Liberalism
Subtitle: the life of an idea
By: Edmund Fawcett
Edition: Second edition.
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Published: 2018
Language: eng
Number of pages: 513
ISBN-13: 9780691180380
Subjects: Liberalism
Description: "Despite playing a decisive role in shaping the past two hundred years of American and European politics, liberalism is no longer the dominant force it once was. In this expanded and updated edition of what has become a classic history of liberalism, Edmund Fawcett traces its ideals, successes, and failures through the lives and ideas of exemplary thinkers and politicians from the early nineteenth century to today. Significant revisions - including a new conclusion - reflect recent changes affecting the world political order that many see as presenting new and very potent threats to the survival of liberal democracy as we know it. A richly detailed account of a vulnerable but critically important political creed, this book reminds us that to defend liberalism it is vital to understand its character and history."--Backcover.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (pages 467-494) and indexes.
Table of contents: title: Introduction: the practice of liberalism; title: Part one. The confidence of youth (1830-1880); title: Historical setting in the 1830s: thrown into a world of ceaseless change; title: Guiding thoughts from founding thinkers: conflict, resistance, progress, and respect; title: Liberalism in practice: four exemplary politicians; title: The nineteenth-century legacy: liberalism without caricature; title: Part two. Liberalism in maturity and the struggle with democracy (1880-1945); title: Historical setting in the 1880s: the world liberals were making; title: The compromises that gave us liberal democracy; title: The economic powers of the modern state and modern market; title: Damaged ideals and broken dreams; title: Thinking about liberalism in the 1930s-1940s; title: Part three. Second chance and success (1945-1989); title: Historical setting after 1945: liberal democracy's new start; title: New foundations: rights, a democratic rule of law, and welfare; title: Liberal thinking after 1945; title: The breadth of liberal politics in the 1950s-1980s; title: Part four. Liberal dreams and nightmares in the twenty-first century; title: Two decades that shook liberal democracy; title: The primacy of politics.