impressive."

Related Topics: Libertarianism, David Nolan

David Nolan: An Appreciation, by Thomas L. Knapp, 25 Nov 2010
A memorial tribute to Nolan, his chart and his involvement with the libertarian movement and the LP

He was not the first person to propose a bi-dimensional system of political taxonomy to replace the traditional "left-right" spectrum, but his 1971 implementation of such a system, the "Nolan chart," is generally recognized as a breakthrough. As of 2008, Advocates for Self-Government had introduced 11.5 million people to the "Nolan Chart" through the World's Smallest Political Quiz online (more than 4 million of whom located themselves in the "libertarian" quadrant of the chart), and countless millions more on the ground through "Operation Politically Homeless."

Related Topics: Libertarian Party, David Nolan

Publications

The Liberator Online
E-mail, weekly, free

The Liberator Online is for anyone interested in liberty — whether you are a long-time libertarian or just took the World’s Smallest Political Quiz and want to find out more.

The Libertarian Communicator
Hard copy, 2000-2005

As the name suggests, the purpose of The Libertarian Communicator is to help libertarians become more powerful, more effective, more successful communicators of the ideas of liberty.

The introductory paragraph uses material from the Wikipedia article "Advocates for Self-Government" as of 22 Jun 2021, which is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike License 3.0.