Democracy means ‘power voted by the people for the people’ and see’s society as a whole, more important than the individual. In contrast, liberalism core principle lies with the individual. So for liberals to adopt democracy it is also adopting collectivist views of the majority, which is a fear towards liberalism and their beliefs of the single entity of the individual. A minority of liberals - none in the modern period- reject democracy, however, no liberals accept democracy uncritically. Plato and Aristotle believed that a fear did, run though liberals as they viewed democracy as a system of rule by the masses, thus an implication of individualism; seeing society as not as single individual entities but rather a collection of individual groups, possessing opposing interest.
This form of democracy ensures that each person of the country is conscious and acknowledges the government’s decisions, as well as being part of the decision-making. The quote strongly opposes the ideology of democratic liberalism, but identifies with classical conservatism as well as elitism. Therefore, the concept of elitism contrasts the ideology of democratic liberalism. The second source addresses a neutral comparison of democratic liberalism and classical conservatism. The author of the quote, Louis Brandeis, states that by both ideologies cannot coexist in the same society.
Let’s shift the focus by showing just how drastic these differences and concepts can be between the ideologies by looking at liberalism and socialism in terms of government and political systems. In order to understand the workings of a liberalist government we must understand their beliefs. Liberalism supports the idea of individualism over society in that people have the right to make choices for themselves, not society. Liberals believe in equality meaning that no person is morally or politically superior to another. They also believe that people as individuals are capable of thinking logically and rationally in areas of political science and economics, allowing the replacement of old, traditional views by newer and more appropriate views that fit today’s modern way of living.
Out of the ideologies that I compared and contrasted I would have to say that I agree more with Liberalism because of the belief that the most important goals should be individual liberty and equality. I think it is extremely important to set limits and obey boundaries but I also believe that we can and we should achieve that without violating people’s individual rights. Liberalism goes against anarchism in a sense that anarchism believes that there should be no government at all. In the United States, "liberalism" is most often used in the sense of social liberalism, which supports some regulation of business and other economic interventionism which they believe to be in the public interest. Liberalism suggests that government should intervene to “help” but never to “curb freedom.” Liberalism also says that ordinary men and women are entitled to satisfactory lives, but that individual liberties, including the right to prosper from ones efforts, should not be curtailed.
John Locke, an Enlightenment thinker, highly influenced the Declaration of Independence. He mentioned that he believed there were natural rights that all people had life, liberty and property. The Founding Fathers added that in the Declaration of Independence (Life, Liberty, and Pursuit of Happiness). Another idea Locke had was that if a ruler was oppressing his people, the people had the right to rebel. For Jefferson to write the Declaration it was considered treason, but he wrote in the
Firstly on of the fundamental features of democracy is that it establishes and protects freedom. Democracy should ensure that no government can threaten freedom unless it is with the expressed consent of the people. This is certainly true of the United Kingdom as the European Commission of Human Rights Parliament remains sovereign. Also the UK signed up to the Social Chapter of the European Union which guarantees a variety of employment and other economic rights. However, Parliament is sovereign and civil rights and liberties have been put suspended but only in the interests of law and order or national security.
Classical Liberalism and conservatism are just one of these systems that humans came up with as an ideal order of society. It is in my opinion that men need these systems in order to survive and compete with other humans. But that no ideology can be perfectly used on a society other than the society for which it was originally built. 1) Classical Liberalism is a term that refers to the ideology that advocates private property, an unhampered market economy, the rule of law and constitutional guarantees of freedom. The term classical is used in order to distinguish the original liberalism from the newly emerged forms of liberalism.
However, he noticed during his travel in America that the American democratic government had some dangers. In his book, Tocqueville were focus on the tyranny of the majority over minorities, the development of bad tendencies such as individualism and materialism but all those derived from a major problem which is the structure of the government that maintains liberty and equality in America. The fundamental principle of democracy is the sovereignty of the majority and that what Tocqueville states by saying in the beginning of the chapter seven that “The absolute sovereignty of the majority is the essence of democratic government, in democracy, nothing outside the majority is capable of mounting resistance to it”3. According to that statement, there is only one way to run the society and all decisions have to be on the will of the majority. But this led to despotism.
Authority is power in a positive way because the Government has the right to tell others what to do but they can’t force anyone. The democracy in Britain is often described as a liberal democracy because we have the ideas of “Limited government – checks and limitations on the power of government in order to secure essential liberties; Civil liberties and civil rights- the existence of essential public freedoms that are often written into law; Open government – non-secretive government that can be seen to be fair and accountable; Independent judiciary – a just, impartial
According to John Locke, a philosopher who contributed to classical liberalism's vitality, the protection of individuals' "life, liberty, and property" is their natural rights (Jones 227). The thoughts of classical liberalism revolves so much around the individual that Locke believes the people had the right to coalesce into a revolutionary force and systematize a new form of government, or a social contract, as they pleased. Due to the importance of the individual, classical liberalism favors immigrants and people of all classes. Ideally, the judgment of people