Radio Free Mike

a berlin blog

Sunday, November 07, 2004

Usage Note

The Economist likes to trot out a line on the word "liberal" that's always, always worth revisiting, and a short piece in this week's issue is required reading for anyone looking at this blog. The magazine points out that "liberal" works as an insult in both Europe and the United States. In America it means John Kerry. In Europe, and especially France, it implies George Bush. In the good old Enlightenment days it meant anyone who spoke up "for individual rights and freedoms, and challenged over-mighty government and other forms of power." Modern politics, of course, has split into social liberalism and economic or free-market liberalism. I'm not sure Bush qualifies in either category; but anyway The Economist wants to reclaim the word from both Karl Rove and the French.

We'll quote at length, in case the link fails:

When you understand that the tradition it springs from has changed the world so much for the better in the past two and a half centuries, you might have expected all sides to be claiming the label for their own exclusive use.

However, we are certainly not encouraging that. We do not want Republicans and Democrats, socialists and conservatives all demanding to be recognised as liberals (even though they should want to be). That would be too confusing. Better to hand “liberal” back to its original owner. For the use of the right, we therefore recommend the following insults: leftist, statist, collectivist, socialist. For the use of the left: conservative, neoconservative, far-right extremist and apologist for capitalism. That will free "liberal" to be used exclusively from now on in its proper sense, as we shall continue to use it regardless. All we need now is the political party.

posted by Michael Scott Moore | 7:53 PM

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