Liberalism: the story on HearLore

Liberalism

The word liberal first appeared in English in 1375 to describe the liberal arts, a form of education deemed suitable for a free-born man. By 1387, the term had evolved to mean free in bestowing, and by 1433, it signified made without stint. The concept of liberty, derived from the Latin liber, meaning free, has always been central to the identity of this philosophy, yet its meaning has shifted dramatically over centuries. In the 16th and 17th centuries, liberal could be a pejorative, describing someone indiscreet or a villain who had confessed to vile encounters, as William Shakespeare wrote in Much Ado About Nothing. It was not until the Enlightenment that the word acquired decisively positive undertones, defined as free from narrow prejudice in 1781 and free from bigotry in 1823. The first recorded use of the noun liberalism appeared in English in 1815, but the political label liberales was already in use in Spain, where the first group to adopt the term fought for decades to implement the Spanish Constitution of 1812. Between 1820 and 1823, during the Trienio Liberal, King Ferdinand VII was compelled by the liberales to swear to uphold the constitution, marking a pivotal moment in the history of political terminology. The color yellow became the political symbol most commonly associated with liberalism, a tradition that persists in Europe and Latin America, though in the United States, the color blue now represents the liberal party, while conservatism is associated with red.

The Father Of Modern Thought

John Locke, an English philosopher born in 1632, is widely regarded as the father of modern liberalism, having systematized liberal ideas into a distinct ideology for the first time. His Two Treatises of Government, published in 1690, outlined the foundational concept of the social contract, arguing that government acquires its legitimacy only through the consent of the governed. Locke challenged the prevailing doctrine of the divine right of kings, which claimed that monarchs derived their authority directly from God, a theory championed by Robert Filmer in his Patriarcha of 1680. Locke's First Treatise served as a sentence-by-sentence refutation of Filmer's arguments, asserting that no citizen could claim to rule by natural or supernatural right without the consent of the governed. He argued that in a state of nature, humans were driven by instincts of survival and self-preservation, and the only way to escape this dangerous existence was to form a common and supreme power capable of arbitrating between competing human desires. This power, Locke insisted, must be limited, and when a monarch became a tyrant, violating the social contract that protected life, liberty, and property, the people had a right to overthrow him. Locke also originated the concept of the separation of church and state, arguing that the government lacked authority in the realm of individual conscience, which rational people could not cede to the state. His Letters Concerning Toleration formulated a general defense for religious toleration, positing that earthly judges could not reliably evaluate the truth claims of competing religious standpoints and that enforcing a single true religion would lead to social disorder. Influenced by the Presbyterian politician and poet John Milton, Locke integrated women into social theory, arguing that conjugal society was made up by a voluntary compact between men and women, a radical step for the 17th century.

Common questions

When did the word liberal first appear in English and what did it originally mean?

The word liberal first appeared in English in 1375 to describe the liberal arts, which was a form of education deemed suitable for a free-born man. By 1387, the term had evolved to mean free in bestowing, and by 1433, it signified made without stint.

Who is considered the father of modern liberalism and what key work did he publish in 1690?

John Locke, an English philosopher born in 1632, is widely regarded as the father of modern liberalism. His Two Treatises of Government, published in 1690, outlined the foundational concept of the social contract, arguing that government acquires its legitimacy only through the consent of the governed.

What political symbol is most commonly associated with liberalism in Europe and Latin America?

The color yellow became the political symbol most commonly associated with liberalism, a tradition that persists in Europe and Latin America. In the United States, the color blue now represents the liberal party, while conservatism is associated with red.

When was the noun liberalism first recorded in English and what political label was already in use in Spain?

The first recorded use of the noun liberalism appeared in English in 1815, but the political label liberales was already in use in Spain. Between 1820 and 1823, during the Trienio Liberal, King Ferdinand VII was compelled by the liberales to swear to uphold the constitution.

What year did Mary Wollstonecraft publish A Vindication of the Rights of Woman and what was its impact on liberalism?

Mary Wollstonecraft, a British philosopher born in 1759, published A Vindication of the Rights of Woman in 1792. This work expanded the boundaries of liberalism to include women in the political structure of liberal society and is widely regarded as the pioneer of liberal feminism.

When did the first major signs of liberal politics emerge in modern times and what movement called for freedom of religion?

The first major signs of liberal politics emerged in modern times, coalescing at the time of the English Civil War. The Levellers, a largely ignored minority political movement, called for freedom of religion, frequent convening of parliament, and equality under the law.

The Liberty Of Ancients And Moderns

The development of modern classical liberalism took place before and soon after the French Revolution, centered around Coppet Castle near Geneva, where the exiled writer Madame de Staël gathered a group of European thinkers known as the Coppet Group. Among them was Benjamin Constant, a Franco-Swiss political activist who distinguished between the Liberty of the Ancients and the Liberty of the Moderns. The Liberty of the Ancients was a participatory republican liberty that gave citizens the right to influence politics directly through debates and votes in the public assembly, but this required a sub-group of slaves to do the productive work, leaving citizens free to deliberate on public affairs. In contrast, the Liberty of the Moderns was based on the possession of civil liberties, the rule of law, and freedom from excessive state interference, allowing citizens to elect representatives to deliberate in Parliament on their behalf. Constant's distinction informed the understanding of liberalism, as he had not forgotten the Jacobin dictatorship and the dangers of direct participation in large, modern states. The British philosopher Sir Isaiah Berlin later pointed to the debt owed to Constant, calling him the most eloquent of all defenders of freedom and privacy. In Britain, the liberal tradition was based on core concepts such as classical economics, free trade, and laissez-faire government with minimal intervention and taxation. Writers such as John Bright and Richard Cobden opposed aristocratic privilege and property, which they saw as an impediment to developing a class of yeoman farmers. Beginning in the late 19th century, a new conception of liberty entered the liberal intellectual arena, known as positive liberty, first developed by British philosopher T. H. Green. Green rejected the idea that humans were driven solely by self-interest, emphasizing instead the complex circumstances involved in the evolution of our moral character. He tasked society and political institutions with the enhancement of individual freedom and identity, allowing genuine choice and creating the conditions that allow for the development of moral character, will, and reason. This New Liberalism became the essential social and political programme of the Liberal Party in Britain and encircled much of the world in the 20th century.

The Invisible Hand And The Iron Law

Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations, published in 1776, provided most of the ideas of economics until the publication of John Stuart Mill's Principles in 1848. Smith addressed the motivation for economic activity, the causes of prices and wealth distribution, and the policies the state should follow to maximize wealth. He argued that as long as supply, demand, prices, and competition were left free of government regulation, the pursuit of material self-interest, rather than altruism, maximized society's wealth through profit-driven production of goods and services. An invisible hand directed individuals and firms to work toward the nation's good as an unintended consequence of efforts to maximize their gain. Smith assumed that workers could be paid as low as was necessary for their survival, a theory that David Ricardo and Thomas Robert Malthus later transformed into the iron law of wages. Malthus claimed that population growth would outstrip food production because the population grew geometrically while food production grew arithmetically, and that any welfare for the poor would be self-defeating. Jean-Baptiste Say challenged Smith's labor theory of value, believing that prices were determined by utility and emphasizing the critical role of the entrepreneur in the economy. Say's law, or the law of markets, stated that aggregate supply creates its own aggregate demand, a concept later criticized by John Maynard Keynes. During the Great Depression, Keynes gave the definitive liberal response to the economic crisis, arguing that budget deficits were a good thing and that government borrowing was nature's remedy for preventing business losses from being so great as to bring production altogether to a standstill. His magnum opus, The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, published in 1936, challenged the earlier neo-classical economic paradigm and advocated activist economic policy by the government to stimulate demand in times of high unemployment. Keynes believed that where the market failed to allocate resources properly, the government was required to stimulate the economy until private funds could start flowing again, a strategy designed to boost industrial production and prime the pump.

The Subjection Of Women

Mary Wollstonecraft, a British philosopher born in 1759, is widely regarded as the pioneer of liberal feminism, with her work A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, published in 1792, expanding the boundaries of liberalism to include women in the political structure of liberal society. Wollstonecraft denied that women were, by nature, more pleasure-seeking and pleasure-giving than men, reasoning that if they were confined to the same cages that trapped women, men would develop the same flawed characters. What Wollstonecraft most wanted for women was personhood, the ability to maintain their equality through their actions and choices. John Stuart Mill, an early proponent of feminism, wrote The Subjection of Women in 1869, attempting to prove that the legal subjugation of women was wrong and that it should give way to perfect equality. Mill believed that both sexes should have equal rights under the law and that until conditions of equality existed, no one could possibly assess the natural differences between women and men, distorted as they had been. He frequently spoke of this imbalance and wondered if women were able to feel the same genuine unselfishness that men did in providing for their families. Mill compared sexual inequality to slavery, arguing that husbands were often just as abusive as masters and that a human being controlled nearly every aspect of life for another human being. He argued that three major parts of women's lives were hindering them: society and gender construction, education, and marriage. Equity feminism, a form of liberal feminism discussed since the 1980s, makes no commitments regarding open empirical issues in psychology or biology, asserting that equal treatment is a moral doctrine compatible with evolutionary psychology. Liberal feminists hope to eradicate all barriers to gender equality, claiming that the continued existence of such barriers eviscerates the individual rights and freedoms ostensibly guaranteed by a liberal social order.

The Triumph Of Liberal Revolutions

The first major signs of liberal politics emerged in modern times, coalescing at the time of the English Civil War, when the Levellers, a largely ignored minority political movement, called for freedom of religion, frequent convening of parliament, and equality under the law. The Glorious Revolution of 1688 enshrined parliamentary sovereignty and the right of revolution in Britain, referred to by author Steven Pincus as the first modern liberal revolution. Political tension between England and its American colonies grew after 1765 and the Seven Years' War over the issue of taxation without representation, culminating in the American Revolutionary War and, eventually, the Declaration of Independence. The Articles of Confederation, written in 1776, now appeared inadequate to provide security or even a functional government, leading to the Constitutional Convention of 1787, which resulted in the writing of a new Constitution of the United States establishing a federal government. The two key events that marked the triumph of liberalism in France were the abolition of feudalism on the night of the 4th of August 1789 and the passage of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen in August, itself based on the U.S. Declaration of Independence from 1776. During the Napoleonic Wars, the French brought Western Europe the liquidation of the feudal system, the liberalization of property laws, the end of seigneurial dues, the abolition of guilds, the legalization of divorce, the disintegration of Jewish ghettos, the collapse of the Inquisition, and the establishment of the metric system. In Latin America, liberal unrest dates back to the 18th century, when liberal agitation led to independence from the imperial power of Spain and Portugal. The new regimes were generally liberal in their political outlook and employed the philosophy of positivism, which emphasized the truth of modern science, to buttress their positions. In the United States, a vicious war ensured the integrity of the nation and the abolition of slavery in the South, with historian Don H. Doyle arguing that the Union victory in the American Civil War from 1861 to 1865 greatly boosted the course of liberalism.

The Global Spread Of Reform

During the 19th and early 20th centuries, in the Ottoman Empire and the Middle East, liberalism influenced periods of reform, such as the Tanzimat and Al-Nahda, leading to the rise of secularism, constitutionalism, and nationalism. Prominent figures of the era included Rifa'a al-Tahtawi, Namık Kemal, and İbrahim Şinasi, who sought to modernize their societies through liberal ideas. However, the reformist ideas and trends did not reach the common population successfully, as the books, periodicals, and newspapers were accessible primarily to intellectuals and segments of the emerging middle class. Many Muslims saw these changes as a crisis within Islam, which continues to this day, leading to Islamic revivalism. Before 1920, the main ideological opponents of liberalism were communism, conservatism, and socialism, but liberalism then faced major ideological challenges from fascism and Marxism, Leninism as new opponents. During the 20th century, liberal ideas spread even further, especially in Western Europe, as liberal democracies found themselves as the winners in both world wars and the Cold War. Liberals sought and established a constitutional order that prized important individual freedoms, such as freedom of speech and freedom of association, an independent judiciary and public trial by jury, and the abolition of aristocratic privileges. Later waves of modern liberal thought and struggle were strongly influenced by the need to expand civil rights, with liberals advocating gender and racial equality in their drive to promote civil rights. Global civil rights movements in the 20th century achieved several objectives towards both goals, including universal suffrage and universal access to education. In Europe and North America, the establishment of social liberalism became a key component in expanding the welfare state, with modern liberalism occupying the left-of-center in the traditional political spectrum. In the United States, the Democratic Party is usually considered liberal, while in Europe and Australia, the term often means classical liberalism. 21st-century liberal parties continue to wield power and influence throughout the world, and the fundamental elements of contemporary society have liberal roots.