The Challenge of Liberty: Classical Liberalism Today - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1598130021 ISBN 13: 9781598130027

Publisher: Independent Institute,U.S., 2006

Synopsis

Restoring the ideas and ideals of classical liberalism, this collection shows how its contemporary exponents defend such pillars of free societies as individual rights, human dignity, market processes, and the rule of law. The quest for freedom has always been as much a battle of ideas as it is a popular struggle. Classical liberal pioneers such as John Locke and Adam Smith stressed the inherent worth of the individual, inalienable rights, and the benevolent consequences of the cooperative, peaceful pursuit of one’s own happiness. These ideas became the intellectual scaffolding for much of the West’s most fundamental institutions and achievements. Yet after its 19th-century high-water mark, classical liberalism lost much of its passion, focus, and popular support. Intellectual trends increasingly began to support coercive egalitarianism, empire, and central planning at the expense of individual liberty, personal responsibility, private property, natural law, and free institutions. Yet this book indicates that the eclipse of classical liberalism by contemporary liberalism and conservatism is passing.

About this title

Product Description:

Unusual book

Synopsis:

Great political and philosophical debates regarding the problematic results of central planning in the 20th century are presented in this collection of essays from classical liberal thinkers such as Adam Smith, John Locke, and modern liberals of various persuasions. After discussing such issues as constitutionalism and security, freedom and the moral society, and cognitive individualism, modern upholders of classical liberalism are allowed to respond to their critics, making this contemporary articulation of the tenets of classical liberalism of interest to politicians, scientists, philosophers, and historians.

About this edition

• Publisher: Independent Institute,U.S.
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 1598130021
• ISBN 13: 9781598130027
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 422
• Editor: Higgs Robert