E pluribus plurum, or, how to fail to get to utopia in spite of really trying

"The framework for utopia," Robert Nozick tells us at the beginning of the final section of Part III of Anarchy, State, and Utopia (ASU), "is equivalent to the minimal state" (p. 333). The rich and complex body of argumentation of Parts I and II had produced the conclusion that the minimal, and no more than a minimal, state was legitimate or morally justified. What Part III reveals is that the minimal state "is the one that best realizes the utopian aspirations of untold dreamers and visionaries" (p. 333). Although this happy convergence is surely no accident, neither, Nozick insists, is it contrived, for it is the conclusion reached by two independent lines of argument. If there is a framework for utopia - or, as I shall from now simply say, utopia - it is the minimal state.