What is a liberal

Liberalism is one of the bourgeois political trends that have dominated Western society from modern times to the modern era. It takes individualism and individual freedom as its core, emphasizes individual rights, individual freedom and individual liberation, calls for the establishment of democratic politics, and advocates the separation of church and state, freedom of religion and religious tolerance; economically, it advocates the establishment of free enterprise, free business, free trade and free competition. Traditional liberalism has so far had a deep influence in the developed countries of the West. However, its specific propositions and emphases are constantly updated and changed with the development of capitalism.The modern liberalism before the 19th century is called traditional liberalism, and the liberalism since the 20th century is called modern liberalism.

Classical liberalism, or traditional liberalism, arose in England in the 17th century and spread to France, the United States, and other countries, where it continued until the end of the 19th century. The main representatives are John Locke (1632-1704) of England, Montesquieu (1689-1755) and Rousseau (1712-1778) of France, who are regarded as the "originators of liberalism", Penn (Thomas Paine 1737-1809) in the United States, and Thomas Jeffrson 1743-1826 in the United States.

Classical liberalism was a product of the emerging bourgeoisie's struggle against feudal autocracy in the 17th and 18th centuries. It is a theory of government and the state based on the doctrine of natural human rights (or the doctrine of natural rights). Its main contents are: (1) The freedom, life and property of human beings are innate, non-transferable and inalienable rights which no one may violate. (2) It is for the protection of one's natural rights and private property that people establish a government or state by entering into a social contract, and the opinion, or consent, of the people is the basis of government. (3) The power of government is limited, and the power in the hands of the people is supreme and final. (4) In order to prevent the emergence of despotism, the rule of law must be enforced and a mechanism of separation of powers and checks and balances must be established. (5) Once a government violates or jeopardizes people's powers such as freedom, life and property, the people have the power to overthrow its rule and set up a new government which can maintain its power. These ideas had an important influence on the bourgeois revolutions in Britain and France at that time and the American War of Independence, and became a powerful weapon for the bourgeoisie to overthrow the feudal system.

In the bourgeois revolution, the basic spirit of liberalism was affirmed in the form of a fundamental law and political program in the Bill of Rights (1689) in Britain, the Declaration of Independence (1776) and the Federal Constitution (1787) in the United States, and the Declaration of Human Rights and Citizenship in France. The basic principles of liberalism became the founding principles of the major Western capitalist countries.

In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, Western capitalism entered a period of free competition, i.e., the stage of laissez-faire. Classical liberalism took on new characteristics. The main representatives of this period were Bentham (Jeremy Bentham 1748 a 1832), Mill (Muller John Stuart Mil1 1806 a 1873), Adam Smith l723 a 1790) and David Ricardo (David Ricardo 1772 a 1823) in Britain.

The main ideas of liberalism during the laissez-faire period: (1) Utilitarianism as the theoretical basis of liberalism. According to Bianchin, it is human nature to seek profit and utility. Society is fictitious; individual interests are real. The interests of society are nothing but the sum of individual interests, so maximizing individual interests and increased individual interests will inevitably lead to the prosperity of the whole society. According to Adam Smith, in a perfectly competitive market economy, each individual pursues his own self-interest. But in doing so, he is often guided by an invisible hand to promote the interests of society; (2) individual freedom is the source of social progress, and this freedom is "the freedom to pursue our own good according to our own way" (On Liberty, 1962, p. 13). This freedom includes freedom of thought and expression, freedom of belief, freedom of aspiration, freedom of trade and business, freedom of personality development and the pursuit of happiness, etc.; (3) in dealing with the relationship between individual freedom and the state, the state may not interfere with individual freedom as long as it does not hinder others; any interference with freedom will result in social stagnation. The state or government should adopt laissez-faire or the "principle of non-interference" in economic and social life. "Be quiet" and "the government that governs least is the best government" became the maxims of the time. This liberal theory responded to the needs of the bourgeoisie during the period of liberal capitalism, which demanded economic freedom, freedom of competition and freedom of contract. The central basis of this classical liberalism was the preservation and development of the individual freedoms and rights of the bourgeoisie. This constitutes the essence of classical liberalism.

In the era of liberal capitalism, classical liberalism had played a positive role in the development of capitalism by promoting political reforms in Europe and the United States, accelerating the process of industrialization in Europe and the United States, and promoting the vigorous development of the national economy. However, free trade, free competition and the process of industrialization also brought about a series of social contradictions accordingly.

Neoliberalism arose in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Since then, its influence in the Western capitalist world, especially in Britain and the United States, lasted until the late 1970s. The emergence and development of neoliberalism has its deep socio-economic-political roots. (1) The bankruptcy of the theory of individualism. Traditional liberalism asserts that the individual is fully rational and self-governing, and that as long as he or she is given freedom of choice in the diverse real world, he or she is free to develop his or her own personality, determine his or her own destiny, and obtain his or her own benefits. It demands that the individual be given the right to act on his own and rejects all forms of intervention and coercion. Each person does what he or she wants, and in the end, each person gets what he or she wants. However, the reality of capitalist society shattered this beautiful prophecy. The social reality after the industrial revolution in the 19th century and the tragic situation caused by the First World War showed that it was impossible for the individual to control his own destiny and improve his own situation. With the escalating protests and revolts of the working class in Europe and America, and the vigorous development of the workers' movement, the bourgeoisie could no longer use the theory of individualism as a pretext, and had to start adjusting its original political theories; (2) the bankruptcy of economic laissez-faire. Traditional liberalism strenuously advocates the laissez-faire doctrine of non-interference by the state in the private economy. This theory nakedly reflected the demands of the bourgeoisie to do whatever they wanted economically, to exploit the laborers and extract profits without any restriction. As a result of the anarchy of production, by the mid-to-late 19th century, capitalist society did not experience the overall prosperity hoped for by the libertarians, but rather saw the massive use of women and child labor, poor working conditions for the vast majority of workers, polarization of income distribution, disparity between the rich and the poor, social injustice reaching intolerable proportions, social morality degrading, and the intensification of class contradictions and all sorts of social contradictions, especially economic crises The frequent outbreaks of economic crises and other problems. The cyclical depressions in the capitalist economy have led to massive unemployment among workers, the closure of many small and medium-sized enterprises, and the merger and monopolization of large and financially powerful enterprises, with the margin for free competition shrinking. This destabilized the order and stability of society, and thus the so-called myth that the general welfare of society can be achieved through the pursuit of individual interests was shattered. The grim reality forced the bourgeois thinkers to reflect on the theoretical principles of classical liberalism, and to make new explorations and researches on the functions of the state and the government, the relationship between the individual and the society, and the relationship between liberty and law, freedom and equality. They began to realize that laissez-faire economic policies could not guarantee the harmony and stability of capitalist economic development. If the government imposed no restrictions on individual freedom, especially on the economic activities of private enterprises, it would inevitably jeopardize society and affect political stability; (3) The bankruptcy of the negative government theory. Linked to the individualism and economic freedom claims, traditional liberalism believes that government and freedom are opposites, the more the government regulates, the less the freedom; on the contrary, the less the government regulates, the more the freedom. However, after entering monopoly capitalism, the warnings of government threatening freedom gradually disappeared, while the infringement and deprivation of freedom by private monopolies on the majority of the members of the society became more and more obvious, and increasingly became the domination of the society. The oppression actually felt by most people in Western society does not come from the tyranny of the government, but from the big corporations. Under these circumstances, bourgeois thinkers believed that only the government had the power to limit the power of the big corporations and to safeguard the individual's right to freedom. Therefore, they advocated the development of bourgeois individual freedom, while at the same time regulating the large number of contradictions that arose in the economic and political life of society and avoiding major social upheavals, in order to safeguard the fundamental interests of the bourgeoisie and its political rule. As a result, a new trend of thought that advocated the demand for appropriate state intervention in the economy and concern for social welfare on the premise of safeguarding individual freedom, namely neo-liberalism, gradually took shape, and it had a direct impact on the decision-making of the governments of Europe and the United States at that time. Neoliberalism first emerged in Britain and then flourished in the United States. In this way, liberalism gradually changed from advocating a weak "negative government" to advocating a strong "positive government".

The development of neoliberalism is divided into three stages: (1) From the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century. The main representatives were Thomas Hill Green (1836-1882), Leonard Hobhouse (1864-1929) and John Atkinson Hobson (1858-1940) in Britain, and Walter Weyl (1873-1919) in the United States. 1873-1919), Louis Brandeis 1856-1941) and John Dewey 1859-1952). Liberalism in this period was mainly concerned with reinterpreting the concept of freedom and the theoretical foundations of liberalism, and proposing and arguing for comprehensive state intervention in socio-economic activities and social life. These propositions had an impact on government policy in Britain and the United States at the beginning of the 20th century. In Britain, the government implemented many reforms, such as expanding the right to vote, universalizing compulsory education, raising the status of trade unions, and improving labor conditions. In the United States, President Wilson led the neo-liberal movement to reform the political economy of the United States. However, due to the outbreak of the Second World War, the influence of neo-liberalism in Britain and Europe declined temporarily; (2) 1930s to 1960s. The main representatives were the "New Deal" liberalism of Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) in the United States and Keynesianism in Britain. Their main contribution was a comprehensive argument for the theory and policy of state intervention. The success of Roosevelt's "New Deal" made neoliberalism a political trend that swept across the West. neoliberalism reached its peak in the 1950s and 1960s and became an important theoretical basis for the post-war revival of the major capitalist countries in the West and for the establishment of the "welfare state". Neoliberalism has become an important theoretical foundation for the postwar recovery of the major Western capitalist countries and the establishment of the "welfare state," and it has played an important role in guiding the development of the postwar capitalist world. The main representative is John Rawls (1921-2002-11-24) of the U.S. Since the end of the 1960s, various contradictions in Western capitalism have intensified, and finally in the 1970s a serious economic crisis broke out, resulting in "stagflation"; the civil rights movement, student revolts, and the anti-war movement have emerged, civil rights movement, student revolts, anti-war movement, feminist movement and so on. This declared the bankruptcy of neo-liberal theory and policy and aroused people's skepticism towards neo-liberal theory and policy. Under such circumstances, Rawls made a comprehensive and systematic argument for neo-liberalism, which aroused a great response and brought neo-liberalism into a new stage.

The basic features and role of neoliberalism: modern liberalism does not have a rigorous and complete theoretical system, it is only a different time, different countries of liberal thinkers in their respective theoretical writings show some **** the same tendencies and characteristics. Neo-liberalism and classical liberalism, the starting point of the two are the same, both believe that freedom is the fundamental requirement of human nature, individual freedom has the highest value; the primary responsibility of the government is to protect individual freedom and other basic human rights. This is the ****same principle for both old and new liberals. So what is the difference between the two?

First, at the core of modern liberalism is still the need to defend bourgeois individual freedom, and still regards freedom as the most precious quality of human beings. This basic position has determined the evolution of liberalism from classical to modern. Neoliberalism's revision of classical liberalism, which emphasizes the dependence of the individual on the state and society, and thus argues for the importance and necessity of state or government intervention, is not intended to abolish individual liberty, but ultimately to protect it. This is because a completely laissez-faire liberalism would both cause intensification of social conflicts and restrict the development of freedom through the emergence of monopolies. Both would jeopardize individual freedom. In this sense, neo-liberalism is an extension and variant of the contemporary development of classical liberalism, and it has not lost the tradition of classical liberalism.

Secondly, the "new individualism" replaces the "old individualism". Modern liberalism believes that the old individualism of the 19th century, in which the individual is supreme, has become obsolete, and that it must be replaced by the "new individualism", which means that, in the light of the new situation, we must no longer rely on the power of a single individual to struggle alone, but must use the power and wisdom of the group to Instead of relying on individual strengths to struggle alone, it is necessary to use the strength and wisdom of the group to rid itself of the fears and insecurities it faces and to embark once again on the path of equal opportunity. This group power is mainly embodied in the government and political system. Dewey said that any system that does not give basic security to hundreds of people is not worthy of being called an organized system that embraces individual freedom and development. This theory of "new individualism" reflects the acute social contradictions within Western society. The "freedom" and "individualism" of the monopolizing bourgeoisie, which does whatever it wants and runs amok, is based on the loss of freedom, welfare and even the conditions of survival of the majority of people, including the small and medium-sized bourgeoisie. Modern liberalism attempts to use the "new individualism" as a political and moral norm, and to restrain monopoly capital through the state, in order to alleviate social contradictions and prevent social revolution.

Thirdly, it advocates state intervention in the economy and opposes laissez-faire. Classical liberalism holds that the state and government need not and should not intervene in the economy. This is because there is a natural economic law in a market economy which automatically regulates supply and demand, and it has been proved that free competition and free business without restriction or regulation can lead to economic crisis. Therefore neo-liberalism believes that the greatest enemy of freedom today is the economic dictatorship formed by corporate monopoly. The state should take action on economic issues and must use its administrative power to intervene in the economy as necessary, to regulate labor-management relations as well as the relationship between small, medium and large enterprises in the capacity of a planner, so that the interests of all classes of the society can be appropriately taken care of, thus curbing monopoly, deepening free competition, and overpowering the "invisible hand" with the "visible hand". The "invisible hand" will be overpowered by the "visible hand". The power of a few capitalists to manipulate the economic life of the country must be decentralized to the majority or transferred to a publicly accountable government. State intervention in the economy is not limited to sanctioning enterprises that violate the law, but more importantly to provide necessary support and financial assistance to enterprises, through credit, government ordering, and the organization of public **** projects to relieve the plight of enterprises and promote economic prosperity. But modern liberalism, like traditional liberalism, takes the protection of the capitalist system of private property as its fundamental task, and emphasizes that state intervention and regulation can only be carried out within the scope of private ownership.

Fourth, the establishment of a strong and effective government, responsible for social "justice". Modern liberalism, in contrast to traditional liberalism's skepticism and fear of government power, advocates the establishment of a strong and effective government. Former President Roosevelt, a representative of modern liberalism in the United States, responded to traditional liberal skepticism about government by saying that history has shown that dictatorships do not arise from strong and effective governments, but from weak and ineffective ones. Democracy is effective if the people, through democratic means, establish a government that is strong enough to protect them from fear and hunger. While traditional liberalism believes that a fair and competitive market reflects social justice, modern liberalism believes that the economic system, represented by the market, and the political, ethical, and moral systems each have their own centers of gravity and utility, and should not be confused with each other. The market pursues efficiency, which cannot naturally achieve justice, while the political and ethical systems of society must guarantee social justice. The fundamental function of state government is a moral function, which uses coercion to support its members in doing what is worth doing and enjoying what is worth enjoying, and to ensure that members of society both participate in and enjoy society's "public **** welfare" endeavors. Modern liberalism's emphasis on the bourgeois state government is simply to strengthen the regulatory function of the state, the use of improved methods to alleviate social contradictions, and to maintain the capitalist economic and political system.

Fifth, social improvement is used to solve the chronic problems of modern capitalism. Neoliberalism is the theory and policy of improvement. In the face of the various social contradictions and crises that have emerged in the development of capitalist society, modern liberalism recognizes that the free enterprise system of capitalism is full of drawbacks and is in trouble, and that a large number of social problems need to be solved. However, they believe that these problems cannot be solved by means of class struggle, but only by means of "experimental" and "intelligent" "new methods" of improvement. The conflicting interests of the proletariat and the bourgeoisie can be presented so that the particular demands of each side can be seen and commented upon, and then discussed and judged in the light of the wider interests. In this way the conflict of interest between capitalists and workers can be judged in terms of the interests of the majority and the contradictions can be mitigated. Modern liberalism also proposes the establishment of "public welfare" and "welfare state" as the goal of social improvement. It does not shy away from recognizing the inequality and injustice in Western society, or the existence of "islands of poverty" in affluent Western societies, and believes that such poverty and inequality have expanded from the material to the spiritual, that poverty brings about moral degradation, and that the poor are not qualified to, nor have the means to, develop their own latent abilities in the service of society. To change this situation, it was necessary to establish public ***** welfare, requiring the rich to use their personal freedom for the benefit of society. Thus modern liberalism calls for the establishment of a complete state welfare system in all Western countries and the realization of universal social security for the members of society in all areas, such as health, retirement, unemployment, education, food, old age, accidents, housing, and so on. It can be seen that in the face of various crises, neo-liberalism has taken a positive attitude to deal with them, and put forward theoretical propositions and policy recommendations to regulate and deal with the socio-economic contradictions and class contradictions within the limits allowed by the capitalist system, thus helping capitalism to tide over the difficult times.

Sixth, classical liberalism advocates freedom of contract. Capitalists have the freedom to hire and workers have the freedom to sell their labor, and the government has no right to interfere as long as both parties are willing. In addition, workers should not take joint action against capitalists such as holding strikes collectively, because, such coercive means violate the principle of individual freedom. On the other hand, neo-liberals believe that under the condition of unequal property rights, it is hypocritical to emphasize the freedom of contract, which is a formal freedom, therefore, workers should have the right to organize trade unions, to bargain collectively with capitalists, and even to hold strikes, and the government should justly regulate the contradiction between the labor and capitalist and act as an arbitrator.

Seventh, neo-liberalism emphasizes the individual's dependence on the state and society, and attaches importance to the state's positive and dynamic role. Classical liberalism regards the individual as a completely independent and autonomous social atom and ignores the close relationship between the individual and society. Neo-liberalism, on the other hand, emphasizes more often that the interests of the individual and the interests of the public **** must be taken into account, that individual freedom and social responsibility must be combined, that the individual cannot live apart from society or do whatever he wants, and that individual behavior should be subject to the constraints of morality and law. The State should provide the necessary conditions for individual freedom. The state is not merely a "night watchman", but a social organization that exists to seek the welfare of the public and to establish the necessary social legislation so that every citizen can enjoy a minimum standard of living, and so that they can have a sense of security and freedom, not only politically, but also economically. By arguing for this dependence, neoliberalism directly argues for the necessity and importance of state intervention and regulation of socio-economic and other social conflicts.

Neoliberalism has had a significant impact on the development of contemporary capitalism and the development of bourgeois political thought. Neoliberal theory dominated Europe and the United States in the 30's and 60's and had a significant impact on the development of these countries. The bourgeoisie used the state, the most important tool of the superstructure, to regulate the social economy and so on extensively, and pursued the policy of the welfare state, which led to the alleviation of socio-economic and class contradictions and other social contradictions. The overall standard of living in the developed capitalist countries has been greatly improved, and many countries claim to have built welfare states. At the same time, state intervention has created more favorable conditions for the development of modern science and technology. And the development of science and technology in turn greatly contributed to the development of productive forces. In a certain sense, it can be said that the development of contemporary capitalism is mainly achieved under the guidance of neo-liberalism's theories and policies.

Neoliberalism examines deep-seated problems in theory. The freedom preached by the bourgeoisie includes economic freedom and political freedom. This freedom is enjoyed by all and implies equality of opportunity and therefore equality and justice. However, freedom in reality and in the course of development has appeared to be the opposite: the concentration of capital and monopoly resulting from free competition has jeopardized equal opportunity and restricted free competition, and has also led to the polarization of incomes within society, especially between classes, and triggered a large number of social contradictions. Through the study of the relationship between the individual and the state, neo-liberalism argued that the interests of the individual and the interests of the state or society were linked, and that the individual was dependent on the state, and shifted from "negative liberty and the state" to "positive liberty and the state", arguing the necessity and importance of state intervention, thus turning the individual into an individual and the state into a state. It shifted from "negative freedom and the state" to "positive freedom and the state", arguing for the necessity and importance of state intervention, thus linking individual freedom to state intervention, free competition to economic equity and social interest, and equal opportunity to income security (equality of outcome). These have led to a deeper and more multifaceted understanding of the relationship between freedom and equality and justice. Of course, the contradictions are not fundamentally resolved within the confines of the capitalist system.

The Decline of Modern Liberalism: In order to overcome the extreme disparity between the rich and the poor and the social crisis produced by economic anarchy, modern liberalism launched an intermittent and decades-long reform movement centered on the construction of the "welfare state". This movement has played an important role in easing the contradictions in capitalist society and promoting economic development. However, it has inherent contradictions that are difficult to overcome. Liberalism claims that in order to effectively defend the capitalist system of private property, social contradictions should be alleviated by suppressing the rich and helping the poor, so that the whole social life will tend to be equalized. The content of the liberal conception of equality has actually expanded from equality of law and equality of opportunity in the past to equality of result, equality of social status and equality of economic conditions, which aroused the panic of the bourgeoisie, who thought that such equality would inevitably limit the system of private property, dismantle the market on which capitalism depended, and abolish the economic freedom of capitalism. The modern liberal conception of equality, which starts from the protection of capitalist private property, turns out to be potentially injurious to private property. As a result, this theory increasingly fell into serious crisis after the 1970s and finally went into decline.

First of all, the welfare state policy is full of drawbacks. The expansion of welfare was like a horse out of control, far outpacing production, and as a result, the government could not make ends meet, leading to persistent inflation. Capitalists in Western countries generally believe that high and progressive taxes, which are the source of finance for welfare services, affect corporate profits, investment and production incentives. While high wages and low working hours improve the situation of workers, they also raise the cost of products and reduce competitiveness. The expansion and development of state-owned enterprises and public **** projects have had a significant effect on limiting monopolies and reducing unemployment, but these enterprises and undertakings are generally inefficient and incur heavy losses, making it difficult to maintain them. Secondly, excessive social relief has in some respects created new social injustices. The social relief policy, which was originally aimed at easing social conflicts and ameliorating the disparity between the rich and the poor, has led to new irrationalities after repeated developments. For example, in the United Kingdom, unemployment benefits can reach a maximum of 85% of a worker's original wage, which is even more than the actual income of an employed person after paying taxes. Another example is the life-long pension for invalids in the Netherlands, as a result of which the rate of "invalids" in the Netherlands has risen sharply to the highest in the world. This Western-style "big pot" has aroused widespread discontent, and even the workers have accused the welfare state of "feeding the lazy". Again. Universal welfare has led to the proliferation of hedonism and the deterioration of social morals. The policies of the welfare state have consciously or unconsciously guided people to pursue the possession and enjoyment of material wealth, which has led to spiritual emptiness, weak moral values, and widespread drug abuse, homosexuality, and other perverted behaviors. The sexual liberation movement has led to the proliferation of pornography and the disintegration of the family, bringing about a large number of unsupported illegitimate children. The media, in pursuit of profits, have been known as a new public nuisance by promoting violence and obscenity and disregarding the corruption of young people, and more and more parents are forced to send their children to parochial schools in order to seek the inculcation of traditional ethics. In addition, after the abolition of the death penalty in Western countries, violent crimes and terrorist activities have increased dramatically. Finally, the extensive intervention of the State in social and economic life has led to the rapid expansion of State institutions, which have become an increasingly heavy burden on society and have given rise to a new kind of bureaucracy. The "mega-state" created by modern liberalism is most typical of the United States. The above shortcomings gradually developed and finally contributed to a serious economic recession and social crisis in the 1970s. According to opinion polls, 40% of the respondents believed that "society is sick". Modern liberal thinking met with a serious setback. After the 1960s and 1970s, many modern liberals in the West began to move to the right, abandoning their original positions and turning to conservatism. Modern conservatism gradually took over the dominant position of modern liberalism.

Brief comment. Liberalism was formed during the bourgeois revolution, and it has always been a political theory representing the interests of the bourgeoisie. Modern liberalism relative to traditional liberalism, although its theoretical claims and policies have undergone a major transformation, but its purpose of maintaining bourgeois rule remains unchanged, but is only a kind of reformism of the bourgeoisie. After liberal capitalism entered the stage of monopoly capitalism, the contradiction between the socialization of capitalist production and the private appropriation of the means of production became increasingly acute, and other contradictions in society rapidly intensified. The theories and policies of traditional liberalism were challenged on two fronts: firstly, the burgeoning workers' movement was resolutely opposed to the system of capital exploitation represented and protected by liberalism; and secondly, other sectors of society, including the small and medium-sized bourgeoisie, were also very dissatisfied with the expansion of private monopoly capital, which was caused by economic laissez-faire. Thus private monopoly capitalism developed into the 1920s and 1930s and faced a turning point: it was either to be improved, combined with the fascist regime, or replaced by socialism. Under such circumstances, traditional liberalism developed into modern liberalism, which put forward a series of reformist theories in an attempt to alleviate class conflicts and pacify social discontent through improvement, so as to maintain and consolidate the capitalist system. This was clearly stated by Roosevelt, who was once the President of the United States: "No one in the United States believes more strongly than I do in the system of private enterprise, private property and private profit. No government in the history of the United States has done more for this system than this Government, and it was this Government that pulled this system out of the abyss into which it plunged in 1933. If this government had the slightest intention of changing the system at the time, it could have simply stood by and let the system continue to sink. However, we did not do so. We took the steps that the previous government refused to take throughout the years of crisis, and we took swift and drastic action in order to save it." As can be seen, this improvement did not go beyond the scope of capitalist political and economic relations, and it was limited in its usefulness. The crisis and decline that modern liberalism suffered in the 1970s and 1980s of this century proved that it could not cure the ills of capitalism.

Liberalism has undergone changes, but its basic spirit remains unchanged. It regards individual freedom, the preservation of private ownership and basic human rights as the first and foremost value goals, and aims to preserve individual freedom as well as to ensure social justice. Neo-liberalism, on the other hand, emphasizes the latter. At the same time, it advocates gradual improvement, opposes violent revolution and any form of authoritarian rule, and advocates tolerance, reconciliation, consultation and experimentation. These spirits have indeed played a positive role in stabilizing the capitalist order and promoting capitalist economic development. But it was not, after all, a recipe for salvation. By the 1960s and 1970s, the capitalist world was facing a comprehensive economic, political and cultural crisis. Neoliberalism appeared pale and powerless in the face of a series of challenges, and the intellectuals in the ruling group had to find a new way to find new ideological weapons to cope with the grim situation.