Liberalism pt 4

?
View mindmap
  • Liberalism - Modern liberalism
    • Development
      • - Mill didn't offer solutions to the dilemmas of liberalism in the late 19th century
    • Positive liberty/ social justice
      • - During the late 19th century and early 20th century, a new number of English philosophers known as 'new liberals' re-examined the core principles of liberalism
      • - TH Green, LT Hobhouse and JA Hobson argued that modern advanced societies made a mockery of the idea that individuals were innately autonomous. Modern economics and society meant that individuals were increasingly subject to socio-economic forces beyond their control. This makes it impossible to seek self-determination and self-realisation
      • - New liberals argued that social justice as well as legal justice was required if individuals were to fulfill their potential
      • - Promoted positive liberty which denotes the belief that individuals left alone are often inhibited rather than 'free', and so need an enabling state so they are free to exercise their individual talents. Need to be free from socio-economic problems such as poor health, unemployment or lack of education
    • Enlarged and enabling state
      • - John Rawls justified an extension of the state in the name of individual liberty: more laws, more state spending, more tax and more state bureacracy (collectivism)
      • - Rawls argued that only a enlarged state could guarantee the equality of opportunity necessary to enable individual freedom
      • - Rawls priority was to ameliorate the social and economic condition of society's most deprived members and thus enable them to exploit their individual potential and achieve control of their lives
    • Constitutional reform/ liberal democracy
      • - Hobhouse said "if the state is to enlarged, it must also be improved". In the UK liberal demands for reform include a codified constitution, devolution, electoral reform and a more accountable house of Lords
      • - Liberal democracy links core liberal values and universal adult suffrage. In the UK it was liberal PM who oversaw the enfranchisement of most women and nearly all men irrespective of property ownership. Since 1945, UK liberals have championed the lowering of the voting age to 18 in 1969 and to 16 recently
      • - Modern liberalism shows little interest in direct democracy because they fear 'tyranny of the majority' and will dilute representative democracy to protect 'liberal' values. Regard the EU referendum in 2016 as 'the tyranny of the majority'
    • Social liberalism
      • Social liberalism = An updated version of the liberal belief of tolerance. Involves legislation that criminalises actions that discriminate against individuals on the grounds of race, gender, sexual orientation, disability and religious persuasion
      • - From the mid-20th century onwards Modern liberalism strongly linked with calls for greater racial and sexual toleration. Betty Friedan that too many individuals in western society were held back on account of innate factors such as ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation and physical disability
      • - Friedan argued that solutions to these problems lay in further state regulation and 'positive discrimination' which involved correction of historical imbalance by discriminating in favour of groups that were previously discriminated against
      • - President Kennedy's Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) 1960 required those managing projects financed by the state to take 'affirmative action' in respect of hiring employees from racial minorities
        • - In the UK there was the Race Relations Act 1976 and Sex Discrimination Act 1975

Comments

No comments have yet been made

Similar Government & Politics resources:

See all Government & Politics resources »See all Liberalism resources »