From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Recent deletion

The following quote, which has been in the lead for years, was recently removed from the lead by GuardianH:

"Ideologically, all US parties are liberal and always have been. Essentially they espouse classical liberalism, that is a form of democratised Whig constitutionalism plus the free market. The point of difference comes with the influence of social liberalism and the proper role of government." -- Ian Adams. In Adams' view American liberals favor a free market.

I restored the deleted quote. GuardianH deleted it again, maintaining that "Ian Adams is an academic at Durham who has not held a substantial influence over liberal scholarship (far from it); his opinion should be noted in the body, rather than placed prominently in the lede."

Without the Ian Adams quote, the impression a reader gets by reading the lead is guided by this sentence: "Since the 1930s, the term liberalism is usually used without a qualifier in the United States to refer to social liberalism, a variety of liberalism that endorses a regulated market economy and the expansion of civil and political rights, with the common good considered as compatible with or superior to the freedom of the individual." But the reference for this sentence is a book that is not about US liberalism at all, but is De Ruggiero's 1959 book "The History of European Liberalism".

So, GuardianH wants to remove the claim by an academic that American Liberalism favors a free market, and keep a quote based on Europen Liberalism that claims American Liberalism favors a regulated market.

Rather than start an edit war, I would like to see other people weigh in on the question of whether American liberalism is essentially, in favor of a free market or essentially opposed to a free market.

Of course, there is no such thing as a "free market", unless by "free market" you mean a market dominated entirely by the rich. But it is reasonable to ask which side is basically in favor of freedom. Rick Norwood ( talk) 16:58, 19 May 2023 (UTC) reply

The nub of the problem here is that "liberalism" means one thing to Europeans (i.e. Classical liberalism) and another thing to Americans (probably Social liberalism with elements of Economic liberalism comes closest to describing it). Saying "Ideologically, all US parties are liberal..." is confusing to the reader because they will approach such a statement with a different predetermined view of what liberalism is, so that even the corrective that follows the statement will not really be adequate. (An American reader, for instance, will almost certainly balk at parties which are considered to be conservative in the US being described as "liberal".) Adams' view is essentially correct, but they are probably not the best source to base the statement on - there are certainly many other more prominent political scientists who can be quoted to make the same point, which, if it's written up better, would explain the situation to the reader of whatever viewpoint. Beyond My Ken ( talk) 18:34, 19 May 2023 (UTC) reply
This seems like something that should be restored but perhaps with more context. Springee ( talk) 20:24, 19 May 2023 (UTC) reply
Adams eminence as a liberal theorist is irrelevant. Reliable tertiary sources are not typically written by Nobel laureates.
Adams quote is helpful because it helps us, especially Americans, understand the topic. It is the ideology that has dominated both parties from their establishment. The fact that Americans ahistorically adopted the terms liberal and conservative in the mid 20th century to describe competing versions of liberalism should then be explained.
It's probably better to use sources that cover liberalism as a topic, rather than narrowly focus on U.S. politics, because liberal ideology in the U.S. does not exist in isolation.
It's overly simplistic to say that in the U.S. liberalism means the left of the U.S. spectrum, which incidentally contains ideologies outside the liberal tradition, such as democratic socialism. Social scientists such as Louis Hartz for example wrote about the "Liberal tradition in America," by which he meant the dominant ideology. Both definitions are used in academic writing and which is meant is determined by context.
There is no question that despite differences among themselves, Americans have always shared certain beliefs as described in the Federalist Papers, the Declaration of Independence, the 1789 constitution and the Bill of Rights. And these beliefs are expressions of liberal, rather than Tory, socialist or fascist ideology. TFD ( talk) 23:49, 19 May 2023 (UTC) reply
Until rather recently, I would have agreed with your statement "American have always shared...", but in the past decade or so we've seen the rise of a movement which does not share those beliefs. People such as that have always been around, but only on the fringes. Now, unfortunately, they dominate one of the primary political parties. Some of them give lip service to those ideals, but, in fact, their actions hew much closer to fascist ideals than to those of what has been, historically, the American mainstream. I don't say this with any pleasure, I'd much rather it be the case that all Americans believed fervently in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, etc., but differed -- even vigorously -- about ways and means and policies, but that's simply not the case at this moment. Beyond My Ken ( talk) 23:57, 19 May 2023 (UTC) reply
Even if that is true, the fact remains that the political debate uses liberal principles as agreed truths. Both sides seem forced to defend their policies on liberal grounds. That's in contrast to say Russia in the early 20th century when tsarists did not have to explain how their policies promoted equality while the Bolsheviks did not have to explain how their's supported property rights.
One constant in the debate has been to portray the other side as outside the liberal tradition while claiming it for themselves. Hence Republicans accuse Democrats of being socialists. But you don't see conservatives in France accuse their main opponents, the Socialist Party, of being socialists in the hope that would discredit them as being outside the French political spectrum. TFD ( talk) 00:20, 20 May 2023 (UTC) reply
No, I'm sorry, you are not totally correct here. Saying -- as our former President did -- that the Constitution should be suspended is not adhering to liberal principles. Mind you, if you had made that statement 10 or 15 years ago, I would be in full agreement. I'm sorry (very sorry) that it's not possible to agree now, given the circumstances. Yes, lip service is given to "freedom" while passing law after law that restrict personal liberties, but it's their actions which speak loudest, not their lying tongues. We have, I'm afraid, passed through the very long era where the entire American mainstream is dedicated to liberal principles. I very much hope that we'll be able to get back to it, but the signs are not all that great. Beyond My Ken ( talk) 01:34, 20 May 2023 (UTC) reply
But I do agree that historically, until very recently, all but the fringes of American politics, "liberals" and "conservatives" alike, were liberal in terms of classical liberalism. Beyond My Ken ( talk) 01:40, 20 May 2023 (UTC) reply
You can add that. But I think that it doesn't affect the wording under discussion. TFD ( talk) 14:36, 20 May 2023 (UTC) reply
So far, it seems the quote should be restored, perhaps with a short, referenced sentence that politicians have often failed to live up to the ideals they espouse. A good reference for that sentence would be Zinn's "A People's History of the United States". In any case, since my restoration was deleted, I would prefer someone else did the next attempt. Rick Norwood ( talk) 10:21, 20 May 2023 (UTC) reply
I've waited a day, to see if there were going to be any strong objections to restoring the long-standing quote. There haven't been, so I am going to put it back. Rick Norwood ( talk) 12:22, 21 May 2023 (UTC) reply

Capital punishment

After reading that under social liberalism, "the common good [is] considered as compatible with or superior to the freedom of the individual", I found myself wondering why capital punishment, which is justified by considering the common good superior to the freedom of the individual being thus punished, is conservative rather than liberal. Some goal or value is missing from the delineation, because none of the ones given would lead one to oppose rather than support capital punishment. Philgoetz ( talk) 02:50, 5 July 2023 (UTC) reply

Capital punishment is punishment. There is no evidence that it prevents crime. Capital punishment is favored by those who want to hurt people they consider bad. Rick Norwood ( talk) 09:49, 5 July 2023 (UTC) reply
"There is no evidence that it prevents crime." As far as I know, it never did. As with any other laws with the explicit intention to intimidate. There are several centuries of data about its ineffectiveness. Dimadick ( talk) 10:16, 5 July 2023 (UTC) reply

History: Rousseau versus American liberalism

There's something fundamentally wrong here: The article strives to discriminate American liberalism from European liberalism, but attributes belief in "the common good" to American liberalism. "The common good" however, comes from Rousseau, made the difference between the American and French Revolutions, and has always been diagnostic of European thought. The liberalism in America, by the time of the Revolution, was based on a different conception of "the common good" than European liberalism. American liberals have until quite recently believed that, at the policy level, there is no such thing as a "common good". They believed that even good people have conflicting interests, and the purpose of government is to referee the development of a compromise between competing interests. So by identifying the "common good" with American liberalism, this article in effect says that American liberalism has been supplanted by European liberalism. Philgoetz ( talk) 03:08, 5 July 2023 (UTC) reply

There are a number of strange statements above, particularly the idea that "American liberals have until quite recently believed that, at the policy level, there is no such thing as a "common good"." Jefferson changed Locke's "property" to "the pursuit of happiness", certainly happiness is a common good. The preamble to the constitution gives one reason for government to "promote the general welfare", certainly a common good. The big difference between European use of the word liberalism and the American use has to do with economic freedom in the European usage with some limitations on the concentration and power of wealth in the American usage. Rick Norwood ( talk) 09:55, 5 July 2023 (UTC) reply
Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Talk:Liberalism_in_the_United_States&oldid=1212783546"