AN ESSAY IN INTERPRETATION BY PROFESSOR LASKI
"The Rise of European Liberalism," by Harold J. Laski. Published by George Allen and Unwin, London.
LIBERTY OF THE INDIVIDUAL
IN the nineteenth century the dominating idea in the political and social thought of the period was the doctrine of the liberty of the individual. Political freedom was sought to be attained by democratic institutions, economic liberty by the restriction of State interference in industry. In general it was considered that not merely was the general welfare best attained by allowing a maximum of freedom of action to individuals, but that individual liberty of action and thought was a value in itself, something to be sought for its own sake. In medieval times no such doctrine prevailed. Authority was the keynote of the period. Freedom of thought and action was strictly controlled by the dogmas of revealed religion and the moral code of Christianity. In modern times the pursuit of economic gain is regarded as an allowable and even praiseworthy end in itself, but in medieval times the economic interest of the individual was subordinated to consideration of the general welfare. Men lived within an economic order in which the effective social institutions, whether church or state or guild, judged economic activity by criteria derived from outside itself. Material utility was not accepted as a valid justification of economic behaviour. Heaven was man's destination, and his activities in this world were controlled accordingly. Hence competition was controlled, commerce was forbidden on religious grounds prices and the rate of interest were fixed, wages and hours were regulated, and speculation was, within wide limits, prohibited. But in the sixteenth century these medieval ideas began to give way to the habit of thought and system of ideas that are known as liberalism, and the question is, why did they do so?
PENETRATING ANALYSIS.
IN his essay, Professor Laski seeks to supply an answer to this question. To his task he brings qualifications which are possessed by few if any other writers of the present day. Not only is he an accomplished historian, but he is also a political philosopher with an encyclopaedic knowledge of the political writings of the period under consideration: indeed he almost irritates at times by the copiousness of his familiar allusions to writers of whom most people have never heard. The result is a profound and penetrating analysis of the fundamental ideas of liberalism, and of their relation to the historical evolution of the last four centuries. Professor Laski sees in liberalism an ideology invented to justify the methods and the predominance of the commercial class which gradually came to power in the period following the Renaissance and Reformation. Seeing the opportunities which lay before them to take advantage of the new geographical and technological discoveries, merchants and manufacturers rejected the traditional ideas which would have hampered them in their pursuit of gain, and asserted the right of the individual to free enterprise in the acquisition of wealth. They challenged the right of absolute monarchy to rule independently of their consent, thus evolving the doctrines of political liberty, and they next denied the right of the State, however controlled, to interfere with the economic freedom of the individual in the pursuit of gain, thus laying down the doctrine of laissez faire. In place of a society resting on status they substituted one the basis of which was freedom of contract between individuals. They persuaded themselves further that the freedom of the individual to pursue his own personal gain would promote the general welfare of society.
THE DOCTRINE OF LIBERALISM.
THUS Professor Laski sees liberalism as fundamentally a doctrine intended to secure to the middle classes their right to property and their right to pursue individual gain. Its more idealistic exponents did not of course limit its benefits to the middle classes, but Professor Laski lays stress on the fact that in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the founders of liberalism refused to extend their theories to cover the working classes in cases where middle class interests might be affected. Thus they energetically rejected the claim of the working classes to participation in the government of the State, and they denied them the right of combination against employers (which alone could give them equality of bargaining power) as being an infringement of the liberty of contract between employer and employee. In the end they were prepared to grant political rights to the working classes, but only on the understanding that rights of property were not to be interfered with — it probably never occurred to them that such rights would be questioned. Now that they are being questioned, Professor Laski notes a disposition on the part of the middle classes to throw overboard their liberal doctrines in favour of Fascism and similar anti-liberal theories. This supports the thesis that liberalism was intended to maintain middle-class interests.
THE LONELY FURROW OF THE IDEALIST.
HOWEVER, the thesis is one from which many people will violently dissent. They can point out that John Hampden was not a business man, and that many of the aristocracy fought against Charles I. They can point out that Quesnay, who founded the French school of Physiocrats, who propounded the doctrine of freedom of trade, was not a trader but a court physician. There is no doubt that John Stuart Mill when he wrote of liberty had much more in mind than to make the world safe for capitalists. And so on. But ideas have a habit of being carried further than their origin necessitated, and their extensions are accepted so long as they do not conflict too strongly with their essential basis. The notion of individual liberty is one which may well arouse the enthusiasm of a John Stuart Mill, and economic liberalism had practical advantages and triumphs which might easily persuade a man of its value even though he was not engaged in commerce himself. But theories do not gain general acceptance unless they meet the needs of a large and important class, and the idealist will plough a lonely furrow unless his ideas are such that the practical man of affairs can use them to further his own self-interest. An example was given above of how the doctrine of liberalism could be applied to maintain the position of the middle classes against other classes. On the whole Professor Laski's view would seem to be incontrovertible, and his essay constitutes a masterly analysis of the basis of the dominating political thought of the last four centuries.
W.N.H.
Telegraph (Brisbane, Qld.), 29 July 1936 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article181911415