Key Liberal Thinkers

Question 1

What is Locke’s view of human nature? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 1

Locke held a heavily positive view of human nature, believing us to be mindful of the concerns of others despite our own self-interest. Humans were guided by rationality and were capable of making their own decisions without interference.

Question 2

What is Locke’s view of society? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 2

Locke believed that society predates the state, with humans existing in a society governed by natural rights. Humans did not fight or cause conflict with each other, instead living in harmony with each other (linked to the positive view of human nature under Locke).

Question 3

What are Locke’s views of the economy? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 3

Locke believed that a natural right to property for individuals should be respected by the state and that the state should mediate between individuals who were naturally in competition for resources through free trade.

Question 4

What are Locke’s views on the state? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 4

Lock believed that the state should exist as a consensual body to which the people have willingly submitted. Powers should be dispersed between different departments and aspects of the state in order to ensure that no part of government could become autocratic.

Question 5

What are Wollstonecraft’s views on human nature? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 5

Wollstonecraft believed that men and women shared the same inherent rationality, with these equal capabilities meaning that men and women should be regarded similarly.

Question 6

What are Wollstonecraft’s views on society? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 6

Wollstonecraft believed that men subjugated and belittled women within society, with women and men both actively accepting and perpetrating the fact that women had diminished rights. Women should have access to education in order to break the cycle of women being constrained by marriage and motherhood.

Question 7

What are Wollstonecraft’s views on the economy? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 7

Wollstonecraft thought that free market economics would promote and develop the ingenuity of women if liberated from their inferior position in society.

Question 8

What are Wollstonecraft’s views on the state? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 8

Wollstonecraft was a passionate advocate of Republican, anti-monarchical government, as well as a state which enshrines the rights of women. The state should never be overseen by an absolute monarch with a divine right.

Question 9

What did Mill believe about human nature? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 9

Mill believed humans to be intensely rational, believing that they could pioneer and innovate through the principle of negative freedom. Believed that humans could develop and advance as a species and as individuals.

Question 10

What are Mill’s views on society? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 10

Mill believed in a society through which individual beliefs should be tolerated rather than oppressed, as long as those beliefs did not harm others. Humans were individuals and this individuality would advance humanity as a species.

Question 11

What are Mill’s views on the economy? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 11

Mill championed laissez-faire capitalism, with this allowing individuality to develop. This individual ingenuity can advance and pioneer new economic achievements if restrictions and barriers to trade and production are removed.

Question 12

What are Mill’s views on the state? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 12

Mill believed that the state should disengage from the affairs of the individual on account of the principle of negative freedom. Mill was also sceptical of the shift towards democracy and the principle of majority opinion as this could perhaps infringe on individual opinion and lead to tyranny of the majority.

Question 13

What are Rawls’ views on human nature? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 13

Rawls believe mankind to be selfish, yet also empathetic to the plight of other individuals. He recognised and supported individual liberty.

Question 14

What are Rawls’ views on society? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 14

Rawls’ belief in the ‘veil of ignorance’ (where individuals would choose to inhabit a society with reduced inequality if they were not to know what random entry point they would have into a society) outlines his more altruistic and cooperative view of society compared to classical liberals.

Question 15

What are Rawls’ views on the economy? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 15

Rawls believed that the economy should have a greater focus and emphasis on redistribution of wealth to reduce inequality in the form of positive liberty, where the government can interfere (in this case economically) to assist individuals with fulfilling their potential.

Question 16

What are Rawls’ views on the state? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 16

Rawls believed that the state should be permitted to intervene in the lives of individuals and their affairs to advance their achievements and help them to realise their potential. By assisting individuals in their own lives, this also has a mutual benefit for wider society eg. investment in public services.

Question 17

What are Betty Friedan’s views on human nature? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 17

Friedan believed humans to be naturally misogynistic, hence diminishing the advancement and status of women. Only with changes to attitudes can women be liberated and fulfil their potential.

Question 18

What are Friedan’s views on society? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 18

Friedan believed that society was beginning to also perpetuate misogynistic and sexist attitudes through popular culture and media. Women are also partially complicit in their own oppression by accepting and refusing to challenge these stereotypes.

Question 19

What are Friedan’s views on the economy? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 19

Friedan believed that free market capitalism could be a force for female emancipation by accepting and pioneering their enterprising nature and natural ingenuity.

Question 20

What are Friedan’s beliefs on the state? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 20

Friedan believes that the state has a responsibility to act and legislate in the interests of its people, specifically to protect and advance women. A state should be constitutionally bound in order to provide improvement to people’s lives.

Question 21

Explain why Locke believed in a dispersed/fragmented state - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 21

Locke believed that the state should be dispersed/fragmented in order to prevent a single aspect of it from becoming autocratic and dominating governing.

Question 22

Explain Locke’s social contract theory - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 22

Locke’s social contract theory dictates that the populace should voluntarily submit to the state, with the state governed in the interests of and at the command of the people. The government should be made up of the most capable people in a society rather than aristocrats.

Question 23

Explain Locke’s ‘state of nature’. How does this differ from Hobbes’ view of this concept? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 23

Locke believed that prior to the creation of a state, society existed and was governed by natural laws and rights which restricted and determined the interactions of humans with each other. Hobbes, on the other hand, believed that prior to a state, there was no society, with humans fighting one another on account of their selfish nature.

Question 24

What Locke quotes on property outline his views on the subject? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 24

Locke has been quoted as saying that ‘government has no end but the preservation of property,’ and that ‘every man has a property in his own person.’

Question 25

What Wollstonecraft quote outlines her views on female self-determination? Which of her texts outlines her ideas on female rights? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 25

Wollstonecraft said ‘I do not wish women to have power over men, but over themselves.’ She also composed the text ‘The Vindication of the Rights of Woman.’

Question 26

How was education a crucial aspect of Wollstonecraft’s liberal beliefs? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 26

Wollstonecraft believed that formal education was required for as many women and men as possible in order to prevent the subjugation of women through widely perpetrated stereotypes within society.

Question 27

What is Mill’s theory of ‘the harm principle’? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 27

‘The harm principle’ outlines that people should be free to express their own individual opinions as they wish, so long as these do not harm other individuals. This means other individuals or the state do not intervene unless harm is inflicted.

Question 28

What does Mill define as being ‘self-regarding’ actions and ‘other-regarding’ actions? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 28

Mill explained that ‘self-regarding’ actions should be tolerated as these are actions related to the personal lives of individuals, such as worship or individual views). ‘Other-regarding’ actions are those that involve disruptive behaviour, and as such harm others, meaning they should not be tolerated.

Question 29

What is Mill’s theory of utilitarianism? How does this link to his views of society? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 29

Mill’s utilitarian theory is one which puts the happiness and pleasure of as many people as possible at the pinnacle of what society’s aims should be. This means that society as a whole should be understanding of other people when acting, and that individual actions should not disadvantage or harm others.

Question 30

What is Mill’s view of developmental individualism? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 30

Mill believes that liberty and liberalism can be a vehicle through which individuals can develop and advance. This is different from other individualism which prefers to observe and understand what people have achieved, with this strand of individualism looking to consider what people could achieve.

Question 31

What Mill quote outlines how humans are altruistic and understanding of the needs of others? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 31

Mill stated that ‘the liberty of the individual must be thus far limited; he must not make himself a nuisance to others.’

Question 32

Outline Rawls’ belief in the ‘veil of ignorance’ - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 32

The ‘veil of ignorance’ was Rawls’ theory that individuals would wish to have a society with reduced inequalities rather than one rife with inequality if they were to enter that society at a random point.

Question 33

How is Rawls’ view on positive liberty distinct from socialism? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 33

Rawls believed that positive liberty was an enabling mechanism for individuals through redistribution of wealth and an enlarged state rather than a provider for individuals. Where socialism would ensure that everyone would have equality from state provisions, Rawls believes that his positive liberty will only act as foundational equality.

Question 34

What Friedan quote depicts the fact that society and acceptance of misogyny is the reason for the repression of women rather than the actions of men alone? - Key Liberal Thinkers

Answer 34

Freidan wrote that ‘man are not the enemy, but fellow victims. The real enemy is women’s denigration of themselves.’