Liberalism
From Liberapedia
Liberalism means running the government to promote individual liberty and freedom, well many different theories and ideas are included in liberalism. In the United States any number of Social democrat ideas like Universal health care are considered liberal.
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History
Liberalism has its roots in the Western Age of Enlightenment. A liberal society is characterized by freedom of thought for individuals, limitations on power, the rule of law, the free exchange of ideas, a market economy, with a greater or lesser amount of state intervention to protect the weak from the strong, to protect the environment and generally to reduce the harm caused by the worst aspects of capitalism. The system of government should be transparent and the rights of all citizens should be protected. In the 21st Century, this usually means liberal democracy with open and fair elections, where all citizens have equal rights by law.
liberalism and libertarianism
Liberalism and Libertarianism are sometimes confused but are essentially different in many ways. Libertarianism is all too often a hypocritical pretense of freedom while in reality the strong are free to oppress the weak. Liberalism and Libertarianism still nevertheless reflect two things: individual rights and theoretical equality of opportunity. In practise the (excessive?) freedom associated with Libertarianism creates a very unequal society. Inevitably children’s’ opportunities depend to a great extent on what their parents have done. In a Libertarian society people are free to mess their own lives up and inevitably this will mess up their children’s’ lives as well.
Earlier systems of government
Most earlier theories of government were founded on assumptions and tradition, such as the Divine Right of Kings. Liberalism rejects this. Social progressivism teaches that traditions do not carry any inherent value and social practices should be adjusted continually when humanity benefits from this. Liberal ideology usually includes social progressivism. Fundamental human rights that all liberals support include the right to life, liberty, and property.
History and development
Liberalism was seen as a reaction to assumptions and tradition, such as the Divine Right of kings which were the basis of most earlier theories of government. However, the first person to establish Liberalism's emphasis on an individual was actually one who supported authoritarian regimes: Thomas Hobbes. As an Englishman living throughout the English Civil War, Hobbes witnessed the terror and carnage of anarchy as authority throughout war-torn England broke down and resulted in terrible atrocities and crimes against ordinary civilians. Such events would lead him to quote, that with no central authority and no monopoly of the use of force,
"The condition of Man...is a condition of Warre of every one against every one." (Leviathan Pt I Ch 14)
Hobbesian theory and its contribution to Liberalism
For Hobbes, the natural state of man without any means to keep him from preying on others was where there are "no arts; no letters; no society;" only "continual fear and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." (ibid, Pt I Ch 13) Hobbes thus believed that government was necessary and should have absolute power to fulfill its duties, which were:
- the individual's natural right to life; and
- the protection of individuals from other individuals.
Liberalism thus had a strange birth whereby its foundations were founded not by beliefs in freedom and individual responsibility, but in the form of authoritarian power. But as much as Liberals did not subscribe to Hobbes' view of despotic government, they also found great appeal in his views that there were such things as Natural Rights, and that the State's prime responsibility was in enforcing them. Additionally, Hobbes' new method of using logic and reasoning (as influenced by Macchiavelli) also signalled a break from the previous custom of reasoning from previously-founded philosophical schools of thought (as did Thomas Aquinas and Ibn Rushd, who based their theories on Aristotelian tenets).
Locke on limited government
It fell then to another Englishman to found the next great step in Liberal political philosophy, against the background of religious intolerance and political oppression. John Locke would found the next few steps from Divine Right to the Rights of Man. The break between Hobbes and his Liberal grandchildren would come about by the experience of Europe under the tumult of the Religious Wars between Catholic and Protestant. .... As such, Locke's theories should be read not merely as the thoughts of a Liberal philosopher seeking to protect individual effort and right to decision, but also as a personal defence for one's religious beliefs against religious discrimination by the State.
The French Revolution and Napoleon
Modernity and beyond
Social progressivism teaches that traditions do not carry any inherent value and social practices should be adjusted continually when humanity benefits from this. Liberal ideology usually includes social progressivism.
Since freedom and equality do not always go hand in hand, some liberal philosophies stress one of these ideals over the other. Classical liberalism emphasizes free private enterprise, individual property rights, laissez-faire economic policy, and freedom of contract, and opposes the welfare state. Classical liberals support equality before the law and hold that economic inequality, arising naturally from competition in the free market, does not justify forced wealth redistribution. New liberals advocate a greater degree of government influence to protect individual rights (in a broad sense), often in the form of anti-discrimination laws. New liberals support universal education, and many also support welfare, including benefits for the unemployed, housing for the homeless, and medical care for the sick, all supported by progressive taxation.
Liberalism and political economy
This stub needs refitting with links
Liberal arguments maintain that opening up the economy to the outside world and dismantling protection forces domestic production to become efficient as they now compete with other industries and economic entities from overseas. According to Smith, competition in a free market becomes a catalyst for change and improvement, (Clark et al., 1928, pp. 126-8) as well as an encouragement for creating competitive advantages (ibid, p. 65). Smith adds that as far as economic development is concerned, the only tools that the state should use are tariffs and duties, and only in retaliation to get other nations to lower theirs (pg 69). By doing so, this creates employment as well as facilitating transfers of both funds and technical expertise into the developing economy (Clark & Chan, 1994, p 29). Hayek militates for markets free of state intervention, particularly in the economic sphere is not only harmful to the X-efficiency or distributive function of the economy, but it too creates an unhealthy trend towards the centralisation of power as well (Barry et al., 1984, pp. 114-5), because in the face of failure of an interventionist policy occurs, Hayek argues, the authorities in charge will not see it as a sign to abandon it, but would rather be spurred on by the vested interests created by interventionist policies to attempt increasing intervention in the area of policy and other areas too (Barry et al., 1984, p. 32, p. 111). His conviction thus is that the more intervention there is in the economy the sooner or later it will result in a free economy becoming more of a dirigiste regime, ushering later the movement of intervention from the economic sphere into other areas as well (Barry et al., 1984, pp. 16-8 & p. 32). In another sense, the market is best left to its own devices, but interventionist policies are bound to backfire. Krugman goes a notch higher than Hayek and argues in “Competitiveness: A Dangerous Obsession” he argues that it is basically pointless for governments to pursue competitiveness, as “international trade is not a zero-sum game (Krugman, 1994 p. 34)”. The idea is that more successful economies generate demand and new market sectors which other less successful economies can exploit, so thus rather than see international trade as “competition”, Krugman argues that it should be seen as based on reciprocation, not competition (ibid).
See also
External links
Sources
- Wootton, D (ed), Modern Political Thought: Political Readings from Macchiavelli to Nietzsche, Hackett Publishing Co, Inc (1 Oct 1996)
- John Maurice Clark et al., Adam Smith, 1776-1926. (University of Chicago Press, 1928)
- E. L. Hawkins, An abstract of Adam Smith's "Wealth of nations" (Oxford : Hubert Giles, 1905)
- Steve Chan, Cal Clark and Danny Lam (eds.), Beyond the developmental state : East Asia's political economies reconsidered (Basingstoke : Macmillan, 1998)
- Norman P. Barry et al., “Hayek's 'Serfdom' revisited : essays on 'The road to serfdom' after 40 years”, (London : Institute of Economic Affairs, 1984)
- Paul Krugman, “Competitiveness: A Dangerous Obsession”, Foreign Affairs, 73 (2), 1994, pp. 28-44
