Why Liberalism Failed / Patrick J. Deneen ; foreword by James Davison Hunter and John M. Owen IV.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Deneen, Patrick J., 1964- Author.

Series:

Politics and Culture

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Liberalism--History--20th century.

Liberalism.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xxxi, 225 pages)

Place of Publication:

New Haven, Connecticut : Yale University Press, [2018]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

Has liberalism failed because it has succeeded? Of the three dominant ideologies of the twentieth century-fascism, communism, and liberalism-only the last remains. This has created a peculiar situation in which liberalism's proponents tend to forget that it is an ideology and not the natural end-state of human political evolution. As Patrick Deneen argues in this provocative book, liberalism is built on a foundation of contradictions: it trumpets equal rights while fostering incomparable material inequality; its legitimacy rests on consent, yet it discourages civic commitments in favor of privatism; and in its pursuit of individual autonomy, it has given rise to the most far-reaching, comprehensive state system in human history.Here, Deneen offers an astringent warning that the centripetal forces now at work on our political culture are not superficial flaws but inherent features of a system whose success is generating its own failure.

Contents:

Introduction : The end of liberalism

Unsustainable liberalism

United individualism and statism

Liberalism as anticulture

Technology and the loss of liberty

Liberalism against liberal arts

The new aristocracy

The degradation of citizenship

Conclusion : Liberty after liberalism.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 213-220) and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 06. Apr 2020)

ISBN:

9780300231878

9780300223446

OCLC:

1083570234