Yes, unfortunately, the term “Liberalism” is so loaded down with multiple meanings as to not be very useful. Unfortunately, it very hard to get a new term to catch on.
How about a “Gladstone Liberal?” (unfortunately, few people know who he is).
I think your worry with "classical" liberalism sounding out-of-date is unwarranted. One might even say it hearkens back to a purer, untarnished form of liberalism.
I think “Liberalism” is pretty good — no one really confuses it with ignoring externalities and hostility to redistribution — but “Neo-Social Democracy” may be better.
I am definitely not supportive of “sufficient” liberalism. I do not believe that this prefix or qualifier provides people with enough information about what it is and how it differs from other liberalisms. At least the “classical” in “classical liberalism” immediately highlights a difference in tradition and/or time period from modern /contemporary “liberalism” which is important given how illiberal modern “liberalism” is. That being said, i do think that real liberals need to own the concept “liberalism” as we are its true heirs and we will not achieve a free society if we allow our ideological opponents to successfully steal - and then corrupt - the concept which brought us limited government. That would be a win for the Conservatives, progressives and the other statists. I also think that we need to add a qualifier to the concept to help distinguish the tradition from modern “liberalism”. I have 3 suggestions; 1) “Liberal-individualism”: the “individualism” qualifier immediately highlights the importance and value that the tradition places on the individual (as opposed to the collective) and the methodological individualism by which liberals evaluate social-political-economic issues. 2) “Non-Coercive Liberalism”: this immediately highlights the political principle that most distinguishes the liberal tradition from other statists political ideologies. 3) Rational Liberalism: Liberalism succeeds when the culture has confidence in the power of reason. It is not a coincidence that Liberalism was born in the Enlightenment. I understand that since Hayek many classical liberals have embraced skepticism and do not like the word “rational” or “reason” because it invokes in them the idea of some central planner who justifies their policies according to reason and science, however we should treat this the way we treat the phrase “scientific socialism” i.e. it’s scientific in name only. Reason is a faculty of the individual, not of the political elite. The early Liberals, from the Levellers through John Locke and up to the Thomas Jefferson and Tom Paine justified their liberal policies on the grounds that all individuals were capable of reason and must therefore be free to exercise their rational faculties so that they can identify, produce and pursue the values that they determine will support their lives. If and when liberals become skeptical of the power of reason it leads to an irrational skepticism of the individuals power to survive under freedom. We need to reinvigorate the power of reason and the fact that reason is not an attribute of some political elite, but the faculty of the individual which they need to exercise to guide their life.
Equality of permission seems to be Herbert Spencer's law of equal freedom. Equalitarian liberals (or equa-liberals for short) vs the egalitarian (non) liberals?
"every man has freedom to do all that he wills, provided he infringes not the equal freedom of any other man"
Not that it matters: I just finished reading Alexandre Lefebvre's "Liberalism as a Way of Life". He's pretty down on Mont Pelerin-style "classical liberals", who he claims adopted the label as a mere "polemical tactic" to (presumably) bathe themselves in the aura of early liberalism. In his view, "true" liberalism is a pretty small tent.
The concept is a great one; the name will never fly. And you don’t really want it to. Those “liberals” whom you don’t want to call (by implication) “false” or “unreal”; are you comfortable calling them “insufficient”?
I find most people who call themselves “Classical Liberals” have very different views than the actual Classical Liberals of the 18th/19th Century.
Actual Classical Liberals do not believe in widespread suffrage, most were constitutional monarchists or pure monarchists, and none of them supported government pensions.
And the term is typically used to cover many thinkers with quite different beliefs.
I would consider William Gladstone as the preeminent Classical Liberal, and very few people today hold his political views.
Yes, unfortunately, the term “Liberalism” is so loaded down with multiple meanings as to not be very useful. Unfortunately, it very hard to get a new term to catch on.
How about a “Gladstone Liberal?” (unfortunately, few people know who he is).
Or a “Lincoln Liberal?”
I think your worry with "classical" liberalism sounding out-of-date is unwarranted. One might even say it hearkens back to a purer, untarnished form of liberalism.
I think “Liberalism” is pretty good — no one really confuses it with ignoring externalities and hostility to redistribution — but “Neo-Social Democracy” may be better.
I am definitely not supportive of “sufficient” liberalism. I do not believe that this prefix or qualifier provides people with enough information about what it is and how it differs from other liberalisms. At least the “classical” in “classical liberalism” immediately highlights a difference in tradition and/or time period from modern /contemporary “liberalism” which is important given how illiberal modern “liberalism” is. That being said, i do think that real liberals need to own the concept “liberalism” as we are its true heirs and we will not achieve a free society if we allow our ideological opponents to successfully steal - and then corrupt - the concept which brought us limited government. That would be a win for the Conservatives, progressives and the other statists. I also think that we need to add a qualifier to the concept to help distinguish the tradition from modern “liberalism”. I have 3 suggestions; 1) “Liberal-individualism”: the “individualism” qualifier immediately highlights the importance and value that the tradition places on the individual (as opposed to the collective) and the methodological individualism by which liberals evaluate social-political-economic issues. 2) “Non-Coercive Liberalism”: this immediately highlights the political principle that most distinguishes the liberal tradition from other statists political ideologies. 3) Rational Liberalism: Liberalism succeeds when the culture has confidence in the power of reason. It is not a coincidence that Liberalism was born in the Enlightenment. I understand that since Hayek many classical liberals have embraced skepticism and do not like the word “rational” or “reason” because it invokes in them the idea of some central planner who justifies their policies according to reason and science, however we should treat this the way we treat the phrase “scientific socialism” i.e. it’s scientific in name only. Reason is a faculty of the individual, not of the political elite. The early Liberals, from the Levellers through John Locke and up to the Thomas Jefferson and Tom Paine justified their liberal policies on the grounds that all individuals were capable of reason and must therefore be free to exercise their rational faculties so that they can identify, produce and pursue the values that they determine will support their lives. If and when liberals become skeptical of the power of reason it leads to an irrational skepticism of the individuals power to survive under freedom. We need to reinvigorate the power of reason and the fact that reason is not an attribute of some political elite, but the faculty of the individual which they need to exercise to guide their life.
Equality of permission seems to be Herbert Spencer's law of equal freedom. Equalitarian liberals (or equa-liberals for short) vs the egalitarian (non) liberals?
"every man has freedom to do all that he wills, provided he infringes not the equal freedom of any other man"
(https://oll.libertyfund.org/quotes/herbert-spencer-concludes-from-his-principle-of-equal-freedom-that-individuals-have-the-right-to-ignore-the-state-1851)
I guess "neoliberalism" is out too?
Not that it matters: I just finished reading Alexandre Lefebvre's "Liberalism as a Way of Life". He's pretty down on Mont Pelerin-style "classical liberals", who he claims adopted the label as a mere "polemical tactic" to (presumably) bathe themselves in the aura of early liberalism. In his view, "true" liberalism is a pretty small tent.
The concept is a great one; the name will never fly. And you don’t really want it to. Those “liberals” whom you don’t want to call (by implication) “false” or “unreal”; are you comfortable calling them “insufficient”?
Classical liberalism works fine IMO.
I find most people who call themselves “Classical Liberals” have very different views than the actual Classical Liberals of the 18th/19th Century.
Actual Classical Liberals do not believe in widespread suffrage, most were constitutional monarchists or pure monarchists, and none of them supported government pensions.
And the term is typically used to cover many thinkers with quite different beliefs.
I would consider William Gladstone as the preeminent Classical Liberal, and very few people today hold his political views.