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This book redefines ideas of liberty and equality for the modern world. After exploring the origins of liberalism and the role of natural liberty as a principle of social organisation, liberty and equality are reconceived as complex and continuous notions that need support from social institutions to function. Such an approach allows an investigation of the connection between alternative conceptions of liberty and equality, diverging principles of social organization, and the assessment of the coherence and consistency of the entire programme.
By rejecting the existing notions underpinning traditional liberalism, a new framework for socio-liberalism is presented where there is a clear distinction between the social and the private domains. The former is based on value-hierarchy and the latter is guided by alternative principles of economic organisation. The role of education, and the need for institutions to support individual development and sovereignty, are highlighted as a way of enabling this new structure of liberal society where inevitable inequalities are made explicit, contained, and used to serve the public interest.
List of contents
1. Prologue: A False Conception of Politeia.- 2. Society as a Rational Choice.- 3. The returns on the social contract.- 4. The returns on the social contract.- 5. The economy and society.- 6. On the conception of Liberty.- 7. On the conception of Liberty.- 8. A Brief note on the Organic approach.- 9. The Contemporary liberal Conundrum.- 10. The Unity of Humans and Equality.- 11. The Ultimate Endogenization of ethics.- 12. Horizontalization, Diversity and the debasement of Equality.- 13. Is Equality the right Question?.- 14. Interim Summary and Amalgamation.- 15. Natural liberty and Freedom Revisited.- 15. Social implications of freedom being an acquired trait.- 16. Cognition and Autonomy/Sovereignty.- 17. Something about Public Action and Coercion.- 18. The Dual Society and its Systems.- 19. A Note on the Politics of the Dual Society.- 20. A Note on Practicality.- 21. Conclusions.
About the author
Amos Witztum is a Professor of Economics. For many years also a Research Associate at the Centre for the Philosophy of Natural and Social Sciences at the London School of Economics. His research has been focused on the relationship between ethics, economics and society. He has published many articles on the subject which led, a few years ago, to the publication of a two-volume critical examination of modern economics (the Betrayal of Liberal Economics) where he offers an alternative conceptual framework for economic analysis and organisation.
Summary
This book redefines ideas of liberty and equality for the modern world. After exploring the origins of liberalism and the role of natural liberty as a principle of social organisation, liberty and equality are reconceived as complex and continuous notions that need support from social institutions to function. Such an approach allows an investigation of the connection between alternative conceptions of liberty and equality, diverging principles of social organization, and the assessment of the coherence and consistency of the entire programme.
By rejecting the existing notions underpinning traditional liberalism, a new framework for socio-liberalism is presented where there is a clear distinction between the social and the private domains. The former is based on value-hierarchy and the latter is guided by alternative principles of economic organisation. The role of education, and the need for institutions to support individual development and sovereignty, are highlighted as a way of enabling this new structure of liberal society where inevitable inequalities are made explicit, contained, and used to serve the public interest.
