Classical Liberalism Flashcards
What are the 5 key things that classical liberalism is influenced by?
Natural Rights Utilitarianism Economic Liberalism Social Darwinism Neo-Liberalism
What is a right?
A right, most simply, is an entitlement to be treated in a particular way. Such entitlements may be moral or legal in character.
For Locke and Jefferson, how are rights ‘natural’?
They are invested in human beings by god
What are natural rights now commonly called?
Human rights
According to Jefferson, why are rights ‘inalienable’?
Because human beings are entitled to them by the virtue of being humans.
What are the three natural rights according to Locke?
“Life , liberty and property”
How did Jefferson disagree with Locke regarding the three natural rights?
Jefferson did not accept that property was a natural or god-given right, but rather one that had been developed for human convenience.
What are the three natural rights according to Jefferson?
“Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”
What did Hobbes argue that would be able to establish order and security in society?
A strong government, preferably a monarchy.
Why did Hobbes argue that citizens should accept ANY form of government?
Because even repressive government is better than no government at all.
Why did Locke approve of the English Revolution of the seventeenth century and applauded the establishment of a constitutional monarchy in 1688?
He believes that if government violates the rights of its citizens, they in turn have the right of rebellion.
According to Locke, why is government established?
To protect natural rights.
According to Locke, the realm of government should not extend beyond what three ‘minimal’ functions?
Maintaining public order and protecting property.
Providing defence against external attack.
Ensuring that contract are enforced.
What is Jefferson’s quote about the best government/
“That government is best which governs least”
Who are the most notable utilitarians?
Jeremy Bentham and James Mill
How did Bentham describe natural rights?
‘nonsense on stilts’
What is utility?
Use-value; in economics, utility describes the satisfaction that is gained from the consumption of material goods and services.
How is the principle of utility a moral principle?
It suggests that the ‘rightness’ of an action, policy or institution can be established by its tendency to promote happiness.
Why might utilitarian ideas have illiberal implications?
Bentham held that the principle of utility could be applied to society at large and not merely to individual human behavior.
Institutions and legislation can be judged by the yardstick of ‘the greatest happiness’. However, this formula has majoritarian implications because it uses the happiness of ‘the greatest number’ as a standard of what is morally correct, and therefore allows that the interests of the majority outweigh those of the minority or the rights of the individual.
The late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries witnessed the development of classical economic theory in the work of which political economists?
Adam Smith and David Ricardo
In many respects, what was the first economics textbook?
Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations
What did Smith’s ideas draw heavily on?
Liberal and rationalist assumptions about human nature and made a role of government within civil society.
In relation to government control, at what time was Adam Smith writing?
Time of wide-ranging government restrictions upon economic activity.
What is mercantilism?
A school of economic though that emphasizes the state’s role in managing international trade and delivering prosperity.
Smith’s economic writings were designed to attack what?
Mercantilism
What is a market?
A system of commercial exchange between buyers and sellers, controlled by impersonal economic forces : ‘market forces’.
What is the freedom of choice within the market?
The ability of the businesses to choose an employer, and the ability of workers to choose an employer, and the ability of consumers to choose what goods or services to buy.
Who said “It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest”
Adam Smith
What do market forces naturally do?
Naturally promote economic prosperity and well-being.
In the market, who are the prices set by?
the market
How does a market regulate itself?
Through the forces of supply and demand
Who said that the market is regulated by an ‘invisible hand’?
Adam Smith
What is a free market?
The principle or policy of unfettered market competition, free from government interference.
What is laissez-faire?
Literally, ‘leave to do’; the doctrine that economic activity should be entirely free from government interference.
In which countries did free market ideas in the nineteenth century become economic orthodoxy?
UK and USA
What legislation did laissez-faire ideas oppose?
Opposed all forms of factory legislation, including restrictions on the employment of children, limits to the number of hours worked and any regulation of working conditions.
Since the nineteenth century, faith in the free market has been revived through what?
The rise of neoliberalism and the assault on the ‘dead hand’ of government.
What is Samuel Smile’s quote in relation to social Darwinism and what does it suggest?
‘Heaven helps those who help themselves’
Suggesting that those with the ability and a willingness to work will prosper, while the incompetent or the lazy will not.
According to Cobden, how should the improvement of the conditions of the working classes be achieved?
‘Their own efforts and self-reliance’. He advised them to ‘look not to parliament, look only to yourselves’.
Who developed a vigorous defence of the doctrine of laissez-faire, drawing on the ideas that the UK scientist Charles Darwin?
Herbert Spencer
How did Spencer use the theory of natural selection to develop the social principle of ‘the survival of the fittest’?
People who are best suited by nature to survive, rise to the top, while the less fit fall to the bottom. Inequalities of wealth, social position and political power are therefore natural and inevitable, and no attempt should be made by government to interfere with them.
Who said ‘the drunkard in the gutter is just where he ought to be’?
William Sumner
What does neoliberalism specifically refer to?
The revival of economic liberalism that has taken place since the 1970s
How was neoliberalism counter-revolutionary?
Its aim was to halt, and if possible reverse, the trend towards ‘big’ government and state intervention.
Where did neoliberalism have the biggest impact?
UK (Thatcherism) and USA (Reaganism)
What did the new right ideological project fuse?
laissez-faire economics with an essentially conservative social philosophy.
What is market fundamentalism?
An absolute faith in the market, reflecting the belief that the market mechanism offers solutions to all economic and social problems.
Who are the two prominent free-market economists?
Friedrich von Hayek and Milton Friedman.
Why did Hayek argue that state planning in any form is bound to be economically inefficient?
State bureaucrats, however competent they might be, are confronted by a range and complexity of information that is simply beyond their capacity to handle.
On what grounds did Hayek criticize Keynesianism?
‘Tax and spend’ policies fuel inflation by encouraging governments to increase borrowing without, in the process, affecting the ‘natural rate’ of unemployment.
What are the four qualities of the market?
Markets are self regulating.
Markets are naturally efficient and productive.
Markets are responsive.
Markets deliver fairness and economic justice.
