What is Liberalism?
Liberals start from the individual. Each person has rights and should be free to choose how to live, so long as they do not harm others. From this follows a set of shared ideas: limited government, free elections, a free press, freedom of religion and equality before the law. Most liberals also support private property and markets, though they argue about how far the state should step in to help the poor. The word can confuse. In the United States, liberal usually means left of centre. In much of Europe and Latin America, it can mean someone who favours free markets. This page covers the broad tradition behind both uses.
Core beliefs
- Every person has equal rights and dignity.
- Government is legitimate only when people consent to it.
- Power should be limited by a constitution and by courts.
- Free speech, free belief and a free press protect society from tyranny.
- Private property and voluntary exchange support freedom and prosperity.
- Differences of opinion should be settled by debate and votes, not by force.
History
Liberal thinking grew out of Europe's wars of religion, when people began to argue that rulers should tolerate different faiths. John Locke wrote in the 1600s that people have natural rights and that governments exist to protect them. Enlightenment writers such as Montesquieu, Adam Smith and Immanuel Kant added ideas about separated powers, free trade and human dignity. The American Declaration of Independence in 1776 and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man in 1789 turned these ideas into public documents. In the 1800s, liberals fought for free trade, wider voting rights and the end of slavery. John Stuart Mill's On Liberty, from 1859, argued that society may limit a person only to stop harm to others. From the late 1800s, so-called new liberals backed public schools and welfare. In the next century, Isaiah Berlin and John Rawls took the argument further.
Variants
Classical liberalism wants a small state, free markets and strong property rights. Social liberalism, sometimes called modern or new liberalism, accepts a bigger state to give everyone fair chances through schooling, health care and a safety net. Libertarians push the classical view further. Political liberalism, associated with Rawls, asks how people with different beliefs can agree on shared rules. Some liberals focus on economics, others on civil rights, and others on international order and free trade among nations.
Criticisms
Conservatives argue that liberalism puts the individual before family, community and tradition, and that it wears away shared values. Socialists say that formal equal rights hide real unfairness, because markets leave wealth and power in few hands. Nationalists argue that liberal trade and migration policies weaken the nation. Some critics note that early liberal societies kept slavery, empire and limits on women's votes, in conflict with their own principles. Others say liberal neutrality is not truly neutral. Liberals respond that their principles gave the tools used to end those wrongs.
In practice
Liberal ideas underlie the constitutions, courts, elections and bills of rights of most democracies. They also shaped the open trade system and bodies such as the United Nations and the European Convention on Human Rights. Liberal parties have governed in many countries, and liberal ideas are often shared by parties that do not use the name. On the 12 axes liberalism scores toward Democratic on Authority, toward Secular on Religion and toward Global on Trade, with mild leans toward Private on Ownership and Markets.