This week I have three books that defend liberalism. They refute three positions that have allowed progressives and conservatives to fly: anti-imperialism, religion and equality.
One of them is “Violent Saviors: The West’s Conquest of the Rest” by William Easterly. The author advances the extremely convincing thesis that the “mission to civilize” the “Rest” was profoundly, even stupidly, illiberal.
Catholic missionaries to First Nations, 19th-century imperialists, and “development” experts of the last 80 years have all demonstrated the arrogance of expertise (something Easterly wrote about and experienced: he worked for a long time at the World Bank). He indicates that treating women like children has the same metaphor at work: Oh, poor thing, let me help you — by stopping you, for example, from studying medicine.
Marxists and other leftists have stolen anti-imperialism. They claimed that recent European empires were the consequence of… liberalism. JA Hobson (1858-1940), Lenin (1870-1924) and many others believed that “late capitalism” required exploitation of the Third World. We still hear this statement made confidently by the Marxist academics who dominate Brazilian and American universities. This statement has never made sense.
Most classical liberals were staunch anti-imperialists, such as the Scot Adam Smith and the American Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862). Although there was the “empire” of Brazil, Peter 1° was in reality the freedman of the Portuguese empire, and Peter 2°, a model liberal leader, liberator of slaves.
The second book, which will be released in February, is called “No Coercion in Religion – No Exceptions: Islamic Cases for Religious Freedom,” edited by my Cato colleague Mustafa Akyol. Just like Easternly against imperialism, Akyol has for years been bringing liberal thought to confront the minority of Muslim countries consumed by hatred of freedom.
He says that Islam need not be anti-liberal – just as Christianity need not be, even though many recent anti-liberal Christian theorists, such as Patrick Deneen, have claimed that it is.
A thousand years ago, Islam was decidedly more liberal than the miserable Christians. Of the recent reimposition of mad tyranny in Afghanistan, Akyol writes: “But was it really the Islamic thing to do? Were the Taliban right, religiously?” He and other prominent Islamic scholars included in the book say no and cite the Quran (2:256) for support: “There is no compulsion in religion. »
The third book is mine: “Equality of Permission”, which will be released in September. Like the others, he denies illiberal absurdities. Easterly denies the absurd claim that liberalism caused imperialism and Akyol denies the absurd claim that Islam is illiberal. I deny the absurd claim that permission leads to inequality.
Enough nonsense. Liberalism is not a cruel, anti-poor and anti-third world “neoliberalism”. Nor is it the enemy of true religion. This is the natural life of liberated adults.
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