The Historical Stages of Liberalism

Like most things Liberalism did not arrive fully formed, it has progressed in stages. In my opinion Liberalism has 9 stages that it has passed through and the latest one that it is still in. It has taken many wrong turns, had many false dawns and has had many failures. But because the endpoint is understood, the Autonomous Individual, that means that these can be corrected. It also means that people and organisations can start their own initiatives without any central authority. The logic of Liberalism is brilliant. This logic stops opposition as they are often reacting to something that Liberalism has begun.

The 10 stages are:

The Proto-Stage

The Reformation

The English Revolution

The Enlightenment

The French Revolution

Organisation

Progessivism

Liberal Socialism

Death of Classical Liberalism

End of the Cold War

Each stage overlaps with it's neighbour and while I will provide dates, depending upon the location these can vary.

The Proto-Stage
In the Ancient world there were Liberal ideas, it did not spring from nothing. You can find these ideas come from the Greeks, the Bible and the Romans, Republican and Imperial. But none of these survived in anything but the written word, or the implied written word. In the Middle Ages you start to find proto-Liberal ideas as well. Nearly always these are Christian ideas that the church declares to be a heresy. 

The Reformation
Whether Protestantism is a heresy or not is an argument for another day, what is beyond dispute is that the Catholic Church viewed it as such. Officially, it was regarded as a heresy until the Cold War. For the history of Liberalism the Reformation is important because it allows ideas that were once kept in check to exist and even to thrive. It also introduced arguments that attacked the very foundation of Christian belief. Here is where the idea that church and state were separate things began and that the state decided that it was supreme.

The English Revolution
The English Civil War was fought in the 1640's, but it didn't end until the Glorious Revolution of 1688. The war was not simply a political conflict, it was also a religious conflict. Between Anglican and Puritan. The Puritans won, twice, and that would push ideas that started within religion to move into political philosophy. And in time into Ideology. Thomas Hobbes book Leviathan would also provide a foundation for Liberalism because he introduced the idea of the social contract, a contract between the individual and the state. Not between families, or communities, in Leviathan there is only the individual and the state. This was also the time of the Levelers and the Quakers. A time of radical thinking. The Glorious Revolution was the second victory of the puritans, it transformed England into the first Liberal state. Not a liberalism we would recognise, but the beginnings of one.     

The Enlightenment
The 1700's is generally regarded as the period of the Enlightenment. What started with the Reformation takes it next big step here. The rejection of the supernatural in all it's forms, superstition, prophecy, miracles and God. And the institutions that believe in the supernatural. Man is now to take control of his own destiny. This also leads to the rejection of the past, particularly the Middle Ages. It also see's the creation of the second Liberal state, the United States.

The French Revolution
Whether the French Revolution is Liberal or not is up for debate. It certainly pushed ideas that are now regarded as Liberal. It was it's violent rejection of God, Church and King which was a radical departure from the past. This let to two different paths, one which was championed in the English speaking world said that personal liberty and property rights were supreme, that trade, free trade was the right policy. The second path was the European path which said that the state existed to make decisions and that the individual was free to do what they wanted as long as the state approved.

Organisation
Before the 1830's Liberalism was ill-defined and its adherents were generally unorganised. They came together for a campaign, against slavery for example, and then went their own way. Now they began to form more permanent organisations. Here is were most political parties start to be formed, before that they were loose groupings, now they became organised and disciplined. This also meant that they began to push their agenda in an organised way. Before this time it is unusual to find laws that are clearly Liberal, from the 1830's that changes dramatically. This is also the age of Laissez Faire.

Progressivism
From roughly 1880-1920 the Progressives seek to bridge the gap between Liberalism and the working class. Liberalism up until the Organisation Stage was hostile to the working class, it viewed them as unnecessary, even as a hindrance to property rights. Up until the 1880's it tried to ignore them, without success. Progessivism was Liberal unless that Liberalism worked against the working class. It tried to humanize Liberalism, which had revealed that it had quite a vicious side. 

Liberal Socialism
The First World War saw most of Europe adopt a form of war socialism. Much of Liberalism was suspended for the duration. No free press, no free movement of labour, no free movement of goods or money. The economy in most countries saw the adoption of socialist economic policies. After the war that tended to drop of but it was not forgotten and when the Second World War came those same Socialist economic policies were taken up again. For most people the two wars showed that Socialism could be used within a Liberal Democracy. This continued into the 1980's.

Death of Classical Liberalism
Socialism is about as far from Laissez Faire economics as you can get. By the 1950's there started a revolt within Liberalism. A branch wanted to get back to a more open economy. At the same time Communist ideas had made their way into Liberalism. The idea of Class Warfare helped the death of Classical Liberalism. In it's place Right Liberals who wanted an open economy, Left Liberals who wanted what they regarded as a fairer society and Feminists who wanted women to take their place within Liberalism, came into being. Slowly the older styles of Liberalism waned to be replaced by these newer forms.

End of the Cold War
Once the Cold War ended Liberalism began to believe that it could see the endpoint, the Autonomous Individual. Certainly a lot of effort had gone into his creation. It believed that from this point on it had no serious rivals and that it was simply a case of deciding what it wanted and perfecting it. However it has started to understand that it has limitations, something it did not accept. It is like a marathon runner who isn't sure how far away the finish line is but he can feel his energy running out. But he is still running, he hasn't stopped, he is convinced that the finish line exists and that he is close.

As you can see Liberalism has had many twists and turns and I left out many of them. I wanted to present to you an overview that shows how it has changed over time and not always in the obvious way. It has, as I said at the start, taken many false paths and recovered. The genius of Liberalism is that it has an endpoint that can be worked towards. It's second genius is it's patience, something we need to learn.

For those of us who are not Liberals the finish line is not there, but that will not stop them from causing a lot of trouble trying to get there. The story of Liberalism is no where near it's end and so is the story of those of us who oppose it. 


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Recording My Articles

Something I have wanted to do for years has finally happened!

Since starting the podcast I have learnt a lot more about recording and Youtube. I have this week recorded the very first articles that I wrote back in 2013. Starting today one will be published each day this week.

My plan, although plans rarely work out entirely as planned, is to put up an article each day. Youtube having made it much easier to schedule content or at least it's easier to me. None of these are long, this week none go over 4 minutes in length. At this rate I have about 2 years worth of material and hopefully in that time I'll produce some more!

The articles all have the same picture, a lovely picture of a sunrise from Princes Bridge crossing the Yarra River in Melbourne.

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WARNING SPOILERS -  In this episode David Hiscox XYZ and I talk about two movies. David reviews The latest Star Wars movie The Rise of Skywalker and The Last Valley, which I recommended that he watch - WARNING SPOILERS



Length: 42 minutes


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Migrants To Take More Jobs

On the 23rd December 2019 the new Horticulture Industry Labour Agreement was announced and went into effect on the 1st January 2020. It is an agreement between the Australian government and AUSVEG, the association that represents vegetable and potato growers in Australia.

The Agreement allows more migrants to come to Australia to work, because apparently unemployment no longer exists in Australia. Now this agreement is different to past agreements. In the past only unskilled migrants were allowed to work in agriculture. This agreement allows even jobs that require a university qualification to go to migrant workers. And of course every level of job in between will also be open. According to the governments own website, this agreement allows migrants to take 31 different types of Australian jobs.

Mr. Tyson Cattle, AUSVEG marketing manager said:

'It's important to note this is not for pickers and packers. This is for positions such as middle management and roles requiring technical expertise.'

The argument is that Australians just won't do these jobs. Why is it that Australians once did do these jobs but no longer do?

Could it be that Australians are forced to stay in school longer?

Could it be that after 13 years of compulsory education that these jobs are looked down upon?

Could it be that these jobs do not pay wages that Australians expect....and need to live?

Could it be that these jobs have no job security?

The great treason started with working class jobs and has expanded. Even university educated people find it hard to secure employment and that has been true for decades and it has been ignored. At every level of society this is happening. In town and country. Why are we putting up with this rubbish!

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Scott Morrison, Political Football

Scott Morrison, Political Football

Currently in Australia there is a bushfire crisis. People have died, the number of houses destroyed is heading towards 400 and the navy has had to evacuate people by sea. The fires started early and we still have our hottest months ahead of us. Things are bad and people want answers.

The media has decided that one man is responsible, Scott Morrison, the Prime Minister of Australia. You see in December he went on holiday and apparently he's not allowed to. There was a complaint that he should have been doing something to fight the fires. Surely a Prime Minister, any Prime Minister can be spared for a week or two?

I mean there is a Deputy Prime Minister, couldn't he run the government while the Prime Minister is away?

The answer is of course yes, but it appears that this fact is unknown to the media, or the opposition. He cut his holiday short and returned to Australia, he was holidaying in Hawaii, and is now being criticized for doing the only thing he can. He is touring areas affected by the fire and showing his personal support. It turns out that this is also not allowed as it is all a publicity stunt.

So going on holiday showed a lack of empathy and offering support to people affected by the fires is a PR stunt!

To top it all off there is nothing he can do. Fire fighting in Australia is a State not a National government responsibility. The National governments job is to provide support before and after. The army and navy have been called in to help, but that is not unusual at all. Although naval evacuations are!

Then there are those who are attacking the Greens party because they have had a policy of not supporting burn off's during the winter months. This policy has allowed the undergrowth to grow, all of which fuels fires when they arrive. While the Greens do bear some responsibility, no where in Australia are the Greens in power. New South Wales has a Liberal government and Victoria has a Labor government. Why are we once again blaming the wrong people?

Now I hate to defend Scott Morrison, or the Greens for that matter, I have no love for either. But we should hang them for the crimes they have actually committed instead of for someone else's crimes. 

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Is Capital Punishment A Deterrent?

Peter Hitchens has an article up on the death penalty, which I highly recommend, in which he provides some quite useful statistics. They are all for England and Wales between 1956 and 2004.  Here is a part of his article that is needed to give some background to these statistics:

The 1949 UK Royal Commission on Capital Punishment (which was inconclusive on deterrence and most other things) pointed out that deterrence was very hard to establish. Countries which abolish the death penalty usually do so after a long period of suspension, or when it is hardly used, or when the law is unclear. So the murder rates before and after the formal date of abolition often tell us very little. In Britain, this is also the case. The death penalty had its teeth drawn in 1957 and the annual number of executions in the final years of capital punishment was small. So the penalty's official date of abolition, 1965, is misleading. There's another feature of this I'll turn to later.

Then there is the difficulty of classifying murder. The 1957 Act introduced a category of 'manslaughter due to diminished responsibility' which got you off the death penalty. And so, for the eight years after 1957, this category of homicide grew quite sharply. Some suspect that these are cases which would have been murders before 1957.

Homicide means all unlawful killings, murder means killing with forethought. These are not the amount of homicides or murders, these are the number of convictions in these particular years.  All percentages are rounded off.

1956
Homicide 94

Murder 32


1958 (2 years)

Homicide 113 (120% compared to 1956)

Murder 30 (lower because of 'manslaughter due to diminished responsibility' change)


1964 (6 years / 8 years since 1956)
Homicide 170 (150% compared to 6 years earlier / 180% compared to 8 years earlier)

Murder 44 (147% compared to 6 years earlier / 140% compared to 8 years earlier)


1966 (2 years / 10 years since 1956)
Homicide 254 (150% compared to 2 years earlier / 270% compared to 10 years earlier)

Murder 72 (160% compared to 2 years earlier / 225% compared to 10 years earlier)


1975 (9 years / 19 years since 1956)
Homicide 484 (190% compared to 9 years earlier / 515% compared to 19 years earlier)

Murder 107 (150% compared to 9 years earlier / 335% compared to 19 years earlier)


1985 (10 years / 29 years since 1956)
Homicide 614 (125% compared to 10 years earlier / 650% compared to 29 years earlier)

Murder 173 (160% compared to 10 year earlier / 540% compared to 29 years earlier)


2004 (19 years / 48 years since 1956)
Homicide 648 (105% compared to 19 years earlier / 690% compared to 48 years earlier)

Murder 361 (210% compared to 19 years earlier / 1128% compared to 48 years earlier)


Britain does a census every ten years, in 1951 the population of England and Wales was around 40,000,000. In 2001 that population was 52,000,000. If the population had increased at the same rate as the convictions for murder, the population of England and Wales would be 45,120,000,000.

Yes 45 billion people!

In 2004 there were 759 murder charges, 361 resulted in a conviction....thats a failure rate of 53%!

Add to that the fact that medicine has advanced enormously between 1956 and 2004. Imagine, for a horrified moment, what the statistics would be if medicine had not advanced since 1956.

One of the most basic of government functions is to keep people safe, another is to administer justice. How does allowing the murder rate to increase by more than 1000% achieve either of those things?

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In this episode David Hiscox from XYZ and I spoke about my Remigration plan. A sane, rational way to reclaim our country.


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