Liberalism and Its Critics
Psc 3192W/Psc 8105
Fall 2011
Prof. Ingrid Creppell
Phone (202) 994-4106
creppell@gwu.edu
Monroe Hall of Gov 420
2115 G Street, NW, DC
“Liberalism” – a set of ideas about politics, government and human nature – got its start in
western political thinking in the late 17th century. Now, after the collapse of the Soviet system
and its ideological basis, liberal ideals appear to dominate as the normative framework for
conceptualizing political authority, order, and values. Nevertheless, diverse cultural-political
movements including e.g. religious fundamentalism, and continuing authoritarian systems,
challenge the hegemony of liberalism. Intellectual and theoretical critiques of liberal ideas have
existed from the beginning.
In this course we examine the foundations and basic components of liberal theory and then
consider its most prominent challengers. Liberalism cannot be captured in one succinct definition
or single idea but consists in a cluster of values and approaches toward politics, power, and the
person. We might say that it is a theory of how to live life/what is of value, and a theory of
politics and government. The set of typical values includes toleration, individual rights, limits on
government, rule of law, separation of public/private spheres, autonomy, choice, and
universalism. The attacks on liberalism derive from various sources: liberal bias toward
individualism to the exclusion of cultural and political community; liberalism’s rationalism
ignoring the deeper, background forces constraining human possibilities; liberalism’s illusions
about its own universality and neutrality in the face of its coerciveness. These are only some
lines of argument we will consider.
I hope at the conclusion of the course that we have a clearer sense of the tradition of liberalism –
its strengths and weakness, its limitations and potentials – and that we can think through its
cogency as an explanatory framework and as a normative perspective in addressing the
challenges posed by contemporary political problems and conflicts of world-view.
Course Requirements:
1. Class participation (15%): Attend seminars having read the primary texts. Seminars are
based on participation and this requires preparation. You will be asked to comment in
each class. Frequent absences will seriously detract from the final grade. (Background
reading is suggested for those interested in examining a thinker in more depth.)
2. Presentation (15%): You will be responsible for one class presentation during the
semester. This presentation should be approximately 10 minutes in length and give a
succinct review of the reading before offering your analysis. You should prepare a handout for your presentation.
3. Two 10-12 page papers (35% each). I will suggest paper topics from which to choose.
 Paper 1 (October 21; 1st draft due Oct. 14): on the defense or articulation of some
feature of liberalism theory;
 Paper 2 (December 19; 1st draft Dec. 13): on a critique of liberal theory
Those students taking this as a WID will be required to submit a rough draft of each paper.
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Learning Outcomes:
1. Be able to situate the foundations of liberal thought in historical and conceptual
context.
2. Understand the core components of “liberal theory” and the major theoretical
controversies pertaining to them: toleration, freedom, equality, rights, justice, etc.
3. Identify the major reactions against liberal theory and their arguments.
4. Demonstrate competency in analyzing and critiquing texts in political theory.
5. Demonstrate capacity to ask theoretical and ethical questions about political
principles.
The following books are available for purchase:
Locke on Toleration, Cambridge University Press, 2010 (Hackett edition also fine)
Locke, Two Treatises of Government, Cambridge University Press, 1988
Mill, On Liberty, Cambridge University Press, 1989
Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morality, Cambridge University Press, 2006
Foucault, Discipline and Punish, Vintage Books, 1995
Rawls, Justice as Fairness, Harvard University Press, 2001
Schmitt, The Concept of the Political, University of Chicago Press, 1996/2007
8/30
Intro: What is liberalism?
Classical Foundations I
9/6
Religious pluralism
Locke: Letter Concerning Toleration (1689)
Background reading:
Ruth Grant, John Locke’s Liberalism, Chicago, 1987.
John Horton & Susan Mendus, eds. A Letter Concerning Toleration in focus, Routledge,
1991.
Ingrid Creppell, “Locke on Toleration: The Transformation of Constraint,” Political
Theory, May 1996.
9/13
Limited government & property rights
Locke: Second Treatise of Government (1689)
Background reading:
Richard Ashcraft, Revolutionary Politics & Locke’s Two Treatises of Government,
Princeton UP, 1986.
James Tully, An Approach to Political Philosophy: Locke in Contexts, Cambridge UP,
1993.
Classical Foundations II
9/20
Progress, autonomy, individuality, anti-paternalism
Kant: What is Enlightenment? (1784) (hand-out)
Mill, On Liberty, (1859) Ch. 1-4
Background reading:
John Christian Laursen, “The Subversive Kant,” Political Theory, Vol. 14, 4.
(Nov., 1986)
Elizabeth Ellis, Kant's Politics: Provisional Theory for an Uncertain World, Yale UP,
2005.
Jonathan Riley, Mill on Liberty, Routledge, 1998.
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Contemporary Foundations
9/27
Negative freedoms
Berlin, Two Concepts of Liberty (1958) (e-reserves)
Shklar, Liberalism of Fear (1989) (e-reserves)
Background reading:
John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, Princeton UP, 1996.
Bernard Yack, Liberalism Without Illusions, U. of Chicago Press, 1996.
10/4
Egalitarianism
Rawls, Justice as Fairness (2001)
Background reading:
Samuel Freeman, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Rawls, Cambridge UP 2003
10/11
Egalitarianism vs. Libertarianism
Rawls, Justice as Fairness (2001)
Hayek, selections from Law, Legislation and Liberty (1973) (e-reserves)
Background reading:
Gray, John, 1998. Hayek on Liberty
Reactions to Liberalism
10/18
Conservatism
Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France, (1790), selections (e-reserves)
Oakeshott, On Being Conservative (1956) (pdf.)
Background reading:
Kramnick, Isaac. The Rage of Edmund Burke: Portrait of an Ambivalent Conservative,
Basic Books, 1977.
Spinner, Jeff. "Constructing Communities: Edmund Burke on Revolution," Polity, Vol.
23, No. 3 (Spring, 1991)
Paul Franco, Michael Oakeshott: An Introduction, Yale, 2004.
10/25
Marxism
Marx, On the Jewish Question (1843)
Communist Manifesto (1848),
German Ideology, (1846), selections
Background reading:
Schlomo Avineri, The Social and Political Thought of Karl Marx, Cambridge UP, 1970.
Suchting, W.A. Marx: An Introduction, NYU Press, 1983.
11/1
Anti-egalitarianism
Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morality (1887)
Background reading:
Keith Ansell-pearson, An Introduction to Nietzsche as Political Thinker,
Cambridge UP, 1994.
Daniel Conway, Nietzsche and the Political, Routledge, 1997.
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11/8
Postmodernism
Foucault, Discipline and Punish (originally 1975)
Background reading:
Sara Mills, Michel Foucault, Routledge, 2003.
Hoy, D. (Ed.). Foucault. Oxford, Blackwell, 1986.
11/15
Limits of legalism
Schmitt, The Concept of the Political (first published 1927/1932)
Background reading:
David Dyzenhaus, ed. Law as Politics: Carl Schmitt’s Critique of Liberalism, Duke UP,
1998.
Peter C. Caldwell, “Controversies over Carl Schmitt: A Review of Recent Literature,”
The Journal of Modern History, Vol. 77, No. 2 (June 2005): 357-87.
11/22
No Class
11/29
Communitarianism
Hegel, Philosophy of Right, (1821), Preface (e-reserves)
Walzer, Spheres of Justice, (1983) selections
MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (1988) selections
Background reading:
Fred R. Dallmayr, “Minerva at Dusk: Hegel’s Philosophy of Right” in
G.W.F. Hegel: Modernity and Politics, Sage, 1993.
Nancy L. Rosenblum, Review: “Moral Membership in a Postliberal State,” World
Politics, 1984, pp. 581-596
Kelvin Knight, ed. MacIntyre Reader, Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press,
1998)
12/6
Feminism & Multiculturalism
Susan M. Okin, Justice, Gender and the Family, (1989) selections
I.M. Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference, (1990) selections
Background reading:
Joshua Cohen, “Okin on Justice, Gender, and the Family” in Canadian Journal of
Philosophy, Vol 22, No. 2, June 1992, pp. 263-286.
Nancy Fraser, “Recognition or Redistribution? A Critical Reading of Iris Young's Justice
and the Politics of Difference” The Journal of Political Philosophy, Vol 3, Issue 2, June
1995, pp 166-180.
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