Liberal meaning

• v • t • e In In the first half of the 20th century, both major American parties had a Overview [ ] The modern liberal philosophy strongly endorses public spending on programs such as liberal and progressive viewpoints is debated. In 1941, Franklin D. Roosevelt defined a liberal party in the following terms: The liberal party believes that, as new conditions and problems arise beyond the power of men and women to meet as individuals, it becomes the duty of the Government itself to find new remedies with which to meet them. The liberal party insists that the Government has the definite duty to use all its power and resources to meet new social problems with new social controls—to ensure to the average person the right to his own economic and political In 1960, John F. Kennedy defined a liberal as follows: What do our opponents mean when they apply to us the label, "Liberal"? If by "Liberal" they mean, as they want people to believe, someone who is soft in his policies abroad, who is against local government, and who is unconcerned with the taxpayer's dollar, then the record of this party and its members demonstrate that we are not that kind of "Liberal." But, if by a "Liberal," they mean someone who looks ahead and not behind, someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions, someone who cares about the welfare of the people—their health, their housing, their schools, their jobs, their civil rights, and their civil liberties—someone who believes that we can break thr...

'Liberal' shares a root with 'liberty' and can mean anything from "generous" to "loose" to "broad-minded." Politically, it means "“a person who believes that government should be active in supporting social and political change." Liberal can be traced back to the Latin word liber (meaning “free”), which is also the root of liberty ("the quality or state of being free") and libertine ("one leading a dissolute life"). However, we did not simply take the word liber and make it into liberal; our modern term for the inhabitants of the leftish side of the political spectrum comes more recently from the Latin liberalis, which means “of or constituting liberal arts, of freedom, of a freedman.” We still see a strong connection between our use of the word liberal and liber in the origins of liberal arts. In Latin, liber functioned as an adjective, to describe a person who was “free, independent,” and contrasted with the word servus (“slavish, artes liberales (“liberal arts”) and artes serviles (“servile arts”); the former were geared toward freemen (consisting of such subjects as grammar, logic, and rhetoric), while the latter were more concerned with occupational skills. We borrowed liberal arts from French in the 14th century, and sometime after this liberal began to be used in conjunction with other words (such as education, profession, and pastime). When paired with these other words liberal was serving to indicate that the things described were fitting for a person of high soci...

Liberalism is more than one thing. On any close examination, it seems to fracture into a range of related but sometimes competing visions. In this entry we focus on debates within the liberal tradition. (1) We contrast three interpretations of liberalism’s core commitment to liberty. (2) We contrast ‘old’ and ‘new’ liberalism. (3) We ask whether liberalism is a ‘comprehensive’ or a ‘political’ doctrine. (4) We close with questions about the ‘reach’ of liberalism — does it apply to all humankind? Must all political communities be liberal? Could a liberal coherently answer this question by saying No? Could a liberal coherently answer this question by saying Yes? “By definition,” Maurice Cranston says, “a liberal is a man who believes in liberty” (1967: 459). In two ways, liberals accord liberty primacy as a political value. (i) Liberals have typically maintained that humans are naturally in “a State of perfect Freedom to order their Actions…as they think fit…without asking leave, or depending on the Will of any other Man” (Locke, 1960 [1689]: 287). Mill too argued that “the burden of proof is supposed to be with those who are against liberty; who contend for any restriction or prohibition…. The a priori assumption is in favour of freedom…” (1963, vol. 21: 262). Recent liberal thinkers such as as Joel Feinberg (1984: 9), Stanley Benn (1988: 87) and John Rawls (2001: 44, 112) agree. Liberalism is a philosophy that starts from a premise that political authority and law must be ...

The two major political parties in the United States, the Democratic and Republican Parties, correspond closely with liberal and conservative ideologies, respectively. These ideologies influence US policy debates, which often concern the appropriate amount of government intervention in the economy or in social behavior. Although there’s a strong correlation between an individual’s ideology and their party choice, Americans hold a range of opinions on economic and social issues that don’t always fit neatly onto a simple “left-right” continuum. For this reason, some political scientists have proposed a political “spectrum” that charts individual beliefs on multiple dimensions. Term Definition conservative ideology Conservatives tend to believe that government should be small, operating mainly at the state or local level. They favor minimal government interference in the economy and prefer private sector-based solutions to problems. “Social conservatives” believe that government should uphold traditional morality, and therefore should impose restrictions on contraception, abortion, and same-sex marriage. Conservatives are said to fall on the “right wing” of the axis of political beliefs, a convention that dates from the place where conservatives sat in assembly during the French Revolution. Democratic Party One of the two main political parties in the United States. Founded in 1828 by supporters of Andrew Jackson, the Democratic Party is the world’s oldest active political pa...

What is liberal education? How can colleges support it? And how can they attract more students to pursue it? At a conference on such questions at Ursinus College, outside Philadelphia, the vice president for enrollment at Grinnell College, a far wealthier liberal arts institution in Iowa, shared the pitch he currently offers students and parents. “I haven’t even done this for the Grinnell faculty,” Joseph Bagnoli Jr. said Friday to the audience of professors and others. “So it’s a little daunting to do this in front of liberal arts experts… I’d love to hear your feedback, in the interest of the best part of our tradition.” Most Popular Stories “The term ‘liberal arts’ neither means liberal in the political sense, nor is it limited to the arts,” Bagnoli, who’s also Grinnell’s dean of admission and financial aid, says in his pitch. "Rather, this term dates back to classical antiquity and refers to the mastery of subjects deemed essential to becoming a free person.” His pitch then discusses how “liberal artists” think critically, practice civil discourse and “let intellectual curiosity guide their investigations into truth, equity and justice.” He then provides students “some examples of the complex questions that they might engage.” “Why does the U.S. have 5 percent of the world’s population but 25 percent of the world’s prisoners?” he asks. “Why have more than 100 million people living in the world today been forcibly displaced from their homes? With near-unanimous consent ...

Compiled by the Editors. Copyright 2005 (revised 2010) StudentNewsDaily.com. We all want the same things in life. We want freedom; we want the chance for prosperity; we want as few people suffering as possible; we want healthy children; we want to have crime-free streets. The argument is how to achieve them… Liberals believe in government action to achieve equal opportunity and equality for all. It is the duty of the government to alleviate social ills and to protect civil liberties and individual and human rights. Believe the role of the government should be to guarantee that no one is in need. Liberal policies generally emphasize the need for the government to solve problems. Conservatives believe in personal responsibility, limited government, free markets, individual liberty, traditional American values and a strong national defense. Believe the role of government should be to provide people the freedom necessary to pursue their own goals. Conservative policies generally emphasize empowerment of the individual to solve problems. Related comparison page: And check out our page: NOTE: The terms “left” and “right” define opposite ends of the political spectrum. In the United States, liberals are referred to as the left or left-wing and conservatives are referred to as the right or right-wing. On the U.S. political map, blue represents the Democratic Party (which generally upholds liberal principles) and red represents the Republican party (which generally upholds conserva...

• They were quite generous, donating to several charities. • She is incredibly open-handed and won't hesitate to donate whenever asked. • Our professor is quite free with his time and will often extend office hours to accommodate extra students. • There are fewer philanthropic billionaires than one would assume. • Oxfam is a well-known charitable organization working to end global poverty.

The words But how did liberal politics become associated with the word left, anyways? And why are conservatives labelled as right? When we discuss the origins of words, we often warn against origin stories that sound too good to be true. Well, in this case, the history of the terms left and right in the context of politics turns out to be a fascinating exception. In this article, we’ll discuss the modern meanings of each term and then delve into the quite literal origins of how words for opposite directions came to be associated with opposing political views. We’ll cross the aisle to cover it all—right, left, and center. What does left mean? In politics, the word left is applied to people and groups that have The term far left is often used to refer to those who are considered to have more extreme, the Left or the What does right mean? The word right, in contrast, refers to people or groups that have The term far right is often used for more extreme, the Right or the right wing. The origin of left and right in politics The origin of the political left and right do actually have to with the physical directions, left and right. Time for a history lesson. Left and right originally referred to seating positions in the 1789 French National Assembly, the parliament France formed after the Relative to the viewpoint of the speaker (chair) of this assembly, to the right were seated le côté droit in French) became associated with more le côté gauche) with more Left and right, as pol...