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THE REAL ROOT OF EVIL 105
action. She was unwilling to admit he had a point: “When and how did
governments have ‘powers for good?’ ” Some of her comments echoed
the same disillusionment she felt with the fatalistic libertarians of the
Willkie campaign, who underappreciated man’s capacity for creation
and growth. When Hayek spoke about the needs of different people
competing for available resources Rand retorted, “They don’t compete
for the available resources—they create the resources. Here’s the socialist
thinking again.” Hayek didn’t truly understand either competition or
capitalism, she concluded. 14
Rand also objected to Hayek’s defi nition of individualism, which she
felt lacked moral grounding. Using wording Rand herself favored, Hayek
defi ned individualism as “respect for the individual man qua man”
and rooted it in Christianity, classical antiquity, and the Renaissance.
However, he next referred to an individual’s own sphere, “however narrowly
that may be circumscribed.” This qualifi cation, like his willingness
to tolerate limited government programs, outraged Rand. To her it was
proof of why individualism had failed as a political ideology: “It had no
real base, no moral base. This is why my book is needed.” Hayek would
have been surprised at Rand’s contention that his individualism had no
moral base. His work was motivated by a deep sense of spiritual crisis,
and for an organization of economists the Mont Pelerin Society was
unusually sensitive to questions of morality. Hayek originally wanted to
name his group the Acton-Tocqueville Society, in reference to two great
Catholic thinkers. 15
But Rand and Hayek had very different understandings of what was
moral. In The Road to Serfdom Hayek criticized people of goodwill
and their cherished ideals, insisting that the West examine the ethical
assumptions that underlay its descent into barbarism. As Rand detected,
this was only a surface critique of altruism. Hayek also believed that a
revival of traditional morals would save the West, and he was receptive
to Christian values (although cagey about his personal religious
beliefs). By contrast, she believed it was altruism itself that had brought
Europe to the brink of destruction. At the end of Hayek’s second chapter
Rand summarized her thoughts: “Nineteenth Century Liberalism made
the mistake of associating liberty, rights of man etc. with the ideas of
‘fi ghting for the people,’ ‘for the downtrodden,’ ‘for the poor,’ etc. They
made it an altruistic movement. But altruism is collectivism. That is why
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