Today, on television and in general on the Internet, many people say: “Here they are liberals, liberal-minded citizens ...” They also call modern liberals even worse: “liber @ hundred”, liberoids, etc. Why did these liberals not please everyone who hayet? What is liberalism? Now we will explain in simple words, and at the same time we will determine whether it is worth scolding modern liberals like that and for what.

History of liberalism

Liberalism is an ideology - a system of ideas about the structure of society and the state. The word itself comes from the word Libertas (lat.) - which means freedom. What does it have to do with freedom now find out.

So, imagine the harsh Middle Ages. You are a craftsman in a European medieval city: a tanner, or even a butcher. Your city is in the possession of a feudal lord: county, barony or duchy. And the city pays him rent every month for what is on his land. He wanted to, let's say the feudal lord introduce a new tax - for example, on air. And enter. And the townspeople will not go anywhere - they will pay.

Of course, there were cities that were redeemed for freedom and themselves already established more or less fair taxation. But those were extremely wealthy cities. And yours - such an average city - cannot afford such a luxury.

If your son wants to become a doctor or a priest, then it will simply be impossible. Because the state law determines the life of each estate. He can only do what you do - be a butcher. And when the tax burden ruins the city, then, probably, it will rise and overthrow the power of the feudal lord. But the royal troops, or the troops of the feudal lord, of a higher rank, will come and punish such a rebellious city.

By the end of the Middle Ages, this order of things bothered primarily the townspeople: artisans, merchants - in a word, those who really earn their hard work. And Europe was engulfed by bourgeois revolutions: when the bourgeoisie began to dictate its terms. In 1649, the revolution in England,. And what are the interests of the bourgeoisie?

Definition of liberalism

Liberalism is an ideology, the key elements of which are: the freedom of the individual, the idea of ​​the public good, the guarantee of legal and political equality. This is what the bourgeoisie needs. Freedom: if a person wants to do business - let him do what he wants - this is his right. The main thing is that he does not harm other people and does not encroach on their freedom.

Equality is a very important idea. Of course, all people are not equal: in terms of their intelligence, perseverance, physical data. But! We are talking about equal opportunities: if a person wants to do something, no one has the right to interfere with him on the basis of racial, social or other other prejudices. Ideally, any person can break out into people, “rise” with hard work. Of course, not everyone will climb, because not everyone can and wants to work hard and hard for a long time!

Common good: means a rational structure of society. Where the state guarantees the rights and freedoms of the individual, protects this individual from all sorts of threats. The state also protects the rules of life in society: controls the observance of laws.

Another very important foundation of liberalism: idea of ​​natural rights. This idea was developed by the English thinkers John Locke and Thomas Hobbes. It consists in the fact that three rights are inherent in a person from birth: the right to life, to private property and to the pursuit of happiness.

No one has the right to take a life from a person, except perhaps the state and only by law. The right to private property was analyzed in detail. The pursuit of happiness means the same freedom of action, of course within the law.

Classical liberalism died a long time in 1929, when a crisis arose in the United States, as a result of which tens of thousands of banks went bankrupt, millions of people died of starvation, and so on. Today we are talking about neoliberalism. That is, under the influence of various factors, liberalism has changed: it has transformed into neoliberalism.

What is neoliberalism, we analyze in detail.

Why are liberals in Russia today so “bad” that everyone scolds them? The fact is that people who call themselves liberals defend not so much the ideology of liberalism as the idea that Europe and the United States are the best countries and that it is they who should be guided by: to enter the European Union, NATO, in a word, bend under the West. At the same time, if you say that you do not think it is right, they prove to you that you are not right at all. That is, they deliberately violate your right to the same freedom of speech, freedom of opinion, position.

Why do we need Europe if they have a crisis economy? After all, all crises begin in the West. Look at the countries that are members of the European Union: Greece, Romania. Romanians now go to Germany to clean German toilets - they can’t work at their bus factories - they were closed due to the fact that Germany makes bus deliveries. And Greece - several years in the European Union brought this country to a financial collapse, not even a crisis - a collapse.

Looking at all this, you will involuntarily think, why do we need to be in the EU? To at least destroy us, what else somehow works somewhere? Therefore, if I would call modern Russian “liberals” (those people who advocate reckless European integration) liberals, then only through quotation marks.

In conclusion, I give a common joke. To the question: “Should I go down?” the patriot answers "Who?", and the liberal "Where?" 🙂

I hope you received an exhaustive answer to the question "What is liberalism", put likes, write in the comments about all this.

Sincerely, Andrey Puchkov

Further improvement of social relations, expansion of other social groups during the period of active metamorphoses and the formation of modern European states. Liberals are people who advocate in all its manifestations, the only restriction for the unlimited development of the individual, according to liberals, are laws that should limit and harmonize the interests of all social groups in society. The main ideas of liberal ideology appeared in the 19th century, liberalism was further developed in practical and theoretical terms and became the basic principle for a number of politicians.

The liberals of the 19th century considered individual freedom to be the most important value and a sign of the progressiveness of society, but at the same time, the liberal ideology recognized only the person who was responsible for his actions as truly free. Liberals are supporters of a lifestyle that provides a comfortable and safe existence from external coercion. The indisputable factor of the liberal ideology is private property, as well as the presence of a civil society, whose members have the right to independently solve problems without excessive state interference in certain ones. and judicial, each of which acts purely within its competence. Liberals are people with the worldview of a free person who is responsible for his own choice, well-being, and also appreciates and understands the blessings given to him from birth.

In the economic sphere, the views of liberals can be characterized by the concept of market relations unlimited by the state. The main condition for successful economic development, in their opinion, is competition, which itself will identify the most effective participants in the national, and then the global market, without government intervention. He was only required to guarantee the protection of entrepreneurs from the arbitrariness of the bureaucracy and bureaucracy. Each person builds his own well-being - such is the slogan of the liberals of the 19th century. Rapid industrial development increased the number of wage earners, and in order to maintain influence, liberalism was revised.

Liberals of the 20th century - neo-liberals - rejected the position of state non-intervention in the market. In their opinion, it should carry out reforms that contribute to the social protection of the least well-off strata of society. This was done in order to prevent mass indignation and revolutionary outbursts, to achieve the elimination of class enmity and to build a society of general welfare. Thus, liberals are a political force whose main idea is the values ​​of the rule of law and individualism.

(from the Latin liberalis - free) first appeared in literature in the 19th century, although as a current of socio-political thought it was formed much earlier. The ideology arose in response to the powerless position of citizens under the conditions of an absolute monarchy.

The main achievements of classical liberalism are the development of the "Theory of the Social Contract", as well as the concepts of the natural rights of the individual and the theory of separation of powers. The authors of the Theory of the Social Contract were D. Locke, C. Montesquieu and J.-J. Rousseau. According to her, the origin of the state, civil society and law is based on an agreement between people. The social contract implies that people partially renounce sovereignty and transfer it to the state in exchange for ensuring their rights and freedoms. The key principle is that a legitimate governing body must be obtained with the consent of the governed, and it has only those rights that have been delegated to it by citizens.

Based on these signs, the supporters of liberalism did not recognize absolute monarchy and believed that such power corrupts, because. it has no limits. Therefore, the first insisted on the expediency of the separation of powers into legislative, executive and judicial. Thus, a system of checks and balances is created and there is no room for arbitrariness. A similar idea is described in detail in the works of Montesquieu.

Ideological liberalism developed the principle of the natural inalienable rights of a citizen, including the right to life, liberty and property. The possession of them does not depend on belonging to any class, but is given by nature.

classical liberalism

In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, a form of classical liberalism emerged. Its ideologues include Bentham, Mill, Spencer. Proponents of classical liberalism put at the forefront not public, but individual interests. Moreover, the priority of individualism was defended by them in a radical extreme form. This distinguished classical liberalism from the form in which it originally existed.

Another important principle was anti-paternalism, which assumed minimal state interference in private life and the economy. State participation in economic life should be limited to the creation of a free market for goods and labor. Freedom was perceived by liberals as a key value, the main guarantee of which was private property. Accordingly, economic freedom had the highest priority.

Thus, the basic values ​​of classical liberalism were the freedom of the individual, the inviolability of private property and minimal state participation. However, in practice, this model did not contribute to the formation of the common good and led to social stratification. This led to the spread of the neoliberal model.

Modern liberalism

In the last third of the 19th century, a new trend began to take shape -. Its formation was due to the crisis of liberal doctrine, which went to the maximum rapprochement with conservative ideology and did not take into account the interests of the widespread stratum - the working class.

As the leading advantage of the political system, justice and harmony were proclaimed by the ruled. Neoliberalism also sought to reconcile the values ​​of equality and freedom.

Neoliberals no longer insisted that man should be guided by selfish interests, but should contribute to the formation of the common good. And although individuality is the highest goal, it is possible only with a close relationship with society. Man began to be perceived as a social being.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the need for state participation in the economic sphere for a fair distribution of benefits also became apparent. In particular, the functions of the state included the need to create an education system, establish a minimum wage and control working conditions, provide unemployment or sickness benefits, etc.

They are opposed by libertarians who advocate the preservation of the basic principles of liberalism - free enterprise, as well as the inviolability of natural freedoms.

Olga Nagornyuk

Liberals. Who is it?

What do we know about liberalism? This philosophical doctrine, which appeared in the 17th century and developed into a socio-political trend, has become a serious force in the political arena today. Therefore, not knowing today who liberals are means not being guided in the life of society.

Principles of liberalism

Feudalism was an era of absolute monarchies and the dominance of the Catholic Church. Unlimited power, concentrated in the hands of kings and churchmen, was used by them not for good.

The growing extortions and extreme impoverishment of the people against the backdrop of the aristocrats' high society entertainments striking in their luxury became the reason for the aggravation of the class struggle, the change in the social system and the emergence of a new philosophical trend proclaiming the freedom of the individual.

This doctrine was called "liberalism" from the Latin "liber", which means "freedom" in translation. The first who began to use this term and gave explanations to it was the English philosopher John Locke, who lived in the 17th century. His idea was picked up and developed by such liberals as Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Voltaire, Adam Smith and Immanuel Kant.

The largest achievement of the liberals was the creation of the United States of America, which received its statehood as a result of the war of independence and adopted the world's first constitution based on the main liberal principles - equality of human rights and freedoms.

About who the liberals were, they learned in Russia in the 18th century. True, in Russian the word "liberalism" had a slightly different meaning and meant "free-thinking". In society, all dissidents were called liberals and treated with contempt. The negative connotation of meaning has survived to this day, today we call people who are characterized by excessive tolerance and connivance.

The principles of liberalism, progressive for the XVII-XVIII centuries, remain relevant today:

• the proclamation of individual freedom, including freedom of speech, expression of will and religion;

• observance of human rights;

• inviolability of private property;

• equality of all citizens before the law;

• separation of branches of power and its election;

• inadmissibility of interference in private life by the state.

Some of these principles were borrowed and used by ideologues of other movements, but the liberals were the first to take the path of protecting the rights and freedoms of the individual.

Forms of liberalism

We found out who the liberals are and what principles they are guided by, it's time to talk about the forms of liberalism. Sociologists categorize them as follows:

1. Political: expressed in the presence of universal suffrage and the rule of law.
2. Economic: protects the right of private property and upholds the principle of non-intervention of the state in the economy.
3. Cultural: does not accept government regulation of issues such as drug use, abortion, prostitution, gambling. Today, the country with the highest level of cultural liberalism is the Netherlands, which legalized prostitution and the use of soft drugs.
4. Social: stands for the right of every person to education, health care and other basic needs.
5. Liberalism of the third generation, which originated in the course of the anti-colonial struggle of the third world countries. Its main goal is to resist developed countries in their desire to limit the access of third world countries to the latest technologies and material resources.

Speaking of liberals, it is worth remembering their antipodes - conservatives. The former believe that the state should serve the individual. They are ready to make concessions and seek compromises, destroy the old order and create a new one through reform.

Conservatives, on the contrary, do not accept changes and strive to preserve existing values. They keep imported goods out of the domestic market, protect the interests of the national church, and consider reforms an evil that brings decadence. Who would have thought, but such strict principles sometimes bring more benefits to the state than liberal ideas.

Socialists are inherently closer to liberals, since they also follow the path of elective power and the protection of human rights and freedoms. However, they deny private property and act uncompromisingly when it comes to the interests of the proletariat. The question of who is better - liberals, conservatives or socialists - belongs to the category of rhetorical ones, since it has no answer.

The United States of America can be called the largest project of the liberals. This state, based on the principles of freedom and equality, serves as a vivid illustration of liberal ideology. Here are just a few examples:

• the production of the national currency in the United States is carried out by a private enterprise, which is not influenced by either the Senate, or the President, or the CIA, or any other state body;

• in this country there are about 200 religious movements;

• more than 300,000 American teenagers are infected with sexually transmitted diseases every year;

• Americans spend more money buying dog food than buying food for children;

• one in 25 death row inmates in US prisons is found innocent;

• most states do not prohibit an abuser from asking the court for custody of a child if the victim of the abuse is pregnant;

• an American teenager at the time of his 17th birthday manages to see about 40,000 murders on TV;

• topless is allowed in New York;

• the United States does not prohibit smoking by minors, they are only not allowed to sell cigarettes;

• 63% of prisoners serving sentences in American prisons are illiterate.

Such liberals, who put an equal sign between human freedom and the principle of permissiveness, are leading their country to collapse. Apparently, therefore, today liberalism in its pure form is not present in any country in the world.

Many even have no idea what to do if they fell onto the subway rails: is it possible to try to climb back onto the platform, which way to go through the tunnel, where the current is supplied to the train cars ... Therefore, we have prepared detailed instructions for you on how to how to behave properly when falling on the subway.

from lat. liberalis - free) - the name of the "family" of ideological and political movements, historically developed from rationalistic and educational criticism, which in the 17-18 centuries. were subjected to Western European class-corporate society, political "absolutism" and the dictates of the church in secular life. The philosophical foundations of the "members of the liberal family" have always been incompatible. Historically, the most important among them are: 1) the doctrine of the "natural rights" of man and the "social contract" as the foundation of a legitimate political system (J. Locke and others, Social contract); 2) the “Kantian paradigm” of the moral autonomy of the noumental “I” and the concepts of the “lawful state” that follow from it; 3) the ideas of the “Scottish Enlightenment” (D. Hume, A. Smith, A. Ferguson, etc.) about the spontaneous evolution of social institutions, driven by the inevitable scarcity of resources, combined with the egoism and ingenuity of people, connected, however, by “moral feelings”; utilitarianism (I. Betpam, D. Ricardo, J. S. Mill and others) with its program of “the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people”, considered as prudent maximizers of their own benefit; 5) "historical liberalism", one way or another connected with Hegelian philosophy, affirming the freedom of man, but not as something inherent in him "from birth", but as, according to R. Collingwood, "acquired gradually insofar as a person enters into self-conscious possession of one's own personality through ... moral progress. In modified and often eclectic versions, these various philosophical foundations are reproduced in modern discussions within the “liberal family”. The main axes of such discussions, around which new groupings of liberal theories are formed, relegating to the background the significance of differences in philosophical foundations, are the following. Firstly, should liberalism as its main goal strive to “limit the coercive power of any government” (F. Hayek) or is this a secondary issue, decided depending on how liberalism copes with its most important task - “maintaining conditions, without which the free practical realization by a person of his abilities is impossible ”(T. X. Green). The essence of these discussions is the relationship between the state and society, the role, functions and permissible scope of the activity of the former in order to ensure the freedom of development of the individual and the free coexistence of people. Secondly, should liberalism be “value-neutral”, a kind of “pure” technique for protecting individual freedom, regardless of what values ​​it is expressed in (J. Rawls, B. Ackerman), or he embodies certain values ​​(humanity, tolerance and solidarity, justice, etc.), the departure from which and boundless moral relativism are fraught with the most pernicious, including directly political, consequences for him (W. Galston, M. Walzer). The essence of this type is the normative content of liberalism and the dependence on it of the practical functioning of liberal institutions. Thirdly, the dispute between "economic" and "ethical" (or political) liberalism. The first is characterized by the formula of L. von Mises: “If we condense the entire program of liberalism into one word, then it will be private] property ... All other requirements of liberalism follow from this fundamental requirement.” "Ethical" liberalism argues that the connection between freedom and private property is ambiguous and not invariable in different historical contexts. According to B. Krone, freedom "must have the courage to accept the means of social progress, which ... are diverse and contradictory", considering the principle of laissez faire only as "one of the possible types of economic order."

If it is impossible to find a common philosophical denominator among different types of liberalism, classical and modern, and their approaches to key practical problems differ so significantly, then what makes it possible to speak of their belonging to the same “family”? Prominent Western researchers reject the very possibility of giving a single definition to liberalism: its history reveals only a picture of “breaks, accidents, diversity ... thinkers indifferently mixed together under the banner of “liberalism” (D. Gray). The commonality of various types of liberalism in all other respects is revealed if they are considered not from the side of their philosophical or political-programmatic content, but as an ideology, the defining function of which is not to describe reality, but to act in reality, mobilizing and directing the energy of people for certain goals. In different historical situations, the successful implementation of this function requires an appeal to different philosophical ideas and the promotion of different program settings in relation to the same market, the “minimization” or expansion of the state, etc. In other words, the only general definition of liberalism can only be that it is a function of the implementation of certain values-goals, which manifests itself in a specific way in each specific situation. The dignity and measure of the “perfection” of liberalism are determined not by the philosophical depth of its doctrines or fidelity to one or another “sacred” formulation about the “naturalness” of human rights or the “inviolability” of private property, but by its practical (ideological) ability to bring society closer to its goals and not give him to "break" into a state that is radically alien to them. History has repeatedly demonstrated that philosophically poor liberal teachings turned out to be much more effective from this point of view than their philosophically refined and sophisticated "brothers" (let's compare, for example, the political "fates" of the views of the "founding fathers" of the United States, as they are set out in "The Federalist", etc. documents, on the one hand, and German Kantianism, on the other). What are the stable goals-values ​​of liberalism, which received various philosophical justifications in its history and were embodied in various practical programs of action?

1. Individualism - in the sense of the "primacy" of the moral dignity of a person over any encroachment on him by any team, no matter what considerations of expediency support such encroachments. Understood so. individualism does not a priori exclude the self-sacrifice of a person if he recognizes the requirements of the collective as "just". Individualism is not connected in a logically necessary way with those ideas about an "atomized" society, within the framework of which and on the basis of which it was initially affirmed in the history of liberalism.

2. Egalitarianism - in the sense of recognizing all people of equal moral value and denying the importance for the Organization of the most important legal and political institutions of society of any "empirical" differences between them (in terms of origin, property, profession, gender, etc.). Such egalitarianism is not necessarily justified according to the formula "all are born equal." For liberalism, it is important to introduce the problem of equality into the logic of obligation ~ “everyone must be recognized morally and politically equal”, regardless of whether such an introduction follows from the doctrine of “natural rights”, the Hegelian dialectic of “slave and master” or the utilitarian calculation of one’s own strategic benefits.

3. Universalism - in the sense of recognizing that the requirements of individual dignity and equality (in the indicated sense) cannot be rejected by referring to the "immanent" features of certain cultural and historical groups of people. Universalism should not necessarily be linked with ideas about the ahistorical "nature of man" and the same understanding of "dignity" and "equality" by all. It can also be interpreted in such a way that in every culture - in accordance with the character of human development inherent in it - there should be a right to demand respect for dignity and equality, as they are understood in their historical certainty. What is universal is not what exactly people demand in different contexts, but how they demand what they demand, namely, not as slaves seeking favors that their masters can rightfully refuse them, but as worthy people who have the right to for what they require.

4. Meliorism as a statement of the possibility of correcting and improving any social institutions. Meliorism does not necessarily coincide with the idea of ​​progress as a directed and determined process, with which it has long been historically associated. Meliorism also allows different ideas about the relationship between the conscious and spontaneous principles in changing society - in the range from the spontaneous evolution of Hayekado to Bentham's rationalist constructivism.

With this constellation of value-goals, liberalism asserts itself as a modern ideology, distinct from earlier political teachings. The boundary here can be indicated by the transformation of the central problem. All pre-modern political thought, in one way or another, focused on the question: "what is the best state and what should be its citizens?" At the center of liberalism is another question: “how is the state possible if the freedom of the people, capable of pouring out into destructive self-will, is irremovable?” All liberalism, figuratively speaking, follows from two formulas of H. Hobbes: “There is no absolute good, devoid of any relation to anything or anyone” (i.e., the question of “the best state in general” is meaningless) and “ the nature of good and evil depends on the totality of conditions present at a given moment” (i.e., “correct” and “good” policies can only be defined as a function of a given situation). The change of these central questions determined the general outline of liberal political thinking, outlined by the following lines-provisions: 1) in order for a state to take place, it must include all those who are affected by this matter, and not just virtuous or possessing some special features that make them suitable for political participation (as was the case, for example, with Aristotle). This is the liberal principle of equality, which was filled with content in the course of the history of liberalism, progressively spreading to all new groups of people excluded from politics at previous stages. It is clear that this spread took place through the democratic struggle against the pre-existing institutional forms of liberalism with their inherent mechanisms of discrimination, and not through the self-deployment of the "immanent principles" of liberalism. But something else is important: the liberal state and ideology were capable of such development, while earlier political forms (the same ancient policy) broke down when trying to expand their original principles and spread them to groups of the oppressed; 2) if there is no absolute good, self-evident for all participants in politics, then the achievement of peace presupposes the assumption of the freedom of all to follow their own ideas about the good. This assumption is “technically” implemented by establishing channels (procedural and institutional) through which people satisfy their aspirations. Initially, freedom comes to the modern world not in the form of a "good gift", but in the form of a terrible challenge to the very foundations of people's coexistence from their violent selfishness. Liberalism had to recognize this crude and dangerous freedom and socialize it according to that primitive formula of "freedom from" which early liberalism conveys so emphatically. Such recognition and what followed from it for political theory and practice is necessary for realizing the very possibility of people living together in modern conditions. (In the sense of the Hegelian formula - "freedom is necessary", that is, freedom has become a necessity for modernity, which, of course, has little in common with the "dialectical-materialist" interpretation of this formula by F. Engels - freedom as a recognized necessity). But the need to recognize freedom in its crude form does not at all mean that liberalism does not go further in understanding and practicing freedom. If ethically liberalism aspired to something, it was to ensure that freedom in itself became an end in itself for people. The formula of this new understanding of freedom as “freedom for” can be considered the words of A. de Tocqueville: “He who seeks in freedom anything other than freedom itself is created for slavery”; 3) if freedom is recognized (both in the first and in its second sense), then the only way to arrange the state is the consent of its organizers and participants. The meaning and strategic goal of liberal politics is to achieve consensus as the only real foundation of the modern state. Movement in this direction - with all its failures, contradictions, the use of tools of manipulation and suppression, as well as with moments of historical creativity and the realization of new opportunities for the emancipation of people - this is the real history of liberalism, its only content-rich definition.

Lit .: Leonpyuwich VV The history of liberalism in Russia. 1762-1914. Moscow, 1995; DunnJ. Liberalism.-Idem., Western Political Theory in the Face f the Future. Cambr.. 1993; Galston W.A. Liberalism and Public Morality.- Liberals on Liberalism, ed. by A. Damico. Totowa (N.J.), 1986; Grey). liberalism. Milton Keynes, 1986; Hayek F.A. The Constitution and Liberty. L., 1990; Holmes S. The Permanent Structure of Antiliberal Thought.- Liberalism and the Moral Life, ed. by N. Rosenblum, Cambr. (Mass), 1991; Mills W. C. Liberal Values ​​in the Modem Vbrld.-Idem. Power, Politics and People, ed. by I. Horowitz. N.Y., 1963; RawlsJ. political liberalism. N. Y, 1993; Ruggiero G. de. The History of Liberalism. L., 1927; Wallerstein 1. After Liberalism. N. Y., 1995, pans 2, 3.

Great Definition

Incomplete definition ↓