Posted on 08/18/2002 11:38:58 AM PDT by Pyro7480
I also mean classical liberalism as it existed 100 years ago, and yes it is utopian. It upholds liberty as the supreme ideal and seeks to establish a society based exclusively upon it. Modern liberalism is the inevitable practical result from attempting to implement classical liberalism.
He won't change one iota of doctrine or dogma in an ex cathedra manner, but I'd be willing to wager quite a bit that he will write all kinds of non-infallible encyclicals and documents that at the very least imply heresy.
Hi traditionalist. I usually mean by "utopia" a society that was organized from the top down, with rules or laws regulating most aspects and details of life, in order to insure justice and fairness, much as modern liberalism would have it.
"Modern liberalism is the inevitable practical result from attempting to implement classical liberalism. "
Perhaps you mean by this that people will not use their liberty wisely, and numerous laws and rules will be required to maintain order?
It is not yet clear to me where your positions lie, although I suddenly suspect that they are very far from my own. Perhaps you could elaborate a little.
...someone will say, "You have faith; I have deeds."
Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.
Your usage of "utopian" is nonstandard. Typically, a philosophy is utopian if it seeks to attain a society based on an ideal. Marxism's ideal is social equality. Classical Liberalism's is liberty, defined in the strict negative sense.
Perhaps you mean by this that people will not use their liberty wisely, and numerous laws and rules will be required to maintain order?
Close. Because of man's fallen state, he will seek all the benefits of liberty without the costs. For example, he will want the freedom to risk his savings on some hairbrained scheme, but will want the government to bail him out if he loses. He will want to live a life of sexual debauchery, but will not be willing to bear the consequences of unwanted children, disease, and the like. He will want to fry his brain with drugs, but want the state to take care of him once he ceases to be a productive member of soceity. Since people will want all of these things, and since they elect the government, the result is inevitably a hedonistic society with a giant welfare state.
That is why liberty cannot be the ideal upon which to run a society. A soceity cannot be based on any single ideal. Rather, a good society is a virtuous one. The job of the government is to put in place policies that foster virtue, recognizing that no soceity can be perfectly virtuous and that at times it is necessary for the common good to tolerate vice. Policy becomes a matter of pragmatism, rather than ideology.
"Classical Liberalism's is liberty, defined in the strict negative sense."
Agreed (on this thumbnail defintiton of classical liberty), especially because of your use of the phrase "strict negative sense."
"Since people will want all of these things, and since they elect the government, the result is inevitably a hedonistic society with a giant welfare state.
Here I agree also. I believe a constitution, a legal code and a "virtuous people" (as you mention) are needed to prevent this. If one accepts that the United States is an example of an attempt to found a society based on the ideal of "liberty," its current condition does seem to lend support to your argument (that a classical liberal society becomes a "modern" liberal society). I hope the future will prove you wrong, and it very well may, but time will tell.
"Policy becomes a matter of pragmatism, rather than ideology. "
I disagree here, since I consider classical liberalism, because of its negative philosophy, to be almost the absence of an ideology. I also believe that such a system can be very much more pragmatic than one directed by government policy. Though events may prove me to be hopelessly romantic.
I'll check on my use of the word "utopia."
Prayers for Poland are indeed needed.
Will probably be more conservative that Pope John Paul II. That just seems to be how it works.
On the religioun forum people were speculating that the next Pope would come from a staunch Catholic third-world country. I think they mentioned South America or Africa.
Unforuntately, consitutions and legal codes can be altered, either by ammendment or creative interpretation, as has happened here. Also, people are not naturally virtuous. Virtue must be fostered and at times coerced by such institutions as the Church, family, and the state. These three instututions must work together, and any attempt to separate one from the other will prove disasterous.
If one accepts that the United States is an example of an attempt to found a society based on the ideal of "liberty," its current condition does seem to lend support to your argument (that a classical liberal society becomes a "modern" liberal society).
While the founding Fathers paid lip-service to liberty, I do not believe they intended to found our society based on it. They believed government should foster and at times coerce virtue, but at the state and local level, rather than the federal level. Some of the very same poeple who participated in writing our Constitution also sponsored state laws that prohibited things like prostitution, sodomy, blashphemy, work on Sundays, sedition, and the like. Some states even had established Churches until the mid 1800's. Remember, that originally, the Bill of Rights did not apply to the states.
We began our descent into hedonistic welfare-statism around the same time that the courts began striking down state laws like the ones I mentioned above.
And you are wrong that classical liberalism is "the absence of ideology." It is the ideology that casts liberty as the supreme good.
I agree here.
OK, I've researched a little the word "utopia" and though your definition is the original, I find that it has a 150 year old tradition of being used to refer to leftist type "planned" societies, so my usage of it that way is definitely not "non standard".
OTOH, I find that your criticism of my definition of "liberalism" (as being the absence of ideology) has merit, as "liberalism" is definitely based on ideas. Though, since classical liberalism would tolerate individuals espousing any ideology (not just an official one), I continue to like my visualization of it as being the absence of ideology, especially within the context of negative liberty, though, strictly speaking, this may not be correct on my part.
Though we share some common ground, on the fundamental issues, we are so far apart I'm not sure whether to discuss them or not at the present, esp. as I'll be traveling the next few days.
Anyhow, I have enjoyed conversing.
Sam
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