Portal:Liberalism

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Liberalism is a political and moral philosophy based on the rights of the individual, liberty, consent of the governed, political equality, the right to private property and equality before the law. Liberals espouse various and often mutually warring views depending on their understanding of these principles but generally support private property, market economies, individual rights (including civil rights and human rights), liberal democracy, secularism, rule of law, economic and political freedom, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, and freedom of religion. Liberalism is frequently cited as the dominant ideology of modern history.

Liberalism became a distinct movement in the Age of Enlightenment, gaining popularity among Western philosophers and economists. Liberalism sought to replace the norms of hereditary privilege, state religion, absolute monarchy, the divine right of kings and traditional conservatism with representative democracy, rule of law, and equality under the law. Liberals also ended mercantilist policies, royal monopolies, and other trade barriers, instead promoting free trade and marketization. Philosopher John Locke is often credited with founding liberalism as a distinct tradition based on the social contract, arguing that each man has a natural right to life, liberty and property, and governments must not violate these rights. While the British liberal tradition has emphasized expanding democracy, French liberalism has emphasized rejecting authoritarianism and is linked to nation-building. (Full article...)

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The New Freedom was Woodrow Wilson's campaign platform in the 1912 presidential election, and also refers to the progressive programs enacted by Wilson during his time as president. First expressed in his campaign speeches and promises, Wilson later wrote a 1913 book of the same name. After the 1918 midterm elections, Republicans took control of Congress and were mostly hostile to the New Freedom. As president, Wilson focused on various types of reform, such as the following:

Tariff reform: This came through the passage of the Underwood Tariff Act of 1913, which lowered tariffs for the first time since 1857 and went against the protectionist lobby.
Labor reform: This was achieved through measures such as the Eight Hour Law for Women of the District of Columbia, the Seaman’s Act, Workmen’s Compensation for Federal employees, the Federal Child Labor Bill, and the Adamson Act. During the 1912 campaign Wilson spoke in support of workers organizing into unions while endorsing "the betterment of men in this occupation and the other, the protection of women, the shielding of children, the bringing about of social justice.”
Business reform: This was established through the passage of the Federal Trade Commission Act of 1914, which established the Federal Trade Commission to investigate and halt unfair and illegal business practices by issuing "cease and desist" orders, and the Clayton Antitrust Act.
Agricultural reform: This was achieved through measures such as the Cotton Futures and Smith-Lever Acts of 1914, the Grain Standards and Warehouse Acts of 1916, and the Smith-Hughes Act of 1917.
Banking reform: This came in 1913 through the creation of the Federal Reserve System and in 1916 through the passage of the Federal Farm Loan Act, which set up Farm Loan Banks to support farmers. (Full article...)

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John Dewey (/ˈduːi/; October 20, 1859 – June 1, 1952) was an American philosopher, psychologist, and educational reformer. He was one of the most prominent American scholars in the first half of the twentieth century.

The overriding theme of Dewey's works was his profound belief in democracy, be it in politics, education, or communication and journalism. As Dewey himself stated in 1888, while still at the University of Michigan, "Democracy and the one, ultimate, ethical ideal of humanity are to my mind synonymous." Dewey considered two fundamental elements—schools and civil society—to be major topics needing attention and reconstruction to encourage experimental intelligence and plurality. He asserted that complete democracy was to be obtained not just by extending voting rights but also by ensuring that there exists a fully formed public opinion, accomplished by communication among citizens, experts, and politicians. (Full article...)

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John Locke John Stuart Mill T. H. Green Norberto Bobbio John Rawls Isaiah Berlin David Lloyd George Jeremy Bentham

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I have ventured to quote scattered statements at considerable length because the picture of the immediate situation in Washington is typical. The condition at Washington reflects accurately the condition of politics throughout the country. The former has nothing to do with the realities of American life because the latter is completely out of connection. The situation explains the discontent and disgust of the people with the old parties and it constitutes the opportunity for a new party. We have long been told that politics is unimportant, that government is merely a drag and an interference; that the captains of industry and finance are the wise ones, the leaders in whose hands the fortunes of the country are safely entrusted.

The persons who keep reiterating such sayings forget, or they try to conceal from view, that the confusion, the perplexity, the triviality, the irrelevance, of politics at Washington merely reflect the bankruptcy of industrial "leadership," just as politics in general is an echo, except when it is an accomplice, of the interests of big business. The deadlocks and the impotence of Congress are definitely the mirror of the demonstrated incapacity of the captains of industry and finance to conduct the affairs of the country prosperously as an incident to the process of feathering their own nests. It would be ludicrous, were it not tragic, to believe that an appeal to the unregulated activities of those who have got us into the present crisis will get us out of it, provided they are relieved from the incubus of political action. The magic of eating a hair of the dog which bit you in order to cure hydrophobia is as nothing to the magic involved in the belief that those who have privlege and power will remedy the breakdown they have created. As long as politics is the shadow cast on society by big business, the attenuation of the shadow will not change the substance. The only remedy is new political action based on social interests and realities.

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— John Dewey, The need for a new party II: Breakdown of the old order, 1931.

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General images

The following are images from various liberalism-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Montesquieu, who argued for the separation of the powers of government (from Liberalism)
Image 2Madame de Staël (from Liberalism)
Image 3As a liberal nationalist, K. J. Ståhlberg (1865–1952), the President of Finland, anchored the state in liberal democracy, guarded the fragile germ of the rule of law, and embarked on internal reforms. (from Liberalism)
Image 4Wealth inequality in the United States increased from 1989 to 2013. (from Neoliberalism)
Image 5John Milton's Areopagitica (1644) argued for the importance of freedom of speech. (from Liberalism)
Image 6The 2017–2018 Russian protests were organized by Russia's liberal opposition. (from Liberalism)
Image 7Benjamin Constant, a Franco-Swiss political activist and theorist (from Liberalism)
Image 8The iconic painting Liberty Leading the People by Eugène Delacroix, a tableau of the July Revolution in 1830 (from Liberalism)
Image 9United States incarceration rate per 100,000 population, 1925–2014 (from Neoliberalism)
Image 10Noam Chomsky's 1999 book Profit Over People: Neoliberalism and Global Order is an open critique of neoliberalism and the American economic structure. (from Neoliberalism)
Image 11Execution of José María de Torrijos y Uriarte and his men in 1831 as Spanish King Ferdinand VII took repressive measures against the liberal forces in his country (from Liberalism)
Image 12US federal minimum wage if it had kept pace with productivity. Also, the real minimum wage. (from Neoliberalism)
Image 13Monument to the liberals of the 19th century in Agra del Orzán neighborhood, La Coruña, Galicia, (Spain) (from Liberalism)
Image 14Sismondi, who wrote the first critique of the free market from a liberal perspective in 1819 (from Liberalism)
Image 15Julius Faucher (from Liberalism)
Image 16Gustave de Molinari (from Liberalism)
Image 17Pamphlet calling for a protest of economic policy in 1983 following the economic crisis (from Neoliberalism)
Image 18Franklin D. Roosevelt (from Liberalism)
Image 19Mary Wollstonecraft, widely regarded as the pioneer of liberal feminism (from Liberalism)
Image 20Ludwig Erhard (from Neoliberalism)
Image 21U.S. President Bush, Canadian PM Mulroney, and Mexican President Salinas participate in the ceremonies to sign the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). (from Neoliberalism)
Image 22The European Union–Mercosur free trade agreement, which would form one of the world's largest free trade areas, has been denounced by environmental activists and indigenous rights campaigners. (from Neoliberalism)
Image 23Chilean (orange) and average Latin American (blue) rates of growth of GDP (1971–2007) (from Neoliberalism)
Image 24John Locke was the first to develop a liberal philosophy, including the right to private property and the consent of the governed. (from Liberalism)
Image 25John Maynard Keynes, one of the most influential economists of modern times and whose ideas, which are still widely felt, formalized modern liberal economic policy. (from Liberalism)
Image 26Builders in West Berlin, 1952 (from Neoliberalism)
Image 27The Great Depression, with its periods of worldwide economic hardship, formed the backdrop against which the Keynesian Revolution took place (the image is Dorothea Lange's Migrant Mother depiction of destitute pea-pickers in California, taken in March 1936). (from Liberalism)
Image 28GDP per capita in Chile and Latin America 1950–2010 (time under Pinochet highlighted) (from Neoliberalism)
Image 29Friedrich Hayek (from Neoliberalism)
Image 30Member nations of the International Monetary Fund (from Neoliberalism)
Image 31Unemployment in Chile and South America (1980–1990) (from Neoliberalism)
Image 32John Stuart Mill, whose On Liberty greatly influenced 19th-century liberalism (from Liberalism)
Image 33T. H. Green, an influential liberal philosopher who established in Prolegomena to Ethics (1884) the first major foundations for what later became known as positive liberty and in a few years, his ideas became the official policy of the Liberal Party in Britain, precipitating the rise of social liberalism and the modern welfare state (from Liberalism)
Image 34Per capita income during the Great Depression (from Neoliberalism)
Image 35Raif Badawi, a Saudi Arabian writer and the creator of the website Free Saudi Liberals, who was sentenced to ten years in prison and 1,000 lashes for "insulting Islam" in 2014 (from Liberalism)