Reclaiming Democratic Classical Liberalism

https://www.ellerman.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Article-from-ReclaimingLiberalismEbook.pdf

“[L]iberalism expresses a skepticism about government[s] being able to “do good” for people. Instead an important role of government is to … maintain the conditions for people to be empowered and enabled to do good for themselves, for example, in establishing … the private property prerequisites for the functioning of a market economy as emphasized in … economic [thought] (e.g., Heyne et al. 2006, pp. 36–38).”
@liberalism

  • Cagi@lemmy.ca
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    8 months ago

    Classical liberalism is what empowered non blue bloods to achieve wealth and power, an important step toward a just society. But classical liberalism still has aristocratic classes hoarding more than fair share, others living hand to mouth, human well-being is secondary to private economic concerns. The spice must flow.

    We need to move to the next step, liberalism has more than run its course, the solution isn’t to move backwards.

    • J Lou@mastodon.socialOP
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      8 months ago

      The linked article doesn’t suggest moving backwards. The main class divide in usual liberalism is employer vs. employee. The article advocates that divide’s abolition based on an inalienable rights argument.

      “The … result is that the inalienability argument applies as well to … today’s employment contract—as to the self-sale contract[.] … That requires re-constituting the corporation as a democratic organization” where workers control the firm and get the positive and negative result