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Taking Seriously R TAKING FREEDOM SERIOUSLY Volume 65 I 4 Taking FREEDOM Seriously 38 IPA Review | ipa.org.au TAKING FREEDOM SERIOUSLY R JULIE NOVAK Research Fellow at the Institute of Public Affairs The System of Liberty: Themes in the History of Classical Liberalism by George H. Smith Cambridge University Press, 2013, 231 pages ne of the great legacies of Western Civilisation has been the emergence of the philosophical doctrine Oof liberalism (sometimes referred to today as libertarianism). The evolution of the key philosophical themes of liberalism, warts and all, is the subject of an important book written by libertarian scholar George H. Smith, The System of Liberty: Themes in the History of Classical Liberalism. With its emphasis on the primacy of the freedom of individual actions in the economic and social realms, liberal philosophy stands in stark opposition to the historical and contemporary manifestations of authority, including slavery, religious servitude, monopoly, legal privilege, war, and statism. The material comforts and the widespread social freedoms enjoyed by the common man and woman today—although constantly threatened by socialists, progressives, and paternalists—owes its existence to tireless intellectual efforts by those outlining the possibilities for human progress inherent within the liberal Top row: John Locke, John Stuart Mill idea over at least hundreds of years. Bottom row: William of Ockham, Adam Smith, David Hume JANUARY 2014 | IPA Review 39 R TAKING FREEDOM SERIOUSLY Volume 65 I 4 CONTINUED Furthermore, it is no coincidence intervention, but to restrict its scope. that public good notions could that industry, science, arts and culture As Smith describes it: override fundamental liberties have have flourished in those parts of the The principal function of the also informed political debates, for world whereby liberal ideals attained public good in natural rights example the dispute over including a their greatest acceptability. liberalism was to restrict the ‘general welfare’ clause in the American Despite the great practical benefits activities of government to the constitution between James Madison of liberalism, important tensions enforcement of rights. For these and the anti federalists. and disagreements nonetheless liberals, to say that a government In an important chapter called emerged amongst self avowed liberals ought to further the public good ‘The Anarchy Game,’ Smith appraises concerning the applicability—if not means that a government ought the commonly used technique of the very meaning—of key concepts to protect the natural rights of its critics who contend that liberalism and issues. These are still being citizens in normal circumstances. is delegitimised as an acceptable played out today. Natural rights were conceived as philosophy, since it ultimately implies Internecine philosophical debates the primary constituents of the an endorsement of Hobbesian anarchy. among liberals led to the splintering public good. John Locke’s intellectual nemesis, the absolutist Sir Robert Filmer, engaged in the anarchy game by THE INTENT OF THE NATURAL RIGHTS APPEAL challenging the core tenet of ‘social TO THE PUBLIC GOOD IS NOT TO EXTEND THE contract’ theory that government > SPHERE OF COERCIVE STATE INTERVENTION, is constituted by the consent of BUT TO RESTRICT ITS SCOPE. the governed. Filmer not only stated that of liberal thought into ‘old’ and ‘new’ However, a difficulty with accepting a no government in history was varieties, contributing to philosophical natural rights public good concept established by the unanimous consent confusions and later wavering public based upon Locke’s writings is that of the governed, but if people could acceptance of liberal ideas during Locke himself identified the public break away from existing states to much of the twentieth century. good in various contexts, the most form their own then each individual To illustrate the thematic structure controversial of which was justifying could become his or her own king, of The System of Liberty, this review a ‘prerogative power’ overriding the the very essence of anarchy itself. will highlight three topics from the principles of justice, in exceptional Smith explains that Locke book explaining how liberals addressed cases, when this conforms with the ingeniously responded to Filmer’s conceptual difficulties, the first being public good. challenge by presenting an the amorphous notion of the ‘public As Smith rightly observes, intellectual counterattack. good’ in the presence of persistent this idea immediately begs several According to Locke, since it is political power. important questions that remain as impossible to identify the legitimate Many philosophers have long points for discussion: which criteria heirs of biblical Adam’s patriarchal argued that the presumption of can be used to justify the ‘exceptional’ authority, absolutist governments liberty can be annulled, invalidated or case to stifle individual liberties? of his day necessarily stood upon overridden on exceptional occasions by Further, who decides which rights the quicksands of anarchy, since political authorities when those actions can be extinguished in favour of the they lacked God-given legitimacy are consistent with promoting the public good? as Filmer described it. public good. The System of Liberty refers in In any case, Locke claimed it an George Smith identifies several detail as to how these initial debates, absurdity that people would willingly liberals who associated themselves with which can be traced as far back to the join in a civil society only to be made such an idea, including David Hume fourteenth century writings of William worse off, as the absolute sovereign has and Adam Smith, and even those more of Ockham (of Ockham’s razor fame), their way with expunging economic commonly associated with natural subsequently informed the intense and personal liberties at will. rights liberalism, such as John Locke. debates between liberals of natural While Locke may have used the The intent of the natural rights rights and utilitarian persuasions over anarchy game to full effect in his appeal to the public good is not to the accepted scope of government. critique of absolutism, Smith argues extend the sphere of coercive state Smith illustrates how concerns that subsequent usage of the anarchy 40 IPA Review | ipa.org.au TAKING FREEDOM SERIOUSLY R Battle for the soul of the seventeenth century Robert Filmer’s defence of absolutism in Patriarcha, and John Locke’s withering response in Two Treatises of Government. game, particularly by Edmund liberal thought, The System of Liberty access new economic opportunities. Burke in his critique of the French also brings to light the contributions On the other hand, bureaucratic revolutionaries of 1789, engendered of some lesser known, yet influential, state enforced charity, now referred to a decline in the prominence of participants in the unfolding euphemistically as the ‘welfare state,’ Lockean theories within the philosophical debates over the not only drains productive potential broader liberal paradigm. meanings of freedom and liberty. because of the staggering fiscal burdens One of the more thought provoking A highlight of the book is the it imposes, but serves to encourage themes covered in The System of Liberty nuanced interpretation of the work of inappropriate behaviours and values, concerns what George Smith refers to prominent nineteenth century English such as indolence and ‘cheating’ the as ‘The Radical Edge of Liberalism,’ or liberal Herbert Spencer, who is falsely welfare system. the use of resistance or revolution to derided by most people today as a George Smith also reminds us of rectify the situation of a government heartless ‘social Darwinist’ with scant the British ‘voluntaryist’ movement, which does not respect individual regard for the unfortunate. including Edward Baines, Richard liberties. As Smith helpfully reminds us, Hamilton and Auberon Herbert, Support for the use of resistance Spencer was steadfastly dedicated ‘to who adopted Lockean self ownership against illiberal legislation, or revolution improving the economic and social doctrines when arguing for such reforms of a tyrannical government altogether, conditions of the lower and middle as the separation of education and state, cannot only be found in the works classes’, who were deleteriously affected and even the introduction of ‘voluntary’ of Locke, but of Adam Smith, David by government interventions. taxation systems. Hume and Edmund Burke, although With regard to the ‘survival of the Filled with insight befitting a scholar the criteria and circumstances in which fittest’ concept attributed to Spencer, it with a reputation as one of the leading these acts could legitimately apply vary was not intended as a value judgment libertarian thinkers in the world today, among these writers. but as a description of those behavioural George Smith’s The System of Liberty has For example, Adam Smith traits and characteristics more been opportunely written at a time when suggested that people can take up conducive to survival within a given liberal ideas, once again, seem to be on armed resistance when the abuse of society. the rise. governmental power becomes ‘gross, For example, the habits of work Surveys around the Western world flagrant, and palpable,’ say when and thrift are commonly associated reveal a great distrust of government; a government exceeds the feudal with the development of a dynamic, international student liberty
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