17 Facts About Liberalism

Liberalism is a political and moral philosophy based on the rights of the individual, liberty, consent of the governed and equality before the law.

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 and the rule of law.

Liberalism concluded that the people have a right to overthrow a tyrant.

Liberalism distinguished between the "Liberty of the Ancients" and the "Liberty of the Moderns".

Related searches

Liberalism's ideas spread rapidly and were developed by other thinkers such as Leonard Trelawny Hobhouse and John A Hobson.

Liberalism opposed restrictive trade preferences, state grants of monopolies and employers' organisations and trade unions.

Liberalism sees entrepreneurs as intermediaries in the production process who combine productive factors such as land, capital and labour to meet the consumers' demands.

Liberalism's philosophy proved highly influential on government policy and led to increased Benthamite attempts at government social control, including Robert Peel's Metropolitan Police, prison reforms, the workhouses and asylums for the mentally ill.

Liberalism believed budget deficits were a good thing, a product of recessions.

Liberalism wrote: "For Government borrowing of one kind or another is nature's remedy, so to speak, for preventing business losses from being, in so severe a slump as the present one, so great as to bring production altogether to a standstill".

Liberalism reasoned that if they were confined to the same cages that trap women, men would develop the same flawed characters.

Liberalism gave an impassioned defence of free speech, arguing that free discourse is a necessary condition for intellectual and social progress.

Liberalism introduced many different concepts of the form tyranny can take, referred to as social tyranny and tyranny of the majority.

Liberalism's most lasting achievement, the Civil Code, served as "an object of emulation all over the globe" but perpetuated further discrimination against women under the banner of the "natural order".

Liberalism gained momentum at the beginning of the 20th century.

Liberalism has drawn criticism and support from various ideological groups in its history.