My conclusion is not that libertarians should give up our idea of what constitutes good social philosophy. I am not saying that we should repent and henceforth worship at the altar of the state.
What I am saying is that we should not become wedded to the view that the world we want is one in which irrational group attachments have been completely eradicated from the human psyche. Yes, this capacity for group attachment is manifest in state-worship that we find troubling. But group norms are a fundamental component of human nature. We probably owe a debt of gratitude to the part of human behavior that becomes irrationally attached to groups and to group norm enforcement.
It may be that the role of libertarians is to point out that political demagogues are exploiting the tribal loyalty instincts of citizens against their better interests, as is typically the case. But it may be neither realistic nor desirable to "educate" people in order that they should lose all sense of group attachment, including attachment to the state.
http://www.econlib.org/library/Columns/y2012/Klinggroupnorms.html
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