What is Liberalism?
Here are some brief generalizations about a term we hear a lot these days: liberalism. In our current political discourse, it is a synonym for “more statist” and “more culturally permissive” and “of the left.” This is awkward, as classical liberalism strives for a more limited government and less interference in the workings of market forces. But both uses share the notion that individual freedom is to be highly valued. The individual, in fact, is the fundamental unit of social life. Every adult, under liberalism, should be granted the authority and ability to define one’s own life. Since the philosophical earthquake of the Scottish Enlightenment, most Western political parties – including the Republicans and Democrats – argue within this framework. Here, humans may have multiple purposes, yet they are the best judges of right and wrong, reason and irrationality. Liberal language centers on rights instead of order, virtue, or duty. And so, over time, social conditions based on status (mother, child, group) tend to be replaced by contracts of consenting adults. In times of crisis, liberal regimes tend to resort to a depiction of opponents as enemies of liberal autonomy. I think a great deficiency of liberalism is the inability to recognize the importance of social contexts to individual freedom – in other words, the social sources of individuality tend to be neglected. There is more to humanity than the political state and its instruments of false and forced unity. We must recognize, appreciate, and foster the network of social relationships which lie intermediate to the individual and the state. The most important of these is the source and summit of our Christian existence, the Eucharist. These serve not only as buffers, but as the foundation of moral and social character. More here and here and here.
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Johnathan Jones writes : “The individual, in fact, is the fundamental unit of social life.”
Given, that the liberal does not recognize that man is by nature a political animal.
What you write is true qua each individual man, because each man joins society via social contract for his good, not for the good of the state.
But it is not true qua state where man exists for the good of the state, and thus there is no fundamental unit smaller than the state, but only those that subsist in the state. The leviathan is as a single man.
“There is more to humanity than the political state and its instruments of false and forced unity. We must recognize, appreciate, and foster the network of social relationships which lie intermediate to the individual and the state. ”
The liberal would argue, I imagine, that the state is a necessary bulwark against the market, which has a corrosive effect on these very same relationships.
Better a nation of citizens than of customers.
The liberal would argue, I imagine, that the state is a necessary bulwark against the market, which has a corrosive effect on these very same relationships.
Perhaps, but the framework remains in place – statistm and free market individualism are arguments amongst cousins. Maybe once the Industrial Revolution and the Enlightenment have been unleashed, it’s over. There’s no going back….which is why personal and family virtue are so important, because they provide a small counter to original sin plus self-interest plus a framework in which the individual is the fundamental unit of society.
The tension for the concerned Catholic, obviously, is between viewing the “individual” as the basic unit of society in liberalism and viewing the “person” as relational within a family as a basic unit of society in Catholicism. The Scottish Enlightenment (and, I would argue, Kant’s recovery of the self and radicalization of person as agent of pure freedom) developed a trajectory alongside the virtue concept of the State that was still formulated in Catholic Scholastic theology, having its roots in Thomas and being developed through Cajetan, Vitoria, Banez, and Suarez. I agree that, barring some catastrophic event, we cannot do political and social philosophy/theory as if the Industrial Revolution and the European/American Revolutions never happened. The difficulty hinges, I think, on attempting to reconcile the concept of “individual” with the concept of “person.” Given that these two are not commensurable, compromise or resistance is often the hapless effect.
What is the practical difference between the philosophical distinction of the terms person and individual?
err, that should say: What is the practical difference that results from the philosophical distinction made between the terms person and individual?.. thanks!
Zach,
I am thinking along the lines of four posts Anxietas, Henry, and I wrote a while back:
Person vs. Individual (Henry)
The Individual and the Person: A Prolegomena (Anxietas)
Our Debt to Modernity (Anxietas)
The Making of the Modern Social Mind
Excellent post… I immediately think of MacIntyre, Schindler, Nichols, Rowland, and Ratzinger. As Poli notes, we cannot pretend that that last 2-4 centuries didn’t happen, but it seems that we must nonetheless acknowledge not just the gains but also the losses that modernity gave us, and do what we can to alleviate the latter.
How, I have no idea. Well, I should say, no idea in terms of a grand political program. Concretely, I think we go local and focus on the culture of our families, parishes, neighborhoods, communities and states, in that order.
Mr. Burgwald writes : “Concretely, I think we go local and focus on the culture of our families, parishes, neighborhoods, communities and states, in that order.”
That does appear to be the best solution, but once again, how does one get there when the local does not exist?
That does appear to be the best solution, but once again, how does one get there when the local does not exist?
Indeed.