Has Liberalism Failed? Patrick Deneen’S Populist Anti-Lib- Eralism: a Catholic Classical Liberal’S Re- Sponse,” Austrian Institute Paper No

Home , Martin Rhonheimer

How to cite this paper: Martin Rhonheimer, “Has Liberalism Failed? Patrick Deneen’s Populist Anti-Lib- eralism: A Catholic Classical Liberal’s Re- sponse,” Austrian Institute Paper No. 35- EN (2020).

Austrian Institute Paper Nr. 35-EN / 2020

Martin Rhonheimer Has Liberalism Failed? Patrick Deneen’s Populist Anti-Liberalism: A Catholic Classical Liberal’s Response

ast June, the liberal Schweizer Monat The more left-wing Austrian radio station L called Patrick Deneen’s Why Liberalism ORF1 granted the author a friendly fifty-mi- Failed the “Book of the Hour.” 1 The interna- nute interview in which the Catholic commu- tionally discussed work of a political scientist nitarian, who is decidedly critical of free mar- who teaches at the renowned Notre Dame Uni- kets and globalization, praised European so- versity—a book that would also be published cial democracy (at the instigation of the mod- in German in 2019—was reviewed in the New erator) as the force that had countered the vi- York Times (twice2), The Economist,3 and the olence of “raw, unbridled capitalism” and un- Wall Street Journal. 4 Although he disagreed tamed markets. If by “social democracy” one with most of its conclusions, former President understands a “moderate market economy” Barack Obama also praised Deneen's reckon- that ensures that social welfare is provided for ing with liberalism on Facebook for its “cogent and social goals are pursued, then, Deneen insights into the loss of meaning and commu- told ORF1, we should consider how social de- nity that many in the West feel, issues that lib- mocracy could be strengthened in America.6 eral democracies ignore at their own peril..”5 Deneen explained—without being contra-

1 Patrick Deneen, Why Liberalism Failed (New Ha- arts/2018/01/27/liberalism-is-the-most-success- ven: Yale University Press, 2018). ful-idea-of-the-past-400-years, accessed October 2 Jennifer Szalei, “If Liberalism Is Dead, What 19, 2020. Comes Next?” New York Times (January 17, 2018), 4 Tod Lindberg, “A Radical Critique of Modernity in https://www.ny- ‘Why Liberalism Failed’: Liberalism’s Breakdown times.com/2018/01/17/books/review-why-lib- of Social Norms Has Been a Boon to Individuals but eralism-failed-patrick-deneen.html, accessed Oc- a Bust for the Shared Culture,” (January 12, 2018), tober 19, 2020; and Ross Douthat, “Is There Life af- https://www.wsj.com/articles/review-a-radical- ter Liberalism?” New York Times (January 13, critique-of-modernity-in-why-liberalism-failed- 2018), https://www.ny- 1515790039, accessed October 19, 2020. times.com/2018/01/13/opinion/sunday/life-af- 5 Barack Obama, Facebook Post, June 16, 2018, ter-liberalism.html, accessed October 19, 2020. https://www.facebook.com/baracko- 3 “Liberalism Is the Most Successful Idea of the Past bama/posts/10155941960536749, accessed Oc- 400 Years: But Its Best Days Might Be Behind It, Ac- tober 19, 2020. cording to a New Book” The Economist (January 27, 6 Renata Schmidtkunz, Interview with Patrick 2018), https://www.economist.com/books-and- Deneen, “Patrick Deneen—Warum der

Austrian Institute of Economics and Social Philosophy  Möllwaldplatz 5/1  1040 Wien – Austria www.austrian-institute.org | [email protected]

dicted by the moderator—that the “architects priation of the expropriators, to the death of of European social democracy were mostly the state, and finally to a communist society. Catholics.” It is reasonable to assume, then, It is difficult to say how far Deneen was more that he has a confused understanding of recent or less unconsciously inspired by this Marxist European history. form of argumentation—Marx is one of the authors Deneen quotes with approval on the subject of “alienation.” It is not surprising, “Liberalism Is a Victim of Its Own however, that Deneen’s claims were received Success” with more sympathy in the US by left-wing Even if it repeats some well-known positions, progressive liberals than by conservatives, such as those of Alan Bloom (The Closing of the since such claims please all those who despise American Mind) and Alasdair MacIntyre (After the free market, globalization, and those who Virtue), the book is a challenge for every lib- measure technological progress not by the eral, but especially for the Catholic liberal be- gains in prosperity it has brought us, but solely cause of the author's position. After all, by its often less pleasant side-effects. Deneen also puts his finger on sensitive issues of modern society and brings up topics that liberals like to sweep under the rug—often Does Liberalism Have a Destructive self-righteously and arrogantly. This is how Anthropology? Alexander Grau summarizes it in the Deneen settles accounts with all varieties of : “Deneen exposes the apor- Schweizer Monat liberalism, both the classical form, considered ias of liberal ideology and shows how liberal- today in the US as conservative and market- ism produces with a fateful logic homogeneity, oriented, and also notoriously labeled as ‘ne- authoritarianism and intolerance. In the tradi- oliberal’, and the left-progressive and state-in- tion of Tocqueville, Deneen reconstructs how terventionist variant. According to Deneen, the individualism of liberal moderns leads to both are fruits of the same tree and the same the strong, all-powerful welfare state.” 7 An corrupting spirit. To this day they play into astonishing verdict from a liberal pen! each other’s hands. What is reprehensible However, Deneen's historical analysis and the about liberalism, however, is not its own ob- narrative he builds on it do not stand up to jectives such as freedom and the preservation critical examination. In his view, liberalism of human dignity, but its view of man—for has finally failed because it was successful. which reason we are left wondering how lib- Failure through success and through the ful- eralism was able to develop an ideal of free- fillment of logical consequences is the form of dom and human dignity worth preserving argument Marx uses to describe the develop- when its anthropology is so fundamentally ment of capitalism, and how he predicts its wrong. But this is only one of the many end: its success will lead to its collapse and the emergence of something new, to the expro-

Liberalismus gescheitert ist,” gescheitert ist” Kultur, Kurzkritik, Rezension 1077 https://oe1.orf.at/artikel/662671/Patrick- (June 2020), https://schweizermonat.ch/das- Deneen-Warum-der-Liberalismus-gescheitert-ist., licht-das-erlosch-eine-abrechnung-und-warum- accessed October 19, 2020. der-liberalismus-gescheitert-ist/, accessed Oc- 7 Alexander Grau, “Das Licht, das erlosch. Eine Ab- tober 19, 2020. rechnung. Und: Warum der Liberalismus

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 2

inconsistencies in Deneen’s book. First, let us actor in the history of the last two hundred look closer at his claims. years. Deneen excludes in his narrative, to the greater shame of liberalism, the enormous in- According to the classical pre-liberal and fluence of socialist ideas in this history, social- Christian understanding, which, according to ist ideas with which liberals often made pacts Deneen, liberalism has always systematically or were forced to compromise. Nor is there fought against, man is not free by nature, but mention of the extremely successful neo- rather freedom must be learned. This is only Marxist Cultural Revolution of the 1960s, possible under guidance, by authority, by self- which, as liberal intellectuals often lament, is control and the practice of the virtues. Liberal- still effective under various guises today. For ism, he says, has understood freedom as mere Deneen, there simply has not been anything autonomy of the individual and thus as the else but liberalism’s destructive force in the ability to do what one wants. Liberal volunta- last two centuries. rism destroyed the humanistic educational ideal, indeed the Liberal arts and liberal education in general, which was based on the An Idealized Past and the Maligned practice of self-control and virtue, and this caused the loneliness and “alienation” of the Masterminds of the Modern Age individual. It has also made, he adds, the indi- The antithesis of this narrative of decadence is vidual dependent on the all-competent bu- provided by Deneen's classical humanist tra- reaucratic welfare state. The liberal combina- dition and its heroes: Plato, Aristotle, Thomas tion of individualism and statism, of market Aquinas, Edmund Burke, Tocqueville. The vil- and state, supposedly leads to the dissolution lains, on the other hand, are Machiavelli, Fran- of all communal ties, above all those of the cis Bacon, Thomas Hobbes and especially John family, but also of other communities, from Locke, along with, not surprisingly, J.S. Mill, which man as a relational being draws his and finally, and on this we might rather agree, moral resources. Thus, according to Deneen’s John Dewey, who is less well known in Europe, analysis outlined here, the modern person has and astonishingly enough Deneen also in- become both individualistic and a believer in cludes in this list F. A. Hayek. Likewise—and the state. this makes one sit up and take notice—the The market economy and globalization, Founding Fathers of the United States, espe- Deneen adds, contribute their part to handing cially James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, people over to the forces of this individualistic co-authors of the Federalist Papers, have to egocentricity: they promote the pursuit of self- dodge an attack. According to Deneen, their interest, the maximization of consumption aim was to alienate people from local commu- and, if possible, the aspiration to ascend to an nities and to create a bureaucratic central elite that is more and more distinguished from power, and to create an elite that was de- the masses of people. The consequences are tached from the popular masses and their in- increasing social inequality, to go along with terests, serving instead the economic and the plundering and destruction of nature. commercial interests of the nation. Deneen, Thus, the whole anti-“neo-liberal,” eco-social- moreover, reinterprets the principle of repre- ist, civilization-critical, and technology-critical sentation rooted in European history, and thus argumentation is tried, whereby everything is also the Anglo-Saxon tradition of parliamen- blamed on “liberalism,” which appears in tarism, as an anti-democratic vehicle for the Deneen's narrative as the only significant disempowerment of the people, and in

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 3

contrast praises direct decision-making in manity’s survival in prosperity and dignity. It smaller, local and morally and religiously ho- chastises the modern project, which began not mogeneous communities. The author, how- with Machiavelli—as Deneen claims—but ever, understands these not only as a histori- with Jean Bodin. It was a project of not basing cal model, but also as an acute instrument to political institutions on individual virtue and defy the liberal “anti-culture,” as he calls it, high philosophical-ethical claims, but to be through new forms of political practice. content with the moral minimum necessary for the peaceful coexistence of people of differ- However, Deneen is by no means advocating a ent faiths and with different ideas about what return to the past. He wants to save what he is good. Modern political thought therefore be- believes to be the “admirable ideals” of liber- gins with the insight, most radically formu- alism for the future: human dignity and true lated by Thomas Hobbes, that the conflict- freedom. Surprisingly, he moreover speaks of laden establishment of the as the “achievements of liberalism” which must Summum Bonum a political goal must be replaced by the avoid- be acknowledged and built upon, “abandoning ance of the Summum Malum, civil war. the foundational reasons for its failures.”8 – He deliberately does not offer, however, a practi- Even if Bodin and Hobbes were not liberals in cal alternative of a political, economic or insti- the sense of promoting modern constitution- tutional nature, or a new political theory, but alism, which was essentially directed against only a strategy of practical resistance in local absolutism, the signature of modernity and fi- communities. Praised are the Amish, the eco- nally of liberal constitutionalism was the in- logical cultivation techniques in the spirit of sight that freedom was not to be secured by the award-winning (also honored by Obama) the actions of individual rulers, but by the rule agrarian humanist Wendell Berry, and the of law—precisely independent of the virtues “Benedict Option”—the withdrawal from the of the individual rulers. This was a decisive ad- majority society in old-native communities— vance over the idea of limited rule, which had and all this in the hope that this will spontane- its origins in the Middle Ages, but was still ously lead to something new and ultimately a based on the Aristotelian idea that the ideal better world. commonwealth had the virtuous ruler as a prerequisite, and that the laws were to lead

men to virtue. The Misunderstood Political Project But the liberal conception of the rule of law, of Modernity which is not founded on virtue, does not en- But what Deneen calls a moral alternative to tail—here lies the great misunderstanding— an inhumane world of market-based globali- that a new concept of freedom has been intro- zation, ecological exploitation, growing ine- duced in the form of individualistic arbitrari- quality, bureaucratic overreach of human life, ness. What is new is merely the differentiation and the uncontrolled power of elites, is actu- of the level of the political (the task of the ally a dead end of illusions. Why? Because it state) from that of morality, or from the stand- disregards the real preconditions of the mod- ards for a good individual life. The fact that the ern world’s emergence, the institutional pre- state was no longer understood as a highly requisites for securing freedom, and the eco- moral institution, but pragmatically and in- nomic laws and necessities required for hu- strumentally as a means of securing freedom,

8 Deneen, Why Liberalism Failed, 184; 182.

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 4

and that instead of the virtues of rulers, the Deneen uses the questionable method of all rule of law was to become foundational— so-called neo-Aristotelians: he fallaciously hence the importance of the separation of compares the ideals and normative recom- powers—did not automatically mean lower- mendations drawn in the books of classics— ing the goals of morality or establishing a new i.e. a “reality” consisting of texts—with the so- concept of freedom. Rather, it meant that po- cial, political, economic and technological real- litical authority would no longer have the task ity of today's world. This is a category error, of acting as an arbitrator or even as an educa- analogous to the bad habit of leftist utopians tor in questions of morality and religion. In who sketch an ideal image of socialism as a this, liberal constitutionalism, without its pro- possible reality, but then recognize the reality ponents being aware of this, is in the tradition of realized (and failed) forms of socialism not of Thomas Aquinas, in whose writings one can as a failure of this ideal, but as a betrayal of it, find that the state’s laws have the task of pun- while still upholding the ideal of “real” social- ishing, above all, those actions “which are to ism as a still possible reality and as sketched the detriment of others and without whose out in their own classic texts. Deneen makes prohibition human society cannot be main- the same mistake in the opposite way: The tained, such as murder, theft and the like” 9: past is judged on the basis of ideals found in everything else is a matter for God, not the philosophical texts of the past, the present on task of men—a very restrictive and in this the basis of today's social, political and eco- sense liberal political criterion. nomic reality, and both are then compared. Thereby the “classics” are mostly mentioned selectively and warped for the purpose of the Methodological Weakness: Inappro- narrative; the real world understandably priate Comparisons and the Confu- comes off looking badly when compared with sion of Texts with Realities this idealized model. Because of this miscon- It would be destructive to Deneen’s rhetori- ception, the real—social, political and eco- cally brilliant narrative, which on closer in- nomic—conditions of those “classical” times, spection proves to be rather simplistic from an as well as their actual level of morality, are not analytical perspective, to consider such histor- discussed. For example, there is no discussion ical implications along with real political prob- of the real Athens or Sparta in Aristotle's time lems of the exercise of power and of securing or the life of the broad masses in those pre-in- freedom, or to consider institutional and—as dustrial times that were overcome by liberal- will be discussed later—economic and politi- ism and industrial capitalism. To compare the cal special-interest concerns. Deneen's “real- world that capitalism, market economies, and ity” is found in books and classical writings. In liberal democracy created with the theoretical the texts of Plato, Aristotle, and Thomas Aqui- concepts of past philosophers is methodologi- nas, he sifts through the ideal past; in those of cally inadmissible and nonsensical, just as it is Machiavelli, Bacon, Hobbes, Locke, J.S. Mill, nonsensical to try to understand the world to- and Dewey, which he lumps together, he iden- day simply from the texts of the classics of mo- tifies the demon “liberalism” that destroyed dernity. Of course, one must compare theories the former world. with the reality that results from their applica- tion—and many classical ideas do indeed have

9 Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, I-II, q. 96, a. 2, corp.

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 5

an excellent track record. What one cannot do, mate self-interest—not selfishness—with the however, is to measure today’s reality against promotion of the best drives in people, thus the normative ideals found in classical texts of creating that mass prosperity that has never the past and to derive a value judgement about been seen before in the history of humankind. today's reality from this. In order to arrive at Adam Smith called this the “invisible hand,” such a value judgement, today's reality must because it is a hand that does not exist. The be compared not with texts from the past, but non-existent hand is the market, which works with the real conditions of that past. Based on through the anonymous price system, proba- such a comparison of social, economic and bly the most powerful, efficient and morally even moral realities, our present “liberal” best instrument of cooperation and coordina- world would probably come off looking better tion that humankind has ever known. than any other epoch! This is essentially due Markets and entrepreneurial competition not to those liberal forces that Deneen misunder- only create prosperity, but also encourage stands and demonizes: the institutions of the both a willingness to take risks and a sense of liberal constitutional and legal state, the rep- responsibility. They also encourage specifi- resentative, parliamentary democracy embed- cally entrepreneurial and commercial virtues ded in them, the free market, capitalist entre- such as honesty and reliability, and they pro- preneurship, scientific and technical progress mote trust as the most important and scarcest and innovation, international trade and glob- entrepreneurial resource. Market-economy alization. cooperation among free individuals is not morally corrosive, as the communitarian theory claims; it only becomes so through mis- The Market, Spontaneous Order, and guided political incentives and the hunt for Morals benefits, privileges, subsidies and state guar- As an authority securing freedom, the liberal antees that are promoted by market interfer- state—within the limits necessary for the ence, giving influential persons—usually the preservation of civil coexistence in peace and powerful and financially strong—competitive justice—is not only the guarantor of the free- advantages at the expense of others. Thus, in dom of different life plans that concern the cooperation with large companies, regulations “good life,” but also the protector of the free are promoted that promise an economic ad- market and the “spontaneous order” of society vantage over competitors—“crony capitalism” created by it. At first Deneen seems to agree is the key concept here. It is not surprising that with this, but then he denounces the market as there is no paradise even in a society based on a mere product of the modern state—and on a market economy and capitalist entrepre- this he is historically and factually wrong. neurship, and those in such societies are cer- What is overlooked here is that the market tainly familiar with abuse, fraud and incompe- economies that exist today are not organized tence. However, these deficiencies are not in- by the state, but rather, for the most part, trinsic to the market system, but rather atypi- handicapped, over-regulated, and often mis- cal to it—in contrast to all statist solutions, es- regulated by the state, without a genuinely lib- pecially socialism, in which, instead of compe- eral principle of order. It is precisely to the ex- tition, there are systemic and system-preserv- tent that they also lose their actual “market ing privileges, favoritism and the elimination economy” quality, namely to create those in- of competitors, not through better products, centives that almost inevitably combine legiti-

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 6

but through privileged relationships, the exer- materially most highly developed societies cise of power, and the deprivation of freedom. that are most likely to get such problems under control; the members of poor nations are

largely helpless and suffer most. This also ap- The “War against Nature” through Its plies to global warming: The best strategy to Mastery: Technological Criticism help the poor, says Danish Economist Bjorn Lomborg, is to enable them to rise to our pros- Even though Deneen acknowledges that liber- perity, to bring them legal security and capital- alism has brought incomparable freedom and ism. For in prosperity, climate change cannot unprecedented prosperity to humanity, he be better prevented, but, if it cannot be slowed says that it did so by waging a devastating down, we can live with it in a humane way, be- “war against nature” at an intolerable cost and cause we possess the technologies, energy re- loss. The modern project of dominating nature sources, and institutions to adapt to what can- is for him the original sin of liberalism and the not be prevented.10 reason for the project’s self-destruction. How- ever, Deneen's plea for a return to a “natural” way of life ignores the fact that nature is not at Intellectual Populism and a Question- all well-disposed towards humanity but is, in able Handling of Sources fact, its enemy. According to the Christian view, nature was not so from the beginning, Deneen refuses such thoughts because he uses but rather, as a consequence of humanity’s the entire leftist anti-capitalist, anti-market Fall, it only became so through the expulsion and anti-globalization arsenal of arguments in from paradise. an almost “populist” manner. Yet the intricate, often seemingly contradictory web of his argu- Without the blessings of modern technology ments, quotations and references, does not and medicine, people would still be exposed to stand up to closer scrutiny. In detail, it the forces of nature of all kinds: famine, pov- abounds with tendentious textual interpreta- erty, misery, subsistence farming, and lack of tions and out-of-context and thus distorted education would be the norm. There remain quotations. On closer inspection, Deneen's plenty, but fewer and fewer, regions on earth, handling of the sources proves to be charla- and people in them, where we can still see tanism. what this means. In view of today's enormous challenges, but also the successes in the fight To give an example, John Locke advocated the against poverty, Deneen’s disdain for techno- typically liberal view that “natural freedom” logical progress, which is deeply contrary to meant the freedom to do what one wants and Christian tradition—it is part of the mission of what one feels like doing. What Deneen con- creation to “subdue the earth!”—proves to be ceals is Locke's addition: “within the limits of a form of aesthetic-professorial cynicism. The natural law.”11 The fact that Locke was a natu- COVID-19 pandemic, in particular, shows ral law theorist in the tradition of the Anglican what untamed nature entails: a global threat theologian Richard Hooker, whose thought in by a deadly virus. And it shows that it is the turn was in line with Thomas Aquinas, does

10 See Bjorn Lomborg, False Alarm. How Climate 11 John Locke, Second Treatise on Government, IV, Change Panic Costs Us Trillions, Hurts the Poor, and 22; in, Locke, Two Treatises of Government, ed. Pe- Fails to Fix the Planet (New York: Basic Books, ter Laslett (Cambridge: Cambridge University 2020). Press, 1960), 283 f.

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 7

not fit into his narrative.12 The historical rela- the overarching protection of a constitutional tionships are more complicated and complex. state and republican government. (Even a direct democracy like the Swiss one is only a The use of a key passage from F. A. Hayek’s The supplement to the representative democracy Constitution of Liberty also appears to be char- that Deneen seeks to ridicule: it does not re- latanism.13 Hayek's astute economic insight— place it; moreover, it is integrated into an referencing the French sociologist Gabriel overarching rule of law whose norms do not Tarde in this context—that in a progressive depend on small group decisions at the local society, unlike in a static society, material pro- level). To conceal Madison's true intentions gress ”takes place in echelon fashion.” That is, (in 10), Deneen suppresses in an im- material progress happens in such a way that Federalist portant quote14 a part of the sentence in which the rich make it possible through their luxury “[through] patriotism and love of justice consumption that it will later become mass [elected representatives] will be least likely to consumption for the next generation. Deneen sacrifice [the true interest of their country] to reinterprets this as a justification, even ideali- temporary or partial considerations,” which is zation of ever-growing inequality—whereas mentioned in favor of a national govern- in reality it is the exact opposite, namely an ment.15 On the other hand, and this is also not economic argument for the progressive level- mentioned, precisely those areas that are clas- ling of inequality in terms of prosperity and sically considered sovereign powers and of di- quality of life. Deneen is not interested in un- rect importance to citizens should (according derstanding economics; it does not belong to to Hamilton) be transferred to, or left with, lo- the reality that is relevant to him. cal communities as far as possible: “the ordi- His dealings with the Founding Fathers James nary administration of criminal and civil jus- Madison and Alexander Hamilton have al- tice […] and [service as the] visible guardian of ready been mentioned. This is a deliberately life and property.” 16 The realistic anthropol- out-of-context interpretation, whereby the ac- ogy on which the recommendations of the tual concern of the constitutional fathers criti- Federalist Papers are based, however, is sup- cized by Deneen is concealed and falsified, pressed by Deneen's tendentious citation. namely the overcoming of partisanship, small- Deneen cannot accept that the authors of the scale special interest politics, and demagogy. Federalist Papers, like Kant, pit the republican The goal of the Founding Fathers was to deal against the (direct) democratic principle. His with the consequences of the inescapable communitarianism calls for a freedom that weaknesses of human nature, to prevent local consists in democratic participation in local concentrations of power and the “mischief of communities. He considers republican, large- factions” that are a consequence of direct de- scale, “supra-regional” government based on mocracy in small communities, and that en- the principle of (parliamentary) representa- danger the freedom of the individual: and they tion to be one of the liberal demands that con- attempt to mitigate these problems through tribute significantly to destroying local com-

12 See Martin Rhonheimer, “St. Thomas Aquinas Collected Works of F.A. Hayek, Vol. XVII (Chicago: and the Idea of Limited Government,” Journal of The University of Chicago Press [1960] 2011, 96- Markets & Morality 22, 2 (Fall 2019), 439–455; esp. 97. 443 ff. 14 Deneen, Why Liberalism Failed, 163. 13 F. A. Hayek, The Constitution of Liberty. The De- 15 Federalist 10 (Madison). finitive Edition, ed. Ronald Hamowy in The 16 Ibid., n. 17 (Hamilton).

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 8

munities and ties, as well as community spirit. tion would destroy his narrative. The distinc- Moreover, he believes it tends to replace an tion shows that the alternative is not one of orientation toward the common good with a “bureaucratic central government,” on the one situation in which the individual aims at mere hand, and “local, participatory communities” self-interest, while at the same time making on the other, but, in Constant's words, the al- the latter dependent on a superior and all- ternative between “ancient liberty” which “de- dominant state and its bureaucracies. mands that the citizens should be entirely sub- jected in order for the nation to be sovereign, Of course, it is fair to ask whether history and that the individual should be enslaved for would not have been better if the North Amer- the people to be free.”; and “personal free- ican states that now make up the United States dom,” which is precisely freedom from poli- had remained sovereign states, more like Eu- tics, but also from the police, or an independ- rope, without an overarching central govern- ence protected and secured by the state to do ment (even if sensible decentralization always what you decide and to live as you please: “The remains an asset). But even Europe, consisting aim of the moderns is the enjoyment of secu- of many sovereign nation-states, has not been rity in private pleasures; and they call liberty spared the phenomena that Deneen laments: the guarantees accorded by institutions to not even the small, federalist Switzerland with these pleasures.” Among the ancients, on the its direct democracy. other hand, “the individual, almost always sovereign in public affairs, was a slave in all his “Liberty of the Ancients” vs. “Liberty private relations.” of the Moderns” The great error consists in thinking that this “modern liberty” is hostile to the community. Deneen's concept of freedom corresponds in It is not so, because it frees human freedom political terms to what Benjamin Constant, the and inventiveness to organize itself, to associ- great liberal theorist of the early nineteenth ate, and of course grants protection especially century, called the “liberty of the ancients,” to the family, which enables it to carry out its freedom that consists in political participation tasks independently. Compare this to the arbi- and thus at the same time in, and dependence trary anti-liberty regime of French absolutism, on, the community, its norms, values, etc. The but also compare it to the tyrannical commu- “liberty of the ancients” differs from the “lib- nitarianism of the ancient family!18 erty of the moderns” which is characterized precisely by being left in peace by the commu- Certainly, and here Deneen is right, one can nity, in particular by the state, and in being also distort this modern understanding of lib- guaranteed the right to live according to one’s erty as personal independence or autonomy. own ideas, to pursue business independently The question is only whether this itself is a of governmental dictates.17 work of “liberalism.” One can only come up with this idea if, especially in the case of a clas- Constant's distinction is still relevant today; sical liberal like Benjamin Constant, one also Deneen does not mention it because its men-

17 Benjamin Constant, De la liberté des anciens com- https://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/2251, accessed parée à celle des modernes (1819). Translated as October 19, 2020. The Liberty of Ancients Compared with that of 18 On this last point, see Larry Siedentop. Inventing Moderns, uncredited translator (Unknown, 1819). the Individual. The Origins of Western Liberalism (London: Penguin, 2014), 7-18.

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 9

rips this claim out of its broader context. For liberal, all the more so if his or her liberal atti- in Constant's work we also read: “Every time tude is rooted in the Christian faith. governments pretend to do our own business, The discomfort in the globalized world of they do it more incompetently and expen- growing inequality, and the loss of meaning sively than we would.”19 It seems difficult to and community, as addressed by Barack recognize a causal nexus between such a pro- Obama’s praise of Deneen’s book, are first and gram and a welfare state that interferes in all foremost consequences of a huge political and areas of life, and it is implausible to make peo- media influence, along with an education sys- ple who thought like Constant jointly respon- tem that, at least in Europe, clearly promotes a sible for such a development. lack of understanding of economic interrela- Admittedly, this too is only a text, not in every tionships and aversion to everything related respect beyond all doubt, and it has time-de- to free market economies and capitalism. pendent weaknesses and one-sidedness. The Catholic social teaching has also played its development of the modern world has not fol- part here, not always in the same way, but nev- lowed the logic of texts, but actual political de- ertheless in its general tendency and through cisions, sociological as well as economic devel- many of its prominent representatives in both opments, the logic of institutional action and teaching and journalism.20 the often irrational, incompetent or irrespon- The unease is therefore often based on false sible reaction of politicians to crises or catas- information and ignorance, which is promoted trophes. It is precisely on this level that by precisely that kind of non-economic or Deneen's narrative becomes entirely ques- even anti-economic, humanistic, i.e. “liberal”, tionable for obvious reasons that cannot be education whose disappearance and disre- discussed in detail here. gard Deneen laments. It is precisely “humanistic” intellectuals like him who are partly to blame for the fact that young people remain in “Real Existing Liberalism” in a State of economic and economic-historical ignorance Imbalance and accordingly develop false images of the By attempting to cover up the deep differ- enemy. More economic and economic-histori- ences, even contradictions, within the liberal cal education would be a good antidote to the world of ideas, and to speak quite simply of socialist infiltration of the liberal and human- liberalism as if it were a single historical force, istic ideal of education. Deneen not only makes it too easy for himself, but also distances himself from historical reality. But independently of this, as mentioned at The Failure of the Liberals and the Di- the beginning, critics also claim that he has versity of “Liberalisms” recognized and addressed sore points of “lib- If one looks more closely, most of the undesir- eral” modernity. And these are points that able developments—especially those of an should actually be a concern for every classical economic and social nature—are not to be

19 Constant, The Liberty of Ancients. idem, “Brüche in der katholischen Soziallehre: Vom 20 Cf. Martin Rhonheimer, “Vom Subsidiaritätsprin- Primat der Freiheit zur staatlichen Zwangssolida- zip zum Sozialstaat. Kontinuitäten und Brüche in rität,” in Wirz, Stephan (ed.), Kapitalismus – ein der katholischen Soziallehre,” Historisches Jahr- Feindbild für die Kirchen? (Zürich—Baden-Baden: buch der Görres Gesellschaft 138 (2018): 6-71; and Schriften Paulus Akademie, 2018), 57–78.

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 10

attributed to “liberalism” as such, but rather to high regard by liberals today.21 Likewise, be- a lack of liberalism, to a betrayal of it, often trayal comes from a liberalism that offers a precisely by liberals, and to liberal incon- hand in furthering the originally socialistic sistency and weak character in the face of illib- program of Friedrich Engels to integrate men eral tendencies, to which they cave for “social” and women as completely as possible into or “ecological” reasons. working life and the labor market, aiming thereby at destroying the bourgeois family In reality, it is not “liberalism” that has suppos- and thereby, having as a side-effect the social- edly failed, it is interpretations of it and cer- ization of education. This, as well as a number tain forms of it that owe their existence to the of demands of the neo-Marxist Cultural Revo- betrayal of the many liberals who became solution—such as the idealization of a complete cial democrats. They assimilated the view that decoupling of sexuality and procreation, or the market must be tamed so that it does not their “anti-authoritarian” educational mod- serve only the rich, as is often wrongly as- els—represent “liberals” today, and not only serted, and that its results must be corrected in the United States. This is indeed a problem. by redistribution for social reasons; in addi- Yet all this cannot be derived from the nature tion, the individual should be protected as of liberalism, at most it can only be derived completely as possible against uncertainties from certain historically contingent interpre- by a state safety net—not only for actual ex- tations of it. treme emergencies, but also where one could help oneself (read Ludwig Erhard to see what a deep perversion of his liberal concept of the The Liberal Distinction between the “social market economy” this is). At the same time, this deprives of oxygen the family, as a Political-Legal Level and that of the natural community of reproduction, upbring- Morality of Individual Lifestyles ing, and provision. Here too, Deneen has a Liberalism was never an ideologically homo- point, even if his analysis of the historical gen- geneous entity. Thus J.S. Mill, for some, is the esis of this development is wrong. The modern liberal par excellence, but for others the first welfare state is not a product of liberalism; its socialist—and a case can indeed be made for history, which begins with Bismarck, is far that. He was of the opinion that although pro- more complex. duction should be left to the market, the fair But the liberalism of the 19th century is also distribution of the national product was a mat- partly to blame for the steadily increasing ter for the state. On the other hand, his concept power of the state. No less than F. A. Hayek la- of autonomy and freedom is considered typi- mented the destruction in the wake of liberal cally liberal, although as a liberal thinker one statism of the “corps intermédiaires,” the social can take a different view on this. Mill’s disre- voluntary communities and corporations— gard for customs and tradition was certainly many of them also of a church or denomina- an understandable anti-Victorian reflex tional nature—acting between the individual against the repressive power of public opin- and the state. This grossly disregarded the ion, but as such not the final conclusion of lib- principle of subsidiarity that is also held in eral wisdom, as demonstrated by the libera-

21 F.A. Hayek, Law, Legislation, and Liberty: Volume II, The Mirage of Social Justice (London: Routledge, 1982), 150-2.

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 11

lism of F. A. Hayek and his understanding of it to mean the freedom to do what one wants, freedom, which is more in line with Burke and but—and this is left out by Deneen—“within Tocqueville. It is no coincidence that Hayek the limits of natural law.” Locke therefore dis- dedicated his book The Road to Serfdom to the tinguishes between natural and political free- “socialists in all parties”! dom, the latter which follows a specifically political ethics for the purpose of securing indi- Mill's concept of freedom is particularly prob- vidual freedom and its foundations in physical lematic. For him, the ultimate justification of integrity and property. individual freedom consists in the mere exercise of freedom—whatever the purpose and It is not the political concept of freedom of whatever good is pursued with it, the main classical liberalism that is problematic, as thing is to realize one's own individuality and Deneen insinuates, but the abolition of the not to harm others.22 This is a useful criterion modern distinction between the political-legal at the legal-political level—Mill’s contempo- level and that of the morality of individual life- rary, the Catholic liberal Lord Acton also said styles, an abolition that he also advocates. The that in political terms liberty is the highest end decisive political-legal—especially constitu- and not just a means to something higher.23 tional—factor is that people are given the free- Otherwise the state would have the task of dom to make their own choices and lead their “educating” our freedom. Precisely for this own lives, as long as these do not conflict with reason, however, it becomes clear what Mill's the same freedom of others. This is not so in concept of freedom—and in his wake that of the case of education and formation, or of mo- many liberals—is ill-suited to do: it is not suit- rality. For these it is not exclusively im- able for the non-political sphere, neither for portant—even if it is fundamental—to edu- the family nor for education and formation. A cate people in independence and the ability to pedagogy based on it creates disorientation make their own choices; it is also crucial to and has a destructive effect. Here Deneen is learn to practice the ability to distinguish good right, but only insofar as the mistake lies in from evil and—to the best of one's knowledge “totalizing” a political, morally “neutral” con- and conscience—also to put into practice cept of freedom, and in seeing the essence and what has been understood as good and right- fulfillment of freedom in the freedom of choice eous. An education to freedom is thus educa- alone, and in accepting this even for individual tion in freedom, but a “value-bound” educa- morality and as fundamental for education. tion, that is, one that is not morally neutral, but This reverses the modern distinction between spurs one on to choose and do what is good, the political sphere and the morality of a good and one that is able to offer standards for such life. choices. Precisely this is the nature of educational authority, but it can have an educational As I said, John Locke, who is cited by Deneen effect only if it is able to stimulate freedom, in- as the chief liberal representative, had a differ- sight, and self-responsibility in the one being ent concept of natural freedom: he understood

22 J. S. Mill, On Liberty, in Utilitarianism, On Liberty, on Catholic Social Doctrine (Washington D.C.: Cath- and Considerations on Representative Government, olic University of America Press, 2013), 36-71; re- ed. H. B. Acton (London: J.M. Dent and Sons, garding Mill see, especially, 45ff. Ltd.,1972), 125; 114; 136ff. Cf. Martin Rhonheimer, 23 John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton, First “The Liberal Image of Man and the Concept of Au- Baron Acton, Essays in the History of Liberty, ed. J. tonomy: Beyond the Debate between Liberals and Rufus Fears, in Selected Writings of Lord Acton, Vol. Communitarians,” in The Common Good of Constitu- I (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund Inc., 1985), 22. tional Democracy: Essays in Political Philosophy and

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 12

educated.24 Nobody can know with certainty if dable reaction to unjust and often brutal dis- the values that are mediated by one’s educa- crimination in the past—and in many places tion are the “absolutely” correct ones. In the also in the present—of women, and of ethnic, end, in the course of his life, even in conflict, racial, religious, and sexual minorities. This often in resistance to or even in—often fruit- becomes a problem, however, as soon as the ful—rebellion against one’s own education, injustice of discrimination is addressed with each one must form one’s own conscience in- socialist-statist solutions. Liberals, too, are independently and with one’s own responsibil- creasingly speaking out today in favor of so- ity. And this can be done only if one has en- cialist, state-imposed solutions—on socio-po- joyed an education and formation that is litical issues about which they often agree value-based in this sense and not “value-neu- with social democrats and socialists. One tral.” thinks of topics such as the inheritance tax, “women’s quotas”—or the controversial The “value-conscious” liberal must walk a same-sex marriage. There has been the im- tightrope. He must clearly distinguish the level plicit redefinition of traditional marriage—the of personal conduct, wherever the freedom of basically, though not necessarily factually, re- choice between good and evil, morality and productive union between man and woman, virtue, is at stake, from the political level. The which in turn is based on their biological-re- latter is that level of the legal defense of the productive and psychological complementa- freedom of everyone, which makes possible rity—to what is in fact a “socialist” (and “con- the peaceful coexistence of citizens who have structivist”) proposal. When, instead of the lib- divergent views on good and evil, morality and eral legal equality for those who differ— virtue. Deneen would fall on this tightrope “equality before the law”—which, in recogni- walk, if he wanted to take it at all, because he tion of equal human dignity, otherwise treats denies himself this distinction and thus also inequalities before the law equally, the social- misreads history. But the same is true of many ist solution decrees the legal by the “progressive” liberals or “left-wing liberals” levelling state of such inequality—inequality that is due who, strangely enough, rely on statist, state- to natural diversity. But such disparities and interventionist policies to realize their agen- differences are socially and morally relevant, das, which one would rather expect from so- for they form the social foundation of a free socialists. They want to impose their own, ulti- ciety and function—as does private prop- mately egalitarian moral concepts—and more erty—as a bulwark against the presumptuous- recently also identity-political demands— ness of state power and politics. with the power of the state, and thus uninten- tionally participate in the game of the anti- This is where the liberals have failed, in that bourgeois cultural revolution. they missed a liberal solution to counteract discrimination against sexual minorities. This

solution would have consisted in respecting The Moral and Social Foundation of a the diversity of sexual minorities and enabling Free Society appropriate legal regulations for overcoming their discrimination, while leaving the identity Many demands of today’s “liberal-progres- of the family, which is based on traditional sives” or “left-wing liberals” are an understan- marriage, untouched as a reproductive and

24 See Martin Rhonheimer, The Perspective of Mo- Virtue Ethics (Washington D.C.: The Catholic Uni- rality. Philosophical Foundations of Thomistic versity of America Press, 2011), 213-15.

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 13

provident community. Let us not forget: the also a rise in demands generated by prosper- sexual orientation of a person and his or her ity—that we have not yet really learned to use corresponding actions must be indifferent to without undermining the moral and social the state and its law: they are a private matter. foundations of a free society. But this is not the case with marriage as a com- The religious and moral neutrality of the state munity of reproduction and provision for off- does not mean religious and moral neutrality spring. Marriage is of eminent social, eco- of the citizen, of education, of social life. Who- nomic and political importance, and therefore ever claims this only plays into the hands of of public significance. For this reason, the cre- the enemies of freedom, because in doing so ation of “same-sex marriage” is, from a liberal he legitimizes the steady increase in the state's point of view, an absurdity, because it gives power of disposal over the individual, his public recognition to a relationship that is rel- property and his freedom—or at least weak- evant purely on the private level, which means ens the resistance against it. an unjustified privilege in comparison to marriage as a community of reproduction and pro- Relativists and agnostics are neither better vision.25 liberals nor better democrats—indeed, they may one day turn out to be the gravediggers of Today, the liberal project must be defended freedom and democracy. What the liberal— both from conservative reactionary critics and even, as in the case of the writer, a Catholic or from its left-wing gravediggers. The latter do otherwise “value-bound” liberal—needs to be indeed undermine the social and moral pre- concerned about is the defense of a political conditions of a free society and thus open the culture that keeps the state out of such issues, door to the state’s—“constructivist”—control and prevents it from imposing any agnostic, over the individual and over natural commu- relativistic moral concepts or ideas of a “so- nities like the family. Liberals need strong eth- cially just” society from above—even if this ical convictions and a liberal society needs a were supported by democratic majority deci- social foundation capable of shaping such con- sions. For respect for minorities is part of the victions. It was the “leftist” cultural revolution essence of the liberal constitutional state, that championed the opposite against liberal, which is committed to a liberal democracy bourgeois society, and it did so not without based on the rule of law. consequences and in an extraordinarily effective way. Many of the problems we have with freedom Political Freedom or Social Equality? are side effects of progress that is good in itself. The increasing liberation of people from The state has no traditional or modern moral- the constraints of natural circumstances, ity to impose on society. To take the much- 26 which once also determined gender roles and cited Böckenförde dilemma further: free so- social structures, is also leading to an increase ciety, the secular, liberal constitutional state, in normative disorientation. It has led to a lives from resources that it cannot generate it- freedom—not least of all sexual freedom, but self nor undermine with impunity. The fact

25 A possible “right to adoption” for all does not must—in each individual case—be considered ex- stand in the way of this argument, for the simple clusively from the child's point of view. reason that there is no “right to adoption”—not 26 For the so called Böckenförde-Dilemma see even for a marital community consisting of man https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Böckenförde_di- and woman. Adoption and the ability to do so lemma

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 14

that these resources are being depleted is not its contempt for the market economy and cap- a consequence of liberalism, but of a general italism. F.A. Hayek's verdict that political con- cultural crisis. The churches are partly to servatism is always dragged along by socialist blame, as they have failed completely in this ideas because of its disregard for political respect; the schools, education and pedagogy principles is also proven true here.27 are partly to blame—think of the destructive Liberals should have the courage to state effects of the ideas of “anti-authoritarian” ed- clearly that there can be no free society with- ucation in the 1970s. But those liberals who out a social substructure that is itself not mod- gave these ideas room, and even assimilated elled on the requirements of political free- them, are also partly to blame, because they dom—just as democracy requires social struc- did not recognize that they were ideas deeply tures that are not themselves democratic. This opposed to the liberal cause. is exactly what the liberal Zurich state law pro- By describing classical and left-progressive fessor Dietrich Schindler taught decades ago liberalism as variants of the same basic idea, in his classic treatise Verfassungsrecht und and by ultimately understanding them as two soziale Struktur (“Constitutional Law and So- forms of liberalism appearing one after the cial Structure”) A liberal state that emphasizes other in history and as still competing forms of the independence and freedom of the individ- that same idea today, Deneen blurs the deci- ual as well as democracy—which is “ulti- sive difference between a liberalism rooted in mately a negation of subordination and com- classical thinking and constructivist-statist, mitment”—requires “compensation through left-liberal progressivism. More closely, it opposing principles,” “moral prerequisites,” blurs the crucial difference between a political “self-discipline, moderation, the will to com- theory of political freedom based on the rule municate...,” yes, according to Schindler, as the of law and a political theory of social equality American constitutional Fathers believed, it based on the rule of political arbitrariness. requires “a code of virtues that citizens had to These are, to put it very simply, the two great comply with.”28 opposites. The opposition was originally that Both freedom and active participation must be between liberalism and socialism. By assimi- practiced, they must be learned. This is done lating socialist elements, progressist left-wing through processes of education that respect liberalism is in conflict with classical liberal- the person as a free being, but do not them- ism. Deneen blurs this contradiction by con- selves obey the political logic of freedom and structing the great antagonism as being one democratic participation. Fine differentiation between liberalism and “communitarianism,” of levels is not Deneen's thing. However, liber- the latter which, it is not surprising, clearly in- als are also guilty of confusing the levels when corporates socialist motives, especially in its they advocate socio-political concepts that go aversion to any form of social inequality, in- beyond the granting of legal equality in politi- cluding performance-based inequality, hence cal and civil life to instead aim for an

27 F.A. Hayek, “Why I Am Not a Conservative” in The Burkean Whig, and thus would consider Burke a Constitution of Liberty, “Postscript,” 519-33. See true liberal and not an object in his critique of “con- Martin Rhonheimer, “Warum Hayek kein Konser- servativism”). vativer war: Ein Beitrag zur aktuellen Liberalis- 28 Dietrich Schindler, Verfassungsrecht und soziale musdebatte,” ORDO – Jahrbuch für die Ordnung von Struktur, 5th ed. (Zürich: Schulthess Juristische Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft 67 (2016): 481-497. Medien, 1970), 142-33. (Translator’s note: For the American audience it is worth noting that Hayek considered himself a

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 15

egalitarian, legally “constructed” transfor- society, and it continues to do so in an extraor- mation of society in its interior. Even if law and dinarily effective manner, because many liber- order have the task of reacting to social devel- als today have become their allies out of pure opments, this does not mean that new forms short-sightedness. of social life—such as new forms of “family”— ■ should be invented. In any case, one cannot derive such demands from the essence of liberalism. It was the “left” Cultural Revolution that Translated from German by Thomas and Kira championed this against liberal bourgeois Howes.

About the author:

Martin Rhonheimer, born 1950 in Zurich, was Professor of Ethics and Political Philosophy from 1990 to 2020 at the Faculty of Philosophy of the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome. He remains associated with the university as a visiting professor. He is co-founder and president of the Austrian Institute of Economics and Social Philosophy and lives in Vienna.

He studied history, philosophy and political science in Zurich and theology in Rome. In 1977, he died his doctorate with Hermann Lübbe at the University of Zurich. From 1972-1978, he was assistant to Hermann Lübbe at the Philosophical Seminar of the University of Zurich. 1981/82 research assistant to Otfried Höffe at the University of Freiburg, Switzerland. Research fellow (ha- bilitation project) of the Fritz Thyssen Foundation, Cologne. Since 1982 collaboration with Wolf- gang Kluxen, Bonn.

In 1983 he was ordained priest in Rome by Pope John Paul II (incardination in the personal prel- ature Opus Dei). Since 1990 he has been Professor of Ethics and Political Philosophy at the Fac- ulty of Philosophy of the Pontifical University of Santa Croce in Rome (since 2015 without teaching obligations).

He is a member of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts, corresponding member of the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas, member of the Friedrich A. von Hayek Society (Ber- lin) and a founding member of the Lord Acton Circle.

Numerous publications in professional journals and anthologies, mainly in the fields of ethics and political philosophy as well as economic and social philosophy, including several books, some of which have been translated into various languages. Currently, his work focuses on economic and social-philosophical issues, in particular the study of the Austrian School of

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 16

Economics and its philosophical, ethical, political social implications; the tradition of the “Social Market Economy”, the development of Christian social teaching, especially Catholic Social Doc- trine, and the critical examination of the idea and reality of the welfare state as well as related political-philosophical and ethical issues, in particular those referring to the theory of justice. Last books:

Christentum und säkularer Staat. Geschichte – Gegenwart – Zukunft (Mit einem Vorwort von Ernst-Wolfgang Böckenförde), Herder, Freiburg i. Br. 2012,

Homo sapiens: die Krone der Schöpfung. Herausforderungen der Evolutionstheorie und die Ant- wort der Philosophie, Springer VS, Wiesbaden 2016.

The Common Good of Constitutional Democracy. Essays in Political Philosophy and on Catholic Social Doctrine, Catholic University of America Press, Washington D.C., 2013.

Die Perspektive der Moral. Philosophische Grundlagen der Tugendethik, Akademie Verlag, Berlin 2001.

Libertad económica, capitalismo y ética cristiana. Ensayos para un encuentro entre economía de mercado y pensamiento cristiano, Unión Editorial, Madrid 2017.

Personal website:

Martin Rhonheimer’s Homepage at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, Rome

How to cite this paper: Martin Rhonheimer, “Has Liberalism Failed? Patrick Deneen’s Populist Anti-Liberalism: A Catholic Classical Liberal’s Response,” Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020).

Original version (online) and Download of the Working Paper: https://austrian-institute.org/en/blog/has-liberalism-failed-patrick-deneens-populist- anti-liberalism-a-catholic-classical-liberals-response

Austrian Institute Paper No. 35-EN (2020) Page 17