Fun fact: In Feynman's formative years, 'libertarian' still meant 'anarchist'.
I think libertarianism had been defined in opposition to non-democratic regimes; then after the fall of feudalism it continued to be used by socialism/anarchism/communism.
I think the US Libertarian Party's name serves (or served) mostly as a rebranding of anarchism, but I am not sure about the origins of that party, anybody more knowledgeable please join in. An interesting note about them is that both Ayn Rand and Frank Zappa dismissed them as closet anarchists.
I am also interested in when did the influx of the right wing into "anarchism" or "libertarianism" happen? Maybe it has something to do with Lenin&co.'s and later Stalin's suppression of anarchism, and even later the Cold war propaganda?
Also, who invented the weird term 'anarcho-capitalist'?
The economist Murray Rothbard used it first in the mid-20th century, according to the Wikipedia page on anarcho-capitalism. He felt free to use the term as it borrowed some ideas from anarchism, but many would say he excluded crucial parts.
Most anarchists are very unwilling to be associated with anarcho-capitalism, and resent the prefix. They are probably even less thrilled about being associated with the libertarian party.
US Libertarians: limit the size and scope of government
Anarcho-capitalism: no centralised state, society self-regulates via free markets.
Anarchism: no heirarchical power structures, thus no private capital at all.
What I was aiming at with GP post was that as far as I understand, at least in the early days of the Libertarian Party, a significant number of them were actually completely against the existence of a government. (Wikipedia mentions something about an "anarchist-minarchist debate" or something like that.)
But political reality of course leads to compromise. It is simply untenable in the US, and most of the Earth to be taken seriously by a large majority of voters while espousing getting rid of the government.
