6 Key excerpts on "Liberalism"

• 

  eBook - ePub

  Theories of International Relations

  Contending Approaches to World Politics

  • Stephanie Lawson(Author)
  • 2015(Publication Date)
  • Polity

    (Publisher)

  4

  The Foundations of Liberal Thought

  Liberal approaches to international relations acknowledge the tendency to conflict in human affairs but focus much more on the human capacity to cooperate – to create effective laws and institutions and to promote norms which moderate the behaviour of states in the sphere of international anarchy. It was noted earlier that ‘Liberalism’ names one of a number of political ideologies, and that ideologies may be regarded as sets of ideas which both incorporate a view of the world as it is and how it ought to be from a particular normative standpoint and promote a plan of political action designed to bring about the desired state of affairs. In short, an ideology is a normative belief system oriented to political action. Liberalism is usually regarded as progressive, with progress defined in terms of certain key social and political goods. Individual human liberty, along with a notion of the essential equality of individuals, takes pride of place. It was also noted earlier that Liberalism, as a distinctive body of thought concerning conflict and cooperation in the international sphere, rose to prominence in the aftermath of the First World War. Like realism, it did so on the basis of a longer tradition of thought. But, unlike realism, at least in its classical form, Liberalism is associated closely with the phenomenon of modernity. This is linked in turn with a set of ideas which, in addition to the notion of progress, included distinctive approaches to the universality of the human condition and the inherent rationality of individual humans.

  Liberal political thought is also deeply implicated in economic thought, but again there are significant variations on the theme of liberal political economy, ranging from moderate, left-of-centre social Liberalism to quite extreme versions of economic neoLiberalism on the political right. Here is where the terminology can get quite confusing, for ‘neoLiberalism’ names both a body of liberal thought in IR which underwent a period of conscious renewal in the postwar period to meet the challenges of neorealism and the contemporary body of economic thought associated with radical free market ideas in the context of globalization. These will be discussed in chapter 5

  Sign up to read

  Learn more about book
• 

  eBook - ePub

  International Relations Theory for the Twenty-First Century

  An Introduction

  • Martin Griffiths, Martin Griffiths(Authors)
  • 2007(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  Historically, whilst many liberals such as Adam Smith, Kant, Cobden, and Bright were critics of colonialism, others such as John Stuart Mill went as far as to sanction despotism as a legitimate mode of government for ‘uncivilized’ non-Europeans. Whilst imperialism came increasingly to be perceived as illegitimate as the colonized claimed for themselves the ‘universal’ right of self-determination that the Europeans enjoyed, the broader issue of the widespread liberal presumption of moral superiority remains. The issue is particularly pointed given the relative power advantage liberals have to act on this premise and is discussed at greater length below. To conclude this section, Liberalism has constructed the modern states system as a framework of interplay and tension between the Westphalian values of state sovereignty and Liberalism’s own internationalist and cosmopolitan ambitions, even if in its origin the reform of the international realm was often regarded primarily as a means of enabling the constitutional–institutional and social development of politics at the domestic level. The philosophical pursuit of individual and collective freedom had wide-ranging political implications across such areas as civil–military relations, political economy, the bases of state legitimacy and national self-determination, and for the rise of international organizations and the modern development of ‘humanity’ as a moral category. Liberalism’s most significant achievements lie in the efforts to develop politics in accordance with the perceived requirements of justice and to develop ways through which states can move beyond the realist representation of IR as a war-bound realm with strictly limited potential for cooperation. Among its weaknesses, however, are a problematic association with capitalism, a presumption of moral superiority and inclination toward imperialism, and an inconsistent level of engagement with international affairs and issues. The next section of this chapter is concerned with the future of liberal internationalism.

  Liberal internationalism in the twenty-first century

  The starting point for this analysis of contemporary liberal internationalism – by which in practice is meant left-liberal and social-democratic internationalism – is the need to recognise that the project has become derailed. Despite its historical record discussed above, liberal internationalism has struggled to resolve tensions in the policy, political, and structural realms and faces an underlying crisis of belief in the intellectual and normative realms. Until this deeper crisis is satisfactorily addressed it is unlikely that liberal internationalism will reemerge as a major political force. Indeed, the future of liberal internationalism depends to a considerable extent upon whether the tensions and problems of contemporary liberal internationalism serve to fatally undermine the central project of combining individual and collective freedom or whether this crisis can be utilized as a regenerative experience from which a new globalism can emerge.

  Sign up to read

  Learn more about book
• 

  eBook - ePub

  International Relations: The Basics

  • Peter Sutch, Juanita Elias(Authors)
  • 2007(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  Chapter 8 ). A grasp of the basics of Liberalism therefore requires both an understanding of the history of liberal institutionalism and an understanding of liberal ethics.

  THE INTELLECTUAL HISTORY OF Liberalism

  Because normative Liberalism was sidelined for so long in IR, students are often not fully introduced to the intellectual history of Liberalism. The study of ethics and morality is often ignored or thought of as properly the subject of a different class such as political theory which is rarely mandatory for students of IR. This is partly because realism rejected morality as irrelevant to the study of the proper subject of IR – power. However, the claim that IR is solely, or even primarily, the study of power is itself a contentious argument. Liberalism, in very broad terms, is a series of arguments about why we should study other aspects of world politics such as international law, human rights, economic cooperation or justice. Liberalism describes the very rich and diverse traditions of thought that ascribe real value to internationalism in political and international thought. For the canonical thinkers in this tradition morality has a key place in our political thinking as ultimately it is individuals, rather than states, that are important in international relations (as in all life). Theories that fall in to this broad tradition have very different reasons for their internationalism and see very different consequences flowing from their positions. Some liberals argue for the progressive development of international law, others for a reordering of the institutions of world politics on democratic or cosmopolitan lines, some urge a greater respect for human rights and global economic justice, others for a free market. To dismiss all liberal arguments as utopian is to dismiss a complex range of arguments that appear throughout the history of ideas in political and international thought.

  Sign up to read

  Learn more about book
• 

  eBook - ePub

  Liberal Peace

  Selected Essays

  • Michael Doyle(Author)
  • 2011(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  3    Liberalism and world politics

  Promoting freedom will produce peace, we have often been told. In a speech before the British Parliament in June of 1982, President Reagan proclaimed that governments founded on a respect for individual liberty exercise “restraint” and “peaceful intentions” in their foreign policy. He then announced a “crusade for freedom” and a “campaign for democratic development” (Reagan, June 9, 1982).

  In making these claims the president joined a long list of liberal theorists (and propagandists) and echoed an old argument: the aggressive instincts of authoritarian leaders and totalitarian ruling parties make for war. Liberal states, founded on such individual rights as equality before the law, free speech and other civil liberties, private property, and elected representation are fundamentally against war this argument asserts. When the citizens who bear the burdens of war elect their governments, wars become impossible. Furthermore, citizens appreciate that the benefits of trade can be enjoyed only under conditions of peace. Thus the very existence of liberal states, such as the U.S., Japan, and our European allies, makes for peace.

  Building on a growing literature in international political science, I reexamine the liberal claim President Reagan reiterated for us. I look at three distinct theoretical traditions of Liberalism, attributable to three theorists: Schumpeter, a brilliant explicator of the liberal pacifism the president invoked; Machiavelli, a classical republican whose glory is an imperialism we often practice; and Kant.

  Despite the contradictions of liberal pacifism and liberal imperialism, I find, with Kant and other liberal republicans, that Liberalism does leave a coherent legacy on foreign affairs. Liberal states are different. They are indeed peaceful, yet they are also prone to make war, as the U.S. and our “freedom fighters” are now doing, not so covertly, against Nicaragua. Liberal states have created a separate peace, as Kant argued they would, and have also discovered liberal reasons for aggression, as he feared they might. I conclude by arguing that the differences among liberal pacifism, liberal imperialism, and Kant’s liberal internationalism are not arbitrary but rooted in differing conceptions of the citizen and the state.

  Sign up to read

  Learn more about book
• 

  eBook - ePub

  Global Political Economy

  Theory and Practice

  • Theodore H. Cohn, Anil Hira(Authors)
  • 2020(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  Chapter4

  Liberalism

  L iberalism is the most influential perspective in IPE. Most international economic organizations and the economic policies of most states today are strongly influenced by liberal principles. It is important to note that the term liberal is used differently in IPE and in U.S. politics. Whereas U.S. conservatives support free markets and minimal government intervention, U.S. liberals support government involvement in the market to prevent inequalities and stimulate growth. Classic liberal economists, by contrast, have similarities with U.S. conservatives; they emphasize the importance of the free market and private property and seek to limit the government’s role in economic affairs. This chapter shows that there are also variations among economic liberals. Although some liberal economists favor minimal government involvement, others believe that some government intervention is necessary for the effective functioning of markets.

  Basic Tenets of the Liberal Perspective

  Neomercantilists and Marxists place more emphasis than liberals on developing parsimonious theories that rely on a small number of concepts and variables.1 Whereas neomercantilists focus on the centrality of the state and Marxists view the world in terms of class relations, liberals deal with a wider range of actors and levels of analysis. Although this broader outlook enables liberals to capture complexities that neomercantilists and Marxists overlook, it also hinders the development of a coherent liberal international theory. This chapter focuses on three types of Liberalism relevant to IPE: Orthodox liberals promote “negative freedom,” or freedom of the market to function with minimal interference from the state. Interventionist liberals believe that negative freedom is not sufficient, and they support some government involvement to promote more equality and justice in a free market economy (an economy in which the market coordinates individual choices to determine the types of goods and services produced). Institutional liberals also view some outside involvement as necessary to supplement the market, and they favor strong international institutions such as the WTO, IMF, and World Bank. In addition to these three variants, liberals also employ different methods of studying IPE; they may rely on rationalism , constructivism , or some combination of the two. We discussed rational choice in the introduction to Part II; we discuss constructivism in Chapter 5

  Sign up to read

  Learn more about book
• 

  eBook - ePub

  The Return of the Political

  • Chantal Mouffe(Author)
  • 2020(Publication Date)
  • Verso

    (Publisher)

  And I am also committed – although in a way that differs from them – to elucidating the political dimension of Liberalism. I want to scrutinize its contribution to the emergence of modern democracy as a new regime. But this requires recognition that the liberal democratic regime is not exhausted by its liberal component. For it consists in the articulation of two elements, the liberal one constituted by the institutions of the liberal state (rule of law, separation of powers, defence of individual rights) and the democratic one of popular sovereignty and majority rule. Moreover, liberty and equality, which constitute the political principles of the liberal democratic regime, can be interpreted in many different ways and ranked according to different priorities. This accounts for the multiple possible forms of liberal democracy. The ‘liberals’ privilege the values of liberty and individual rights, while the ‘democrats’ insist on equality and participation. But as long as neither side attempts to suppress the other, we are witnessing a struggle inside liberal democracy, over its priorities, and not one between alternative regimes. To state, as Larmore does, that ‘Liberalism and democracy are separate values whose relation … consists largely in democratic self-government being the best means for protecting the principles of a liberal political order’, 38 is typically a liberal interpretation and is open to challenge. To be sure, the relation between Liberalism and democracy has long been a controversial issue and will probably never be settled. A pluralist democracy is constantly pulled in opposite directions: towards exacerbation of differences and disintegration on one side; towards homogenization and strong forms of unity on the other

  Sign up to read

  Learn more about book