The Evolutionary Limits of Liberalism
The Evolutionary Limits of Liberalism

Author: Filipe Nobre Faria

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2019-11-01

Total Pages: 239

ISBN-13: 3030314960

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This book assesses the evolutionary sustainability of liberalism. The book’s central claim is that liberal institutions ultimately weaken their social groups in the evolutionary process of inter-group competition. In this sense, institutions relying on the liberal satisfaction of preferences reveal maladaptive tendencies. Based on the model of multilevel selection, this work appraises the capacity of liberal democracy and free markets to satisfy preferences. In particular, the book re-evaluates public choice theory’s classic postulate that free markets are a suitable alternative to the shortcomings of western liberal democracies regarding preference satisfaction. Yet, the book concludes that free markets are not a solution to the problems of liberal democracy because both market and democratic liberal institutions rest on the liberal satisfaction of preferences, an ethic which hurts group evolutionary fitness. This volume is of interest to political theorists, evolutionary ethicists, political economists and to general readers interested in the future of liberalism.

Liberalism: The limits of liberalism
Liberalism: The limits of liberalism

Author: G. W. Smith

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2002

Total Pages: 524

ISBN-13: 9780415223614

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Encompassing the relationship between the state and the individual, society and the individual, the nature of freedom and the concept of the person, this four-volume set covers the main tenets of the liberal tradition. The collection includes material from the rich background and history of classical writings, and also emphasizes modern scholarship and contemporary issues.Fully indexed and including a new introduction by the editor, this is an invaluable reference tool for both researchers and students in the field.

Liberalism
Liberalism

Author: Michael Freeden

Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA

Published: 2015

Total Pages: 161

ISBN-13: 0199670439

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Michael Freeden explores the concept of liberalism, one of the longest-standing and central political theories and ideologies. Combining a variety of approaches, he distinguishes between liberalism as a political movement, as a system of ideas, and as a series of ethical and philosophical principles.

Liberalism
Liberalism

Author:

Publisher: Ludwig von Mises Institute

Published:

Total Pages: 225

ISBN-13: 1610164083

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This is Mises's classic statement in defense of a free society, one of the last statements of the old liberal school and a text from which we can continue to learn. It has been the conscience of a global movement for liberty for 80 years. This edition, from the Mises Institute, features a new foreword by Thomas Woods. It first appeared in 1927, as a followup to both his devastating 1922 book showing that socialism would fail, and his 1926 book on interventionism. It was written to address the burning question: if not socialism, and if not fascism or interventionism, what form of social arrangements are most conducive to human flourishing? Mises's answer is summed up in the title, by which he meant classical liberalism. Mises did more than restate classical doctrine. He gave a thoroughly modern defense of freedom, one that corrected the errors of the old liberal school by rooting the idea of liberty in the institution of private property (a subject on which the classical school was sometimes unclear). Here is the grand contribution of this volume. "The program of liberalism, therefore, if condensed into a single word, would have to read: property, that is, private ownership of the means of production... All the other demands of liberalism result from this fundamental demand." But there are other insights too. He shows that political decentralization and secession are the best means to peace and political liberty. As for religion, he recommends the complete separation of church and state. On immigration, he favors the freedom of movement. On culture, he praised the political virtue of tolerance. On education: state involvement must end, and completely. He deals frankly with the nationalities problem, and provides a stirring defense of rationalism as the essential foundation of liberal political order. He discusses political strategy, and the relationship of liberalism to special-interest politics. In some ways, this is the most political of Mises's treatises, and also one of the most inspiring books ever written on the idea of liberty. It remains the book that can set the world on fire for freedom, which is probably why it has been translated into more than a dozen languages.

Skepticism and Freedom
Skepticism and Freedom

Author: Richard A. Epstein

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2003-06

Total Pages: 324

ISBN-13: 9780226213040

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With this book, Richard A. Epstein provides a spirited and systematic defense of classical liberalism against the critiques mounted against it over the past thirty years. One of the most distinguished and provocative legal scholars writing today, Epstein here explains his controversial ideas in what will quickly come to be considered one of his cornerstone works. He begins by laying out his own vision of the key principles of classical liberalism: respect for the autonomy of the individual, a strong system of private property rights, the voluntary exchange of labor and possessions, and prohibitions against force or fraud. Nonetheless, he not only recognizes but insists that state coercion is crucial to safeguarding these principles of private ordering and supplying the social infrastructure on which they depend. Within this framework, Epstein then shows why limited government is much to be preferred over the modern interventionist welfare state. Many of the modern attacks on the classical liberal system seek to undermine the moral, conceptual, cognitive, and psychological foundations on which it rests. Epstein rises to this challenge by carefully rebutting each of these objections in turn. For instance, Epstein demonstrates how our inability to judge the preferences of others means we should respect their liberty of choice regarding their own lives. And he points out the flaws in behavioral economic arguments which, overlooking strong evolutionary pressures, claim that individual preferences are unstable and that people are unable to adopt rational means to achieve their own ends. Freedom, Epstein ultimately shows, depends upon a skepticism that rightly shuns making judgments about what is best for individuals, but that also avoids the relativistic trap that all judgments about our political institutions have equal worth. A brilliant defense of classical liberalism, Skepticism and Freedom will rightly be seen as an intellectual landmark.

Political Failure by Agreement
Political Failure by Agreement

Author: Gerhard Wegner

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

Published: 2008-01-01

Total Pages: 151

ISBN-13: 1848441568

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Gerhard Wegner provides new insight into the relation between democracies and market economies. He recognizes conflict between the two, but he doesn t propose constitutional controls over political action. Such proposals are grounded in the comparative static manipulation of equilibrium models. In contrast, Wegner advances an evolutionary theory of political economy, and uses this theory to explain how processes of societal learning might be set in motion that could expand support for market arrangements through time. This thoughtful and challenging book will repay examination by all students of political economy. Richard E. Wagner, George Mason University, US In drawing particular attention to the implications of evolutionary market theory for public policy Gerhard Wegner adds a novel and instructive line of argument to the long-standing debate on the inherent tension between democratic politics and economic liberalism. His concept of learning liberalism addresses an important dimension of political failure that has been neglected in this debate. Viktor J. Vanberg, Universitaet Freiburg, Germany The purpose of this book is to reconsider economic liberalism from the viewpoint of political liberalism. The author argues that advocates of economic liberalism largely overlook empirical political preferences which, in many societies, go far beyond a limited role of the state. Recent difficulties of reforming the welfare state provide evidence that political preferences are at odds with liberal economic policy in numerous cases. This fact challenges a political conception which demands a limited state role but also claims that citizens preferences as they are should determine the content of policies. Using an evolutionary perspective on economic liberalism, the book develops new arguments about how economic liberalism can be brought into line with political liberalism. Drawing on an evolutionary theory of markets, Gerhard Wegner reinforces the claim that liberal economic policies are conducive to prosperity in society, but he argues that the liberal promise of prosperity does not translate into corresponding political preferences on the part of citizens. A tension between political and economic liberalism arises which lies at the centre of this book. Political Failure by Agreement will strongly appeal to postgraduate students and researchers of global governance, political theory, political economy and institutional economics.

Liberalism and the Limits of Justice
Liberalism and the Limits of Justice

Author: Michael J. Sandel

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1998-03-28

Total Pages: 252

ISBN-13: 9780521562980

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A liberal society seeks not to impose a single way of life, but to leave its citizens as free as possible to choose their own values and ends. It therefore must govern by principles of justice that do not presuppose any particular vision of the good life. But can any such principles be found? And if not, what are the consequences for justice as a moral and political ideal? These are the questions Michael Sandel takes up in this penetrating critique of contemporary liberalism. This new edition includes a new introduction and a new final chapter in which Professor Sandel responds to the later work of John Rawls.