
Why Liberalism Failed - jkuria
https://www.economist.com/news/books-and-arts/21735578-its-best-years-are-behind-it-according-new-book-liberalism-most
======
abusoufiyan
I wonder what children in Western schools must think as they read Locke,
Hobbes, Rousseau, etc and look at the Western world around them which is so
roundly and loudly rejecting the very basis of their current society.

It never fails to amaze me how many people (even in this forum) can
rationalize both an intense desire to deny immigrants or "new" people into
their culture and yet maintain free speech and the marketplace of ideas as a
necessary thing to uphold for a free and just society.

If free speech is so good because good and true ideas always win in the end,
then why are Westerners so increasingly concerned about immigrants (and
specifically, in recent times, Muslims) entering their countries? If the ideas
which underly their societies are so true, exposure to them in the marketplace
of ideas should convert many of these immigrants to their way of thinking,
yes?

There is always the excuse that they are different, that they won't listen,
that they are too entrenched in religious belief, etc. What an anti-humanist
perspective to have for a society which owes so much of itself to humanism.
How are immigrants somehow not human enough to have the capacity to reason and
be convinced of ideas just as everyone else?

The anti-immigrant sentiment of Western societies is a direct manifestation of
the rejection of liberalism. I full-heartedly agree with both the book and
this review. There is, right now, a direct challenge to liberalism in the
Western world. No country which walled itself up and refused to admit
outsiders into its society could own the label of liberalism (in terms of the
classical philosophy which underpins much of Western society). Not Germany,
not China, nor will the Western world be able to do so if it does not steer
its ship straight again.

~~~
flukus
> It never fails to amaze me how many people (even in this forum) can
> rationalize both an intense desire to deny immigrants or "new" people into
> their culture and yet maintain free speech and the marketplace of ideas as a
> necessary thing to uphold for a free and just society.

Has it occurred to you that there positions is more nuanced than that? Very
few people are against immigration completely, just not mass migration that
has become common in much of the west.

As for the market place of ideas, the first problem is that converting people
is a slow process and can take many generations. The process can even go
backward at times depending on socio economic factors. The other issue is that
if you have enough migrants in sufficient concentration then they can build a
society within a society, almost entirely cut off from that market place.

~~~
abusoufiyan
But why are they against mass migration? It almost always has to do with the
culture of the current immigrants being different from the one of the host
country.

>As for the market place of ideas, the first problem is that converting people
is a slow process and can take many generations. The process can even go
backward at times depending on socio economic factors. The other issue is that
if you have enough migrants in sufficient concentration then they can build a
society within a society, almost entirely cut off from that market place.

So in your mind, the marketplace is not sufficient enough on its own and
requires regulations? That's very much not a liberal philosophical principle.
It's a rejection of the lassiez-faire approach to speech and ideas which the
liberal philosophers championed.

The things you mention apply to all humans, not just migrants. If for example
the Universe is heliocentric but the geocentric believers are in sufficient
concentration they too can just build a society within the society and shield
themselves from the heliocentric people, right? Why did that not happen?

The reason is that migrants cannot realistically avoid all the ideas of the
host country while living there. It's not possible. You cannot cut yourself
off from a market you live in.

