Liberalism as It Is - Essay Example

Liberalism The term Liberal was first originated in the ical period spurred by the study and free enquiry of the liberal arts; Aristotle described the greatest pleasure of man as the ability and means to spend their life indulging in the study of nature, the liberal arts and science as opposed to spending their time slaving away. In this context, liberal people were teacher’s philosophes and citizens who engaged in free and open discourse and the tolerance of the views of others without necessarily accepting them. This form of liberalism however faded with the dark ages and the period postdating it have experienced various form of the concept as it continues to evolve in terms of description and the manner in which it affects the thinking and ultimately lives of people and society. Liberalism was reawakened in the enlightenment age by the works of Hume, Locke and other scholar and it gradually grew coming to the peak of its ascendancy in the 18th and 19th century in Europe and America (Hall 1988, p.10). In a general sense, liberalism embodies a variety of ideals and view such as the idea of universal liberty equality, support for democracy freedom of expression privacy and owing property among numerous other rights. In the 20th century, liberalism was the most dominant social political ideology in the United States and part of Britain and this can be demonstrated by the fact that the leaders of the time recognized its power and embraced it. According to JF Kennedy, a liberal is an individual who focus lies on the future as opposed to the past, someone receptive to new ideas and someone concerned about the welfare and rights of the people with faith in the possibility of breaking through the barrier of suspicion and distrust at home and abroad (Alterman 2008, p.32). Indeed liberalism was responsible for many of the freedoms and rights enjoyed by most of the western world today many of which can be traced back to the United States and the UK. The 19th century was mostly an age of liberalism through which great political changes were attained, for example their governments in the constitution gave people used to believe that rights. However, the works of thinkers like John Locke radically change this perspective, he proved that it was actually the other way round and the government actually gets its power from the people (Mills 1982, p.18). Tyrannical governments that seemed to operate around the notion that subjects existed purely for the sake of the kings and dictators to use for their own benefit were discarded and in many instance replaced with democracies. In the 20th century, other schools of thought emerged in Europe such as communism and fascism and liberalism was in many instances cast aside. The consequences were phenomenal; individuals like Hitler and Mussolini used these ideologies to champion discriminative polices social Darwinism and racism among others (Goldberg 2007, p.11), in the US, slavery had been banned in the 19th century but the enforcement of segregating rules such as the Jim Crow laws was still taking place. For this reason, liberalism proved to be a very useful tool for liberating the minds of the 20th century. Liberalism brought about changes such as the end of discriminative laws in the US through the Civil Rights movement, the suffrage movement emancipated women and a great many changes were made reversing the unfair and in many cases inhuman practices carried out before the end of the second world war. In the late 20th century and early 21s century, liberalism has dominated political discourse in the US and Europe with key motifs in the debate including, support for freedom of speech and expression, freedom of religion and reproductive rights for women. In addition there is the equal rights and zero tolerance to discrimination of minority groups such as blacks, Hispanics, gays and lesbians, liberalism also advocates for multilaralism, international institutions as well as the interest of individual rights being superior to corporate interest. The last three are however not share by Liberals in the UK or Europe. The continental evolution of the term is evident in the fact that while the Americans expect that a liberal government should play a role in relief from poverty as well as universal healthcare and education, in Europe this would be seen as more of a social democracy than liberal state. Ultimately, liberals today tend to believe that the individual should be given priority and the idea of sacrificing the right or even convenience of the individual for the sake of the greater society cannot be accepted. Liberal will support abortion laws, legalization of Marijuana, Abortion and numerous of other controversial issues not necessarily because they agree with them but because they deem them to rights which every person has a right to. While conceding that the liberal philosophy as instrumental in bring about justice and equality in the 20th century, today it has evolved a great deal in many ways, fully adapting the principles of liberalism may in the long run prove to be a negative thing given that the needs of society have also evolved considerably. In the past and contemporary periods, liberal have proven to be considerably complicated owing to the diversity of their beliefs, which are in many cases inconsistent. For example, they tend to support virtually unrestricted abortion rights because according to them, the woman owns the womb and she should not be told what to do with it. As for the baby, some either refuse to acknowledge its humanity while others insist that nevertheless, in a choice between the baby’s life and mothers “freedom” the mother should come first. Given this cavalier attitude on life, it is rather surprising that it is the conservatives who promote the death penalty while liberal insist that nobody should be executed by the state. They belief in rehabilitation as opposed to punishment and in most cases the former is more expensive and this cost is born by tax payers. Liberal will also argue that and individual has the right to smoke marijuana for recreation purposes while on the other hand they will insist that experimental drugs should not be used on patients by the government. Today, liberals are particularly involved in the fight to oppose restrictions on owning firearms in the United States, despite the fact that statistics prove that most of the violent crime is committed using weapons, the liberal insisted that the individual should have the right to buy and own one even if it means endangering the lives of others. One of the most common arguments for these gun laws is that if everyone has a gun, criminal will have a harder time, however this is based on the assumption that everyone would want to have a gun. This is actually unfair people who do not like or have no interest in firearms but the liberal are more interested in the individual freedom than collective community’s safety. According to Gray, (1991, p.70) liberalism is grossly violated when the few use it as an excuse to enjoy their freedoms at the expense of other, to a great extent, this is what the gun laws in the US should they be allowed precipitate. The aforementioned issue of abortion can also be used to demonstrate the self-defeating element of liberal fixation with personal freedom, by promoting abortion that the conservatives oppose. The liberals are creating a leeway for young people to engage in unprotected sex and thus exposing them to other consequences of irresponsible sexual practices such as STDs not to mention an increase in the rate of abortions, which in many states are paid for by the taxpayer. While classical liberalism was supportive of economic liberalism where trade was open to competition, the modern liberals are less tolerant of this and they advocate for a closed system, as they perceive free trade to be injurious to the small trader. While this position has merit, given the rate and role of globalization in modern society, such a position is hardly practical since it would imply that a country become self-sufficient in as far as industrialization and food security are concerned. Ironically, that was a retrospective conservative stand but currently the two seemed to have changed sides on the issue. At the end of the day, in modern society, especially in the US, liberalism is tending to appear more like a form of post-world war two communisms than anything else, especially in apparent attempts to bring about a state welfare state. While taking to account that it has been and remains instrumental in safeguarding human right, the environment and equality or all persons, it focus of the individual rather than society have tended to force the state to expend too much attention and finances to address the needs of a few at the expense of the many. Given that modern conservatism also addressed most of the issue that are championed by the liberal albeit in a more considerate and moderated way. It is clear that liberalism should either evolve with the times or find itself relegated to obscurity since in many ways it is like a general whose war was fought and won a long time ago but who remains in his fatigues brandishing his weapon to mostly imagined enemies and refusing to believe that the war is over. References Alterman, E. 2008., Why Were Liberals. New York: Viking Adult. ISBN 0-670-01860-0 Goldberg, J., 2007.  Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left from Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning. New York, N.Y.: Doubleday, 2007, pp. 11-12. Gray, J. 1991. Liberalisms : essays in political philosophy . London : Routledge Hall, A. 1988. Liberalism : politics, ideology and the market. Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press Mill, J. S. 1982. On liberty / John Stuart Mill; edited with an introduction by Gertrude Himmelfarb. Harmondsworth : Penguin Read More