Skip to main content

10 Liberal Texts

Iain Dale put down some thoughts on his blog as to what the 10 key texts of Conservatism were. I was interested to see that several Conservatives tried to claim Liberal thinkers, such as JS Mill, as Conservative.

My own choice for Liberalism would be (in no particular order):

JS Mill: On Liberty
FA Hayek: The Constitution of Liberty
Karl Popper: The Open Society and its Enemies
John Locke: Second Treatise on Civil Government
Voltaire: Essay on the Manner and Spirit of Nations and on the Principal Occurrences in History
Rousseau: The Social Contract
von Humboldt: On the limits of State Action
Isaiah Berlin: Two concepts of Liberty
James Madision/Alexander Hamilton: The Federalist Papers
David Hume: A Treatise on Human Nature

Probably various others such as Aristotle's Politics or Joseph Steiglitz' Globalisation and its Discontents, should be included- please leave your ideas...

Comments

I actually can't understand why so many liberals seem to think that Rousseau was a liberal. Indeed, Rousseau said in the footnotes of the Social Contract that "In Genoa, the word, libertas, can be read on the front of prisons and on the fetters of galley‐slaves. The application of this motto is fine and just."

Probably one reason why so many make the mistake to take Rousseau as liberal is because his book was called "the Social contract". However, it wasn't the first time that the idea of a social contract was introduced, and not all the social contract models are liberal. Rousseau's certainly wasn't, and he has inspired and appealed to later socialists, communists, anarchists, fascists, populists and the modern greens - almost everybody except the liberals.

The most important political thoughts of Voltaire were presented in his contribution to the Encyclopédie, but as there were other (also less liberal) contributors and the whole book isn't about political theory, I'd mention "A Treatise on Toleration" as a good example of his contribution to liberalism.

Though James Madison was clearly a liberal, his co-authors of the Federalist Papers, John Jay and Alexander Hamilton, are usually regarded as conservatives.

David Hume was a great philosopher, but don't you think that his contribution to the political philosophy was somewhat modest, and "A Treatise on Human Nature" was hardly about liberalism?

I think there are some essential texts you have missed (here in chronological order):

Adam Smith: An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
Immanuel Kant: On the common saying: this may be true in theory but it does not apply in practice (OR: Theory and Practice)
Frédéric Bastiat: The Law
Robert Nozick: Anarchy, State, and Utopia
RE Aritotle and Stiglitz:

Aristotle was rather conservative, supporting for instance slavery unlike some more radical but less known thinker of his time. But of course he was less socialist than Plato, which probably why many liberals would like to adopt him as a liberal. However, I recall that Popper mentioned some more liberal thinkers from the classical period in the Open Society and its Enemies.

As for Stiglitz, if you'll add him, you might want to mention also some books of Peter Thomas Bauer,Jagdish Bhagwati and Hernando de Soto.
Cicero said…
I must say I do have reservations about Rousseau, but I included him since teh main thrust of the Social Contract is what the state may not do, and this was one of my definitions of Liberal. As for David Hume, although I agree, he is more of a moral philosopher, one can see empiricism and utilitarianism as major features in his work. Smith and Kant I also concur are in the Liberal school, but in limiting my list to 10- and assuming that Smith is regarded with approval by most political schools (Marxists aside), but I will happily claim him as a Liberal. Bastiat was a forerunner of the Austrian school, but I did not consider him to be top 10. Nozick is usually considered "anarcho-capitalist" as much as Liberal, but in any event he lacks the Ciceronian moderation that I was also looking for in my classification.

Arguably including Aristotle is an anachronism, but I often find myself using Aristotilian definitions, and I wanted to use him as an intellectual contrast to Plato, whose influence can be seen in many anti-Liberal philosophers.

As for Bauer- certainly a friend of Hayek, but not, I submit as significant. I do approve of Jagdish Bhagwati- especially "In defence of globalization". Hernando de Soto is a more controversial figure who while he clearly has a liberal inspiration, I think is not of sufficient stature to be included.

Thanks for your thoughts
"Nozick is usually considered "anarcho-capitalist" as much as Liberal,...

That's a common mistake, made by people I suspect have not read his book Anarchy, State and Utopia, and are judging him by the name of the book. However, in the first part of his book, Anarchy, he starts, like John Locke, from a state of nature (anarchy) and tries to show how a state can rise from it without violating the rights of individuals. It is sometimes disputed whether he succeeded, but he can't by any means be described an "anarcho-capitalist".

In the second part of the book, State he tries to define the limits of the state, and ends in supporting a minimal state, or a night-watchman state, as it is also called. This makes him a minarchist, which is mutually exclusive with anarcho-capitalism.

In the third part, Utopia, he introduces his vision, a framework of utopia, where people within a minimal state could set up their own communities, where they could practise their own ideals, even socialism (of course as long as the membership of these communities would be voluntary).
Tristan said…
I'd say that to get a fuller picture the Anti-federalist papers should be read with the Federalist papers.

The other glaring omission would be Cato's Letters (Gordon & Trenchard) which deal with many areas of liberalism.

The Liberal Internation has an (incomplete) list of liberal thinkers on its website as well as those in the Hall of Freedom

Its a diverse group of people from Ayn Rand and Ludwig von Mises to L.T. Hobhouse, Eleanor Rosevelt and John Rawls.

Many of the writings of these people could probably be included on this list, even though many of them vehemently disagree with each other...
Anonymous said…
thank you nice sharing

cep program

Popular posts from this blog

Concert and Blues

Tallinn is full tonight... Big concerts on at the Song field The Weeknd and Bonnie Tyler (!). The place is buzzing and some sixty thousand concert goers have booked every bed for thirty miles around Tallinn. It should be a busy high summer, but it isn´t. Tourism is down sharply overall. Only 70 cruise ships calling this season, versus over 300 before Ukraine. Since no one goes to St Pete, demand has fallen, and of course people think that Estonia is not safe. We are tired. The economy is still under big pressure, and the fall of tourism is a significant part of that. The credit rating for Estonia has been downgraded as the government struggles with spending. The summer has been a little gloomy, and soon the long and slow autumn will drift into the dark of the year. Yesterday I met with more refugees: the usual horrible stories, the usual tears. I try to make myself immune, but I can´t. These people are wounded in spirit, carrying their grief in a terrible cradling. I try to project hop

Media misdirection

In the small print of the UK budget we find that the Chancellor of the Exchequer (the British Finance Minister) has allocated a further 15 billion Pounds to the funding for the UK track and trace system. This means that the cost of the UK´s track and trace system is now 37 billion Pounds.  That is approximately €43 billion or US$51 billion, which is to say that it is amount of money greater than the national GDP of over 110 countries, or if you prefer, it is roughly the same number as the combined GDP of the 34 smallest economies of the planet.  As at December 2020, 70% of the contracts for the track and trace system were awarded by the Conservative government without a competitive tender being made . The program is overseen by Dido Harding , who is not only a Conservative Life Peer, but the wife of a Conservative MP, John Penrose, and a contemporary of David Cameron and Boris Johnson at Oxford. Many of these untendered contracts have been given to companies that seem to have no notewo

Bournemouth absence

Although I had hoped to get down to the Liberal Democrat conference in Bournemouth this year, simple pressure of work has now made that impossible. I must admit to great disappointment. The last conference before the General Election was always likely to show a few fireworks, and indeed the conference has attracted more headlines than any other over the past three years. Some of these headlines show a significant change of course in terms of economic policy. Scepticism about the size of government expenditure has given way to concern and now it is clear that reducing government expenditure will need to be the most urgent priority of the next government. So far it has been the Liberal Democrats that have made the running, and although the Conservatives are now belatedly recognising that cuts will be required they continue to fail to provide even the slightest detail as to what they think should guide their decisions in this area. This political cowardice means that we are expected to ch