Core Ideologies - Liberalism Key Thinkers Flashcards
The five key liberal thinkers are…
John Locke
Mary Wollstonecraft
John Stuart Mill
Betty Friedan
John Rawls
The classical liberal key thinkers are…
Locke
Wollstonecraft
Mill
The Modern liberal key thinkers are…
Friedan
Rawls
Which key thinker is seen by some as a bridge between classical and modern liberalism?
Mill
John Locke’s (1632 -1704) most important work was…
Two Treaties of Government (1690)
In Two Treaties of Government Locke argued that…
Both rulers and people must be subject to the rule of law
Locke was a supporter of which constitutional settlement?
The Glorious Revolution (1688)
The Glorious Revolution forms the basis of…
The constitutional monarchy
According to Locke the government must be…
Limited and based on consent from below
Locke based his philosophy on…
The doctrine of natural rights and natural laws
For Locke, society,state and government based on…
A voluntary agreement (Social Contract)
For Locke, men should accept the authority of the government as long as…
it fulfils its side of the contract
According to Locke, what could people do if the government breaks its contract
Resist the government and overthrow it if needed
Who introduced the idea of the separation of powers?
John Locke
For Locke, men had natural rights to…
Life, liberty and property
Locke thought that the main reason men put themselves under the government was…
The preservation of their property.
Locke’s belief on the right to own property was based on…
‘Labour mixing’ - land is useless until we work on it. Working on it means people can claim it.
What were Locke’s views on the relationship between government and religion?
Governments should exercise tolerance in religious and private matters
Locke’s writings are based on reason. The idea that…
No rational individual would accept a form of government with unlimited power.
Locke’s view on women and atheism?
His view on women is unclear and his tolerance did not extent to atheism.
Not a key thinker, but the father of Utilitarianism…
Jeremy Bentham
Utilitarianism is a theory of morality that…
advocates actions that foster happiness or pleasure and opposes actions that foster unhappiness or pain
Bentham’s theory is known as…
Direct utilitarianism
Who built on Bentham’s work with a theory known as indirect utilitarianism?
John Stuart Mill (1806 - 1873)
Bentham wrote that…
‘It is the greatest happiness for the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong’
John Stuart Mill differentiated between higher and lower what?
Pleasures. Higher = mental, moral and aesthetic. Lower = sensational
In a book titled ‘On Liberty’ (1859) Mill outlined what principle?
The Harm Principle
The Harm Principle is that…
The only purpose in which power can be used over an individual in society is to prevent harm to others
The Harm Principle showed that Mill was a great believer in…
Individual freedom
For Mill the way to maximise utility is to…
Create a set of laws based on the harm principle
The Harm Principle means that Mill recognised that…
With Bentham’s utilitarianism greatest happiness could be achieved by infringing an individuals rights
Mill believed in…
Limited government
Free speech and expression
Social and economic justice
Individuality and diversity
Education and self improvement
Women’s rights
Representative democracy
Mary Wollstonecraft (1759 -1797) studied the new liberal ideas of rights, liberty and reason and wondered…
Why these ideas were thought to belong to men only
Wollstonecraft is seen as a key figure in the…
Development of universal rights
Wollstonecraft was writing at a time when…
Women were seen as the property of their father or husband and had no legal rights
Wollstonecraft wrote around the time of…
The French Revolution
In ‘A Vindication of the Rights of Women’ (1792) Wollstonecraft argued that…
Legal and formal rights (education, employment, political participation) should apply to men and women
Wollstonecraft emphasised the importance of…
Individual reason, believing it was the key to a just and enlightened society that both men and women could contribute to
Like some later feminists Wollstonecraft emphasised the importance of…
motherhood
Wollstonecraft wrote that…‘I do not wish (women) to have power over men…
but over themselves’
Wollstonecraft believed in what kind of government?
A rational and accountable government which promotes the welfare of all individuals
Wollstonecraft thought society should be…
governed by reason and principles of justice. She championed social reforms, including better working conditions and the abolition of slavery.
Feminism…
an advocacy of the rights of women based on the equality of the sexes
Patriarchy…
A system of government or society dominated by men and run in the interests of men.
Essentialism…
The belief that biological factors are important in explaining the different character and behaviour of men and women
Betty Friedan (1921 - 2006) was a leading figure in which wave of feminism?
Second
The second wave of feminism aimed to…
Eradicate discrimination against women and end traditional gender roles.
The feminist slogan which rejected the view that there are two spheres of life - the public and the private
The Personal is Political
Feminists believe power structure relationships exist…
Both in government and at home.
The book Friedan wrote in 1963…
The Feminine Mystique
Friedan argued that women felt trapped in…
Domestic life and needed to enter the public sphere of work, politics and education
The Feminine Mystique argued that…
Women had sacrificed their desires (and positive freedom) in favour of family life
According to Friedan women sacrificed their desires due to…
Societal pressure and expectations…which went against core liberal values.
Another key liberal trait in Friedan was her…
Commitment to reform through legislation.
Friedan set up which organisation in 1966?
the National Organisation for Women (NOW)
Friedan campaigned for…
Legal and abortion rights
In The Second Stage (1981) Friedan criticised…
Feminists who she thought were too radical and alienated women who wanted a family based life.
Liberal feminism (Friedan) emphasises?
Individual freedom, choice and equality of opportunity
Meritocracy…
A society based on the premise that success is based on ability and hard work
Mechanistic Theory
The idea that the state was created by man to serve the people and act in their interests.
Veil of Ignorance…
A hypothetical state, advanced by John Rawls in which decisions on social justice would be made fairly as if a person would not know their position in future society.
Original Position…
The name of the position behind the veil of ignorance.
Rawls had a famous rivalry with his colleague…
Robert Nozick
John Rawls (1921-2002) was…
A professor of philosophy at Harvard
Rawls was heavily influenced by…
His experiences of WW2 and the civil rights movement
Rawls was heavily critical of…
The Vietnam war because it discriminated against black and poor Americans.
The Vietnam war…
Impelled Rawls to analyze the defects in the American political system
Rawls’ magnum opus is called…
A Theory of Justice (1971)
Rawls advocated a…
political philosophy known as “justice as fairness” which aimed to create a just and equitable society
Rawls emphasised the importance of…
maximising the well being of the least advantaged members of society - The difference principle.
The difference principle promotes equality by…
Allowing inequalities only if they benefit the most vulnerable in society.
Rawls rejected utilitarianism and focused on…
Individual rights and freedoms
Rawls’ “first principle”
Each person has the right to equal basic liberties within the context of the same rights for everyone.
Rawls’ “second principle” - Social and economic injustices are justified if they…
1.They are to the benefit of the least advantaged members of society
2.They are applied to positions under fair equality of opportunity
