Liberalism has produced the largest, most successful Utopian experiment of all time. Yet, most people don't realize how radical liberalism was at its inception or how radical it still is. Thinkers like John Locke proposed an entirely new basis for the legitimacy of governments, a clean break with the rule of force, faith, and custom that had been the basis for government from the beginning of history. Locke himself argued that there was a right to revolution if a terrible ruler could not be removed by other means, and fled his native country after he was implicated in a plot to kill the king. He could only safely return in the wake of an invading army. A period of polarization and religious wars made the old basis for the legitimacy of governments untenable, leading to a revolution in how society is organized. The Outlaw John Locke shows how a philosophy that says we are all born our own masters revolutionized the way we think about issues from government to marriage, and how we take this revolution for granted at our peril. We live in a time of unprecedented wealth, scientific knowledge, and cultural attainment, but fail to understand what brought us these things, and could lose them if we don't defend them.
Liberalism has produced the largest, most successful Utopian experiment of all time. Yet, most people don't realize how radical liberalism was at its inception or how radical it still is. Thinkers like John Locke proposed an entirely new basis for the legitimacy of governments, a clean break with the rule of force, faith, and custom that had been the basis for government from the beginning of history. Locke himself argued that there was a right to revolution if a terrible ruler could not be removed by other means, and fled his native country after he was implicated in a plot to kill the king. He could only safely return in the wake of an invading army. A period of polarization and religious wars made the old basis for the legitimacy of governments untenable, leading to a revolution in how society is organized. The Outlaw John Locke shows how a philosophy that says we are all born our own masters revolutionized the way we think about issues from government to marriage, and how we take this revolution for granted at our peril. We live in a time of unprecedented wealth, scientific knowledge, and cultural attainment, but fail to understand what brought us these things, and could lose them if we don't defend them.
