Portal:Liberalism

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Liberalism is a political and moral philosophy based on the rights of the individual, liberty, consent of the governed, political equality, right to private property and equality before the law. Liberals espouse various and often mutually warring views depending on their understanding of these principles but generally support private property, market economies, individual rights (including civil rights and human rights), liberal democracy, secularism, rule of law, economic and political freedom, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, and freedom of religion. Liberalism is frequently cited as the dominant ideology of modern history.

Liberalism became a distinct movement in the Age of Enlightenment, gaining popularity among Western philosophers and economists. Liberalism sought to replace the norms of hereditary privilege, state religion, absolute monarchy, the divine right of kings and traditional conservatism with representative democracy, rule of law, and equality under the law. Liberals also ended mercantilist policies, royal monopolies, and other trade barriers, instead promoting free trade and marketization. Philosopher John Locke is often credited with founding liberalism as a distinct tradition based on the social contract, arguing that each man has a natural right to life, liberty and property, and governments must not violate these rights. While the British liberal tradition has emphasized expanding democracy, French liberalism has emphasized rejecting authoritarianism and is linked to nation-building. (Full article...)

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Women's suffrage is the right of women to vote in elections. At the beginning of the 19th century, some people sought to change voting laws to allow women to vote. Liberal political parties would go on to grant women the right to vote, increasing the number of those parties' potential constituencies. National and international organizations formed to coordinate efforts towards women voting, especially the International Woman Suffrage Alliance (founded in 1904 in Berlin, Germany).

Several instances occurred in recent centuries where women were selectively given, then stripped of, the right to vote. In Sweden, conditional women's suffrage was in effect during the Age of Liberty (1718–1772), as well as in Revolutionary and early-independence New Jersey (1776–1807) in the US. (Full article...)

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Thomas Hill Green (7 April 1836 – 26 March 1882), known as T. H. Green, was an English philosopher, political radical and temperance reformer, and a member of the British idealism movement. Like all the British idealists, Green was influenced by the metaphysical historicism of G. W. F. Hegel. He was one of the thinkers behind the philosophy of social liberalism. (Full article...)

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John Locke John Stuart Mill John Dewey Norberto Bobbio John Rawls Isaiah Berlin David Lloyd George Jeremy Bentham

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Well, I would say that, as long-term institutions, I am totally against dictatorships. But a dictatorship may be a necessary system for a transitional period. At times it is necessary for a country to have, for a time, some form or other of dictatorial power. As you will understand, it is possible for a dictator to govern in a liberal way. And it is also possible for a democracy to govern with a total lack of liberalism. Personally I prefer a liberal dictator to democratic government lacking liberalism. My personal impression — and this is valid for South America - is that in Chile, for example, we will witness a transition from a dictatorial government to a liberal government. And during this transition it may be necessary to maintain certain dictatorial powers, not as something permanent, but as a temporary arrangement.

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— Friedrich von Hayek, El Mercurio (12 April 1981)

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General images

The following are images from various liberalism-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1John Maynard Keynes, one of the most influential economists of modern times and whose ideas, which are still widely felt, formalized modern liberal economic policy. (from Liberalism)
Image 2John Milton's Areopagitica (1644) argued for the importance of freedom of speech. (from Liberalism)
Image 3Noam Chomsky's 1999 book Profit Over People: Neoliberalism and Global Order is an open critique of neoliberalism and the American economic structure. (from Neoliberalism)
Image 4John Locke was the first to develop a liberal philosophy, including the right to private property and the consent of the governed. (from Liberalism)
Image 5Builders in West Berlin, 1952 (from Neoliberalism)
Image 6Franklin D. Roosevelt (from Liberalism)
Image 7Per capita income during the Great Depression (from Neoliberalism)
Image 8T. H. Green, an influential liberal philosopher who established in Prolegomena to Ethics (1884) the first major foundations for what later became known as positive liberty and in a few years, his ideas became the official policy of the Liberal Party in Britain, precipitating the rise of social liberalism and the modern welfare state (from Liberalism)
Image 9The European Union–Mercosur free trade agreement, which would form one of the world's largest free trade areas, has been denounced by environmental activists and indigenous rights campaigners. (from Neoliberalism)
Image 10Sismondi, who wrote the first critique of the free market from a liberal perspective in 1819 (from Liberalism)
Image 11Monument to the liberals of the 19th century in Agra del Orzán neighborhood, La Coruña, Galicia, (Spain) (from Liberalism)
Image 12The 2017–2018 Russian protests were organized by Russia's liberal opposition. (from Liberalism)
Image 13Raif Badawi, a Saudi Arabian writer and the creator of the website Free Saudi Liberals, who was sentenced to ten years in prison and 1,000 lashes for "insulting Islam" in 2014 (from Liberalism)
Image 14Julius Faucher (from Liberalism)
Image 15Pamphlet calling for a protest of economic policy in 1983 following the economic crisis (from Neoliberalism)
Image 16United States incarceration rate per 100,000 population, 1925–2014 (from Neoliberalism)
Image 17As a liberal nationalist, K. J. Ståhlberg (1865–1952), the President of Finland, anchored the state in liberal democracy, guarded the fragile germ of the rule of law, and embarked on internal reforms. (from Liberalism)
Image 18Member nations of the International Monetary Fund (from Neoliberalism)
Image 19Mary Wollstonecraft, widely regarded as the pioneer of liberal feminism (from Liberalism)
Image 20John Stuart Mill, whose On Liberty greatly influenced 19th-century liberalism (from Liberalism)
Image 21Benjamin Constant, a Franco-Swiss political activist and theorist (from Liberalism)
Image 22The Great Depression, with its periods of worldwide economic hardship, formed the backdrop against which the Keynesian Revolution took place (the image is Dorothea Lange's Migrant Mother depiction of destitute pea-pickers in California, taken in March 1936). (from Liberalism)
Image 23Execution of José María de Torrijos y Uriarte and his men in 1831 as Spanish King Ferdinand VII took repressive measures against the liberal forces in his country (from Liberalism)
Image 24Montesquieu, who argued for the separation of the powers of government (from Liberalism)
Image 25Unemployment in Chile and South America (1980–1990) (from Neoliberalism)
Image 26U.S. President Bush, Canadian PM Mulroney, and Mexican President Salinas participate in the ceremonies to sign the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). (from Neoliberalism)
Image 27Madame de Staël (from Liberalism)
Image 28Ludwig Erhard (from Neoliberalism)
Image 29The iconic painting Liberty Leading the People by Eugène Delacroix, a tableau of the July Revolution in 1830 (from Liberalism)
Image 30GDP per capita in Chile and Latin America 1950–2010 (time under Pinochet highlighted) (from Neoliberalism)
Image 31Friedrich Hayek (from Neoliberalism)
Image 32Wealth inequality in the United States increased from 1989 to 2013. (from Neoliberalism)
Image 33Gustave de Molinari (from Liberalism)
Image 34Chilean (orange) and average Latin American (blue) rates of growth of GDP (1971–2007) (from Neoliberalism)