Liberalism Ancient and ModernLeo Strauss

(1968)

1 of 15 10-2011Cristina Varela, Ciencia Política (2009-1)

cristinavarela404@hotmail.com

Contents1. Concepts

2. Power of education

3. Ideal of democracy and democracy as it is

4. Perspectives of liberalism: classic and modern doctrine

5. Preface to Spinoza's critique of religion: Teologico-Political predicament

6. Critical view

7. Index

2Cristina Varela

1.What is liberal education2.Liberal education and responsibility 3.The liberalism of classical political philosophy4.On the Minos5.Notes on Lucretius6. How to begin to study the guide of the perplexed 7.Marsilius of Padua 8.An Epilogue9.Preface to Spinoza's critique of religion 10. Perspectives on the good society

3

Liberal democracy

Liberalism

ConservatismCommunism

G.Almond

Progressivism

Concepts

Cristina Varela

Classical and Modern Political

Philosophy

Liberal Education

4Cristina Varela

Liberal education is education

towards culture.

Will consist in studying with

the proper care the great books which the greatest minds have left behind. A

study which the more

experienced pupils assist the

less experienced pupils,

including the beginners.

Liberal education is

liberation from vulgarity

'apeirokalia' for the greeks

Lack of experience in

things beautiful

It cannot be simply indoctrination

Liberal education is education in a variety of cultures.

Culture is any pattern of conduct common to any human group.

Liberal education is literate education: education in letters or through letters.

5Cristina Varela

6

Modern Democracy:

Ideal of democracy & democracy as it is

Far from being universal aristocracy, would be mass rule were it not for the fact that the

mass cannot rule, but is ruled by elites. Democracy is then not indeed mass rule, but

mass culture.

Mass Culture is a culture which can be appropriated by the meanest capacities without an intellectual an moral effort, at a very low

monetary price.

Elites: groupings of men who for what ever reason are on

top.

Cristina Varela

La educación liberal es la escalera por la cual ascendemos de la democracia de masa a la democracia como fué originalmente concebida.La educación liberal es el esfuerzo necesario para fundar una aristocracia dentro de la sociedad democrática de masas.

7

"Liberal education is the ladder by which we try to a s c e n d f r o m m a s s democracy to democracy a s o r i g i n a l l y m e a n t . Liberal education is the necessary endeavor to found an aristocracy within democratic mass society."

Cristina Varela

8

Education in the highest sense is philosophy. Plato

Monologues into a Dialogue

Noesis

Noeseos

understanding of understanding Metatheory

Liberal Education demands the complete break with the Noise, Rush, cheapness, thought lessness of the V a n i t y F a i r o f t h e intellectuals as well as of their enemies.

"Philosophy is quest for wisdom or quest for knowledge regarding

the most important, the highest or the most

comprehensive things; is virtue and is

happiness". However, "Wisdom is

inaccessible to man, and hence virtue and

happiness will be always imperfect."

"By becoming aware of the dignity of the mind, we

realize the true ground of the dignity of man and there with

the goodness of society." Strauss

Philosophy vs Politics

9

The word 'Liberal' always have had a political meaning, is almost opposite to it's present political meaning.

Gentleman's vs

Philosopher's

Justice of a society

ruled by gentlemen

ruling their own right?

Just government is government who rules in the interest of the whole society, and not merely of a part.

10

Classic Doctrine

Modern Doctrine

" Veo hombres piadosos que querrían sofocar la libertad, como si la

libertad, ese gran privilegio del hombre, no fuese una cosa casi santa.

Más allá veo otros que piensan llegar a ser libres atacando todas las

creencias; pero no veo a nadie que parezca percibir el vínculo estrecho

y necesario que une la república, la religión y la libertad."

Alexis de Toqueville

Starts from the natural equality of all men. Sovereignty belongs to the people. Sovereignty as to guarantee the natural rights of each. It achieves this result by distinguishing between the sovereign and the government and by demanding that the fundamental governmental powers be separated from one another.

Cristina Varela

11

Sartre

Descartes

Havelock

Hamilton

Mill

Burke

The liberal temper in Greek Politics

"Siempre habrá una diferencia no

pequeña entre sujetar a una muchedumbre y gobernar

a una sociedad."

POSITIVISM

EXISTENTIALISM

"En toda comunidad tiene que

haber una obediencia, bajo el

mecanismo de la constitución

estatal según leyes de

coacción, pero al mismo tiempo

un espíritu de libertad, puesto

que cada uno aspira a ser

convencido por la razón de que

esa coacción es conforme al

derecho, a fin de no caer en

contradicción consigo misma."

Harm Principle

Natural Law: the great principles of reason and equity.

"The men who will hold power will be the men of the learned professions."

12

Aristotelian Political Science &

New Political Science

1. For Aristotle, political science is identical to political philosophy. New political philosophy argues the distinction between philosophy and science.

2. No natural awareness is genuine knowledge. New political science is no longer based in political experience, only scientific knowledge is genuine knowledge.

3. According to the Aristotelian political science, views political things in the perspective of the citizen, it follows that language. The new political science cannot speak without having an elaborated technical vocabulary.

4. Aristotelian political science evaluates political things. The new political science conceives of the principle of action as 'values' which are merely 'subjective'.

5. Aristotelian man is the rational and political animal: zoonpolitikon/ connection between morality and law. The whole consist of essentially different parts. The new political science in the other hand is based on the fundamental premise that there are no essential differences: there are only difference of degree. According to the universal science of which the new political science is part, to understand a thing means to understand it in terms of its genesis or it's conditions. New political science cannot admit that the common good is something that it is.

Theologico-Political Predicament

13

"Theologico-political predicament" refers to the ultimate results of the early modern attempt to

separate theology from politics.

Spinoza: natural difference between nature and morality.

Everything that is, is natural. For Spinoza there are no natural ends, there is no natural

end to man. A man end is not natural, but rational.

Theologico-Political Treatise

Spinoza cannot legitimately deny the possibility of revelation. Philosophy, the quest for ev ident and necessary knowledge, rest itself on an unevident decision, on an act of will, just as faith. Hence the antagonism between Spinoza and Judaism, between unbelief and belief, is ultimately not theoretical, but moral.

14

Epicureanism

Modern Unbelief

Is hedonism, the classic form of the critique of religion. Is so radically m e r c e n a r y t h a t i t conceives of theoretical doctrines as the means for liberating the mind f rom the ter rors ofreligion. Epicureanismfights the re l ig ious'delusion' because of itsterrible character.

Modern unbelief is no longer Epicurean. Fights because it is a delusion: regardless of wether religion is terrible or comforting, qua delusion it makes men oblivious to the real goods, of the enjoyment of the real goods, and thus seduces them into being cheated of the real.

15

"The success of liberal politics and liberal economics frequently rests on irrational forms of recognition that liberalism was supposed to overcome. For democracy to work, citizens need to develop an irrational pride in their own democratic institutions, and must also develop what Tocqueville called the “art of associating,” which rests on prideful attachment to small communities. These communities are frequently based on religion, ethnicity, or other forms of recognition that fall short of the universal recognition on which the liberal state is based. The same is true for liberal economics. Labor has traditionally been understood in the Western liberal economic tradition as an essentially unpleasant activity undertaken for the sake of the satisfaction of human desires and the relief of human pain." The end of history, Francis Fukuyama.

Critical View

16

Map reflecting the findings of Freedom House's 2010 survey, concerning the state of world freedom in 2009, which correlates highly with other measures of democracy . Some of these estimates are disputed.

Free (89)

Partly Free (58)

Not Free (47)

State of World Freedom in 2009

Index of Names

17

Índice OnomásticoAristotle

Bacon, Francis

Burke, Edmund

Cohen, Hermann

Comte, Auguste

Democritus

Descartes, René

Epicurus

Goethe

Hamilton, Alexander

Havelock, Eric A.

Hegel, Georg

Heidegger, Martin

Herzl, Theodor

Hobbes, Thomas

Kant, Emmanuel

Kojève, Alexandre

Locke, John

Lucretius

Machiavelli

Maimonides

Marx, Karl

Mill, J. St.

Montesquieu, Charles de Secondat, Baron

Nietzsche, Friedrich

Plato

Protagoras

Rosenzweig, Franz

Rousseau, Jean Jaques

Spinoza

Thomas Aquinas

Thucydides

Bibliografía recomendada

Recommended Bibliography

Ackerman, Bruce: La justicia social en el Estado liberalAristóteles: La política., Ética a NicómacoBentham, Jeremy: Anarchical FallaciesBuchanan, James: Social choice, Democracy and free markets.Constant,Benjamin: De la liberatad de los antiguos comparada con la de los modernos.Gardner, Ron: The strategic inconsistenciy of Paretian Liberalism.Habermas, Jürgen: The structural transformation of the public sphere., Conciencia moral y acción comunicativa.Hume, David: Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Treatise of Human Nature. Herlz, Theodor: The Jew's State.Kant, Emmanuel: Teoría y Praxis., Fundamentación para una teoría de las costumbres.Locke, John: Some Thoughts Concerning Education., Federalist Papers Mill, John Stuart: Sobre la libertad.Nietzsche, Friedrich: Also Sprach Zarathustra.Nozick, Robert: Anarquía, Estado y Utopía.Platón: La República.Polanyi, Michael: Life's irreductible structure.Rawls, John: La justicia como equidad., Teoría de la justicia, El liberalismo político. Rousseau, Jean Jacques: El Contrato Social.Spinoza, Baruch de: Tratado Teológico Político., La ÉticaStrauss, Leo: On tyranny: Tyranny and wisdom, Alexander Kojéve., leostrausscenter.uchicago.eduToqueville, Alexis de: La Democracia en América.Wollstonecraft, Mary: A vindication of men rights.