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We Should Be Liberals (at least)

Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Geneva, NY, passavant{at}hws.edu

This paper addresses what it means to "critique" liberalism today. Liberalism has been subjected to critique from the left, and has endured such concerted attacks from the right, that virtually no national politician in the United States calls him or herself a "liberal." This commentary, using John Locke's as an exemplar of liberalism, discusses a tradition of critiques of liberalism that use the resources within liberalism to deepen liberalism's democratic potential. I argue that liberalism, thus understood, enables us to address the most pressing forms of economic and political tyranny in the United States today. Some contend that our future politics should aspire to something more than liberalism. In the meantime, though, let us not be anything less than liberals.

Key Words: liberalism • Locke • tyranny • revolution

Law, Culture and the Humanities, Vol. 5, No. 2, 173-193 (2009)
DOI: 10.1177/1743872109102487


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