Excerpts from the Introduction of the book The Lost History of Liberalism: From Ancient Rome to the 21st Century by Helena Rosenblatt
“Liberalism” is a basic and ubiquitous word in our vocabulary. Yet it is also a highly contentious concept—one that triggers heated debate. Some see it as Western civilization’s greatest gift to humanity; others regard it as the cause of its decline. A never-ending stream of books attacks or defends it, and hardly anyone remains neutral.
Critics accuse liberalism of a long list of sins. They argue that it destroys religion, the family, and the community. They portray it as morally lax and hedonistic, if not racist, sexist, and imperialist. Defenders are equally emphatic. They maintain that liberalism is responsible for all that is best about modern society—our ideas of fairness, social justice, freedom, and equality.
The truth, however, is that we are often muddled about what we mean by liberalism.
One important realization is the centrality of France to the history of liberalism. We cannot discuss the concept’s history without considering France and its successive revolutions. Nor can we ignore the fact that some of the most profound and influential thinkers in the history of liberalism were French. Another equally significant discovery is the importance of Germany, whose contributions to the development of liberalism are often underplayed or ignored altogether.
The truth is that France invented liberalism in the early years of the nineteenth century, and Germany fundamentally reconfigured it about half a century later. America took possession of liberalism only in the early twentieth century, and only then did it become a distinctly American political tradition.
Liberals who are usually regarded as canonical—such as John Locke and John Stuart Mill—certainly play important roles in this story. Yet, as we shall see, they were deeply immersed in the debates of their own times. They conversed with and were inspired by French and German thinkers. They spoke directly to their contemporaries, addressing the problems of their own age rather than ours.
At heart, most liberals were moralists. Their liberalism had little to do with the atomistic individualism often associated with the term today. They never spoke about rights without simultaneously stressing duties. Most liberals believed that people possessed rights because they also had duties, and they were deeply concerned with questions of social justice.
They consistently rejected the notion that a viable community could be built solely upon self-interest. Time and again, they warned against selfishness and ceaselessly advocated generosity, moral integrity, and civic virtue. This should not, of course, be taken to mean that they always practiced what they preached or consistently lived up to their own ideals.
As I also endeavor to show, the widespread belief that liberalism is primarily an Anglo-American tradition concerned with protecting individual rights and interests is a relatively recent development. It emerged from the wars of the twentieth century, particularly the fear of totalitarianism during the Cold War.
For centuries before that, being liberal meant something quite different. It meant being generous and civic-minded. It meant recognizing one’s interconnectedness with fellow citizens and acting in ways that promoted the common good.
From the very beginning, liberals were virtually obsessed with the need for moral reform. They viewed their project as fundamentally ethical. This concern helps explain their constant engagement with religion, and one aim of this book is to recalibrate our understanding by making room for this often-overlooked fact.
I show that religious ideas and controversies shaped debates about liberalism from the outset and polarized people into opposing camps. One of the earliest attacks on liberalism branded it a “religio-political heresy,” setting the tone for centuries of criticism. To this day, liberalism continues to defend itself against persistent accusations of irreligion and immorality.
The fact that liberals regarded themselves as moral reformers does not mean they were without fault. Much recent scholarship has uncovered liberalism’s darker side. Historians have exposed the elitism, sexism, racism, and imperialism embraced by many liberals. How, they ask, could an ideology dedicated to equal rights have supported such reprehensible practices?
I do not deny these darker aspects of liberalism. Rather, by placing liberal ideas within the historical context of their own time, I seek to present a more nuanced and complex account.
I do believe that liberalism was born in Europe and spread outward from there. More specifically, its origins lie in the French Revolution, and wherever it later migrated, it remained closely connected to—and profoundly influenced by—political developments in France.
Know Thyself 