Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

• Author: Barton, Benjamin H.
• Position: Book review

HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE. By J.K. Rowling. New York: Scholastic Press. 2005. Pp. x, 652. $29.99.

1. HARRY POTTER AND THE REPULSIVE MINISTRY OF MAGIC II. HARRY POTTER AND THE PUBLIC-CHOICE GOVERNMENT III. HARRY POTTER AND THE BUREAUCRACY THAT ATE GOVERNMENT WHOLE A. The Democratic Defense B. The Structural Defense C. The Free Press D. Bureaucrats Are People Too E. Love It or Leave It IV. J.K. ROWLING AND THE LIBERTARIAN MINDSET V. HARRY POTTER AND THE FUTURE LIBERTARIAN MAJORITY. What would you think of a government that engaged in this list of tyrannical activities: tortured children for lying; (1) designed its prison specifically to suck all life and hope out of the inmates; (2) placed citizens in that prison without a hearing; (3) ordered the death penalty without a trial; (4) allowed the powerful, rich, or famous to control policy; (5) selectively prosecuted crimes (the powerful go unpunished and the unpopular face trumped-up charges); (6) conducted criminal trials without defense counsel; (7) used truth serum to force confessions; (8) maintained constant surveillance over all citizens; (9) offered no elections and no democratic lawmaking process; (10) and controlled the press? (11)

   You might assume that the above list is the work of some despotic central African nation, but it is actually the product of the Ministry of Magic, the magicians' government in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series. When Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince was released this summer, I, along with many others, bought and read it on the day of its release. (12) I was immediately struck by Rowling's unsparingly negative portrait of the Ministry of Magic and its bureaucrats. I decided to sit down and reread each of the Harry Potter books with an eye toward discerning what exactly J.K. Rowling's most recent novel tells us about the nature, societal role, and legitimacy of government.

   I did this for several reasons. First, with all due respect to Richard Posner, Cass Sunstein, or Peter Schuck, (13) no book released in 2005 will have more influence on what kids and adults around the world think about government than The Half-Blood Prince. It would be difficult to overstate the influence and market penetration of the Harry Potter series. (14) Somewhere over the last few years, the Harry Potter novels passed from a children's-literature sensation to a bona fide international happening.

   Second, Rowling's scathing portrait of government is surprisingly strident and effective. This is partly because her critique works on so many levels: the functions of government (see above), the structure of government, and the bureaucrats who run the show. All three elements work together to depict a Ministry of Magic run by self-interested bureaucrats bent on increasing and protecting their power, often to the detriment of the public at large. In other words, Rowling creates a public-interest scholar's dream--or nightmare--government.

   Her critique is also particularly effective because, despite how awful Rowling's Ministry of Magic looks and acts, it bears such a tremendous resemblance to current Anglo-American government. Rowling's negative picture of government is thus both subtle and extraordinarily piercing. Taken in the context of the Harry Potter novels and the personalities of the bureaucrats involved, each of the above acts of government misconduct seems perfectly natural and familiar to the reader. The critique works because the reader identifies her own government with Rowling's Ministry of Magic.

   Lastly, The Half-Blood Prince is a tremendous work of fiction that deserves a more careful reading of its themes and plot. It continues a trend in the Harry Potter novels: over the last six books, Rowling's Harry Potter novels have gotten longer, more complex, and much, much darker. The first two Harry Potter books tell straightforward stories of good triumphing over evil--Harry defeating the evil Lord Voldemort--at the magical Hogwarts School. (15) The next four books present a more complex vision of an entire wizard society, including a wizard government and an international struggle against Voldemort and his followers that does not feature easy answers, instant triumphs, unblemished heroes, or even clear lines between good and evil. (16)

   Rowling's decision to eschew the tried-and-true formula of her first two books in favor of longer books featuring deaths, imperfect characters, and moral ambiguity is both exceptional and refreshing. She could have repeated her formula from the first two books to great acclaim. Instead, she created a much richer world, where the more typical elements of magic and childhood collide with satire and social commentary in the mold of Mark Twain or Jonathan Swift. (17)

   Given the overwhelming popularity and influence of the Harry Potter books, it is worth examining what Rowling has to say about government and its role in society. Part I gives a short synopsis of the plot and themes of The Half-Blood Prince and its predecessors, and describes how The Half-Blood Prince cements Rowling's negative portrayal of government. Part II argues that The Half-Blood Prince presents a government that fits perfectly into the public-choice model of self-interested bureaucrats running roughshod over the broader public interest. Part III asserts that The Half-Blood Prince's unflattering depiction of government is particularly damning because it so closely resembles the British and U.S. governments, but without many of the features that potentially undermine the public-choice critique. Rowling's vision of government consists almost solely of bureaucracy, without elections to offer the sheen of democracy, without a free press or independent judiciary to act as a check on bureaucratic excess, and with few true public servants to counteract craven bureaucrats. Part IV talks a little bit about how Rowling's personal story may explain her disdain for government and bureaucracy. Part V concludes that Rowling may do more for libertarianism than anyone since John Stuart Mill. (18)

1. HARRY POTTER AND THE REPULSIVE MINISTRY OF MAGIC

   Rowling's Harry Potter books, up to and including The Half-Blood Prince, slowly but surely build an impregnable invective against government, while still telling charming fantasy stories about witches and wizards at a school for magic. (19) Each of the first six Harry Potter books follows a similar template. They begin with Harry Potter living with his extremely unlikable "muggle" (20) relations. They then proceed through the course of a school year at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Each year presents a new mystery to be resolved or a Lord Voldemort-inspired challenge to overcome, as well as the details of Harry's social life and school work. (21)

   The last three books all have the same meta-narrative: Lord Voldemort has returned from the dead, and is seeking to kill Harry and take over the world. (22) Book four, The Goblet of Fire, ends with Voldemort's return to full power (and the murder of fellow student Cedric Diggory). (23) In book five, The Order of the Phoenix, Voldemort tries to discover the exact contents of the prophesy that proclaims that either Harry or Voldemort are destined to kill the other. (24) In The Half-Blood Prince, Harry and the Hogwart's headmaster--and Harry's hero--Professor Dumbledore explore the history and nature of Voldemort, presumably in preparation for Harry's final battle against Voldemort in the next, and final, book in the series.

   The first five books lay the groundwork for Rowling's depiction of the Ministry of Magic in The Half-Blood Prince. The first three books take a relatively lighthearted view of the wizard government. Rowling gives us goofy and highly bureaucratic-sounding government offices like "[t]he Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office" (25) or "the Department of Magical Catastrophes" (26) and a portrait of the Minister of Magic, Cornelius Fudge, as a bumbling, but well-meaning, political hack. (27)

   In The Goblet of Fire, we have the first real hints of Rowling's darker vision for the Ministry of Magic. The depiction of how the Ministry handles Voldemort's first rise to power features overzealous prosecutions and the suspension of civil rights. (28) Most notably, at the end of the book, the Ministry refuses to believe that Voldemort has returned to power, and actually works to discredit and suppress Harry's story. (29)

   The end of The Goblet of Fire presages the open hostility between the Ministry of Magic and Harry and Dumbledore in The Order of the Phoenix. The Ministry attempts to kick Harry out of school, strips Dumbledore of his various government positions (including headmaster of Hogwarts), sicks the evil-bureaucrat par excellence Dolores Umbridge on Hogwarts, and generally brings the full weight of the Ministry's powers to bear upon Harry and Dumbledore. (30)

   Nevertheless, The Order of the Phoenix ends on hopeful note: Fudge finally recognizes that Voldemort has returned to power. (31) We are left with the impression that Fudge will now use the full powers of the Ministry to battle Voldemort and his followers, the Death Eaters. (32) After all, even the most hardened libertarian generally recognizes that government is best suited to fight wars against aggressors and pursue police actions against those who threaten the well-being of others. (33)

   The Half-Blood Prince, however, offers no such succor to government. The Ministry remains remarkably ineffective in its battle against Voldemort (pp. 7-18, 648-49). Cornelius Fudge is replaced as Minister of Magic by Rufus Scrimgeour, a savvy veteran of the battles against Lord Voldemort, and yet the tone and actions of the Ministry remain unchanged (pp. 7-18). In fact, Scrimgeour decides to try to calm the public by detaining individuals who are likely innocent (pp. 221, 331, 346-47). And his attempts to use Harry as a "mascot" (p. 346) or "poster boy" (p. 650) for the ministry are also...