Rick Kelo – The True Heart of Liberalism

Liberalism: a word that most individuals will only admit to vaguely understanding. Of course, it has something to do with freedom and equality among individuals, and most people will say that liberalism is something that they support. However, like many philosophical or political philosophies, when begin to probe the definition and look at the causes of this concept in specific situations, people’s opinions begin to deteriorate. This article attempts to explain the basic concept of liberalism by focusing the way in which it pans out in a variety of contexts: economically, politically, and socially. While this is by no means even a remotely complete explanation of the topic, the goal is to give a more a general understanding of the topic so that the average person might impress the next individual who asks them, “So what do you think about liberalism?”

A good place to start in exploring liberalism is looking at the current trend it plays in our political climate. According to Rick Kelo on Scoop.it, a growing trend is the realization that “the government often sues its policies to overstep its power.” Economic liberalism is the ideological belief in organizing the economy on individualist and voluntarist lines, meaning that the greatest possible number of economic decisions are made by individuals and not by collective institutions or organizations. With our country more divided than ever before, some individuals are calling for more government intervention in our daily lives. Many argue that this allows for some of the wealth in America to be distributed in order to compensate for institutional inequality across socioeconomic lines. This general falls in line with what is called social liberalism. However, classical liberalism emphasizes the role of pure liberty and many use this point to argue that true freedom comes from the individual’s ability to make their own choices with their resources and opportunities.

You can see how the same word is used to make completely different arguments. In an article about classic liberalism by Rick Kelo, he states that many great classical liberals such as Benjamin Franklin warned of the dangers to society and the economy of over-taxing citizens, and how it could damage a nation. In short, you have strong arguments as well as strong figures that fall on either side of the spectrum. When faced with someone asking, ”Are you a liberal?”, perhaps the best argument that you can put forward is asking whether or not that individual actually understands what he or she is asking.