The Waning of Classical Liberalism

Section: 15.77:

Liberalism Changed

• Net effect of political, economic, and intellectual trends was:

• Continued advance of much that was basic to liberalism

• Weakening of the grounds on which liberalism rested

• Liberalism persisted but the classical type was fading

Classical liberalism• Went back to John

Locke• 19th century

proponents were William Gladstone, John Stuart Mill

• Deepest principle was the liberty and autonomy of the individual (actually adult males)

• But liberal principles fueled movement of women’s rights

John Stuart Mill and his wife Harriet'sdaughter (JSM's stepdaughter) Helen Tay

The Rational Individual• Individual was not defined by race, color, or creed• Individual was a free thinking being• Capable of reason and thinking out matter

independently (apart from group)• people of different interest could reassembly discuss

differences and make compromises• Liberals opposed all used of force upon the individual

(physical or mental)• View of religion was one of tolerance• Clergy should not play a part in public affairs• Self government through representatives• Will of the majority• The minority could become the majority in the future• Originally distrustful of democracy (excess mob rule)• Lips came to accept universal male suffrage• Economics• Laissez-faire, free trade

Foundations of Liberalism

• Toleration, constitutionalism, laissez-faire, free trade, international economic system and progress of mankind

• Pure liberalism existed only as a doctrine

• Europe before 1914 was mostly liberal but began to decline after 1880 with the new conceptions of human behavior and a belief in the irrational

The Decline of 19th century liberalism: Economic trends

• free economy produced hardship for workers and producers

• Both sought protection• Social reforms, Tariff protection• Depression of 1873 sent prices and

wages into steep decline• European farmers could not compete

with American Mid West and Russian steppes

• Both had been opened up by RR and steamship

• Tariff revival began with agriculture and then drifted into industry

• Junkers and Rhineland industrialist got Bismarck to renew tariffs in 1879

• French joined with similar measures

• Show Empire of Good Intentions from about 9-18 (Irish famine) as an example of laissez-faire ‘s failure

• And 36-39

A Revival of List• Many nations began resistance to

buying manufactures from England• Friedrich List, a German economist

wrote National System of Political Economy in 1840

• Said that Free trade only helped England (List)

• No nation could be strong and independent so long as it remained an agrarian supplier of unfinished goods

• A new Drive for colonies and imperialism set in

• Former disinterest in colonies ended as Industrialized nations needed raw materials and expanding markets

Economic Nationalism• classic liberalism divided politics from

economics but this theory began to lose ground

• Politics and economics began to merge• neo-mercantilism or Economic

Nationalism arose (about 1900)• Nations used economic polices against

each other• Tariffs, trade rivalries, internal regulation• Changed the relationship between the

business owner and the country the business was in (England and Russia)

• Business interests began to merge to attain greater control and protect themselves from uncontrolled markets

• Source of raw materials• Manufacturing facilities• Markets• Corporations, monopolies, trusts, cartels

Labor Unions• Rise of big business and Labor unions

forced libs to interfere in economic matters

• Governments began to support organized labor, socialist parties, universal male suffrage, social distress

• Social insurance, enforcement of regulations, new regulations on food and drugs

• This doesn’t jive with Laissez faire• Enlarged role of government directed the

social and economic affairs of the masses• David Lloyd George, Theodore Roosevelt,

Woodrow Wilson• Re-establish economic competition by

breaking trusts

The New Liberalism and the Welfare State

• Favorable toward workers and disadvantaged classes

• Growing government met the demands of the new liberals

• Growing government and centralized authority threatened classic liberals who worried about individual liberties

Intellectual and other currents• Challenges to liberalism was also found in intellectual circles• Dawinian evolution, Freudian mind, new art and literature trends• Darwin implied that humans were merely a highly evolved

organism whose mind was merely an adaptation to the environment

• Freud seemed to say that what was called reason was often only rationalization or finding alleged reasons to justify wants

• The conscience mind governed little of human behavior• Ideas themselves were cultural constructs• Implies that parties or nations with conflicting interest could

never reasonably agree• Insidious ant-intellectualism was destructive to liberal principles• Called Intellectual Determinism• IF Darwin, Freud, Pavlov and others were right human

perspectives were the result of non-rational an environmental factors

• THEN the perspectives held by any individual would not change through rational discussion

• THERFORE it is useless to discuss the differences and focus on striving for survival of the individual’s own interests

Rejection of reason• From the view that humans were not rational

came the cultivation the irrational• Stress the will, intuition, impulse, and emotion• Value violence and conflict• Realism

– new philosophy developed out of this new view of the irrational human

– it placed faith in the constructive value of struggle– Tough minded rejection of ideals

• Similar to the tenets of Marxism– Class warfare

• Nietzsche: courage, daring• Social Darwinists: the most fit• Sorel’s Reflections on Violence (1908):

syndicalism attained via by keeping the workers agitated and excited and ready for action

• These ideas later passed into fascism

The Popularity of Struggle• Late 19th century, the greatest age of

peace in Europe abounded with philosophies that Glorified struggle

• Violence was a positive good through which progress could be accomplished

• 1871 saw social questions settled by force

• 1848 was associated with the advance of social reforms

• Unity of Italy, Germany, and the United Sates was confirmed by war

English Liberalism• Economic and political matters in England

(homeland of liberalism) showed signs of liberalism’s decline

• Joseph Chamberlain• led a movement Tariff protection (to repeal the repeal of

the corn laws)• Liberal party • Abandoned laissez-faire policy• took up Labor legislation• Labor party• Required its members of Parliament to vote as the party

directed• this initiated part solidarity copied by others• Hardened lines of opposition• but it denied of the individual choice to think freely• Reduced practical parliamentary discussion• Anti-Irish prepared to resist Irish home rule by force• Suffragettes resorted to violent political actions• Railway and coal strikes of 1911-12 showed the power

of organized labor

Persistence of liberalism• Yet liberalism persisted• Tariffs existed yet goods circulated

freely• Nationalism was high but not

totalitarian• Racist ideas were circulating but were

of little political importance• Laissez-faire state was disappearing• Social legislation was humanitarian• Doctrinaires exalted the beauty of war

– But Countries sought to maintain peace

• Still a popular faith in progress