1. Liberalism
Mark Philp

2. Narrative of liberalism
From darkness to light
From faith and superstition to rational knowledge
From arbitrary power to constitutional rule – macht to recht
From communalism to private property
From serfdom and slavery to personal freedoms
From the closed local mind to universalism
From locality to cosmopolitanism and internationalism
From autocracy to democracy
From social exchange to free market exchange
From patriarchy to egalitarianism

3. Or From collectivism to individualism From communalism to egoism
From socially embedded exchange to rampant free-market capitalism
From morality to nihilism
From grounded values to relativism
From ordered hierarchy to the creation of mass society
From social inclusion to defending the rights of property at all cost

4. Histories of Liberalism
As ideas and thinkers
Tracing liberal ideas back to antiquity
As a social and political movement
Identifying the emergence of liberalism as a political ideology and movement

5. The canon John Locke 1632-1704 Natural Rights Toleration
Property Rights
Limited Government
Consent

6. Benjamin Constant Benjamin Constant 1767-1830 Liberty of the Ancients
and the Moderns (1816)

7. J. S. Mill J S Mill 1806-1873 On Liberty, 1859
Subjection of Women 1869
Individuality and self
Development
Anti-paternalism
Representative Government
Chapters on Socialism

8. L. T. Hobhouse L. T. Hobhouse 1864-1929 Liberalism (1911):
Civil liberty, Fiscal liberty,
Personal liberty, social liberty,
Economic liberty, Domestic
Liberty, National liberty, International liberty, Political liberty

9. F. A Hayek Friedrich Hayek (1899-1992) Economist and Philosopher
Austrian school of Economics
Road To Serfdom (1944)
Constitution of Liberty (1960)
Defence of what he saw as classical liberalism: ie:
Minimal state – against the illusions of socialism
A free society to enable people to develop and pursue their own life plans
Market as a spontaneous order
Scientism as a threat to understanding of diversity of human purposes.

10. Isaiah Berlin Isaiah Berlin 1909-1997 Two Concepts of Liberty (1958)
Pluralism vs monism
Conflicts of values

11. John Rawls John Rawls 1921-2002 A Theory Of Justice 1971
Two principles of justice
Equal Liberty
Fair Eq of Opportunity and the
Difference Principle
Original position
Political Liberalism 1993
Overlapping consensus
Law of Peoples (1999)
Decent hierarchical peoples

12. But…. Where are the women?!
Mary Wollstonecraft, Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792)
Attack on patriarchy and paternalism
Demand for women’s rights to education, property, in marriage, etc.

13. Harriet Taylor and John Stuart Mill Mill’s dedication to On Liberty: Like all that I have written for many years, it belongs as much to her as to me…

14. The Subjection of Women (1869)
‘The vilest malefactor has some wretched woman tied to him, against whom he can commit any atrocity except killing her, and, if tolerably cautious, can do that without much danger of the legal penalty.’
But there are fundamental issues about liberal understandings of rights, in relation to property, control of reproduction etc., that has made the liberal tradition one that women have rarely wholeheartedly committed to.
Waves of feminism:
1st Equal liberal rights 19thth C
2nd Women’s distinctive claims and substantive rights (1960s)
3rd moving away from universalist account of women and interests (1990s)

15. hostility to liberalism in the USA

16. …and…

17. The other side of the historical record
Locke:
Toleration
Patriarchy
Theology
Carolina
Liberal democracy

18. Emergence of liberalism

19. Liberalism and cognate terms: Britain

20. France

21. Italy

22. Spain

23. Constitution of Cadiz 1812

24. Constitutional provisions
Sovereignty resides in the nation, which retains the exclusive right to establish its own fundamental laws (art. 3).
Spain was proclaimed a hereditary monarchy (art. 14),
legislative power vested in the Cortes and the monarch (art. 15)
executive power represented by the monarch (art. 16).
individual freedom and the inviolability of domicile (arts. 286 and 307) proclaimed
Catholicism declared the official religion of Spain and prohibited the practice of any other religion (art. 12).
equality of Spaniards of the mother country and those of the Spanish colonies (art. 18)
Wide franchise
Freedom of the press
established a national militia in the provinces (art. 362).
Provided for primary education as a right (art 368)
On his return to Spain, King Ferdinand VII revoked the constitution on May 4, 1814.

25. Revolutions of 1830

26. Doctrinaires

28. 1920s-30s The end of liberal-democratic compromise Carl Schmitt
Joseph Schumpeter

29. Post 1945

30. Triumph of liberal-democracy
Since the French Revolution there has been a constant theme of the threats of populism and majoritarianism, riding rough-shod over liberal principles and individual rights.
In many political orders this has restrained popular initiatives and participation and entrusted legislatures and increasingly courts with jurisdiction over contentious political issues (abortion, death penalty, etc).
Most political systems are not very liberal: 'Emergencies' have always been the pretext on which the safeguards of individual liberty have been eroded.’ (Hayek) And not very democratic. (Giorgio Agamben, The State of Exception)
Liberal democracy is liberal first, democratic second (And liberal states are secure first, liberal second)

31. Procedural liberalism
Aims for fundamental agreement on processes – concerned to protect the rights of participants – but to allow whatever outcomes these processes produce as legitimate.
Liberal societies regarded as fair because people have their say – not because they get their way.
Raises questions about what personal, educational, intellectual, etc., resources people need for effective participation in these processes; and Qs about the culture in which those processes are conducted.
What level of self-censorship is appropriate to the public forum?
What are the threats: Trump, Brexit, increasing fragility of procedures over outcomes; S. Mediterranean cultures;
Procedures need at least three components:
Impartiality, transparency, determinacy

32. Pluralist Liberalism
If there are multiple competing values - that is: many values and good ways of living that are in competition for space, resources etc., - then there is inevitable conflict on distributive questions, the weight to be accorded to different rights, the extent of people’s liberties, the role of the state, and the degree of support for or protection against society and its pressures. - But there will also be disagreement over what kinds of arrangements and processes can be defended on the grounds of their impartiality between competing conceptions of the good. - Pluralism is the beating heart of liberalism – but also a consistently destabilising element in its thinking and practices.

33. L.T. Hobhouse on J. S. Mill
‘Brought up on the pure milk of the Benthamite word, he was perpetually bringing (its principles) into contact with fresh experience and new trains of thought, considering how they worked, and how they ought to be modified …to maintain what was really sound and valuable…Mill is the easiest person to convict of inconsistency, incompleteness, and lack of rounded system. Hence, also, his work will survive the death of many consistent, complete, and perfectly rounded systems.’
Liberalism (1911)