Why Liberalism Failed (Politics and Culture)

This book takes a while to get your head totally around it. But the dominating message is “Liberalism failed, Liberalism failed because of Liberalism, and Liberalism cannot fix itself.”In the United States today, we use the word “Liberal” to mean the Progressive Liberals. But this is not what Professor Deneen means: Liberalism includes both the “Conservatives” and “Liberals!” Both Conservatives and Progressives are the opposite sides of the coin called Liberalism. To understand this, we need a definition of what Liberalism is in Deneen’s usage.Deneen’s definition is, “Liberalism … is understood to be the greatest possible freedom from external constraints, including customary norms. The only limitation on Liberty, in this view, should be duly enacted laws consistent with maintaining order of otherwise unfettered individuals. Liberalism thus disassembles a world of customs and replaces it with promulgated laws.” (italics in the original) From the Preface to the Paperback Edition. Whereas the Conservatives insist on the liberty to free the individual man through opportunity to access free markets globally, the Progressives insist liberty to free the individual man through economic and social equality.The three major ideologies of the world are Communism, Fascism, and Liberalism. Francis Fukuyama in the 1989 essay, “The End Of the World,” used Hegel’s definition of the end of the world where all ideologies would finally be resolved into the only and correct one. He declared the End of World when Liberalism successfully stood alone in the world after the flaws were exposed of both Communism and Fascism lead to the destruction of states based on those ideologies. Much of this book is a refutation of Fukuyama's premise. I think a reader would have difficulty understanding what Deneen is arguing against without having read Fukuyama.The founders of the United States built a republic based on a philosophy of Classical Liberalism. Today, a solid majority of Americans believe that the United States has and is moving in the wrong direction. Nearly every premise of Classical Liberalism has been destroyed through the construction of the government of the United States as it exists today. There is almost no aspect of human life for an American that isn’t somehow impacted by the US government, and most Americans feel that they are powerless to change the situation. Liberalism promised the limitation of government and the liberation of the individual from arbitrary political control. Liberalism has produced just the opposite of what Liberalism initially promised. This is part of the evidence of why Professor Deneen claims Liberalism failed.According to Deneen, Liberalism ultimately fails because it has a false concept of human nature which results in the state growing through its agencies removed from the electorate, the regulations enforce the removal of some constraint on freedom (in itself an oxymoron,) and the laws imposed to create human equality. In politics, government, economics, education, and technology, Liberalism is bankrupting freedom. Liberalism gives the citizens of the United States politicians that have no power other than figureheads of the nation, a massive government structure, an economic system borrowing on the future with debts to be paid by our grandchildren left with a supposed plan, “they will figure it out,” an educational system that rejects the history of the world including the United States while providing a “servile” education to placate the needs of the economic and technologic systems and rejecting the study of its own culture, and a technology system that uses massive amounts of resources, unbounded by the loss of morals and virtues of the US citizen while trying to fill the unsatisfiable appetites for more by the peoples. (“WOW: A long sentence for me but well documented in Deneen’s analysis.) A conclusion is drawn by Deneen and I agree with it: Liberalism is unsustainable!Deneen then builds his argument supporting these conclusions by examining what the various political philosophers had observed and proposed. Then, he comparing the outcomes of the growth of the state, the construction of the free market, the destruction of the culture of the United States, the effects of technology and the loss of freedoms as a result of technology, the destruction of an educational system that allowed critical thinking and introspection of Liberalism while fostering a false sense of value to STEM education, the building of an elite aristocracy cutoff from the electorate, and the loss of freedom for the citizenship. So where does this all lead? What comes after Liberalism? The scions of the slaves produced under Liberalism will produce populist movements and revolution. There may be hope for a new ideology that is better, but it is more likely that this will lead to authoritarianism: It has in the past: one only needs to look the probability of where past revolution produced. To avoid these grim outcomes, Deneen suggests that we need to engage in the negotiation between the Utopia and the realistic as was initiated by Plato. We need to acknowledge what Liberalism achieved and have the desire to eschew a return to a “preliberal age.” We can not go back. We must outgrow the “age of ideologies” and foster a culture of household economics and polis life where the focus is on events near and local to us rather than far away and conducted by the massive, impersonal government(s) which are now the outcomes of Liberalism. And finally, there might emerge a better theory of politics.Professor Patrick J. Deneen is the David A. Potenziani Memorial College Chair of Constitutional Studies at the University of Notre Dame. This book is erudite and is well referenced. It is based on the studies of various pollical philosophers including Plato, Aristotle, Niccolo Machiavelli, Thomas Hobbes, Francis Bacon, John Locke, John Stuart Mill, Immanuel Kant, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, Alexis de Tocqueville, Edwin Burke, Georg Hegel, Karl Marx, John Dewey, Friedrich Hayek and many, many, more. In part, this is what makes this book, while readable, difficult to fully understand. While almost all readers will come away from this book with an appreciation for the argument Deneen is making, I doubt anyone unfamiliar with the major arguments of these philosophers will understand Deneen’s logic. While I consider myself well read in Philosophy, I found myself referring back to original sources to comprehend Deneen’s arguments. Of most importance, in my opinion, was the concept of “freedom” from Hegel’s “Philosophy of History.”All in all: this book which probably began as a series of essays when taken together, creates a book worth thinking about.

This is an important book, but it is a book on political theory/history with the emphasis on the theory. Political theory or political philosophy has a tendency to become too abstract. This is compounded by the fact that its key terms are endlessly debated (just like the key terms of other branches of philosophy). Hence, we need lots of concrete examples to keep us on the straight and narrow and to keep the argument clean and clear. Here there are a number of examples but never enough for me. I had to focus very carefully on individual sentences and paragraphs to insure that I knew what, precisely, he was saying. Even then there were points at which the reasoning became hazy.The overall argument is straightforward. Both modern and classical liberalism are about liberty but they are about radically different ideas of liberty. In antiquity (and for much of western thought) liberty turns on virtue. To be free and to enjoy liberty is to have control of one's appetites. Otherwise, you are enslaved by those appetites, desires and drives. That means constraining yourself and disciplining yourself. We receive help in this process from institutional structures and cultural traditions. 'Mores' and customs—so important, e.g., for Tocqueville play an important role here. Modern (i.e. post 17th-c) liberalism is just the opposite. It entails the ability to pursue all of one's desires and it is, basically, license. This is the liberalism that has failed us and the unchained sexuality which it promotes has taken us to Sodom and Gomorrah, not to utopia and certainly not the city of God. In combination with the satisfaction of other material desires (basically, consumerism) we have found ourselves within a soulless society where individuals are lonely and wracked by anomie and alienation. So long as we pursue this course we will become increasingly frustrated, lonely and lost. Since the human imagination (as Samuel Johnson pointed out) can always conceive of more and more things to be desired we can never really be satiated. For Johnson we must find our stability in the truth and in faith, recalling Augustine's famous comment that our hearts are restless until they rest in God.The most active area for modern liberalism has been the area of sexuality (always the first chain to be cast off, as Blake notes) and it has left us with a world of pornography, delayed or disregarded family formation, out-of-wedlock births, and so on. The world of the hookup is a lonely one.Related to the 'liberation' with regard to sexuality is the desire to control nature. Men who feel as if they are women can actually attempt to become women. The author locates the beginning of this process with Bacon (very important for the progressive liberal, Dewey) who advocates the control and exploitation of nature. This is ultimately in conflict with human nature, the author argues, and he looks instead to a writer like Wendell Berry who traces many of our social ills to our detachment from nature. This control of nature/modern liberalism connection is probably the least developed section of the book, though many points are made. The author is very concerned, e.g., about global warming and the despoiliation of nature and sees it in parallel with the endless indebtedness incurred by the government to satisfy our desires for instant gratification and to keep any thoughts of sacrifice or personal discomfort at a distance.He sees Mill as another principal culprit in the development of modern liberalism and argues that the founding fathers were themselves complicit in ultimately arguing for a strong central government which would be distant from the people and undercut the kinds of local associations that were so important to Tocqueville and his understanding of the essential American character. Many would dispute this particular argument (re: the founders and the Federalist papers), but he develops it in some detail.Bottom line: a thoughtful book, largely but not exclusively conservative in its thrusts, arguing for a new localism, a new agrarianism and perhaps even for a new Benedictine model (via Rod Dreher). It is always provocative and it would make a great 'common read' for newly-matriculated college students (though its very title would doubtless disqualify it, despite the nuanced nature of the argument).Highly recommended.

Deneen's book was a good read. While I did not agree with everything he argued, he made many good points that show his basic thesis to be sound.The basic idea: liberalism (as a system, not the left) is built on implicit contradictions, which necessarily lead it towards polarization and failure in practice. Why? Because contradictions are false, and denying reality never leads anywhere good.The focus of the book seems to be on ways in which human nature is viewed, so as to either increase or restrict liberty. Can you escape the restrictions of reality on human nature? Liberalism would say yes, if you deny that there is a human nature. However, this goes against reality and causes issues in practice.I think the book would have profited more from vectoring in more on that focus, instead of touching other topics lightly and inadequately. But overall it was very good.The interested reader may also consider reading and comparing Deneen's argumentation (in 2019) with that of Van Prinsterer (in 1847) in his work "Unbelief and Revolution" where he analyzes the French Revolution's philosophy and practice. I was surprised to see so much overlap between them. Van Prinsterer argues from an explicitly reformed Christian perspective, while Deneen appears to try and make a very similar argument from a pragmatic secular perspective.

This book brings together a large number of issues related to the dynamics of modernization. In the customarily crass sociological terms modernization is little more than the increased use of non-animate sources of power. This book delves much more deeply than the usually shallow sociological tautologies and ventures into the underlying cultural dangers of the modernization trend with which the "modern" world is so heavily infected. At its root it is a liberalism that is not only self-defeating but that threatens to suffocate whatever freedoms we may still enjoy into eternal oblivion. Read it and gain new insights!

Välskriven, vältänkt

This is a very well reasoned critique of the foundations of modernity and a thoughtful explanation on why the society is currently dismantling itself in its unbridled individualism. A necessary read for everyone of whichever political orientation.

Excelente

Whether you agree with the book's recommendations or not, it's clear to see how liberalism (as in, the favouring of the individual over the community) has led to the precarious state we find ourselves in now. This is an interesting book that lays out how both sides of our current political debate are proponents of liberalism, and engaging with either will only serve to entrench our current economic inequality. This is a book I would recommend for anyone, of any political persuasion, to read to get a striking diagnosis of where things went wrong.