On the Crisis of Liberalism

Liberalism is facing a severe crisis. Crisis indicates an impending change of direction and orientation. In addition, the term is commonly inferred to indicate that the change is to be dramatic and caused by the ineffectiveness of the prior direction or orientation in providing for some set of felt needs. In both systems for ordering society and systems for ordering thought, crisis has meaning as a situation in which the prevailing institutions and world views fail to meet some critical set of needs and suffer a decline in authority and ability to provide cohesion. The modern classic concerning crisis in thought systems is Kuhn (1970). Ward (1972) and Stanfield (1974a) have applied Kuhn’s discussion to economics. Wallace (1972) has suggested a generalization of the paradigmatic change model. The abundant literature on crises in social systems is reminiscent of the Marxist literature on an institutional configuration becoming a fetter on further progress.