Delighted to trigger ideas in someone who thinks and writes much better than I do. This is one of my reasons for commenting and occasionally posting on Substack.
Interesting! You are American? "Liberal" is not associated with the left here. I wouldn't say that liberalism, despite being based on individual liberty, is defined by individual or collective purpose. It's that liberalism gives the individual the right to decide which collective, if any to belong to. I choose my own husband and whether or not to have a family and then I dedicate myself to our collective wellbeing. I choose my own political party and then dedicate myself to organising with it. I choose my own religion or not to have one and then hold myself accountable to the community and its rules if applicable.
Yes, I am American. Also notice that this post was written before Trump was elected -- before left illiberalism went fully mainstream.
I think many people who call themselves liberal are balancing liberalism (as I am defining it) against more collective interests. I place myself a third of the way above the center line because I think we need some collective purpose to have meaningful lives. But I want to choose the collectivity I join. Illiberals feel entitled to impose it.
Yes, I think it is absolutely true to say that liberalism places individual individual interests above collective ones and illiberal factions of various kinds place collective interests above individual ones. But those individuals that liberals protect do them typically choose their collectives. Some people (not suggesting you) mistake liberal individualism for selfishness or narcissism rather than the freedom to choose what we commit to.
While most of this is quite correct, you err when you say that "capitalism ... is a central pillar of liberalism." This conflates two quite different things: liberalism, which is foundational to bourgeois society, and capitalism, a contradiction that has arisen within that society that effectively negates the liberal values of the bourgeois revolution. As Erin Hagood of the Platypus Affiliated Society put it:
"Socialism is not opposed to liberalism but seeks to take up the desiderata of liberalism in its crisis. The proletarian revolution is not made against the bourgeois revolution, but rather works through the unfinished tasks of that revolution in its hour of need. Marxism as the highest critic of socialism sought to clarify the world historical task of human freedom." ("The American Constitution and the Left," Platypus Review # 180)
"Contrary to narratives on the right (and occasionally on the left), these are not the same thing. Marxist critiques of liberalism have (since Marx) been economic. They are materialists who believe in objective truth and the importance of dialectic, but have a radical and single-minded focus on the source of societal injustice."
Marxist has been and remains a moral critique of capitalism. It's "economic" arguments have long since been dust. The reason people associate Marxism with Critical Social Justice is that they both have same attitude towards power and its morality (i.e., the powerful are immoral by definition, and the powerless are moral by definition, and our job is to arrange the revolution after which there are no more power structures). Marxist economic thought fails because it imagines a world with no scarcity. If we through some miracle arrived at a world with no scarcity, *we would create more of it.* As an economic model, Marxism simple does a poor job at predicting outcomes. It is first and foremost a moral critique of capitalism (and not an unfair one had capitalism not evolved at all, and even though it has, not entirely unfair or unuseful).
Thanks, that covers your ideas there in more detail. I suppose where I get confused is that, to me, Marxists today are not engaging in Marxism; they are moralists making arguments about what is economically moral (and pretending that economic moralism is upstream of cultural moralism, and thus is the "true" sight for justice; in fairness to them, I think Marx would have agreed with them morally and denied that what they were doing was his project analytically since they are prescriptive). Marx claimed he wasn't about justice, at least not theoretically; he was describing historical facts and analyzing their inevitable outcome, which is unsound in analysis and empirically incorrect. That moralism of the Marxists of today feels very much similar to the moralism of CSJ (there is an immoral edifice that must be torn down and made anew through its inherent immorality; it cannot be fixed, it must be eradicated), though obviously targeting different arenas of society.
Thanks Helen for your comprehensive setting the scene and the challenge of holding on to liberal ways. The term liberal has so many variants and meanings. What words best label and distinguish your clear case for “liberalism as a higher order”?
A commitment to individual liberty - freedom of belief, speech, association (individualism)
Tolerance of difference and a will to live and let live as well as a recognition of the value of viewpoint diversity to advancing knowledge and resolving conflict in a democratic society (pluralism)
Recognition of our shared humanity and the common rights, freedoms and responsibilities this bestows upon us all (universalism),
A drive for reform over revolution or reactionism as a model for resolving societal problems.
A commitment to actively protecting others' right to believe, speak and live as they see fit, provided they do no material harm to anyone else nor deny them the same freedoms.
The belief that all people come into the world with the same right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and this can only justifiably be removed from any individual due to their own demonstrable harmful actions.
An understanding that threats to freedom come not only from the state but from authoritarian ideologies, individuals and groups, so liberal principles need to be protected not only in law but widely understood and valued in society.
A belief that it is in the interests of the overwhelming majority to conserve liberalism and the liberal democracies within which it flourishes.
Many thanks. It’s good to have that repeated concisely. But I’m guilty of a typo: my question meant to be “ What word …?” In the singular. A single term or label that best denotes this “higher order liberalism”. One that distinguishes it from the wider variants of liberalism. A hashtag if you will. Sorry but I think it’s important to have one! 😟
There isn’t another word for liberalism. That’s why it is a problem that the US uses it to mean leftism. Normally, I think it is futile to try to reclaim words which have moved away from their original meaning, but with liberalism, there simply isn’t another word for it. It’s a whole cluster of concepts developed into a philosophical school of thought known as liberalism.
We can say that conservatism is, at root, the drive to conserve that which is good, progressivism is the drive to make positive progress, socialism is the drive to have the means of production socially owned and liberalism is the drive to protect liberty but that just gets at their core drivers. We need people to have a strong sense of liberalism as all of the above as well as support for capitalism and free trade because those are the principles that underlie liberal democracies. We still do have that sense in the UK so Starmer and Badenoch call themselves liberals. Much of Europe still has it. In the US, it is understood to mean left-wing and in Australia to mean right-wing. My friend who is staying with me is from Brazil and he says that liberal there is understood as centre-right but focused particularly on free markets.
Delighted to trigger ideas in someone who thinks and writes much better than I do. This is one of my reasons for commenting and occasionally posting on Substack.
I've thought along very similar lines. Liberalism falls inside a gamut between left and right, but is not a balance, tension or mixture. https://www.anomalogue.com/2015/06/27/political-framework/
Interesting! You are American? "Liberal" is not associated with the left here. I wouldn't say that liberalism, despite being based on individual liberty, is defined by individual or collective purpose. It's that liberalism gives the individual the right to decide which collective, if any to belong to. I choose my own husband and whether or not to have a family and then I dedicate myself to our collective wellbeing. I choose my own political party and then dedicate myself to organising with it. I choose my own religion or not to have one and then hold myself accountable to the community and its rules if applicable.
Yes, I am American. Also notice that this post was written before Trump was elected -- before left illiberalism went fully mainstream.
I think many people who call themselves liberal are balancing liberalism (as I am defining it) against more collective interests. I place myself a third of the way above the center line because I think we need some collective purpose to have meaningful lives. But I want to choose the collectivity I join. Illiberals feel entitled to impose it.
Yes, I think it is absolutely true to say that liberalism places individual individual interests above collective ones and illiberal factions of various kinds place collective interests above individual ones. But those individuals that liberals protect do them typically choose their collectives. Some people (not suggesting you) mistake liberal individualism for selfishness or narcissism rather than the freedom to choose what we commit to.
Grazie, il post è veramente ben scritto ed esauriente.
Ho apprezzato particolarmente la sottolineatura a vigilare / contrastare l'illiberalismo della PROPRIA FAMIGLIA POLITICA.
Un buon proposito per il '26 ,cordialità.
Vincenzo Bertozzi
While most of this is quite correct, you err when you say that "capitalism ... is a central pillar of liberalism." This conflates two quite different things: liberalism, which is foundational to bourgeois society, and capitalism, a contradiction that has arisen within that society that effectively negates the liberal values of the bourgeois revolution. As Erin Hagood of the Platypus Affiliated Society put it:
"Socialism is not opposed to liberalism but seeks to take up the desiderata of liberalism in its crisis. The proletarian revolution is not made against the bourgeois revolution, but rather works through the unfinished tasks of that revolution in its hour of need. Marxism as the highest critic of socialism sought to clarify the world historical task of human freedom." ("The American Constitution and the Left," Platypus Review # 180)
"Contrary to narratives on the right (and occasionally on the left), these are not the same thing. Marxist critiques of liberalism have (since Marx) been economic. They are materialists who believe in objective truth and the importance of dialectic, but have a radical and single-minded focus on the source of societal injustice."
Marxist has been and remains a moral critique of capitalism. It's "economic" arguments have long since been dust. The reason people associate Marxism with Critical Social Justice is that they both have same attitude towards power and its morality (i.e., the powerful are immoral by definition, and the powerless are moral by definition, and our job is to arrange the revolution after which there are no more power structures). Marxist economic thought fails because it imagines a world with no scarcity. If we through some miracle arrived at a world with no scarcity, *we would create more of it.* As an economic model, Marxism simple does a poor job at predicting outcomes. It is first and foremost a moral critique of capitalism (and not an unfair one had capitalism not evolved at all, and even though it has, not entirely unfair or unuseful).
Capitalism is an economic system. The woke use it to their advantage. I linked to a piece of mine addressing your points. It’s under “lip-service.”
Thanks, that covers your ideas there in more detail. I suppose where I get confused is that, to me, Marxists today are not engaging in Marxism; they are moralists making arguments about what is economically moral (and pretending that economic moralism is upstream of cultural moralism, and thus is the "true" sight for justice; in fairness to them, I think Marx would have agreed with them morally and denied that what they were doing was his project analytically since they are prescriptive). Marx claimed he wasn't about justice, at least not theoretically; he was describing historical facts and analyzing their inevitable outcome, which is unsound in analysis and empirically incorrect. That moralism of the Marxists of today feels very much similar to the moralism of CSJ (there is an immoral edifice that must be torn down and made anew through its inherent immorality; it cannot be fixed, it must be eradicated), though obviously targeting different arenas of society.
Well, yes, to that degree all political systems are moral. People advocate for them because they think they represent the right way to go on.
@Helen Pluckrose
Your essays on liberalism have alerted me to the misunderstanding that US "conservative" critics exhibit when sniveling about "liberals".
I point out similarities between left and right wings within the US at https://tinyurl.com/yc3jrr93
Thank you for this essay.
Thanks Helen for your comprehensive setting the scene and the challenge of holding on to liberal ways. The term liberal has so many variants and meanings. What words best label and distinguish your clear case for “liberalism as a higher order”?
This is how I set it out on my ‘about’ page:
A commitment to individual liberty - freedom of belief, speech, association (individualism)
Tolerance of difference and a will to live and let live as well as a recognition of the value of viewpoint diversity to advancing knowledge and resolving conflict in a democratic society (pluralism)
Recognition of our shared humanity and the common rights, freedoms and responsibilities this bestows upon us all (universalism),
A drive for reform over revolution or reactionism as a model for resolving societal problems.
A commitment to actively protecting others' right to believe, speak and live as they see fit, provided they do no material harm to anyone else nor deny them the same freedoms.
The belief that all people come into the world with the same right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and this can only justifiably be removed from any individual due to their own demonstrable harmful actions.
An understanding that threats to freedom come not only from the state but from authoritarian ideologies, individuals and groups, so liberal principles need to be protected not only in law but widely understood and valued in society.
A belief that it is in the interests of the overwhelming majority to conserve liberalism and the liberal democracies within which it flourishes.
Many thanks. It’s good to have that repeated concisely. But I’m guilty of a typo: my question meant to be “ What word …?” In the singular. A single term or label that best denotes this “higher order liberalism”. One that distinguishes it from the wider variants of liberalism. A hashtag if you will. Sorry but I think it’s important to have one! 😟
There isn’t another word for liberalism. That’s why it is a problem that the US uses it to mean leftism. Normally, I think it is futile to try to reclaim words which have moved away from their original meaning, but with liberalism, there simply isn’t another word for it. It’s a whole cluster of concepts developed into a philosophical school of thought known as liberalism.
We can say that conservatism is, at root, the drive to conserve that which is good, progressivism is the drive to make positive progress, socialism is the drive to have the means of production socially owned and liberalism is the drive to protect liberty but that just gets at their core drivers. We need people to have a strong sense of liberalism as all of the above as well as support for capitalism and free trade because those are the principles that underlie liberal democracies. We still do have that sense in the UK so Starmer and Badenoch call themselves liberals. Much of Europe still has it. In the US, it is understood to mean left-wing and in Australia to mean right-wing. My friend who is staying with me is from Brazil and he says that liberal there is understood as centre-right but focused particularly on free markets.