Classical Liberalism died one-hundred years ago this week, its promise of peace and prosperity carried off like 16 million souls in the meat-grinder of the First World War.
A long, interesting read. Grab a coffee. (h/t Adrian)
Classical Liberalism died one-hundred years ago this week, its promise of peace and prosperity carried off like 16 million souls in the meat-grinder of the First World War.
A long, interesting read. Grab a coffee. (h/t Adrian)
Yeah well, any who think they understand it….ain’t been properly briefed….
“The actual war profiteers of all mixed economies were and are of that type: men with political pull who acquire fortunes by government favour, during or after a war—fortunes which they could not have acquired on a free market.”
The Clinton wealth creator is EU Socialism. We are all headed down the same path to WWIII. Why do Statist’s seek the impossible?
Great read- Kate thank you for posting. The principal of subsidiarity is once again the answer to many, many ills I believe. Definition – Subsidiarity is an organizing principle that matters ought to be handled by the smallest, lowest or least centralized competent authority. Political decisions should be taken at a local level if possible, rather than by a central authority.
Hey, thanks for the link, Kate. Really appreciate it.
Yes, very interesting. It is basically statism versus liberty. The same argument is ongoing, with the artists still on the statist side, ironically, as they consider themselves l’avant garde of progressivism (AKA statism) and hence amongst the angels.
WWIII has already been fought – the Cold War.
We are in now WWIV which, paradoxically, preceded the other three – against islam.
… hope you’re stocked up on canned goods. And go for a swim already big guy!
“The bigger the state the smaller the citizen.” – Dennis Praeger, though I think it was said earlier.
Peter
Would have left some comments but can never get past your captcha (prove your not a robot) when posting as Anonymous(don’t have any of the other ID’s) and you have no email to send comments to.
Adrian
@Adrian: Sorry about that. I do plan to fix that ASAP. (But it is similar to Kate’s, which I had to fill out to post here.) Anyway, no huhu: I’m happy to respond to comments here, if you like?
A very interesting read. It seems we are looking once again at many of the same tinder piles that were prevalent in 1914. Just waiting for the spark to set it ablaze. We have now advanced to inter connected world wide traders but the financial picture with very few exceptions in the free world looks gloomy and heading for a crash that will impact every nation on the planet. If we had true free trade and government stayed out of the way in commerce and our personal lives , who knows ? Peace might have lasted another hundred years. As Reagan stated, ” Government can’t solve the problem, government is the problem”. Reading that well written article brings on a strong feeling of dejavu.
“Peace and Prosperity” is not the promise of Classical Liberalism, it is the reality of Classical Liberalism. as the hundred or so years before WWI demonstrated. Peace and Prosperity is the promise of Statism, of which it’s reality is the opposite.
Peter
I won’t take up to much of Kates comments pages, but I will thank you for what was, and I think as has already been mentioned here, a well structured and informative piece. It brought forward some things that I wasn’t particularly aware of and I was so pleased to see the graph and reference to global trading and to whom it benefited. Recently back in the UK I’ve had some rather concerning conversations with “Godchildren” and people slightly younger than myself, what they are being taught, actually indoctrinated with is basically a re-write of history. One was asked as part of his AS to write about the impact on society of the period 18-1900, instead of the great strides so clearly outlined by your article he was supposed to write about the evils of the “workhouse” the disaster of industrialisation and the exploitation of the working classes to benefit a wealthy elite aristocracy, I tried to counter and outlined the benefits but not quite as eloquently as you have put it.
I was blessed having a father that had me much later in life, we didn’t do too much of the stuff other children and fathers did, but I did learn about things most other children’s grandfathers knew, he had first hand experience of the 1920’s depression, the decline of the Empire after the Victorian era and the rise of International Socialism, he explained much that is now conveniently forgotten.
I’m sure as an architect you will be familiar with many old buildings not only in the UK, with the engraved words “Reading Rooms” on facade somewhere, here in his youth they would go to hear first hand from returning travellers/salesmen/explorers those that plied trade and adventure within the empire and further afield, as a youth and young man they were well aware of what was happening not only in the Empire which of course was huge but also Europe and he was as well versed in what was happening with trading partners like China/Japan just as well as everywhere from Australia and Vanuatu but also different cultures, beliefs and politics of places todays youth haven’t even heard of.
The folly of youth that we all had, that the previous generation didn’t have the understanding we had with our modern advances was brutally laid bare by my fathers experience and seeing the decline of, as you say “classical” liberalism and the replacement with internationalism and socialism the basis of the last centuries follies firmly planted in the 1920’s-30’s including the present unfolding train wrecks.
Again thanks for writing, and hopefully with pieces like this we can try and staunch the spread of revisionism.
Liberalism is what lead to nazism and communisim their more alike then you might think
Thanks again, Adrian, and others, for your kind words. (I exclude the ignorant Mr Plover from those thanks.)
Indeed it’s hard to imagine how youngsters who get their history from their schools could ever integrate the lies they’ve learned into anything approaching an understanding of how the world worked, and works.
And on your comment about “Reading Rooms”: I just returned from a long weekend in Melbourne (which is why I’m late in replying), and was interested to stumble across two old private libraries that are still going from the 19th century, that were started and still sustained by private subscribers wanting to discover more about the world they live in. Strangely, even socialists of the early 20th century were keen on learning — in those days, as you probably know, trades unions for example would provide reading rooms and host lectures so their members could be fully informed and education could be spread. They too would probably be horrified at the mis-education now delivered to impressionable young minds.