This thread
Liberal and conservative are relative terms, meaning they are not defined by the particular debates of a particular time. What it meant to be liberal in the 18th century is not the same as what it means to be liberal in 2018. In their most general sense, liberals embrace "the new" while conservatives embrace "the traditional". Again, and in other words, what is "new" or "traditional" in 2018 is much different than what was "new" or "traditional" in the 18th century.
So, basically, modern state politics in western society began during th 17th century (Scientific Revolution,
Westphalian Sovereignty, inductive reasoning, English Civil War, Glorious Revolution, etc.) and further developed into the 18th century (Enlightenment, American Revolution, French Revolution), and two camps developed:
Classical Conservatives:
Absolutism (
per Thomas Hobbes)
Mercantilism (
per Cardinal Richelieu)
Defined social hierarchy (per the
Great Chain of Being/Feudal System/Thee Estate System)
Catholicism
Classical Liberals:
Limited Government/Constitutionalism (
per John Locke)
Free Market Economics (per
Smith' Economic Liberalism,
Malthusian Theory,
Ricardo's Iron Law of Wages, etc.)
Meritocracy
Protestantism
The British were the first to put into practice Classical Liberalism (Glorious Revolution, 1689) and, by the early 1800's, were achieving the world's first Industrial Revolution, and the world's first true global empire. They were also the first to experience the pitfalls of free market economics. It's one thing for Ricardo to theorize on the Iron Law of Wages, it's another to
witness it first hand.
Liberals, based on the suffering of the working class, began to adapt into "Utilitarian" or "Progressive" Liberals, based on the philosophy and writing of
Jeremy Bentham &
John Stuart Mill. Their basic premise was that the government should embrace free market economic policies, but should intervene/regulate/limit the economy only when free market forces were denying the constitutionally guaranteed rights of all citizens (life, liberty, property).
America went through basically the same exact process in the late 1800's/early 1900's, and had it's own "Progressive" era (Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, etc)
By the 1920's & 1930's, in America, Progressive Liberals began to support significantly more authority to the federal government (New Deal, World War II Mobilization), and, contrarily, Conservatives became the ones looking to the past success of free market economics and limited government ideology.
The last wrinkle came in the 1960's when the Democratic Party (
who had previously been the party of the south) embraced the Civil Rights Movement per their growing Progressive stance. The Republic Party resisted (because: racism),in theory, based on their limited government belief that "social justice" couldn't be achieved by government mandate.
So, in short, 21st century liberals and conservatives are essentially opposite of their classical counterparts:
Current Liberals:
Powerful Federal Government
Progressive Capitalism
Current Conservatives:
Limited Federal Government
Free Market Capitalism
and tell I don't know shyt about shyt. They would say well that's cuz you're a liberal.
and keep it moving. They get mad and pretty much never talk to me again.
