ABSTRACT
This chapter summarizes the development of the concept of individualism in Western European thought from its Christian antecedents, locating the origins of three very different conceptualizations of individualism: French, Anglo-Saxon and German. It outlines the influential German conception of individualism and its implications for political organization. Communitarianism emerged in the USA during the 1980s as a response to what its advocates considered to be the limitations of liberal theory and practice. Communitarians argue that the one-sided emphasis on rights in liberalism is related to philosophical notions of the individual as a ‘disembodied self’ who has been uprooted from fundamental cultural meanings, community attachments and the life stories which constitute the full identities of real human beings. The development of the concept of individualism in Western European thought has its origins in three different disciplines: Christian theology; politics; and economics.
